Gasser Madness! - George Carroll's '58 Tanus B/Gasser

I received these photos recently. The car owner was George Carroll. I wanted to put all the pics he sent to me for a couple of reasons. First, not all Gassers were well known cars. Secondly, some of these photos leave a little to be desired...I mean that they aren't exactly magazine quality! But you know what? He has a number of photos of his old race car and the memories to go with them. You wouldn't believe how many notes I get asking if I have a photo of this or that car that the writer/his dad/his uncle/an old friend/etc. raced in the 50's/60's/70's because they don't have ANY.

The point I'm trying to make here is that if you have photos of some old Gassers, Roadsters, Altereds, whatever, send 'em to me. If they aren't Gassers or Roadsters, etc and don't really fit on Gasser Madness, I'll forward them to one of the guys who can and probably will use them. We're trying to save some history here. If you heard all the stories we do about how "...all his negatives and photos got tossed/burned/soaked/lost by a rampant ex-wife/fire/flood/you name it", it'd be enough to make you cry.

Byron

Update 05 July 2001

My name is Ed Burns and I too owned this car for a brief period in the mid-80's. I received a call from a friend that the car was heading for the scrap yard, so I told him to drop it off at my garage my self and three other guys lifted off the rollback and put it on jack stands. I eventually sold the car after installing 429 c. in. Ford and C6 trans. ,I also installed a Corvair front suspension .The car was sold for $650.00 and was last seen at Atco Raceway being campaigned as the Flying Farmer . May be someone else can shed some light as to it's present state.

I am curious to what has become of the car now. I did speak to the man who had the car briefly at Atco Raceway a number of years ago and I seem to remember the car running a Ford 468 c.in. engine. but again that was some time ago. I do have some pictures of the car when I had it unfortunately my scanner is acting up so I can not send them. I am glad to see there are racers out there who appreciate these cars enough to restore and race them so our children can see real American Iron in action.Thanks Ed Burns

The car was a 1958 German Ford ,Taunus model. It originally had about a 60 hp 4 cyl engine. It was a race car when I bought it. It had been run with several engines including an olds v-8, hilborn injected small block, and a 6 cyl Chevy in G-Gas. I put a worked 427 L-88 crate motor in it after I bought it. It ran a Muncie 4-speed and a 57 olds rear with locked spiders. I ran the car in B/gas for several years at tracks in the New Jersey area in the early 70s , with out much success. Although the Big Block made plenty of power I just couldn't get the car to go straight. In the dirt at Atco, running over pylons in the center of the track at Cecil County, sideways in the lights at Englishtown. Whee Doggie. During the odd times it would make a reasonably straight pass it ran in the mid tens. With no front brakes or parachute it was almost as exciting getting it stopped. After several years of this nonsense I sold the car and got married. To this day I have never seen another German Ford Drag car other then this one.

George Carroll

Click on the thumbnail for a larger picture
First row contains pictures added 05 July 2001