The Harrison Racing Outboards - Legendary Birmingham Metal Products Alky Outboards

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

Some more parts pictures.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

We got out first spring rain from a very relatively not much snow winter and we got our first spring rain today. I was going to do a picture shoot on Harrison pistons and variants but due to the rain will put it off for a couple. Harrison was long making pistons for Anzanis and then they made their unique differences for their own. Seems that the Harrisons advanced porting systems made differences to how the ring design and positioning decisions were made that mde differences in terms of how the crown contolled port timing. Pictures coming as soon as the sun arrives shortly.

[Mark40H]

John; Just got a new Antique Outboard news letter. Guy has B Anzani pistons, rings and wrist pins for sale. Thought you might be interested phone number is 631-754-2763.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

Thank you Mark 40H.

I will call and also spread to the news to the other Anzani restorers I know too. Its great to be able to pool parts and information when its available.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

As many readers know Harrison HRP - Birmingham Metal Products was making Anzani replacement parts for Anzani engines already as Anzani was already phasing out of production itself that eventually led to the making of the "all American" Harrison Alky racing engines for the North American market. That included pistons, rings, aluminum exhaust elbs etc.

During this time of transition where Anzani declined and Harrison took over there was the era of the Anzani/Harrison hybrids. Pistons for Anzanis becoming scarce found Harrison/HRP/Lodite aftermarket pistons in Anzani A and B Alky engines. All Harrison pistons as were Anzani made from aluminum castings of what was then considered good "piston grade" aluminum alloys. To date I have yet to see and even hear about any diecast aluminum pistons for these engines though all the major motor manufacturers for the consumers market was making diecast pistons for some time.

During this same period of Anzani decline, transitions and hybrids piston ring development went hand in hand in terms of numbers, types of and even ring placements on the pistons. In the end of that development cycle for both makes of these first cousins of engines the single ring type pistons came about finally for both of Harrison and Anzani. Harrison's final ring design on the piston was a single rectangular ring one rings thickness distant from the piston crown proper leaving the aluminum crown sides to control port timing. Anzani on the other side went with the single "Dykes" L type ring where the top edge of the ring was at piston crown height leaving the ring as the controller of the engines porting. In both styles wear and tear dictated how good the port timing stayed accurate. Each had its following and in many cases many drivers used many of the varied number and styles of rings through the full use of the engines until they were themselves no longer competitive in racing due to obsolesence.

The following pictures show how some Harrison/HRP/Lodite pistons appeared through their history and they were many and varied just as the Anzanis. were.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

During the transition period where Anzani parts were running down, Harrison was making aftermarket substitution parts for Anzani and for the Harrison which became more a Harrison hybrid and then became the "all American" Harrison as the Anzani parts ran down and no replacements of any sort were to be had.

During this hybrid or transitional period (mid 1960s) Vacturi carbs were used almost exclusively on the hybrid engines along with the Tillotson HLs where multi-carb setups were running. It was during this period that saw the introduction of the rotary barrel carbs on Konigs. They were a very simple and reliable carb that dispensed with the use of any butterflys given that the rotary inner barrel did the whole job. There was a singular high speed jet with a singular high speed needle right under the jet within the rotary barrel. Hybrids and later models no longer used the DelOrto remote fuel bowl to imitate a gravity feed tank required by Vacturis that still used floats within their fuel bowls. This Harrison rotary barrel carb had 1/4 the parts in use of the average Vacturi AO500 and weighed 1/2 as much overall taking some more overhanging weight off the engine that had the same looking exhaust systems of Anzanis taking some more strain off the aluminum towers used to support the engine.

The following are multi-angled pictures of this remarkably simple and reliable rotary barrel carb that Harrisons used.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

2 More Harrison rotary barrel carb pictures.

[Mark75H]

Awesome!

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

Thanks. There is so much more to come for the Harrisons yet. That is pretty much realized when you sit down with the parts, look at some fuzzy and some better pictures to try to make decisions on how to duplicate a hybrid you are trying to visualize through all this realizing there are never going to be enough parts to make a strictly Harrison engine.

[Gstillwill]

John heres a listing on ebay.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Johns...spagenameZWDVW