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Thread: James Diedrich Hallum, 5/18/32 - 7/19/16

  1. #11
    Team Member OldRJexSea's Avatar
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    Default Earlier moto to outboard efforts by Jim Hallum

    Well Smitty, your latest good words about the changing period into the outboard full open racing classes is quite interesting but mostly after my time with Jim Hallum. Jim and I had spent much conversation, and some detailed thoughts, about fitting the better mid-1960's motorcycle engines to outboard racing use. You have provided a nice overview of the later conversion successes and Jim sent a set of DVD's he made that showed the more current small racing classes using current motors & maybe some of the earlier conversions. I think that DVD set ought to be kept in an SOA library rather that go extinct with me out here in the hinterlands.

    But more of interest for early moto engine to outboard conversion. It was about 1965-67 when we were out at the farm shop and thinking about some practical way to adapt the current 125 cc rotary valve Yamaha single to outboard racing use. The issue of engine approval was a question but since the motor was certainly a production engine by the thousands we thought that use was possible in the NOA if not the APBA. You previously told of the Bill Tenney twin Anzani gearbox to tower housing setup used one final time by Hallum and Anderson. That setup was the basis for a rough design drawing Hallum made which placed four of the 125 cc Yamaha motorcycle motors into a configuration which used the Tenney bevel gear system similar to the coupled Anzani's but with 4 input shafts, one on each face of a cube gearbox. As I mentioned earlier, this 'imagineering' was a fun exercise but Hallum was serious enough to make a fairly accurate rough design drawing. There was not a chance at that time of any actual construction.

    The output of four "full modified" 125 cc Yamaha running alcohol was going to be something near or over 4 HP per cubic inch so the "Square 4" 500 cc Yamaha setup was likely to have 120 HP and loads of torque because of the basic bore/stroke ratio which I think was the same as the Factory RD-56 250 cc twin Gran Prix machine. It was also not going to be a light motor hanging on the transom; maybe no worse than two iron B Anzani's though.

    Hallum & Dunn's first effort for the road racing 125 rotary valve Yamaha did prove out the horsepower range estimate using gasoline so the 500 cc outboard configuration would have been impressive right from the beginning. Probably would have needed to fit it to Charles Walters runabout for safe enough use though.

    So there you have it, another snippet of an early interesting effort by Hallum before he got busy doing the rather outstanding post-Anzani workings.
    Fun times later but I missed almost all of it unfortunately.

    Another tidbit Smitty. In 1962 at Lake Lawrence, 1 2/3 mile record course, I ran over the record with my 1955 Entrop hull in DOH but by not enough to make the books; worst start I ever made at 3 seconds behind the clock. Finished well over a full turn ahead. Surprising super smooth ride with the transom off of the water except for the last half of each turn. Much lament over that lost 3 seconds since it would have put the DOH 5-mile record in the books until almost 1970. Wasn't wise enough to find $5 to buy the Bob Carver turn entry photo. A month earlier at the Divisionals in Estacada, Oregon I also finished with over a full turn lead but threw the shear pin in heat 2. I think it was Howard Anderson who won on points and got the guarantee to run at the Nationals. Am pretty sure that he won DOH at those Nationals so was was a fast fellow. OK then on your "gear head" description but I was plenty quick in DOH for a few short years. Fun times then too at age 20.
    Russ Rotzler

  2. #12
    Team Member smittythewelder's Avatar
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    Interesting, Russ. I never heard about that mid-Sixties brainstorming about hanging four 125cc Yamahas on a common gearbox. You guys must have had one of those early rotary-valve engines to look at, and probably that was the one that Jim ultimately built for Jimmy Losvar to run, as I described above. Sort of a funny-looking thing in its outboard form, with the inlet duct (to the rotary valve) angling up and out, just missing the rope-plate, with the carb sitting at about a 45-degree angle to the lake, as I recall it. Again, I hope J. Losvar will come here, hopefully with a photo or two (for all I know, he might still have the engine).

    You say you and Jim speculated that 4hp per cubic inch should be obtainable with an engine tricked-out for methanol, a good estimate as it turned out. I never heard a dyno figure for that first (rotary-valve) Yamaha of Losvar's, but Demeray's piston-port 1972 engine made 29hp, IIRC (I forget the rpm figure, but Mark would know, something like 11,200, maybe). Of course today's GRM and VRP 125s are said to be putting out something like 47hp; when I told Jim a year or so ago that I had read that, he laughed and said that his best A Anzani wouldn't quite do that!!

    Russ, is your old Entrop hull long-gone? Those big old cabovers were quite a sight.

    So sad to see those old good-guys dropping off. Both Hallum and Entrop, not to forget Rautenburg among many other old-timers, were wonderfully likeable and interesting guys to listen to, and I wish they could be here to speak for themselves.

  3. #13
    Team Member OldRJexSea's Avatar
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    Yes Smitty, there are too many lost memory tales from the really speedy Northwest racers of the 1960's era. The later 1970's and onward may have better ongoing memories and good movie records.

    Hallum's Anzanis (and Anderson's) were good for about 3 HP per cu/in or more on average. We knew that 4 HP cu/in for a good modern 2-stroke was almost certain and would probably reach to 5 HP cu/in with specialty designs. That has proven to be far too modest if the current 125 cc motors are at 6 HP cu/in. At my last visit with Hallum in late 2015 we talked about the 125 cc outboard class and the single cylinder rule. We had a chuckle about my speculation of a single cylinder twin opposed piston design. The purpose would be to finally have a Curtis Loop full circumference port system controlled by the second (auxiliary) piston since the modified Schnurle Loop systems have long since run out of places to put more port area and also shorten the stroke. That concept tickled Jim as we thought about how it might best be a diesel with outstanding cornering torque. Then we went back to looking at his pulse jet engine efforts toward making the much smaller sizes operate well.

    As for Entrop's first 3 cabover hulls for C & D/(F) motors. These were 11 1/2 foot length designed for the Merc KG-9 and later MK-55. I was able to buy the 1955 #2 hull which had been in storage for years by Dick Brunes near Kenmore who mostly ran it in D Stock. I think hull #3 was a special build for Doc Jones' class C OMC PR twin which had a ton of power. I never saw those older hulls in their original operations. And yes, my hull and equipment went to a fellow in Spokane about 1973 and I doubt it has run since or survived. Entrop's 13 foot hulls for the Mark 75 followed immediately since his 107 mph record was in 1958. The #2 (final) 13 ft. hull first ran in about 1964 and was the rig which set the class F kilo record of about 112 mph at DeLake. Amazing hulls for certain as were the later record hulls for Evinrude.

    A last comment with regard to your earlier mention of my B Stock motor design of 1972 which was an effort to replace the old, obsolete and very noisy motors with something affordable. For those who may be curious, it was based on standard Evinrude parts using a single piston from their first loop scavenged 3 cyl. motor. Every part was modern Evinrude except the ignition, crankshaft, case/cyl block, and tuned pipe (muffled). It was a "detuned" low compression design to try for under 30 HP but had serious porting. Obviously, a 20 cu/in single was going to shake strongly so dealing with the vibration would be an issue. I still have the semi finished crankshaft, the block casting patterns, and all of the original Evinrude parts. I hope that there will eventually be time to build one powerhead just for fun. It will not be the detuned version however. I do have a PDF file (scanned) of the assembly drawing which shows the OMC part numbers if anyone would like to see my old drafting board effort.

    As said previously, it was a fun time/era.
    Russ Rotzler

  4. #14
    Team Member Master Oil Racing Team's Avatar
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    I'm glad that this thread has revived. Thank you Smitty for getting some of you old friends aboard. Russ.....it has been extremely interesting to hear what you have to say. Please keep up with your comments. You have told us stuff none of us guys toward the East ever heard. We knew that you guys in the Northwest had some real exoctic thing going, but most of the time you guys came East to race. Not many of us ever went to your home ground to race. I always loved the few times we went out there.



  5. #15
    Team Member smittythewelder's Avatar
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    Well by the same token, Wayne, some of us who were only region racers, and rarely or never made the weeks-long trips to other locales would surely like to hear the stories that were only known in those places, and for this thread the stories about the creative tuners and tech guys who left the piles of aluminum chips or sawdust on their basement floors building stuff that others drove. Who were some of the early experimenters with oddball engines in other regions, the quietly creative tech guys who would have had so much to talk about with Jim Hallum? I know John Alden down in California made an outboard out of the first reed-valve 125cc Yamaha of '73, having previously built some of the fastest alky Champ Hot Rods and probably a ton of other stuff I don't know about. The range of interest of some of these fellows was very wide; Duane Wallick once told me (hope I recall it correctly, that Alden had developed a new method of gem-cutting that had amazed the people in that business. And many here probably have samples of the innovative hose-clamp designed by Harry Pasturzak, best small hose-clamp I ever saw.

    Russ, please put up a link so that members can have a look at your motor drawings. My laptop had a brain seizure not long after you posted it to me, and I lost it along with a ton of other stuff (some of which was important, dang it!!).

  6. #16
    Team Member OldRJexSea's Avatar
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    Default Long highways...

    Team Master Oil tells of two strong issues for outboard racing in times prior to the 1970’s, not the least of which was the very long road to either Coast from almost anywhere to attend major racing events using the old national highways. They were generally good routes but not at all as effective as the Interstate highways after all of those route segments were finally cemented together. Time and cost of those long travels were quite a deterrent for most outboard racers I think. Eventually setting the major National Championships regularly into the middle Regions certainly helped.

    The second item of note was the perceived “mystique” of APBA Region 10, mainly the coastal Pacific Northwest. Even those of us within the region who were new to outboard racing in the late 1950’s and the ’60’s were aware of the ongoing well deserved history generated by those good old racing hands of Jim Hallum’s father’s era. It is not quite fair to list only a few but Leonard Keller, Art Losfar, Val Hallum, plus a bunch of tough old C Service drivers such as Rocky Stone and the younger Harold Tolford, John Laird and their contemporaries defined that racing.

    The old iron engines those fellows had raced since the early times, (and even back into step hydro’s), were what set the class motor sizes. The Johnson-Evinrude KR, SR, PR, SpeedTwin(?) in -C service, and the '4-60’ were the 15, 20, 30, and 60 cubic inch motors of A, B, C, and F classes. (The -D- and -E- classes were defined I think but seemed to be unused). There was even an M (midget) class which was about 1/2 size of A motors. A small group of Californians kept that class running until about 1960 as I recall.

    The decade of the 1950’s with Mercury introducing a full line of Stock Racing motors by fitting good racing lower units to their production line motors brought a major sudden increase in racing drivers, probably everywhere, but certainly in Region 10. The -B-Stock class also had Champion motors and Martin (which disappeared along with its clockwise prop rotation). The already fast Northwest racers soon hauled these motors to DeLake and the records jumped, probably adding to the “mystique”. More racers were available to make the Nationals trek too.

    I should end here since this thread is defined as related to Jim Hallum so I am unfamiliar with how these Forums continue when comments drift away from the main focus. There is more to add at another time if my concern about drifting topics is not an issue.
    RR...

  7. #17
    Team Member OldRJexSea's Avatar
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    Default 1972 B-Stock motor design.

    OK Smitty, here is the assembly drawing PDF file for the 1972 B-Stock motor using mostly OMC parts.
    B-Stock Assy image.jpg
    Well it worked. A click downloads the file to your computer for viewing. Maybe I should try to upload it as an image which may be directly visible in the window.
    B-stock draw 1.pdf
    That worked,.. good when stuff happens.

    Hallum enjoyed seeing this drawing, the actual detail design drawings (now firmly in hiding), and crankshaft counterweight calculations needed to direct the dominate vibratory force vector. It's most likely that I purchased the OMC parts from him at Losfar's Boathouse in Mukilteo before doing the design.

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    Long highways, for sure. The Ketzer Racing Team, with a home base in Hot Springs, Arkansas, went as far west as Arizona for one race, and east to Florida for another, but for the most part, we raced Arkansas and the surrounding states. We would have loved to travel farther, but being working-class folks, as most boat racers were in the 60s and 70s, when we dispatched on Friday after work for a race, we had to be back to work Monday morning--drive all night to get there; drive all night to get home. And we did, and although we got home all sore from the work and bruised from being slammed around in boats, it was fun, incredible fun.
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  9. #19
    Team Member smittythewelder's Avatar
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    I've got something to say about that, Steve, but first I have a question for Russ:

    Now this is really stretching the old memory banks, but if I remember right, there was a paired set of bounce pipes sitting with other discards in Hallum's shop, an early experiment. Again IF I remember correctly, these two early, rather skinny pipes, which were for a single-cylinder engine, were welded to each other at the header, that is, they used the exhaust outlet header in common, but they had no diverter valve of any kind, only this "one-into-two" header with it's single mounting flange. The pipes were of different lengths, and as I recall it the idea was to have a sort of "automatic-shift" at some point from the long pipe to the short pipe as the engine went up in rpms. I forget if this set of paired long/short pipes was for a motorcycle or possibly for a racing chainsaw (I remember they weren't for a boat, and they couldn't have been since there were no single-cylinder outboards racing in Reg. 10 in the days when they were made (mid-to-late-60s, I imagine). Do you recall anything like these valve-less "auto-shift" pipes, Russ? Jim didn't seem too excited about them, so maybe they were not particularly successful. I think at the time I saw them was when Jim and Keller had cast Jim's patterns for exhaust valves for the Anzanis. Now if you were no longer around at that point, you might not know that the original idea for those valves was to hold the "ram's-horn" curved bounce pipes on one side of the valves, and megaphones on the other side. The megaphones were for getting the boat up to speed, after which the valves would shift to the bounce pipes. But this configuration was very short-lived, as they decided to leave the megaphones off, and just have a no-pipe open exhaust for getting the boat planed-off.

    One of the early users of two bounce-pipes WITH the diverter-valve on a single-cylinder motorcycle was Seattle's DSH ace, Tom O'Neill (also recently lost to us). O'Neill had a well-used 100cc Suzuki dirt bike with which he was trying to keep up with the 125s that flat-tracked in the dome at Gold Creek Park, near Bothell, every winter in the early '70s. Ron Anderson welded up a set of pipes (long and short) and a sheetmetal valve-box; Tom actuated the butterfly with a cable-connected trigger on the handlebars. I think all the two-pipe rigamarole had to do with some of the early Hallum and Anderson pipes being rather peaky (narrow working range), something they got better at later on. In any event, it was fun to try to listen for Tom's "shift" while sitting in the stands in the dome, with all the echos and racket (and dust) from all the other bikes in the race.

  10. #20
    Team Member smittythewelder's Avatar
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    Steve, this country is so big that even some in-state drives take hours, as from the Seattle-Tacoma area over the Cascades to central Washington where a lot of the best races used to be. Could be worse; from a few long trips it has always seemed to me that the State of Montana by itself takes a Whole Day to get across!! Anyhow, not so long ago, another old codger and I were laughing about a certain, uhmm, endurance or capacity issue that overtakes many old fellas. We were noting that when we were young we would have a couple of us guys riding along in the van with a hydro on top or trailer behind, and the girlfriends in back. WE could go on for hours, and we used to laugh at the gals, who seemed to have to make a "rest stop" every forty five minutes! Well, we're not laughing anymore.
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