Unlimited Hydroplane Wins With Duct Tape and Bondo!

Unlimited Hydroplanes race in my city and one of the teams had a serious collision with another boat in a heat race leaving the left sponson seriously damaged.



Keep in mind these boats run a Chinook helicopter turbine at over 100% and do over 200 mph.

To fix it the team applied liberal amounts of bondo in about a 30-40 minute period (helped by people from other teams....that's how this sport rolls) and came back to win the final race!

Picture of patched boat racing.

Back to the collison...I'm just finding

.

The driver in the yellow boat (nicknamed by some as Darth Villwock) was disqualified.

You have to roll with the go fast tape. I don't know how the world managed until duct tape was invented.

Those hydroplane guys are nutz. At some speed water stops being a fluid and turns into concrete. Eddie Hill stopped driving hydroplanes and moved into a safer sport -- driving top fuel dragsters at 280 mph (at the time).

I think Hill was a drag boat guy, he held the fast ET's on both land and water at the same time.

He also raced MC's and did well at it also.

That is one big patch on the Oberto!

Panman said:

I think Hill was a drag boat guy, he held the fast ET's on both land and water at the same time.He also raced MC's and did well at it also.

That is one big patch on the Oberto!

Click to expand...

Hill was a hydroplane drag racer and at one point had a 1/4 mile time record on water that was faster than the national land time record. At speed water turns hard and Hill broke enough bones to move back to land racing.

When Oberto was making the championship run and was ~200 mph, how much pressure was on the repaired area of the sponson until it came up on plane? Or, even after it was on plane? I wouldn't have faith that bondo and duct tape would even hold the rocker panels on a car at that speed.

ionbeam said:

When Oberto was making the championship run and was ~200 mph, how much pressure was on the repaired area of the sponson until it came up on plane? Or, even after it was on plane? I wouldn't have faith that bondo and duct tape would even hold the rocker panels on a car at that speed.

Click to expand...

While I'm not an expert on Unlimited Hydroplane physics...I was pondering it Sunday as I saw the damage picture and that the team crew was even trying to repair it. I *believe* the most pressure on that left sponson is that 3 or 4 second period from the dock that they go from dead in the water, fire up the turbine, and it launches on to plane as the main shaft engages. This video shows a different course where they spend more time going on plane than ours for some reason. I think they could have exaggerate a left turn as they came on plane to further protect the weak spot.

Once on plane I think the risk wasn't about the weak spot on the boat for water intrusion, but aerodynamics are all wonky (the driver said so in an interview), and if the boat got into rough water and put pressure on the weakened area if they started walking front sponson to sponson. I watched him come out on the course after the repair and his first two laps in the 5 minute window getting ready for the start were a bit tentative, but then he started mashing the throttle.

Hydro drivers ain't the same as us mortals though. I'm friends with one of the crazier ones, Mark Evans, and asked him one day, "I bet you were the crazy weird kid in the neighborhood that would jump off roofs when challenged."

He started laughing and said, "That was my brother! ......I was the kid that would jump off the roof, break a leg, come home with a cast, and try again before my cast was off!" The single best hydroplane footage I've ever seen is another boat crabwalking on top of him. (3:45 of

....my course has 5 of the Top 10 on it).

Here's a little bit of interesting trivia for ya, Matt....

In that video you linked with Mark Evans, you hear two announcers from the Unlimited Radio Network. The 2nd announcer in the video is Jim Hendrick, who owned and operated the Unlimited Radio Network for 20+ years, reporting on the UHRA season annually. Jim has retired from Thunderboat broadcasts, as he is now 80 years old, but he's still working the microphone...doing 6am-10am Monday thru Friday on one of my 4 radio stations. He moved to Lakeland, Florida, home of his old UHRA buddy, Bernie Little, who was the long time owner of Miss Budweiser. Bernie used his Budweiser distributorship to pay for his unlimited hydroplane "fix".

We carried the Unlimited Radio Network on the station Jim is now working on, and he parlayed his years of UHRA broadcasting into a DeeJay gig in his "golden" years.

RadioHowie said:

Here's a little bit of interesting trivia for ya, Matt....The 2nd announcer in the video is Jim Hendrick, who owned and operated the Unlimited Radio Network for 20+ years, reporting on the UHRA season annually.

Click to expand...

I've shared lunch, dinner, several hydro flips, and numerous Villwock events with Jim.

Damn small world, my friend. I'm going "upstairs" to the studio right now to say "Hi" for ya.....

RadioHowie said:

Damn small world, my friend. I'm going "upstairs" to the studio right now to say "Hi" for ya.....

Click to expand...

He'd probably remember me as the big lurch-like figure at Tri-Cities hanging around the event director, Karen. I was President in 2001 and the one that went on at lunch about riding shotgun with Seebold Sr. in their two-seat version of a

.

They use to all use Lycoming turbines when I followed the circuit, mainly from the helicopter world. I still liked the ole Rolls-Royce Griffins, Merlins as they ruled the Allisons and other naturally aspired engines...back then, It was "Thunder" on the water. Now it's an airport runway with rooster tails, but arguably much more dependable powerplants, especially now since they've worked out the air intakes.

WA. State was always "home" to most of these teams. Good entertainment for a weekend, pack your cooler and kickup a waterside party w friends. funnn schtuff!

Top_Speed1 said:

They use to all use Lycoming turbines when I followed the circuit, mainly from the helicopter world. I still liked the ole Rolls-Royce Griffins, Merlins as they ruled the Allisons and other naturally aspired engines...back then, It was "Thunder" on the water. Now it's an airport runway with rooster tails, but arguably much more dependable powerplants, especially now since they've worked out the air intakes.
WA. State was always "home" to most of these teams. Good entertainment for a weekend, pack your cooler and kickup a waterside party w friends. funnn schtuff!

Click to expand...

I used to love the big boats when they ran the big Rolls and Merlins, but the turbines changed it all. Add a diminishing field and it's not the same anymore. Evans has a marina and boat shop in Chelan and was giving joy rides in a 4 seat hydro recently. Haven't seen it in a while though. His whole family has a colorful history, he learned the trade from his dad.

juniorfjr said:

I used to love the big boats when they ran the big Rolls and Merlins, but the turbines changed it all. Add a diminishing field and it's not the same anymore.

Click to expand...

13 boats last weekend here in Tri-Cities. Pretty good turn out.

The Merlins were great, powerful, beastly, noisy engines....that finished a race about 1/3 of the time.

While I miss them too I also see the vintage hydros running 2/3 throttle and can't help but realize turbines are so much faster and reliable that races these days are more competitive more often. And some of the best racing I've EVER seen (yes, I have been watching them since '69) were in the past decade when Mitch Evans was running competitively with his Allison V-12 against the turbines. And the speeds they're running today through the hole course is stunning. While watching a big hunk of metal wallow through a corner and accelerate down the straight is interesting....seeing a finely balance airplane slice through a corner with preserved speed is a more impressive feat IMO.

Part of the more modern also fun is that a racer can flip a boat (or tear a gaping hole like this OP), be pulled by rescue folks out of a cockpit, drag the boat back to the pits, and have the same boat WIN the race. Mark did that more than once...he's an ubercat with 18 lives.

So, I guess I'm saying it's different now. Not as much noise, but more good things balance IMO.

IF I'm not mistaken, I think Bernie Littles Ms Bud was the only one using the larger Griffin engines, most others including Chip Hanauer's Atlas Van Lines ran the tad smaller Merlin's. Parts or obtaining them was the biggie back then. Most of these old WWII airplane engines (and parts) were getting pretty scarce, so the turbines were welcomed by the crews (plus they wanted to stay competitive).

I remember that Oh Boy hydro running with a aft driver,meaning the engine sat ahead of him. When there was an engine blow, the driver wore a hot bath of oil. We watched many of oil spills come to shore. Back then, heck, we didn't think much of it as an Un-Environmentally friendly thing, just as beer drinking entertainment.

ESPN use to show the races, I've either missed them or they dropped the series cuz I haven't seen a race in years.

I saw my first cab forward Hydro in the Tri-Cities in 1967 or 68, it was Gail boat out of Detroit as I recall.

Panman said:

I saw my first cab forward Hydro in the Tri-Cities in 1967 or 68, it was Gail boat out of Detroit as I recall.

Click to expand...

I have programs for those years and I'd have to look through to see for sure, but I know '67 would have been the year that Bardahl with a V-12 Merlin did battle with Miss Chyrysler powered by a pair of hemi V-8s. Seattle based aircraft won over Detroit automotive power that weekend with a 104 mph finishing average.

...wait I think I have it! Was it The Dutchman? I don't think any of the Gale boats (the gnarly ones were the IV and V) were cabover. If so, it didn't qualify, but the cabover was controversial (the prevailing thought was getting stuff between you and the thing you were going to hit was important). Cabover would become the way to go in the next decade or so. If so, another one of those PNW boats that added to the Detroit-Seattle rivalry.

The one I remember the most was in the mid 60"s. The Exide boat, with a black/white checker deck flipped and sank at the Seafair. And I remember the Atlas Van Lines "Muncie, Muncie, Muncie, coming around the north corner" Didn't Bill Muncie die in a boat wreck in San Diego?

And who can forget this

on Lake Washington in 1958 when Bill Muncey in the Miss Thriftway sinks a Coast Guard cutter? Muncey was taken to the hospital and racing continued. I was on the beach watching it all happen. "That's entertainment!"
Keep going!

Up until the early 60's there used to be an Apple Cup unlimited race on Lake Chelan. Dad had some pictures from the late 50 to early 60's. My uncle was a chelan merchant and active in the Chamber of Commerce. After about 5 years they canceled the race and didn't invite the racers back, too many bad checks left for the locals to cover. It was quite a different budget then.

juniorfjr said:

Didn't Bill Muncie die in a boat wreck in San Diego?

Click to expand...

Acapulco in '81. Bill was my childhood hero. He lifted me up off the trailer wheel in '77 or '78, plopped me into the cockpit of the Blue Blaster, and then put his hat on me. I got to touch the boat again a few years ago before it was restored.

Coincidentally, the boat (winningest unlimited in history) is running again for the very first time since that black day 23 years ago....this Friday. Chip will be driving it in Seattle at 2:40.