I need help locating old drag racing footage from the 67 & 68 Winternationals and the 70 & 71 Winternats. I'm looking for footage of e gas (67, 68) and B/Altered (70, 71) My father raced an orange 55 210 at those events. He won in 68 in the E/Gas car. The B/A car is actually on your site, the Sander Bros 55 Chevy. Or any footage from lions dragstrip from about this time. We still have the car in the garage with the same 426 Hemi, C&O prepped clutch-flite, and all. Any help would be much appreciated!!!
 Joe Sander

I get over 300 emails a day, and that one arrived while I happened to be on a business trip, so I "Marked as unread" and set it aside to answer when I returned home.  In my typical fashion, I unfortunately forgot about it upon my return.  Well, the other day (19 May 2006), the subject of this car came up on the Gas-FX mail group when Bob Plumer sent this photo of the car at Lions The photo was already on Gasser Madness, but without much in the way of information.  Bob wrote: I left the date on this photo I took at Lions which was May of '70. Does anybody know anything about this car? I only seen it once at it was the first shoebox I ever seen that ran 9's. Now this was in 1970 so I was quite impressed. It was powered by a injected Hemi but not sure if it was a 426 or old type hemi.

I vaguely remembered receiving the email sometime back, so a quick search located the original email.  At that point, I wrote back to Joe Sander asking:  First, my apologies. I was going through old emails and found that I had never responded to you. I'm really sorry. As for footage of the car, I don't know of any offhand, but I would suggest you contact Jamie Jackson of Jackson Bros Videos at 707-426-3532. If anyone might have footage, he's the guy to start with! He's easy to talk with, and he can also do individual "workups" of a particular car if he has it. Your dad's car is well remembered, and well thought of. It was a screamer! Do you have any original photos of the car? How about some photos of it today. People (myself included!) love to see "where they are now".
 

Joe responded: You asked for it! I scanned in some good pics I found of both the steel and the glass 55's. The steel 55 (Orange Crush as it was called) is long gone. Last we heard some old lady had it in Ohio. The glass 55 is still nearly 100% intact in my fathers garage (he took the drive shaft out to prevent any accidents) The black and white shots are mostly at Lions, with one of the steel 55 at the Winternationals, probably '68. Then there is a shot of the steel car launching on a big block Chevelle at Lions. Then there are various shots of the steel car at a the LA Auto Show at the LA Convention Center from the mid 60's or so. Note the pea shooter exhaust pipes (ran open headers at the track), the giant traction bars, the 57 Pontiac rear-end, no cutout wheel wells, and all the chrome is intact. The glass car was supposed to get a grill and headlight and bumpers but it was never finished. Of the two cars the steel one was more notorious. It spanked many big block cars, with its T-10 4-speed and 292, and 301 small block motors. Today this car would have a single plane and a Dominator. They were running a vacuum secondary 650 cfm carb through a factory GM aluminum dual-plane intake. But at least they had the requisite white headers and magneto. I have build photos somewhere of the glass car, that show its chassis and cage and suspension, I'll try to scrounge them out. One more thing to note, look at the stance of the glass car. This should be a notice to many that not all gassers sat a mile off the ground. This cars ride height gave it a wicked stance! My dad doesn't like cutout wheels wells or cars that sit high, so he made his own the way he thought they should all look. Its amazing how undated the car looks today because of this. Enjoy

Not being sure from the photos, I asked if any of the photos were of the car in it's current condition.  The color photos of the glass 55 are for all sakes and purposes current with the exception of the early color photo of the 55 without side windows or rear window which is from 1969 or so. It is actually buried in the back of our garage behind my hot rod, a 50 Ford Tudor. This car was the tow rig for the steel 55 back in the 60's. It would flat tow the Chevy with its lame 6 cylinder flat head motor! They even towed it down to San Diego for a car show back when.  Those color photos of the 55 are roughly 10 years old, but the car is in the same condition. It's just waiting for Jeremy and myself to get it thumpin again.  It is a 426 hemi (original bore and stroke) with a C&O Clutch Flite trans, '57 Pontiac rear with full floating axles, tall gears, and Halibrand disc brakes. It has coilovers, long drag traction bars and a watts linkage. The body actually tilts up, similar to modern floppers.  The front end is a standard drop tube axle, leaf spring and no shocks, with a Corvair steering box, and the brake-less Halibrand spindle mount front wheels on VW tires. The body was made from a mold off of a donor car. The one piece nose was purchased but modified by stretching the front wheel well opening 5" to accommodate the stretch of the front suspension 5" forward. This is a subtle little thing most people never notice.  Just for kicks I'm attaching current pics of the 'tow rig' which now sports a 517" big block Ford with nearly 600 ponies and nearly 700 lb/ft of torque. The only thing it hauls now is ass.

Realizing that I didn't know the original Sander Bro names, I asked.  Can't believe I haven't mentioned it! My father is Robert (Bob) Sander and his younger 'bro' is Glen Sander. The steel car was Glen's but the glass car is my dad's. My dad painted them both the same Competition Orange hue, and both were lettered and hand turned gold leafed by a local who is still turning out hand lettered cars, Steve Feinberg. Got any more questions feel free to ask!

So...Bob & Glen...you haven't been forgotten.  There are many people who remember your orange 55's, me among them.  To Joe & Jeremy...Guys, get your butts in gear and get that thing out there (CHRR would be good!) and let us have another look at it...and Joe...THANK YOU!  Nice to know that someone still does hand lettering, too.

By the way, to anyone out there reading this who might have footage or photos of either car, let me know, and I'll be glad to put you in touch with Joe & Jeremy.

Byron

21 May 2006