Booth's killer 'Kelvinators'

In the days before aftermarket blocks and cylinder heads patterned after generic designs, Pro Stock teams ran factory production style engines that represented the under-the-hood offerings of a far wider variety of brands and makes.

Perhaps the most illustrious examples of this phenomenon were the AMC entries that Wally Booth campaigned during the mid-1970s. Though Booth had earned a reputation as Chevrolet's most successful Super Stock and Pro Stock

Despite that there were virtually no aftermarket components for AMG engines when Booth agreed to head the American Motors effort in fall 1971, he and engine-building partner Dick Arons transformed the brand's staid grocerygetter reputation into that of a genuine performance powerhouse.

After reaching the winner's circle for

"I may have had a phone conversation with the people at Traco, who built Roger Penske's AMC Trans-Am engines." said Booth, "but that was about it. The big problem was finding performance parts. There just weren't wany. We finally got JE to machine pistons from TRE castings, and General Kenetics made us some camshafts. The biggest form of outside help came from Edlebrock, whose dyno we used until we got our own. They also manufactured our first tunnel-ram intake manifolds at a time when nothing was avaiable and later worked with us on our hand-built versions.

"We built a pair of 342-cid engines and a pair of 354's. We hoped that the Gremlin would be light enough for the 342, but it wasn't. The engines kept going up in size, from 362- to 368-

Booth said that the engine program had come a long way by the time he retired in 1979. "Remember, our last small-block Chevy, which was a 331, made just over 500 hp back in 1971. that was about 1.5 hp per cubic inch. At the end, we were making about 800hp with the 362. That almost 2.2hp per cubic inch. Just about all of that came from our work on the cylinder heads."

According to Booth, the basic AMC components "weren't that bad," despite the company's non-performance image. "They had a good block to begin with. It had a wide bore and a short stroke. If you remember, the American Motors AMX's had done pretty good in Super Stock. The basic AMC design was better than most people gave it credit for."

In the beginning

Said Booth, HWC were in the middle of building a new small-block Vega, like Jenkins', for the 72 season. We had already run our 331 -cid small-block on the dyno, and it produced middle-of-the-road numbers at just under 500 horsepower. We needed about 525 to at least look presentable!

"Swaim told me right away how much money and parts were available. I learned that [Don] Nicholson had been offered the deal first, but had decided not to accept it. I thought about it for a couple of days and accepted. The Vega, which was in the middle of construction, was never finished!

As per AMC's wishes, Booth ran a Gremlin X body that was built at his shop. Though the vehicle appeared tall and

Though Jenkins won six major races, grossing $250,000 in the process, Booth didn't have regrets about not racing his own Vega. "I never felt that we couldn't win with the AMC program," said Booth. "It was far more satisfying to eventually win, with those cars!"

In winter 1972, Booth had Tom Smith build a second Gremlin X, a car Booth called "probably the first tube-chassis car In Pro Stock. We just hung the sheet metal on it."

The Hornet's sting

"The Gremlin was about three and a half miles per hour and a tenth of a second slower than the Hornet," said Booth. "After that, I ordered a new Hornet from Smith that we debuted at the Spring Nationals in June, and we started to run better.

"I beat Ronnie Sox for the first time a few weeks later at an Englishtown match race. He was pretty upset after the run and said, 'The next thing that'll happen is that III get beat by a Henry J.' "

It was during this period that Booth and other Pro Stock engine builders began to discover the potential power that could be obtained through extensive cylinder head work. "I'd say that between 1972 and 1976 was the age of enlightenment for us," said Booth.

In the winter of 1973-74, Booth and the Maskin-Kanners team collaborated on a then-unique research and development program. "We had made a couple of trips to Florida during the past winter,' said Booth, but they weren't productive; you spend so much of your time tra-

"Dick [Arons] and I sent them a lot of new parts. One pair of heads that Bobo Schaeffer had made with modified intake ports picked upa bunch. The trip put both teams in a real good position for the 1974 season, and we ran real good all year."

First AMC triumph

Booth qualified third at the 1974 closest that I came to splitting up with tornationals with a 9.05 and won the event with an 8.97 to Jack Roush's 9.01 in the final. As it turned out, the first win for AMC didn't come a race too soon.

"There had been some personnel changes at AMC," said Booth. "Swaim and the other people backing the program had been shifted to the other parts of the company, and it was all but official that they were going to put their resources elsewhere. The Gatornationals win absolutely saved the program, and Swaim's replacement, Bob Wheat, was instrumental in capitalizing on the win. He had been hired to promote racing, and after the Gatornationals, he finally had something to promote.

"It certainly woul have been tragic if it had ended then since we had gone from nothing to the winner's circle in just slightly over two years."

Booth achieved additional performance gains when he ran his new section cylinder heads (see sidebar, page 34) at the 1975 U.S. Nationals,

"I absolutely gave that race away," he said, "That loss made the win I had at Indy in 1976 probably the most meaninful, even bigger than the '74 Gatornationals, because the '75 race had been mine for the taking."

The new heads were a result of Booth's intensified efforts. "I was very angry that more work hadn't been done on our heads," he said, "That time was the closest I came to splitting up with Arons. [Wayne] Gapp and Roush had really been aggressive with their program, and we were sitting still, which is really like going backwards. When Maskin and Kanners were running really fast in Pomana with their new heads, I decided to make my own sectioned versions, and that gave us the power for the rest of our wins."

Back to Chevy?

"At the Gatornationals in March, I qualified 11th without my good heads, but I put them back on for a morning time

Booth might not have won the 1976 season closer, the World Finals, if it hadn't been for some needling from Maskin. Running in their best form ever, Maskin and Kanners had qualified No. 1 and had low e.t. of every round going into the final against Booth.

"I had won my share of races," said Booth, "and I figured it was finally their turn. But then Maskin invited me to a victory party at his shop. Well, that got my dander up, and I decided I was going to make them earn it."

Booth won a holeshot, 8.78 to 8.76, and that was the closest that Maskin and Kanners came to winning a national event.

Final three seasons

"I was racing some of my own money that year. I was runing over 160 mph in test at Orange County (Int'l Raceway) two weeks before the Winternatinoals wich was real good at the time. We broke my good motors during those tests though, and I showed up at Pomona with garbage under the hood. At that point I felt like I was done, but I ran the rest of the races anyway to meet my obligations with the sponsors. After the year was over, that was it. I retired from racing."

Booth today

"I started from working out or a 450-square-foot building to grossing $2.5 million in sales last year. I put in a lot of hours initially, but have backed off now to about 50 hours a week. We sell all engine components, such as pistons, rings, bearings, gaskets, etc. We can provide better pricing and service to the smaller shops. Dick [Arons] comes here every day."

Of his racing days, Booth said, "The greatest thing about drag racing was that nobody could make you lose. Some guys might psyche you out, but it's not like other I forms of racing where they can knock you out on a turn. Nobody could come over in your lane and hit you, or at least they weren't supposed to. In drag racing, you had absolute control of your destiny. If you lost, it was your fault."

I really haven't attended any races since I quit, but I've got two younger sons now who knew that their dad used to race but have never been to one themselves, so I'll probably take them to one of the NHRA meets this year.

"From watching on TV, I can see that most of the guys I raced against have retired, but the approach to racing is still the same, It might look different, but everybody is still trying to do the same thing that we were doing back in the 1970s."

Maskin, current engine builder for the Jeg's Mail Order Pro Stock car and Pro Stock Truck teams, had been running Booth-Arons engines in his Mouse Pack C/MP '68 Camaro. He recalled, "I was going to get a deal with AMC when they made their first offer to Don Nicholson. That fell through when Nicholson declined, but it got new life again when Wally got the deal."

First teamed with Jim Gilbert in 1972, Maskin drove a white Gremlin X, then toon on Kanners as a partner in 1973. Kanners became the team driver early that year, and the pair produced significant performance gains during their winter-long stay in California during 1973 and 1974.

Said Maskin, "We ran two to three days a week at Irwindale [Raceway in Southern California] and made close to 300 runs. We'd wear a motor out, and Wally would send us a new one that he and Arons had just dynoed. We picked up well over a tenth that winter, and the feedback we provided helped Wally to run good at the 1974 Winternationals and win the Gatornationals just one race later. That trip to California helped set the foundation for all the round-wins that our two cars produced during the next five years."

Though Maskin and Kanners failed to win an NHRA national event, they enjoyed many bright moments during the period, including match race victories, a No. 1 qualifying effort at the 1975 Springnationals, several semifinal-round showings, and a running-up finish at the 1976 World Finals.

Of even more lasting significance wsa the experience that Maskin gained, which enabled him to start his Dart cylinder-head business in the early 1980s. "Running the Hornet taught us not to take no for an answer," he said. "There weren't any AMC aftermarket parts back then, and it came natural for us to make everything on our own. It was that philosophy that my business was built on.

"When I returned to racing in the 1990's, it seemed that things had changed, but not really. We use the same path now that we did back then. The newer technology, such as CNC equipment, allows us to skip some steps, but the approach is essentially the same as it was in the 1970's."