The importance of RET’s documentation of race engine technology is emphasised by the quandary of a significant unit that pre-dates our 150 issues. Our Indianapolis Race Engine Directory 1940- 89 in RET 148 (August/September 2023) identified all of the new engines that took a 500 race start during that half-century. In doing so, it summarised the provenance of each, in the process differentiating between stock and semi-stock.
The former implies the use of a production block, albeit most probably modified, the latter using a block derived from a production design but specifically created for racing. In that respect, a quandary was the Fageol I6 that competed in the 1948 race, its provenance seemingly lost in the mists of pre-RET time.
The naturally aspirated all-iron FTC 180 I6 that powered Fageol buses from the mid-1940s had a 4.25 in bore and a 4.75 in stroke for 404 cu in. Derived from it, we know that the 1948 Indy engine retained the same bore, so it would probably have had a 3.225 in stroke for 274.5 cu in, keeping within the 274.6 cu in limit for unblown engines.
In having a single overhead camshaft operating two valves per cylinder, the Fageol I6 was not a Gasoline Alley maverick. It was fed by three Stromberg downdraft carburettors via an intake manifold on one side of the head, with the exhaust manifold on the other side.
The inline valves appear to have been upright, suggesting a combustion chamber formed primarily in the piston crown. All state of the art in 1948. In his seminal work, Offenhauser: The Legendary Racing Engine and the Men Who Built It, author ordon Eliot White writes, “Another, lesser-known Winfield engine that ran at Indianapolis was originally designed for well-known Indy car owner Lou Fageol’s Twin Coach buses. A big, single overhead-cam six, it performed admirably on the streets of Los Angeles.” Eliot White simply adds, “In 1948, Fageol had Bud Winfield hop up the bus engine and stuff it into a Stevens chassis. Bill Cantrell finished 16th with it but a year later, it was 0.5 miles per hour too slow to qualify at 125.055 mph.”
Eliot White’s somewhat disparaging remarks imply the use of a stock block. What those remarks don’t tell us is that hydroplane racer William ‘Wild Bill’ Cantrell was an Indy rookie in 1948 who qualified what was a 10-year-old chassis seventh fastest. Moreover, that the car was never out of the top 10 until its steering disintegrated late in the race.
Clearly this engine was also worthy of admiration while pounding the bricks at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. What does Floyd Clymer’s Complete 1948 Indianapolis 500 Mile Race Supplement (a precursor of the hallowed Indianapolis 500 Yearbooks) have to say about that year’s Fageol Twin Coach Special?
As usual, Clymer was there at the Speedway in 1948 talking to participants. He says, “In recent Indianapolis history, one man, representing one firm, has used this race in the manner for which it was originally intended – that of true engineering development. That man is Lou Fageol (president) of the Fageol Twin Coach organisation in Kent, Ohio, manufacturers of transit and highway buses.
“Fageol, as rabid a supporter of racing as exists, theorised that one of the engines such as power the buses he builds, modified to racing specifications, would operate efficiently. The changes made in the actual bus engine were in carburetion, cam, compression and stroke, which was shortened.
It developed 260 bhp and had a compression ratio of 14:1. ‘Regular high-test gasoline was used, without the aid of special alcohol-benzol blends. In fact the engine was designed by Ed Winfield, brother of Bud, of Novi Special fame.”
No mention by Clymer as to whether the Indy engine used the stock iron block or the aluminium alternative that was developed around the same time for hydroplane racing (which by our definition would have made it semi-stock). And further confusion as to who designed the Indy version – Bud or brother Ed Winfield?
An unidentified Twin Coach historian has been quoted as saying, “Lou Fageol was instrumental in the choice of noted racing engineer Bud Winfield to design an engine for Twin Coach.” It has been suggested by a number of historians that Bud Winfield actually designed the road engine. This is plausible, given that Winfield was a prolific engine designer, especially as it is likely Fageol planned from the outset to develop versions for his twin passions of hydroplane racing and Indy.
Indeed, the road engine had seven main bearings, extravagant for the day. It does seem likely that whoever had drawn it envisaged it as a base for performance upgrades. A 1950 newspaper report says, “The Fageol [road] engine was designed 6 years ago by LJ Fageol, company president”.
Fageol’s company had an ‘Experimental Department’ that had shown itself capable enough to have created a 1946 Indy front-row starter. This was the twin-engined Fageol, as included in our Indianapolis Race Engine Directory.
Perhaps it was actually those ingenious engineers under the direction of Lou Fageol who designed the road engine? The in-house manufactured I6 was optionally fuelled by gasoline or propane. The 404 cu in FTC 180 officially produced 180 bhp and 379 lb-ft torque on gasoline, and it had an 8:1 compression ratio. For hydroplane racing the all-aluminium version was supercharged and, using a compression ratio of 10:1, from its 404 cu in produced a claimed 335 bhp at 3700 rpm.
Was that aluminium version a revised design or simply a change of block and head material? RET materials expert Matt Grant observes, “Given that an iron block is inherently stronger than an aluminium one, I doubt that just changing the material without any design changes would be OK.
“In most circumstances it would be advisable to almost start from scratch with the aluminium design. An advantage of aluminium is that it has better heat transfer than iron, so areas like water jackets can be optimised.”
The compression ratio and fuel cited by Clymer are pointers to an efficient design. That suggests exploitation of the thermal transfer properties of aluminium, not that an aluminium version would necessarily have been any more potent; it would have been inherently lighter and cooler running. If it were indeed a design makeover, that process might conceivably have helped extract additional specific power along with the other engine specification changes noted by Clymer.
While Clymer does not mention the use of an aluminium block, Fageol promoting his unblown Indy engine as a hopped-up bus engine would have been an obvious marketing ploy. On the other hand, promoting the marine race engine as all- aluminium would have helped attract customers in the hydroplane world.
In mundane cast iron trim, this engine was mass-manufactured by Fageol for its buses. By contrast, a supercharged marine career of six years or so, which began after Indy 1948, reportedly took total production of that all-aluminium race version to no more than a handful or two. Bus, boat and Indy engines were presented in the same contemporary newspaper advert for the Fageol company, but whether the Indy engine was iron or aluminium was not specified.
When the restored 1948 Mercury hydroplane was sold a few years ago it was claimed that its Fageol all-aluminium I6 had the actual cylinder head from the 1948 Indy engine. The accompanying illustration is from the May 1948 issue of Popular Mechanics, page 101. The magazine didn’t give any information beyond what is on page 101, but that must have come directly from Fageol. It clearly states the use of an aluminium block.
This new (to us) evidence further suggests the Indy engine was all-aluminium, hence by our definition semi-stock. But the identity of its designer remains a quandary, and we don’t know which Winfield brother it was who then designed the twin exhaust, 18-valve head of the 1949 entry.