Konig History

[Steve Litzell]

Here are some pics of Uli (that's him isn't it Steve?) working on the new style crankshaft. It made all the difference in the world. For one, it was much simpler to rebuild an engine without having to spend so much time spacing the crank and centering up the rods. Most importantly it's greater longevity meant the powerful motors would last a lot longer and win more races.

Yes that is Uli, One of the best crankshaft men in the biz. What a great man. I have been out racing the past couple weeks and now just getting caught up with this thread. many memories that have been brought back. First story about Dieter from Ralph is what Dieter told me back in 86 or 87 when i asked him about the History of his factory. I first meet dieter in about 1971 or 2 at Walt Blankenstiens shop in Lakeland fl. It was just casual as I was just 19/ 20 at the time. i too found this man from germany to be very polite to me as he knew i ran flatheads at the time. second time i meet him was when I worked for Walt. That was around 74/75. I was involved with Drag cars at this time but my first love of boat racing still burned inside. In about 1980 Ralph and Bill Hosler convinced me that i should attend the make up nationals in Lakeland. it wasnt long before a boat followed me home. ( Thanks Ralph) Later , we were at Lakland in the spring and Konig was there as well. That was the first real conversation I had with Dieter and also he had a chance to see me work and solve racing problems. At the end of the day Konig asked me to help put a A hydro with motor on top of a truck. I said ok and for him to take the front I will take the back. he said to me it was impossible for me to lift a boat with motor over my head and I said to him to just watch. he grab the front and i the back and I beched pressed this rig to the roof. after we were done Konig said to me that I was Hurculan. The next spring Ralph and I was at a race In Leesburg sharing patrol boat duties. i had made a comment about learning about 4 cylinder motors and more at the Konig factory. Ralphs response to me was "All you have to do is go there". I did not make enough money at the time to do this and expressed this to Ralph and that is were it was left. Several weeks later I learned that I with Ralph was going to the Factory. ( Thanks Ralph, Can't say this enough) When we walked into Konig Factory Dieter looked up at me, ( I'm 6'4') and then said to Ralph, " Ralph! You finally bring to me the right mechanic! This was how this man was. I will write more but Mrs say's grits are ready. Steve:D

[Steve Litzell]

Yes that is Uli, One of the best crankshaft men in the biz. What a great man. I have been out racing the past couple weeks and now just getting caught up with this thread. many memories that have been brought back. First story about Dieter from Ralph is what Dieter told me back in 86 or 87 when i asked him about the History of his factory. I first meet dieter in about 1971 or 2 at Walt Blankenstiens shop in Lakeland fl. It was just casual as I was just 19/ 20 at the time. i too found this man from germany to be very polite to me as he knew i ran flatheads at the time. second time i meet him was when I worked for Walt. That was around 74/75. I was involved with Drag cars at this time but my first love of boat racing still burned inside. In about 1980 Ralph and Bill Hosler convinced me that i should attend the make up nationals in Lakeland. it wasnt long before a boat followed me home. ( Thanks Ralph) Later , we were at Lakland in the spring and Konig was there as well. That was the first real conversation I had with Dieter and also he had a chance to see me work and solve racing problems. At the end of the day Konig asked me to help put a A hydro with motor on top of a truck. I said ok and for him to take the front I will take the back. he said to me it was impossible for me to lift a boat with motor over my head and I said to him to just watch. he grab the front and i the back and I beched pressed this rig to the roof. after we were done Konig said to me that I was Hurculan. The next spring Ralph and I was at a race In Leesburg sharing patrol boat duties. i had made a comment about learning about 4 cylinder motors and more at the Konig factory. Ralphs response to me was "All you have to do is go there". I did not make enough money at the time to do this and expressed this to Ralph and that is were it was left. Several weeks later I learned that I with Ralph was going to the Factory. ( Thanks Ralph, Can't say this enough) When we walked into Konig Factory Dieter looked up at me, ( I'm 6'4') and then said to Ralph, " Ralph! You finally bring to me the right mechanic! This was how this man was. I will write more but Mrs say's grits are ready. Steve:D
My first day at Factory was a little intimidating to say at least, I knew no German, I was outside USA for first time in my life and could not walk home if need be, Yikes!. First Off Dieter ask me what I wanted to learn there. I said crankshafts and gearboxes. He then introduced me to Uli all in German and then He said that Uli will speak to me in English and also teach me German words that were important to our tasks. This started a long friendship. My first day i spent all day on 1 crank. By day 3 I was doing maybe 3 a day. I then was introduced to Bernard Bayer the gearbox man. he too became friends with me and taught me gearbox fundamentals. Every night after work Konig, Ralph and myself would have dinner and long converstations about motors crankshafts and gearboxes were held. This was done in early January and also one of the coldest winters in Berlin. Seems that one night I and Ralph with the help of a member of MRC and Hans we got a little drunk and did not get to our hotel until late/ early morning. next morning I was to be at factory early and go with Dieter to the maker of cranks and rods Herkel I think was the name. Well I was late and I received my first lesson about being late. First Dieter scolded me and said that it was rude to be late and because I was late he was as well for trip to Herkel. My punishment was to to test motors on dyno for the day. The pictures of dyno room are in this thread. In this cold winter there was ice on the walls as they were not insulated. 10 or so motors were brought in to dyno room, and I was escorted to said room by Dieter and Uli. Dieter told Uli that I was not to come out of that room except for relief and lunch, and to me he said " You will be in the cooler today". with a smile on his face. When I was through with the first motors then the door would open and another cart was brought in. Good punishment for this southern boy. At end of day around 7:00 or so I was let out. and then taken to a fine meal and warm pool to heal up as they say. next day I was early for my work and was then taken to crankshaft Factory. I went back for more training in the summer as well for a couple of races with Ralph. As Time went on and I visit the factory I was always welcomed except one time. It seems that the factory was way behind do to parts not arriving from crank company and a very large motor order from the Soviets was due in a week and half. Dieter told me that he did not want me to bother anyone in factory because it was important that they all work and not speak. I asked him if I could help in some way. he said "you would help us make motors for the Russians?" I said that I was helping him and factory. then all was good. Between Uli and myself we made some 30/40 crankshafts and built engines from early morning till late at night. Ralph was doing the sight seeing and hanging out with Hans while this was going on. The next Monday after a serious week of thrashing i started testing motors on Dyno, ( Much warmer then and my head did not hurt from to much drink) I tested and logged results as Uli was doing assembly and others were busy making boxes for shipment. When I was close to end of Dyno runs Dieter came to me and said when I was finished with last motor and all was Ok, To please let him know right away. I did this and dieter ran to his office and got on phone and seemed very happy as all in factory were delighted as well. I did not understand this but later I would. next day we organized the shop and I was permitted to work on my own motor for up coming race in Berlin. That Friday is when i learned about Konig and how he dealt with each customer. bernard was making something of would that was like a podium that is used for awards at races. Tables were set out like there was going to be a party and I thought nothing of this. At noon time all work was stopped and wine cheese beer and small sandwiches were displayed on tables. It was then I was asked to join the group of workers and indulge in the offerings. at this time it was announced that because of hard work all motors for Soviets were delivered ahead of time. I thought this was strange celebration for this work. I latter learned the rest of story. It seems that when motors were ordered by soviets that they(Konig) were under contract to deliver by a certain date. This date also included a set price per motor. Everyday after delivery date or late if you will, a discount was given,but, for every day ahead of delivery date a bonus would be paid to Konig. The Soviets ordered more than they thought Konig could do and with parts shortage, it looked as though Konig would take a bath on this. What the soviets did not count on was a little help out of a southern boy. I don't know what the amount was, But we delivered order some 4/5 days ahead of time. This was the reason for factory party. Dieter always rewarded his workers with a job well done. Later I will tell of some visits to my home from Konig and some aircraft motor as well as The 3/4 midget car motors.:D

[Jeff Lytle]

Very cool story Steve!

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Excellent.:cool:

[Mark75H]

Its always good to get Steve in story telling mode. :):):)

[Steve Litzell]

before I go on with my story and involvement with Dieter and Konig factory, I want to explain some observances with the man and some stories he told me along the way. dieter was in his early teens during WW2 and like in past posts his mother became really upset with him when he would basically escape shelter to see how many Allied planes were shot down over Berlin. Dieter was a very curious man and though he was not a formally educated engineer, it did not keep him from becoming one of the best engineers i have ever had the pleasure to work with/ for and call as a friend. His curious nature never rested and if he did not know something or how to do something i will say by the next meeting with him he would know. I remember Ralph telling me one time in Lakeland Florida that he , Dieter and Ralph's wife Shirley and maybe others went to dinner at a place I believe was called the Fox Fire Inn. This was a neat place to go as they had great food and a dance floor for dancing to live music. I had my first ever Cherries Jubilee there with Bill Hosler. seems that after dinner Ralph and Shirley were cutting a rug ( dancing for you youngsters) and Dieter was watching as this was going on. Shirley then asked Dieter to dance and he did not know how. I guess after a few clumsy steps and a good time later all was forgotten, until next year at same time same place. I understand That Dieter asked shirley to dance and it was like Fred Astair was there. Seems that Dieter was a bit embarrassed that he could not do this a year before so he took dance lessons at home to perfect his skills. This may seem trite but it was how the man was. I was amazed when he delt with French or Italian customers as well as some Slovic countries that he spoke to them perfectly in their language. This mind set also applied to his work. he thought that everyone should be able to race a boat if they wanted to. So he made available to all boats Motors propellers a complete turn key if you will boat for racing just like he did for pleasure boats. This also applied to Cart and Aircraft use as well. The aircraft use was what Killed him in typical Konig fashion. More on this latter. There are many myths about this man and his machines and the way he was, But to me it is exactly what I would expect. You see during the war all was for the Fatherland as written before and yes he was in the Hitler Youth but, ALL youth's had to be, or was taken away. Because of Konig's factory it was important for young Konig to be in factory producing and not at Aircraft batteries like Hans Krage was at or other assignments imposed. One must understand clearly that with Allied bombs and the air raids after time ALL WAS LOST and there was nothing left. Germans had to eat from garbage pails or dead animals or for what ever they could find, Electricity was Not! Food was Not! Buildings? All but a few destroyed. At the end there was little to nothing to survive. I was told that Rudolf told the wife and kids to go and surrender to the Americans as this would guarantee some safety a s opposed to the Russians. Growing through this was hard to say the least as manufacturing was controlled by the allies. You see Germany may have unconditionally surrendered but Berlin did not and that is why it was an occupied city. Berlin youth did not have to serve in the new German army as all other German youth did. It was tough for the Konig factory to rebuild under these conditions and friendships and deals were made with others just to survive. Nothing but nothing was thrown out or wasted. This applied to Konig factory as long as Dieter was alive. Everything had a use. I remember one time dieter was at my house and we and Krage and kids and other went water skiing at my home in Sarasota Florida. After words we went to Stake and Ale for dinner. I was youg and still growing I guess as I ordered the big steak and others ordered what they wanted. Konig asked for a plate and something to drink as he said to me" it was impossible for me to eat such a big steak". After I was done I gave Dieter a bone. This was the second time I won a bet with him. Don't worry we still fed him but after this he did not wait to see if I could finish my meal in Germany or USA. This idea also applied to the factory and new motors were not released until all old ones or all previous models were sold. I remember one visit to my home dieter wanted to go to South Carolina or Kentucky Or both for meeting with Aircraft people. Like I said before I did not have much money and did not believe in owning a new car. I drove a car that was a mid 70's Malibu wagon that I loving referred to as the Jungle Cruiser. The air conditioner did not work but it ran great. Ralph was giving me hell for letting Dieter go off in that thing with no air. he was doing this in front of Konig after he returned to Florida and Konig said " Ralph! The Jungle Cruiser is a fine car!" Those that knew and seen some of the Mercedes cars that he had can relate. One of two of my favorite aircraft stories was while at the factory dieter asked me to help him test the new 5 cylinder radial motor on the dyno that was outside the back door as described in other posts. As the motor was idling Konig stood in front of propeller and reached through the swinging prop to adjust the carburetor. needless to say of the the hospital we go with a bad cut had. You see at this time I realized the pure brilliance of this man as well as the absent minded professor in him all at the same time. Another time he asked me about a year later to help him again, and I said Ok but he must stand behind me. ( I remember from last time) When the motor came to life i noticed that it was shaky on the mounts just as Konig hit the throttle. Well, as the motor left the stand and flew across the back lot straight into the factory fuel farm door that was wide open there was a small crash. Konig looked at me in amazement and said, "We are lucky". Seems that there was no less than three drums of methonal and two gas drums in there and there should of been a big bang at least! Seems Konig got interrupted when putting motor on dyno and forgot to install the nuts that held motor to stand. YIKES! never before have I or since witnessed such genius and absent minded professor ways as this. Please understand that this is no way belittling him, it is just some funny things about him that we later laffed at. I miss my friend to this day, and when I think of him as now I get a tear in my eye as I wonder in amazement what he would answer with to today's modern boat racing motors. I will write more in week or so as I have to work out of town this week.:)

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Steve...I have to pause for a moment. You have just packed in a whole sardine can of stories about Dieter. I don't know any way better to sum up the man than you just did.:cool:

[Donald]

Steve, You beat me to one of my stories about Dieter learning to dance. He was very good. He could even do what we called jitterbug. Shirley was really impressed. One story he told me and many others also, was about the conditions right after Germany surrendered. There was no fuel for heat in the coming winter and the occupation armies assigned a tree or trees in the forest at Grunewald, I believe, to each family, which would be their fuel for heat. However, families had to form partnerships to have someone stand guard at the trees to prevent anyone from stealing their wood, which Dieter had to do on occasion. He took us to dinner one time at a restaurant which was formally the Kaiser's hunting lodge in this forest, where he told me about this.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

A very interesting story Ralph. And congrats on the National Championship you picked up. Joe and I were thrilled to hear you won at DePue.

The forest at Grunewald was next to where we used to stay in Berlin. One day Harry, Jennie, Peter, Debbie and I were taking a stroll through the forest, and I used a wide angle lens to get some dark trees in the shade and beach in the foreground and across the way was a beach loaded with people. Harry made some kind of grumbling remark in German that I didn't understand. I turned to ask Peter what he said and Peter told me it was a nude beach and Harry said something bad about it. I had planned to take some more pictures, some with the long lens, but after finding out what was going on, I thought the better of it. Sure enough, when I got home and had the film developed, it WAS a nude beach.:D

I would like to hear more stories of the young Dieter during and after the war Ralph and Steve. I was always curious, but I didn't know whether it would be good to bring up the subject. When Debbie and I had mentioned to Jenny and Peter that we were going to the prison camp Dachau near Munich, they kind of talked in whispers. Even though they had no part, nor believed in those crimes, it was still something that bothered them.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I am thinking this is the same place we strolled to that you mentioned was the Kaiser's hunting lodge Ralph. Does any of this look familiar? It was some sort of hunting lodge...turned into a museum. I have some B&W photos that may be the restaurant.

ADD: That is Harry Splettoesser in the first pic standing beside the map guide on one of the entrances to Grunewald Forest. When you enlarge the pic, you will see the brown streak running southwest to northeast intersecting the lower 1/3 of the Grunewald Forest. That is the AVUS. The second small lake straight above Harry's head is "Hundekehlesee" In the middle of the east side of that lake was Jenny Swartz-Nitka's place and where Harry lived.

I am not sure, but after looking at some pictures, I think the widening of the AVUS at the point may have been a turn. I do know that a solid board barrier against sound was on both sides of the road at that point, and was around 12 feet tall that I remember.

[dumperjack]

The winged Konig boat didn't establish any records that I know of. I suspect the motor on it is the opposed 6 Konig. I think young Mssrs Konig & Krage would be good sources on this.

see please my translation:

...the new running engine assembly is by the V-type of two 65 HP of outboard motors developed.
it has 6 cylinders, 3 carburetor, a common fivefold stored crankshaft, battery ignition and generator. ...

[dumperjack]

There was also a 70hp with a 4 cylinder Renault.

nearly correctly, 75 hp .... :D

after nearly 7 years I knew the owner for the delivery move ...
the pictures without hood are from another owner.

[dumperjack]

Because of BRF I learned something new today. It was easy to do the translation, but it did not come out totally right. I didn't have my glasses on and it was kind of hard to see all the punctuation and of course my keyboard doesn't do the double "S" letter or the "A's" or "O's" with the umlaut above. So I will see if I can somehow convert to German typing as much as possible then do the translation that way. I'm not too sure how close that will be though, without a German keyboard.

Anyway here is what the translation says about what I originally guessed at.

"Taking place Adolpf, the Brown, he was ordered by then his civil development work unconditionally in the services of his country....on behalf of the Army, he developed the legendary Grossduetschen 3 cylinder radial engine for assault boats, even emen underen engine for the Navy."

I don't know what the last part means. Maybe there were no English words that fit or I typed the text in wrong because I didn't have my glasses. But might have something to do with "an under water engine".

I will play around with it some more Tim, and if I can get it to make sense, I will do the whole article.

i have the article found and become the words in the best possible way to translate.
i need something time for it.

[wolfgang]

Dumperjack - during Saturday practice of the `69 Berlin 6-hour race the wing boat with its engine was parked about15 meters away from our Dalla Pieta/Johnson parking spot. Always curious, Dieter came over and had a good look at our setup, possibly fearing for his semi works entry, being the Hartmann/Tomczyk boat (yes, that`s the one which seized its block during the last refill stop, which might be an indication for illegal methabnol use, no wonder one could smell the castor oil).
The engine on the wing boat was basically a V6 with the main internal dimensions of the 3 inline "stock" motor, which was available as <850cc for SE class and <1000cc for SF, thus providing 2000cc. At least that is what Dieter told us.
If you pse send me copy of the item on which you tried your translating skills, I will give it a try too.
rgds, Wolfgang

[wolfgang]

nearly correctly, 75 hp .... :D

after nearly 7 years I knew the owner for the delivery move ...
the pictures without hood are from another owner.
that is the same engine block which Mercruiser at the time marketed as its smallest drive unit with 80hp.
rgds, Wolfgang

[dumperjack]

...If you pse send me copy of the item on which you tried your translating skills, I will give it a try too.
rgds, Wolfgang ..

sorry wolfgang, it is not simply for me the articles here in the forum to read really correctly.
i must many word lines step by step translate - the sentence build is completely different in the german language.
it is possible, which i sometimes not the real sense understand.
naturally i know the side scanning and sent to you.
the problem is, in this text are formulations (uncommon, complicated) written.
I think that have wayne large problems prepared.

here correct pictures of my engine mount ....

frank

[Dale]

The first picture and last picture in post #245 show what looks to me like a 6 cylinder powerhead sitting on the bench. I thought it was a 3 cylinder O.E powerhead at first glance until I noticed the front exhaust pipe and extra plug wires. Anybody know what it is ? The 3 cylinder powerheads sitting on the bench next to it look like the same powerhead used on the stock Volvo-Penta 700 (70 h.p.) that came to the U.S. in 1975. I worked for Volvo-Penta as an Outboard Service Rep. then and was told that the powerhead was a Konig design. It makes me think maybe the complete powerhead was built in the Konig factory. It had a cast iron block , aluminum head and 2 carburetors feeding the 3 cylinders through internal rotary valves. All the other Volvo- Penta Outboards from the 9 h.p. to the 60 h.p. had aluminum blocks with integral heads and sleeveless chrome bores, so the 70hp. powerhead was as different as a Merc is compared to an OMC.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

What you are wondering about Dale is the 6 cylinder opposed, methanol fueled Konig that Hans G. Krage won back to back OF World Championships in 1976 and 1977. It has the external rotary valve disc with three carbs. It had a design flaw in that the event the motor revved too quickly, the crank would twist. It was a regular cranshaft like all the other Konigs that were pressed together, but unlike the 4 cylinders with 180 degree banking, this one the throws were on 120 degree. In smooth water it was a very reliable motor, but it was hard on lower units because it ran the same one as the 500 and 700, and no additional oil reservoir. Every time it shucked gears in rough water the engine revved up and the crankshaft twisted, rubbing the inside of the crankcase as the counterweights spread out.

[dumperjack]

i think i can help a littel bit ... ;)
the company könig made several patents - this was used here
3 sides of it in the appendix

TWO-STROKE INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINE

Erfinder KOENIG DIETER
Anmeldedatum 25.06.1976
Anmelder VOLVO PENTA AB

An internal combustion engine has at least three cylinders and induction conduits opening into the lower portion of the cylinders or into the crankcase. The induction conduits are intended at least for combustion air, comprising at least one slide valve rotatably driven by the crankshaft of the engine. The slide valve has the form of a disc whose rotation axis crosses or intersects the crankshaft of the engine and is arranged in a slide housing through which the induction conduits extend, said slide being designed to alternately open and close the passages of the induction conduits through the slide housing. Said slide housing has at least three induction conduit inlets and is driven at an rpm which is lower than the crankshaft rpm and has a number of sets of apertures and/or recesses corresponding to the rpm


frank

[dumperjack]

... the company könig made several patents...

here an older…

frank

[stingray240cs]

The 3 cylinder powerheads sitting on the bench next to it look like the same powerhead used on the stock Volvo-Penta 700 (70 h.p.) that came to the U.S. in 1975. I worked for Volvo-Penta as an Outboard Service rep. then and was told that the powerhead was a Konig design. .

Dale, did you mean this 70 HP engine? The powerhead of the VP700, Archimedes 70 came from König and had 904,5 ccm.
For more info just shout.
BTW, Frank (dumperjack) is one of the best informed guys reg. the german outboard history...
Best Regards,
Roman

[Dale]

What you are wondering about Dale is the 6 cylinder opposed, methanol fueled Konig that Hans G. Krage won back to back OF World Championships in 1976 and 1977. It has the external rotary valve disc with three carbs. It had a design flaw in that the event the motor revved too quickly, the crank would twist. It was a regular cranshaft like all the other Konigs that were pressed together, but unlike the 4 cylinders with 180 degree banking, this one the throws were on 120 degree. In smooth water it was a very reliable motor, but it was hard on lower units because it ran the same one as the 500 and 700, and no additional oil reservoir. Every time it shucked gears in rough water the engine revved up and the crankshaft twisted, rubbing the inside of the crankcase as the counterweights spread out.
It must have been a real beast when it was running. What kind of horsepower did it make?
Do you know whether the O.E. engine that was modified for Volvo- Penta was built from the stock cast iron block or was it a completely different block ? I think I remember seeing a picture of one years ago with the hood off and it looked like it was an external rotary valve engine with 3 carbs.

[Dale]

i think i can help a littel bit ...
the company könig made several patents - this was used here
3 sides of it in the appendix
Thanks for the reply. It looks like he covered about anything you can do with a rotary valve.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I don't know the horsepower Dale, but maybe Frank does. I was able to beat it at Fort Worth in 1977, and my motor was actually a 4 carb, dual rotary valve Konig, but since it was technically an OE, I wasn't officially an eligible entry. We ran down the straights together, but I got out front during the turn. We only ran two heats, and I beat Hans both times, but there were several factors that went into that.

First, I had a Butt's Aerowing that had proven itself superior on the type of smooth, wide turns we ran in America, and high speed cornering was much better on the Butts than the Danisch Propride Hans was driving. Secondly, my 4 cylinder opposed Konig was significantly lighter and much lower center of gravity than the six (his also had an electric starter, and battery big enough to supply the power), Third, it may be that Hans had to be careful in the turns, because if he broke the lower unit, the crank would twist, and finally and possible most important, he didn't have expansion chambers like I did. In the U.S. he could run without silencers so they rigged it with open exhausts. The motor would have been significantly more powerful with expansion chambers I believe, but the weak link was the lower unit, so they definitely didn't need the extra weight hanging off the transom when the motor already had enough power to tear up the lower unit anyway.

One thing I got to thinking about today. Dieter didn't like to hang anymore weight on a boat than necessary, yet he equipped that opposed 6 with a heavier battery and electric starter. Hans would start the motor and go out to a spot before the safety bouys and kill the motor. He would wait there until he figured he could fire it up and make a perfect start. He was very good at this. I have seen this motor twist a crank on the dock in Berlin when Hans wrapped it up just prior to "training" the day before the race. Dieter had to rebuild it overnight. I just realized this morning that the starter may have been added so that when they fired it off in the water, the motor would have had a load on it, thus not rev so quickly and caused the crank to shift.

I have some other pictures of the OE including a pit shot of Gunter Becker's. It will be several days before I can post them, but maybe Frank could answer your question. Also Lars Strom checks the thread and he raced one during 1977, so he would have some good info.

[dumperjack]

Do you know whether the O.E. engine that was modified for Volvo- Penta was built from the stock cast iron block or was it a completely different block ? I think I remember seeing a picture of one years ago with the hood off and it looked like it was an external rotary valve engine with 3 carbs.

new 1974 - 70 HP of series engines had high-quality cast irons

advantage: fewer weights, fewer noises, better temperature for burn

frank

[Dale]

new 1974 - 70 HP of series engines had high-quality cast irons

advantage: fewer weights, fewer noises, better temperature for burn

frank
That is the internal rotary valve stock 70 h.p. Volvo-Penta . Do you know if the powerhead was built in the Konig factory?

Dale

[stingray240cs]

Dale, there was a contract about cooperation between König and Volvo Penta. The powerheads came as I remember not directly from König. VP used them for the serial Archimedes and Volvo Penta 55 and 70 HP engines 1975-1979.
The racing OE engine was in the König selling prospect with Volvo Penta cover, that shows the close cooperation as well.
But lets wait for Frank´s comments to it - he is the best guy regarding german outboards history I know...
br
Roman

[stingray240cs]

See the pictures from the Archimedes selling brochure 1976 and König racing brochure 1977.

[Mark75H]

I believe Steve Litzell told me the cooperation turned out to favor Volvo much more than Konig.

I would like to hear his comments regarding this on this thread.

[Steve Litzell]

Yes the relationship between the two factory's was maybe better for Volvo than Konig, But Volvo did the remake and design of the gears for new Konig units that this agreement lasted until Konig's death 1991. This agreement was long time friendship between Konig and Volvo that goes back to just after war. I my other posts about Deiter, I try to explain about the man and what his early formative years were like as a young teenager and what Germans had to do to survive after the war. At the time 1970's, Konig was into about every type of motor making there was from pleasure boat use under his own brand to collaboration between his factory and Volvo Penta. Konig motors were used in boat, car, cart and plane. Though the Volvo looked more like his pleasure boat motors design wise than his all out race motors. I think this was done for rules meeting in OE at the time before it went back to methanol use in 80's time frame. This is when also Volvo backed out of outboards and Konig made the 850 OE 8 cylinder with a 500ccm motor on bottom and 350ccm motor on top. Mercury and OMC motors were allowed as were Konig motors as Deiter was able to to argue that he had made enough motors to meet the numbers produced rule to qualify for OE. Then rules changed again for circuit racing as opposed to marathon type racing. Methanol was then banned so Konig switched over to Gas. Then rules changed again to up the numbers produced rule and that put Konig out of OE class. I think I have this correct as I was told by Konig. In early 80"s aircraft motors were made and pleasure boat motors were also stopped production but factory continued to service them for customers. Then Konig sold Yamaha outboards as a pleasure boat type motor. Hope this helps. :D

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Very interesting Steve.

Cut now to a preview of coming attractions: Since this thread is widely read, I wish to now notify everyone of a breakthrough in the Claude Fox photos. I carried all but one volume of the DVD's to Joe Rome's yesterday and we were up until 11:30 going through all but the first one and last three. Joe's wife Karen found the type of file they were and downloaded a program that helped her open the files up. What I expected was to see a collection of pictures that appeared in "Roostertail". While there were a number of those, we found an awful lot of gems. Some might just about drop the jaws of viewers. Everytime we loaded a knew disc Karen had to come into the room to show Joe how to open the next one, but after the 4th one....we got it.

Sam will probably go GA GA after he sees some of the motors, and there are some certain famous boat racing people in their youth that people will appreciate. (I had to look at a young skinny Steve Litzell with Ralph Donald a couple of times for Joe to convince me it was Steve). As the majority of the photos opened up Joe said "Wow!" We knew who a lot of the AmPro guys like Mike O'Brien, Walter Curtois, and other's were, but many didn't have names on the photos and a lot of faces looked familiar but we couldn't figure out who they were. An AmPro guy sitting next to Joe most assuredly would have been saying "Wow!" The same goes for the OPC pictures, although we knew Billy Seebold, Art Kennedy and some of them.

I decided not to clutter up BRF with a one time announcement thread, but to just bring it to viewer's attention here, because there are a great many photos of young Dieter Konig. Some are like a few just recently posted on here, but there are many that Joe and I have never seen before. There are also a few shots with Dieter Schultze. And some very good pictures of some Konigs from back in the 50's.

These are pictures that Joe has talked to Marshall and others about to see if we could get ahold of to scan. Thanks to Bill and Janet Hosler who got Claude's albums from his wife last year and took the long time to scan them, that BRF members will be able to see many photos for the first time. There is a lot of work involved in downloading and sizing each pic for jpeg so it can be posted and we decided that we would leave the discs at Joe's for Karen to do when she can. Joe's idea is to put Pro, AmPro, and OPC in separate files and we can post them to view and comment on in thread separate Claude Fox NOA Photos threads. Or maybe we'lll just do it in order of the discs. But after Karen gets going we may have other ideas. In the meantime, just know that some fantastic stuff is headed this way.

[F-12]

Also.........question for Steve. Going throught some parts and ran on to a block labeled VB 91. The initials stamped in the block were 'SL'. Is this one of your builds? If this is the case, I feel the historic value for this motor is great as I don't know how many engines had the designation. Something for the living room if this is true.

[Steve Litzell]

gee Wayne i thought there were not any of me from back in the day as I wa a quite and shy type and yes was a light 160lbs in my senior year of high school. a few years later I put some muscle mass on and with 21" arms there was not a motor I could rope. I have proof of this in some old pictures as well. One were on time at Ralph"s house we were showing some old photos and I put down a photo of me, and Ralph and Shirley both asked " who is that?" Ralph"s daughter, Christie said it was me, and to the shock that she would know this, asked
"How can you tell?" and she said he has that same SH eating grin. Bill Van's wife aske me why once there were no pictures of me from the early Title Series races, and I said it was because I was a vampire and we could not be photographed. She said O yea? and took some pictures of me and none turned out for some reason or the other and she told me she thought maybe I was right about that vampire thing. All good fun eh? The reason I put on mass was to be like one of my roping hero's that I did not meet face to face until this last Nationals at DePue. We knew one another but did not meet if you know what I mean. That Hero is none other than Gene East. How's that for a strange story. :eek:

[Steve Litzell]

Also.........question for Steve. Going throught some parts and ran on to a block labeled VB 91. The initials stamped in the block were 'SL'. Is this one of your builds? If this is the case, I feel the historic value for this motor is great as I don't know how many engines had the designation. Something for the living room if this is true.

Yes Charlie it is true as it was one that I did over here in USA for warranty for Deiter. He asked me to do this to save money and speed up the time for racer to make races. There are a few with my stamp as that was not until I earned my degree with Konig to be a master of crankshaft and motor assembly. Before this I was allowed to do cranks and prepare blocks and fit heads, even do assembly, but Uli would stamp his initials UC on motors. Many myth's about this, one was there was a new guy at factory that put motors together and did not have initials on block. these motors always had problems with little things. When I asked about this I was told By Deiter and Uli both that these were the motors that Konig buit while Uli was on vacation, but typical absent minded professor style he would leave some thing loose. Always when working with Deiter there were interruptions and this is how things were left loose or not quite right.he would always ask me to check to be sure his work. This made me feel good that the "Master" would ask the 'Student" for this help. A very amazing man Deiter was as well as very Humble.:)

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Not only strange Steve, but great as well.:D Joe recognized you immediately. It was that same SH eating grin, then when Joe pointed it out I said "Oh Yeah." I can't understand though about how someone with the gift of gab you have ever could have been shy though. You did pick a good hero though. I'm glad you and Gene finally met. If they ever have a Roper's hall of fame, I think you Gene and Baldy could be inducted handily.

Now back to Charley's question: How about it Steve?

[F-12]

There was a time during Steve's 'evolution' that there was nothing he couldn't rope. One time ine DePue, Tim Butts tried to rope my D Konig and hurt his hand. Steve stepped up and got me out. Not to long after that, it was legend that Steve could 'Push start' any boat on the race course. Case in point. The pic I have on facebook, my Yamato 250 from John Steven's dad............Steve offered to help out and just spin the prop to get us going. Never know when he is serious or not..........but he probably could have done what he offered. Steve, it wouldn't have been the same without you. Thanks for all your help from the 60's until a few days ago............always a pleasure knowing you are close for that extra help to make us faster.

[Gene East]

gee Wayne i thought there were not any of me from back in the day as I wa a quite and shy type and yes was a light 160lbs in my senior year of high school. a few years later I put some muscle mass on and with 21" arms there was not a motor I could rope. I have proof of this in some old pictures as well. One were on time at Ralph"s house we were showing some old photos and I put down a photo of me, and Ralph and Shirley both asked " who is that?" Ralph"s daughter, Christie said it was me, and to the shock that she would know this, asked
"How can you tell?" and she said he has that same SH eating grin. Bill Van's wife aske me why once there were no pictures of me from the early Title Series races, and I said it was because I was a vampire and we could not be photographed. She said O yea? and took some pictures of me and none turned out for some reason or the other and she told me she thought maybe I was right about that vampire thing. All good fun eh? The reason I put on mass was to be like one of my roping hero's that I did not meet face to face until this last Nationals at DePue. We knew one another but did not meet if you know what I mean. That Hero is none other than Gene East. How's that for a strange story. :eek:

Steve,

Your comments are very much appreciated.

Thank you.

Gene

[Dale]

I found a good picture of the business side of the Volvo Konig. It is a lot more Konig than Volvo and I think the only Volvo part may be the hood.

[Dale]

The guy pointing towards the engine is Roger Jenkins. I won't try to guess what he is saying but does anybody know who that is standing next to him ?

[Master Oil Racing Team]

That looks like one of my photos taken at Spandau in Berlin 1977.

[wolfgang]

Despite having raced against the 3-cyl 65hp SE Konig (mainly in the form of the Hartmann/Tomczyk team), I have never seen their engine without the cowling. Does any of you Konig boffins out there possibly have a (brochure) photo of the 65hp Konig "fishing" motor sans cowling and how do these Volvo and Konig engines compare externally and in the internal dimensions? Wish I had one of these!

[Dale]

Wayne, I found 3 or 4 more pictures of the powerhead that you took in other threads, but don't know how to move them here without reposting them. How can I bring them into this thread ?
I didn't know Konig even made fishing motors before I read this thread. There is a lot of good history on this site.

Wolfgang, I would like to find one of these as well. I don't think any ever made it to this side of the water and from what I have read only 17 were made. How did you do against the 65h.p. Konig and what kind of engine were you using ?

[Mark75H]

Despite having raced against the 3-cyl 65hp SE Konig (mainly in the form of the Hartmann/Tomczyk team), I have never seen their engine without the cowling. Does any of you Konig boffins out there possibly have a (brochure) photo of the 65hp Konig "fishing" motor sans cowling and how do these Volvo and Konig engines compare externally and in the internal dimensions? Wish I had one of these!


Look here: http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5986&highlight=tornado&page=2


Scroll down to post #15: http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forums/showpost.php?p=95629&postcount=15

[wolfgang]

Wayne, I found 3 or 4 more pictures of the powerhead that you took in other threads, but don't know how to move them here without reposting them. How can I bring them into this thread ?
I didn't know Konig even made fishing motors before I read this thread. There is a lot of good history on this site.

Wolfgang, I would like to find one of these as well. I don't think any ever made it to this side of the water and from what I have read only 17 were made. How did you do against the 65h.p. Konig and what kind of engine were you using ?
Using a 15.5ft Grupstra (27degr.Vee) I came second at Karlshafen April `69, with hot 65hp OMC with racing lower unit from 115GT. That engine came directly from Bruges (thanks to Dr Hesse, Johnson distr. for Germany) at 2300hrs Saturday night before the Sunday race, after the old 55hp had succumbed to top seal failure. I changed the engines singlehandedly in the deliveries driveway of the hotel. I forgot to screw the thrust pad in by some two turns. Boat was very loose.
Same year `69, same engine, but brand new Dalla Pieta` hull and four new props from Sweden - winner 6 hours Liege on the old course thru town. One month later, last Sunday in October - winner 6 hours Berlin. Despite having received a tempting offer (job and sponsorship) from Dr Hesse I thought it wiser to proceed with my studies. First night-school and after compulsory army service, technical university.

[wolfgang]

Look here: http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5986&highlight=tornado&page=2


Scroll down to post #15: http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forums/showpost.php?p=95629&postcount=15
Thanks for the reminder, Sam. The 2 motors are really like chalk and cheese.
The 65hp Konig cowling was roundish and looked a bit like a heightened and blown-up 40hp Konig cowling. Somewhere in BRF I also saw one of the old style 28hp motors - with Bordeaux metallic std paintjob on the cowling.

[BRIAN HENDRICK]

I have a parts box here with a FA69 in it, but with a block with reed valves and 3rd ports. I did not think these FAs appeared until the late 70s???

[Steve Litzell]

I have a parts box here with a FA69 in it, but with a block with reed valves and 3rd ports. I did not think these FAs appeared until the late 70s???

Brian The motor you have is a real FA. It was just before Konig went to back to cast iron cylinders. It was a aluminum cylinder with Carburetor and exhaust on both sides like earlier cylinders but also had the reed like the late type. I have a brand new cylinder just like it. Std bore was 54.44. Steve

[David Weaver]

I have a parts box here with a FA69 in it, but with a block with reed valves and 3rd ports. I did not think these FAs appeared until the late 70s???

We still have a complete powerhead. Somewhere on site are photo's of this engine.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Here is some correspondence I got from Scott Smith.

[Mark75H]

A question for Steve ... I see some early VB's I guess with the older smaller lower unit like this ... I thought that was obsolete by the time the VB came out?

http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/hh194/mark75h/Other%20Sam/Konig1.jpg

Were they sold this way or was this a motor made by a racer upgrading by just buying a powerhead?

[Steve Litzell]

A question for Steve ... I see some early VB's I guess with the older smaller lower unit like this ... I thought that was obsolete by the time the VB came out?

http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/hh194/mark75h/Other%20Sam/Konig1.jpg

Were they sold this way or was this a motor made by a racer upgrading by just buying a powerhead?

This is the way they were sold as the split case units came sometime in mid to late 70's. Early FA's also had this type unit. In a letter from Scott in Wayne's post he talks about the new 14:14 unit with one piece gear and shaft I think dated 1978 or so. These one piece types would not last long after power came up on motors and many changed to new style. I have a 75VC with a unit made in 12/74. Konig used all of what he had, before selling new type anything in the way of units and motors.:D

[Jeff Lytle]

I knew she would show up sooner or later! :D

That's my old B Konig serial number VB6900, the engine Doug Thompson won the Nationals with in Hinton. When I sold it, it had the split case lower unit, other than that, it still looks exactly the same.

I sold it to a Canadian collector named John Porter after it had a major internal malfunction! :eek:

Who has it Sam? I still have some info from the Simons the new owner might find interesting.

[Mark75H]

Sam has it now in Maine. Maybe both came from Porter.

[Jeff Lytle]

Coming back to me now.........I removed the split case unit and replaced it with the unit you see now before I sold it to John. I had a fellow driver up this way who was having gear issues on his B, so I sold it to him. It was the latest style with the helical gears--No doubt a then recent addition added to the motor by the Simon's.

[Tim Chance]

I had a 1968 VC that came with the one piece gearcase. In '69 I hit something and broke the unit off and replaced it with a split case. I can't remember what the early VB's had though.

[Jeff Lytle]

Just in case you're wondering about the red painted heads..........Almost the entire powerhead was red at one time, except for the polished (dusty :cool:) areas you see here.
I asked Chuck Simon about the red, since it was originally his engine. He told me that red meant it was a B, C motors were painted blue, and I can't remember what he said about A's.

Any truth to this? I never heard of it before, or since. I just kept the red on the heads cause' I thought it looked kinda' cool.

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

Just in case you're wondering about the red painted heads..........Almost the entire powerhead was red at one time, except for the polished (dusty :cool:) areas you see here.
I asked Chuck Simon about the red, since it was originally his engine. He told me that red meant it was a B, C motors were painted blue, and I can't remember what he said about A's.

Any truth to this? I never heard of it before, or since. I just kept the red on the heads cause' I thought it looked kinda' cool.

Jeff,

Even the talented Simon brothers wouldn't have trouble differentiating between a 4 cylinder "B" & "C" from a 2 cylinder "FA"! LOL!!! but when the thimble sized piston "VA" came out, that's a different story.

[Jeff Lytle]

I figured that John :)

I always wondered bout' it though since I remember Chuck Howgate with a painted blue C.

[dumperjack]

i have the article found and become the words in the best possible way to translate.
i need something time for it.

könig motors building

a renowned berlin firm celebrates 50th birthday

has started all this with a lull, at which company founder and senior chef of the engine production company könig always black angry, when he and wife and sailboat on the lakes around berlin was traveling.
precisely in the evening, if he wanted to sail homeward, regularly slept the wind one.
they were rarely at home at the scheduled time.
practical thinker and technically gifted, as he now was, rudolf retired king back to his attic
and worked on his “pusher”, he should make it independent from the wind.
then came something special about out: a side-mounted two stroke motor, the great-grandfather of all royal (könig) motors.
as a könig with this stinking universal single copy was among the people, made his club mates initially mocking remark, on account of their limited technical experience, they thought that the side-mounted engine the boat only turn on the places, however, never move forward can.
But könig’s motor did exactly what the inventor wanted: he pushed him along with sailing boat back home, even without wind.
berliner people understand very quickly, said man …
now realized the boatclubfriends könig which meant the wind help.
everyone wanted to have suddenly a wind subsided helfer.
now he moved from the loft to do in the "oranienstrasse" (is a street name in the "western area" of berlin) and founded in 1927 in berlin a motor company.
there he built with his master “robert blankenfeld” outboard engine.
from then on, progress was rapid with könig.
already in the year 1934/35 it had reached an important goal for him: building a racing engine.
(here comes a paragraph of text that I would literally translate as much as possible, the reality but in my research in writing something different)
but soon it was with the "peaceful activities" to an end.
"adolf the brown" (adolf hitler) he had his previous "civilian" development work without reservation of the "service of the fatherland" provide.
commissioned in the "greater german military makes" he developed the legendary three-cylinder radial engine for storm-boats, and another motor for the navy.
at end of the war was rodolf könig with his company literally (read literally) fallen into the cellar (space under the house).
bomb had its engine factory paralyzed and laid in debris. but not for long.
there began rudolf könig with shovel and pickaxe spilled machines and tools to dig again, including a grinding machine, the very day their service makes.
soon had the "old" ready to run some. then, when some of its fixed employees were resumed, the company began to run again. there was a time of repairs paid for with food was.
lacustrian paid with the fish. bread with paying the "russians", They also könig as a ferryman on the "havel" (names of river) brought.
then again as the demand for new engines began, könig as representatives traveled through the land.
but not with a pattern-suitcase, as was customary, with backpack in which he gave a complete outboard as an exhibition piece carries with it.
now was könig junior, dieter tall. from the father he had the passion for engineering and construction inherited, he built for himself with 15 years a side boat motor on his bike.
the young dieter wanted the working start in the organization of the father, but the Father who sent him into the alien, "So that the young learn something real". apparently with success; because after a few years but he came back into operation the paternal, he now heads.
although it is a small company in relationship to the outboard giants from the usa and japan, but a company who claim’s himself.
the secret to success ?
probably it is because, that in a time of technology and automation the working world at könig
manageable and humane has remained.
this example is representative of the pensioner “karl nußbaum”.
a year ago was the meanwhile 77 year old pensioner at the factory came over and asked for work, the daily walk was too boring.
dieter könig put the learned a fine mechanic.
he was recognized by his colleagues, he praised the good working atmosphere.
if he is happy at his workbench provides one senses why so many people here have learned and still are.

[Per]

Dale, there was a contract about cooperation between König and Volvo Penta. The powerheads came as I remember not directly from König. VP used them for the serial Archimedes and Volvo Penta 55 and 70 HP engines 1975-1979.
The racing OE engine was in the König selling prospect with Volvo Penta cover, that shows the close cooperation as well.
But lets wait for Frank´s comments to it - he is the best guy regarding german outboards history I know...
br
Roman

A bit off topic but...

The Powerheads for VP700 / AP70 were built in Uppsala Sweden.

I have been told that the first prototype of the Volvo / König GTX700 engine had a cast iron block and the rest were all aluminum.

If anybody would like to se some pics of the inside of an almost stock VP700 from -79

Go here!
http://picasaweb.google.se/kvicken34/RenoveringVolvoPentaVP700?feat=directlink

//Per

[Mark75H]

Awesome! Thanks Per!

[wolfgang]

Many thanks Per. Highly interesting for us motorheads. Are you going to dyno the motor after completion/running in? Or alternatively will you be able to give us some on-boat performance numbers? What make pistons/rings will you be installing? What props are these? In `69 I bought four props from Swedish company Man A/B (not related to German MAN), after getting their contact details from those Swedes who were racing the NSU Wankels in 2ltr inboard class. Very good props, but it appears Man A/B are not in business anymore?

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Wow! Fantastic layout of photos Per. How long was the motor sitting before the teardown?

[Per]

Thanks for the kind words!

Hopefully I will be able to at least give you some "on boat performance report" once the boat I'm working on is back on the water. It might take a while though...

Pistons and rings will be VP items.
As the block was bored to the second oversize I had huge trouble finding even a good looking used piston for that hole. I will use the original ones in cyl #1 and 3.
Rings are NOS.

The two round ear props are Rakers but the Cleaver is a bit of a mystery, there are no markings except for pitch and diam. Anybody recognize it?

Never heard of MAN AB, must check that company with some old racer!

I'm not really sure how long the engine been sitting. I bought a "pile" of VP700 parts from a small local outboard repair shop and the engine was part of the deal. There were no signs of rust anywhere though so it must have been used a couple of years ago.

As far as know these engines where never used in racing but I'm planning to build a "classic racer" with a Swedish boat AND motor. That might draw some attention if i ever get finished...

[Dale]

Per, thanks for the answers and the pictures. French Creek Marine bought most of the the left over inventory of V.P. outboard parts in the U.S about 12 or 13 yrs ago. I have no idea what they have left, but if you need any parts you could give them a try :http://frenchcreekmarina.com/service.htm

Dale

[Per]

Thanks Dale!
Will give them a try next time I need some hard to find part.
//Per

[Tim Kurcz]

A bit off topic but...

The Powerheads for VP700 / AP70 were built in Uppsala Sweden.

I have been told that the first prototype of the Volvo / König GTX700 engine had a cast iron block and the rest were all aluminum.

If anybody would like to se some pics of the inside of an almost stock VP700 from -79

Go here!
http://picasaweb.google.se/kvicken34/RenoveringVolvoPentaVP700?feat=directlink

//Per

Hello Per,

A fascinating engine valving concept - thanks for the picasa link. Can you please post an image (or two) of the exhaust ports from the outside in? Also, it appears the grindings are cast iron. Is this the/a prototype? Good luck with your project!

Tim

[Per]

Tim,
I don't have any pics of of the ex-ports looking in and I think that a photo like that might require a small mirror (and a steady hand:) ). I'm going to my work shop tomorrow and I will give it a try!
What are you hooping to see? I might be able to give you the answer in writing instead.

This is not the prototype of the GTX, all production engines were cast iron, a reall shame in my opinion since most of these engines have seized because Volvo Penta didn't use any coating in the water passages and after a while they contain more rust than water....

The early engines had a aluminum head that looks just some of the heads in the pictures from Königs work shop, later engines has cast iron heads and and a hose from the waterjacket around the exhaust.
-77 a jubilee serie engine was released, it had tighter heads, revised ignition timing and rejetted carbs, These changes where then used under the last two years of production.
The early engines produced 67hp @ 5600 (acc to the workshop manual)
The Jubilee engine is listed with the same output but acc to an old VP employe it was closer to 75 (all crank hp of course...)

Luckily this powerhead is from the last year of production and the seems to have galvanized (spelling?) the block before machining.

Maybe I should start a new thread about these engines? Even though König was involved in the design it is not a König engine, Opinions please!?

Per

[Tim Kurcz]

Hello Per,

Thank you - your response answers my question indirectly: If you need a mirror to view the exhaust duct, it must be internally cast. I was hoping it might be external to see how VP joined the widely spaced exhaust ports.

Looking more closely at your powerhead base image, the flat exhaust side cover now makes sense - it's only a water jacket. If my interpretation of your images and question is correct there is no need for right angle images the merge is hidden.

It's a shame an iron block was used. Your assessment about rust causing poor heat transfer is right on. In your engine the middle cylinder took more damage than the top and bottom. Is this typical of this design?

Question: Is the middle cylinder fed partly through both carburetors? If so, might this cylinder run lean due to reduced pulse strength? If so, this may contribute to the overheat problem.

Regardless, this is a very clever, simple, and compact design. Best of luck with your overhaul. Please post images of reassembly. Thanks again for responding.

Tim

BTW - Nice hand work!

[Per]

Hello Tim,
You are correct in all your interpretations!
The exhaust is internaly cast.
The exhaust ports enters into a almost straight tapered pipe. So there are no separate primary pipe at all.
If you were refering to the spacing of the ports in one cylinder:
The divider looks pretty much like a enlongaded (spelling?) D. The first enige that I overhauled actually had a water passage through it...

Judging by the engines I've seen I would say you might be right about the lean out effect in the middle cylinder, the intake porting is different from #1 & 3 (shorter than the other) but of course twice the area.
The fact that it is so compact must contribut to the risk of over heating too I think.

The engine block and crank is already put togheter and there are no pics of that for the simple reason that I had no spare hand during that operation:)
There will be more pics though...

Thanks for asking!
Without questions there would be nothing written about it.

Per

[dumperjack]

day after tomorrow, before 20 years ago died Dieter Koenig....

the accident was on 16.08.1991, the following day he died in hospital.

on a small airfield near Berlin (the name of small city: Saarmund), he fell off during a test flight.

he tested an ultra-light flight - engine.

[Lars Strom]

I have many good memories from racing with Dieter Konig.
This is Paris 6 hours..and the red arrow is Dieter.

Joachim Mareth was my co-pilot for the race..(Dieters sisters son)..
We raced my Molinari with a Volvo Penta/König in the OE class.


Thanks for everything Dieter and R.I.P.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Great photo Lars. And to the left of Dieter and behind your plexiglass windshield is Dieter's son Peter, and to the left of Peter is your co-driver Joachim Mareth. Dieter was a loss to the boat racing community, and to those of us who knew him....a good friend. His mind constantly thought motors and boat racing. He was a one of a kind type of person. In spite of the fact that he was very successful at thinking of improvements on his motors, and making it work, he was a humble man. Dieter always strived to please, and be accomodating.

Lars....I think you will be very interested in Tim Hanna's book which was recently published and contains a lot of interesting stories about Dieter and Kim Newcomb's quest to build a name for Konig as a top manufacturer of motorcycle engines. I will have more information after I get my copy of the book. It has some interesting insights on Dieter I had not heard before.

[wolfgang]

The winged Konig boat didn't establish any records that I know of. I suspect the motor on it is the opposed 6 Konig. I think young Mssrs Konig & Krage would be good sources on this.


The Konig/Ford V-6 was the same hp as the Merc in 1969, but weighed twice as much as the Merc. The price was almost 13,000DM, I don't know how that compared to the Merc at the time.

There was also a 70hp with a 4 cylinder Renault.

The price for the Konig/Ford V-6 must be seen in the context that the Ford Capri RS2600 hit the roads in that selfsame year at DM 10000 flat. Dieter exhibited his 2-stroke
6-cylinder on his unusual boat in the pits during the Berlin 6-hours of `69, Saturday only, not far from where H Tinscher and I had parked our Dalla Pieta` 850cc SE boat. I remember the 6-cylinder as a 60-degree V6, but I may be wrong.

[Smokin' Joe]

day after tomorrow, before 20 years ago died Dieter Koenig....

the accident was on 16.08.1991, the following day he died in hospital.

on a small airfield near Berlin (the name of small city: Saarmund), he fell off during a test flight.

he tested an ultra-light flight - engine.

A week ago our son Hans and I visited Holger Arens at his factory in east Berlin. We'll post photos and a story later. He told us that the König factory is still there on Friedrich Olbricht Damm, the doors were simply shut when Dieter died, and that son Peter König occasionally sells some motor parts to König enthusiasts. That was during our annual vacation on the east German island Hiddensee ne of Berlin.

On the way back from Hiddensee to Austria yesterday we stopped and (with Wayne Baldwin's help with the address) finally found the factory's back entrance just before Peter and his sister Marion were about to drive away. I immediately recognized Peter from photos of Dieter. Peter asked who am I, noticed my Johnson cap, and was immediately very friendly (as was Marion) to an old boat racer. They had a duty to perform but nevertheless took time to show us the factory (I didn't find out if they speak English, but having grown up in west Berlin I assume that they do). As we walked inside the factory I said to Peter 'Wir sind auf heilige Grund' ('We're on holy ground'). When he took me into the test room he finally responded, 'Jetzt sind wir auf heilige Grund' ('Now we're on holy ground'). There were a pair of expansion chambers attached to a hose to send the exhaust out of the building. I didn't see the dyno but it was surely there. In another room we looked at rows of blocks and powerheads, a few with v-block reeds (experimental) but most with rotary valves. There were also the air cooled plane motors. Near the end Marion brought out a box of props, König, Wald (east German) and Dewald. There was an unworked König prop casting among the lot. Peter vaguely recalls being with his father once when the metal was poured (Marion thinks the molds may still exist) but he doesn't recall the foundry. The König prop has a blade shape that I'd build, so I bought it. I don't know which class motor it fits, will put it on my pitch gauge when I get back to Houston and then Wayne can tell me the class. It was a very pleasant and important experience for me to see the old factory, rows of parts complete with machines. Peter didn't want photos made of the machines because of what he saw as Unordnung. My German wife took one photo, she didn't hear him say that, and the machine shop looked fine to both of us.

The first photo shows the front, today, of the former factory building. The König entrance is at rear. Between the used car business and König is a small metal works. Wayne has posted (pg. 1) a photo of the front of the building from 1977, and fantastic photos from the inside. Presumably, that was during Wayne's trip to Berlin when he and Dieter went to a race in Austria on the Donau/Danube. I didn't ask Peter and Marion if the rent out the rest of the building, or simply sold it.

I told Peter I'll try to visit again next summer. Marion was kind enough to give me a stack of König decals before we left, now I'll have to put them on a JohnRude! Unless there are enough parts left in the stock to assemble a complete König. I'm wondering if the old 3 cyl. 500 cc model might be possible but would settle for a Boxer.... .

As an anecdote, I told Peter I was a factory-trained Mercury mechanic at age 14 and cringed every time I saw a König speed record listed in the NOA record book. that brought a smile.

Joe McCauley

PS I learned later via email that Peter is fluent in English.

[Smokin' Joe]

I took the first three photos, the rest were taken by my wife, Cornelia Küffner.
Our 29 year old son, Hans, on the website is 'May Fly III'.
The nice finished prop shown is the König design that I bought yesterday.
Peter stated that Dieter made a pitch gauge (shown below) and that he
found that most props have pitch variation from one blade to another (true, excepting
Mercury, thanks to the Dick Snyder tradition). Dieter found that he could pick up speed just by getting the pitch (distribution) equal on all blades, but his blade shape is also decidedly better than that of many if not most racing props made today.

Did they carry hydros over to the canal (shown below) for testing?

For an update on what's going on today in Berlin in outboard manufacturing, look for my next post on 'Arens Motorenbau'.




day after tomorrow, before 20 years ago died Dieter Koenig....

the accident was on 16.08.1991, the following day he died in hospital.

on a small airfield near Berlin (the name of small city: Saarmund), he fell off during a test flight.

he tested an ultra-light flight - engine.

[Mike Schmidt]

Posts like this are the reason there is a Boat Racing Facts....Joe: Great job, great photo's. The flat 4 with reeds and Rotax style porting would have been very interesting.

Peter looks so much like his dad.....

Michael D-1

[Smokin' Joe]

Posts like this are the reason there is a Boat Racing Facts....Joe: Great job, great photo's. The flat 4 with reeds and Rotax style porting would have been very interesting.

Peter looks so much like his dad.....

Michael D-1

You're ahead of me, Mike. For reeds, rotax cyl. and pistons see my forthcoming Arens post.

Arens is still aactive and has a new direct injected rotary valve race motor they want to detune and produce as sport boat motor.

Best,
Joe

[Smokin' Joe]

One of the BMW/König 2-stroke bikes is still in the factory, Peter uncovered it briefly yesterday..



That was a good story Tim. I'm trying to picture where that happened. Since I started posting pics of the factory, I've been trying to remember the floor plan. I have a general idea, but some parts are fuzzy. Dieter never pointed out Tim's bench to me that I can remember, but I figure it was where the motorcycles were. These pics were taken in poor lighting and I didn't have my flash. Color balance is all wrong and I wasn't really trying to take good pics....just snapping some pics of Dieter with the bikes. I really didn't know anything about them. I just took some for posterity. Now, I wish I would have done more detail pics. So sorry about the quality, but maybe you can pick up something here you were curious about. I'm sure the motor was for a bike, although this one doesn't have the heads with the angled spark plug holes. I think that came a year or two later. These were taken in February 1975. The exhaust system I think is related to the bikes, but I'm not positive. This is the same type of guts that you would find inside the "can" exhaust. In Europe they slid them. The few short years we ran the "cans", we just fixed them close to the top end setting. I have some other pics of these bikes, one showing a different exhaust system with pipes on both sides. I will post them later.

I had responded a few days earlier regarding what happened to Jerry Waldman. Some of the dates were wrong and I merely planned to insert the correct date, plus a brief background and description of what happened. I got carried away when my mind drifted back to that tragic day and I spent over an hour going into detail about what we were up to with Jerry, his success with Quincy and the details of the most frightening half lap I ever ran. I knew I would be logged out by the time I was ready to post, but I knew how to get back in to get it posted.......except one stupid finger hit an extra key while I typed in my password and that killed everything. Writing that took it all out of me and I didn't have the mental energy to do it again. You can find out more detail by looking around in other threads on BRF.

I look forward to more of your info on Kim and connection with Dieter Tim. I will try to fix the tape as well as look into my journal from that visit to the factory in 1975.

ADD: Now that the pics are posted I took another look at the heads and they do appear to be the ones for the angle plugs only these holes were drilled straight.

[Smokin' Joe]

Very nice, Sam! I read recently that the remains of the König factory went to the Czec Republic, and that the new style motors are manufactured under the name Konny (and are sold in Atlanta).


The mistake written above is now corrected. Konny got none of the König factory.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Fantastic Joe. I got your e mail and the article looks very interesting. Have to find my glasses first to read it. Very happy you were able to find the factory, and look forward to future posts. Peter looks more like Dieter now than when I last saw him. Germans were very interested in American cowboys and indians. On one of my trips I brought some arrowheads I had found and gave them to some of my friends in Berlin, including Peter. When I saw him in 1993 he didn't remember me, as he was too young in the 70's, but he did remember the arrowhead.:)

[Smokin' Joe]

Fantastic Joe. I got your e mail and the article looks very interesting. Have to find my glasses first to read it. Very happy you were able to find the factory, and look forward to future posts. Peter looks more like Dieter now than when I last saw him. Germans were very interested in American cowboys and indians. On one of my trips I brought some arrowheads I had found and gave them to some of my friends in Berlin, including Peter. When I saw him in 1993 he didn't remember me, as he was too young in the 70's, but he did remember the arrowhead.:)

Wayne, Here's the pitch distribution of the König-built prop I bought. Taking pitch at mid-chord it's a 7x13 with 15mm propshaft dia. Can you identify the motor/class?
Rake is 0 degrees as expected for a hydro, with -1 degree on one blade. I saw Dieter's self-made pitch gauge but did not see a separate rake gauge. Given the slightly large pitch distribution/variation from leading to trailing edge I doubt that this prop was a winner. It does have a hydrodynamically-beautiful blade shape.

I see that you held several records with Königs ca. 1985 with larger motors. What was the 100 cc motor?

Joe

[Master Oil Racing Team]

It's not just simply the diameter and pitch to identify the motor and class Joe. Marshall Grant had one prop that turned out to be his best prop for the 350cc (OB class), 700cc (OD class) and 825cc (OE claass) motors. How can this be you ask. The B class ran either a 12:15 or 12:14 gear ratio lower unit, the D ran a 15:16 lower unit and the E (or F class as we called it in the U.S., ran a 1:1 lower unit.

I pulled out my test book and will look at some examples of the best props we ran. That 7 X 13 would run on a B, but it also would work with other classes as I mentioned.

My first competition record was at Alexandria in 1967 in A hydro. I set at B hydro record at Alex the following year. Over the years I set a number of competition records that were broken before the year ended so the last guy went into the books. On a good day at Alexandria, it was common for a half dozen records to be set only to be broken in the second heat, many times by the same driver who upped the previous record. Of my proudest accomplishments with records were two that we set with competition setups. In 1976 we averaged a little over 110 mph with the same setup but different boat that we won the world championship with and in 1979 we went a little over 105 mph. These were both kilo records and reflected what the hydros could do on a race course like Alex or Dayton when the water was good. We used the same props we raced with on 1 1/4 mile courses. That is.....with good acceleration...not a long wind up to enter the traps. We did this just to find out how fast we were running in good conditions. When boat development lagged behind engine horsepower no one was constesting the records of the bigger bore alky classes and we knew from our Kellers that we were within range of the old records.

Another accomplishment we were proud of is being the first boat to average over 80mph on a 1 1/4 mile course. Of course inboards didn't have records for that size course, but ALL outboards did. We were the first. Jerry Kirts went over 80 later that year at Alex. so he went into the books. The records you might have been referring to Joe were probalby the competition records I set at Yelm in 1976 and 1980. One was with a 700cc Konig and the other was an 825cc Konig, and remarkably the records were exactly the same...90.817 for the 700 and 1100 cc hydro class I was hoping to be the first outboard to break 100 mph average in competition, but there was no testing at either of the surveyed 1 2/3rds miles courses where that might be possible. My last shot was at Yelm in 1980 where I got a terrible start and the 90.817 was because the first lap was around 88mph, the second was 93 or so and the last lap was a little over 96, but it was all I could do to keep the boat on the water. I kept the throttle wide open, but feathered the pipes up and down to keep from blowing over. If we could have had just an hour on the water we could have broken 100. The two guys who came closer than I did were the late Jim Stone, and Todd Brinkman, Jr. Jim averaged 99 the year he was killed and Todd was averaging over 100 when he blew over on the final few hundred feet to the finish. Sorry to ramble on, but...you asked....and I got flooded with memories looking up some info

Be back with some stats on props later tonite or maybe tommorrow. Have to head to Corpus for fried speckled trout with my father in law and nephew and his wife who came to visit from East Texas.

[Smokin' Joe]

Wayne,

Very nice, thanks! What was the 1100cc motor? Peter thinks there are enough
parts to build a 250 cc motor but warned that the driver must be light (<75 kg)
and must work the pipes a lot. I didn't realize how much more you guys had to do while
steering and trying to keep the hydro on the water! Arens showed me a 'mod-vp' type
tunnel that's run, I guess, with 850 cc motors. The mod vp was a v-bottom with
sponsons added, sponsons lower than the pad. He said it came to the point where, one weekend, one death with hydros. I can believe that at 100 mph and better. The tunnel has a safety capsule.

Speckled trout ...., not bad.

In the old photo where you're walking out of the water after a heat you look like some movie star, J. Bridges or the like.

I didn't know to ask Peter if Margit is still alive. Seems that Peter and Marion are close, and close to the old factory.

Joe




It's not just simply the diameter and pitch to identify the motor and class Joe. Marshall Grant had one prop that turned out to be his best prop for the 350cc (OB class), 700cc (OD class) and 825cc (OE claass) motors. How can this be you ask. The B class ran either a 12:15 or 12:14 gear ratio lower unit, the D ran a 15:16 lower unit and the E (or F class as we called it in the U.S., ran a 1:1 lower unit.

I pulled out my test book and will look at some examples of the best props we ran. That 7 X 13 would run on a B, but it also would work with other classes as I mentioned.

My first competition record was at Alexandria in 1967 in A hydro. I set at B hydro record at Alex the following year. Over the years I set a number of competition records that were broken before the year ended so the last guy went into the books. On a good day at Alexandria, it was common for a half dozen records to be set only to be broken in the second heat, many times by the same driver who upped the previous record. Of my proudest accomplishments with records were two that we set with competition setups. In 1976 we averaged a little over 110 mph with the same setup but different boat that we won the world championship with and in 1979 we went a little over 105 mph. These were both kilo records and reflected what the hydros could do on a race course like Alex or Dayton when the water was good. We used the same props we raced with on 1 1/4 mile courses. That is.....with good acceleration...not a long wind up to enter the traps. We did this just to find out how fast we were running in good conditions. When boat development lagged behind engine horsepower no one was constesting the records of the bigger bore alky classes and we knew from our Kellers that we were within range of the old records.

Another accomplishment we were proud of is being the first boat to average over 80mph on a 1 1/4 mile course. Of course inboards didn't have records for that size course, but ALL outboards did. We were the first. Jerry Kirts went over 80 later that year at Alex. so he went into the books. The records you might have been referring to Joe were probalby the competition records I set at Yelm in 1976 and 1980. One was with a 700cc Konig and the other was an 825cc Konig, and remarkably the records were exactly the same...90.817 for the 700 and 1100 cc hydro class I was hoping to be the first outboard to break 100 mph average in competition, but there was no testing at either of the surveyed 1 2/3rds miles courses where that might be possible. My last shot was at Yelm in 1980 where I got a terrible start and the 90.817 was because the first lap was around 88mph, the second was 93 or so and the last lap was a little over 96, but it was all I could do to keep the boat on the water. I kept the throttle wide open, but feathered the pipes up and down to keep from blowing over. If we could have had just an hour on the water we could have broken 100. The two guys who came closer than I did were the late Jim Stone, and Todd Brinkman, Jr. Jim averaged 99 the year he was killed and Todd was averaging over 100 when he blew over on the final few hundred feet to the finish. Sorry to ramble on, but...you asked....and I got flooded with memories looking up some info

Be back with some stats on props later tonite or maybe tommorrow. Have to head to Corpus for fried speckled trout with my father in law and nephew and his wife who came to visit from East Texas.

[dumperjack]

I didn't know to ask Peter if Margit is still alive.

yes, dieter his sister is still alive.
we (klassik-boote), had contact with her.
they gave us information from the old story of könig.
unfortunately we can not get good contact with Peter.
thanks for the pictures of the old production site of könig motore.
I would quite like to see with my own eyes.
there are over here in Germany too many royal wrong and bad information.

pictures in the notes of the memorial

[Smokin' Joe]

yes, dieter his sister is still alive.
we (klassik-boote), had contact with her.
they gave us information from the old story of könig.
unfortunately we can not get good contact with Peter.
thanks for the pictures of the old production site of könig motore.
I would quite like to see with my own eyes.
there are over here in Germany too many royal wrong and bad information.

pictures in the notes of the memorial

Where (in Berlin?) is the memorial? Did they carry hydros across Saatwinkler Damm to
test in the canal beneath? We should come into contact. My wife is German, I speak German, I've spent 80% of my time in the last ten years in Austria and Germany. My contact with Peter is good, I think, I may go back next summer and try to put together a motor. I'll be in Texas until next June, then back to Austria for the summer.

jmccauley@uh.edu

http://mccauleyandson.com/index.html

[dumperjack]

The memorial stone is located in Berlin, on the grounds of the "MRC".

Here is a link:

http://www.mrc-berlin.com/rennsport_e/dieter_koenig.html

[1100r]

Thanks to all involved for putting all the information/articles and pictures up of the factory and the memorial of Dieter.
Very nice to see and read
Thanks,
Todd

[Smokin' Joe]

Thanks to all involved for putting all the information/articles and pictures up of the factory and the memorial of Dieter.
Very nice to see and read
Thanks,
Todd

It was my pleasure. I'd like to have stayed longer in the factory but we had 10 hrs. more
to drive to Austria and two of us had to fly back to Houston less than two days later. As I said, I hope to be motivat3ed enough to go back next summer.

Joe

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Thanks for the photos of the memorial Dumperjack and the photos of the Friends of Dieter. I had seen pictures of the memorial before, but not from the additional angles nor the Friends of Dieter. I knew most of those guys.

Our website provider went down for a couple of days, so sorry to respond so late Joe. There was not an 1100 cc Konig. That was an American class created to keep the 6 cylinder Mercs in the mix. That would have been the old F class. OF in UIM is a max of 1000 cc,s and we wanted to keep the 6 cylinder loopers and deflectors racing, plus a little allowance for overboring to clean up cylinders.

As far as testing on the canal, I can't remember exactly where it was, but it was close to the factory, though not across the street. Seems like we loaded a boat on the roof of Dieter's Mercedes then went a short way down Saatwinkler Damm where there was a ramp that led down to the water. It was very narrow and my first lap, I was unable to make the turn and had to kill the engine and drift up against the sloped cobblestone embankment. The next attempt I dropped the sponsons back in the water, and when it slowed enough, I jerked the wheel hard and almost all the way to the left while at the same time getting back hard on the throttle and that caused the prop to break loose. Then I could just spin the back around until I got aimed the right direction and back off so the prop could bite again. Kind of like getting a cavitation started, then feathering the throttle to take back off. Takes a little practice. Hans Krage was a master in that canal.

Now to the props. I did some research in our test book and unfortunately not all the prop info is there. Most of our best props were Seebold and Hopkins. Testing revealed that some of the best props weren't working that great all the time depending on the set up. Although we started running a couple of 3 bladed cleavers at the end of our career, I don't have any data on them. I think that your prop would be worth a good look on a C (500cc hydro) with a 15:16 lower unit or a B (350cc hydro) with a 15:16 lower unit. Maybe even a D (600cc hydro or the American class 700cc hydro) with a 15:16 lower unit.

Our Hopkins BRG1- PC11 prop worked good on a B with a 12:14 and C with 15:16. It was considered 7 X 13 with measurements of 12 1/2--11 1/2---14 7/8 across both blades. It was one of the few props that measured identical on each blade.

Hopkins BRG1-PKD 66 also ran good on both B and C with same gear ratios as above. It was a 7 X 13 measuring 12 11 and 14 1/2 on one blade and 12 1/2 11 1/2 and 14 1/2 on the other blade.

One of Marshall Grant's props.( K4-10), that ran good on our 4 carb, dual rotary valve engine with a 1:1 lower unit was a 6 7/8 diameter prop with blade readings of 11 10 7/8 15 and 11 11 7/8 15.

We had a lot of success with a Hopkins CDH prop, a Hopkins Baldy 4, a Seebold Super D Konig, and a Seebold 113 ssc that was a 7 X 13, but infortunately I don't have any other data for comparison on those.

[Smokin' Joe]

Thanks for the photos of the memorial Dumperjack and the photos of the Friends of Dieter. I had seen pictures of the memorial before, but not from the additional angles nor the Friends of Dieter. I knew most of those guys.

Our website provider went down for a couple of days, so sorry to respond so late Joe. There was not an 1100 cc Konig. That was an American class created to keep the 6 cylinder Mercs in the mix. That would have been the old F class. OF in UIM is a max of 1000 cc,s and we wanted to keep the 6 cylinder loopers and deflectors racing, plus a little allowance for overboring to clean up cylinders.

As far as testing on the canal, I can't remember exactly where it was, but it was close to the factory, though not across the street. Seems like we loaded a boat on the roof of Dieter's Mercedes then went a short way down Saatwinkler Damm where there was a ramp that led down to the water. It was very narrow and my first lap, I was unable to make the turn and had to kill the engine and drift up against the sloped cobblestone embankment. The next attempt I dropped the sponsons back in the water, and when it slowed enough, I jerked the wheel hard and almost all the way to the left while at the same time getting back hard on the throttle and that caused the prop to break loose. Then I could just spin the back around until I got aimed the right direction and back off so the prop could bite again. Kind of like getting a cavitation started, then feathering the throttle to take back off. Takes a little practice. Hans Krage was a master in that canal.

Now to the props. I did some research in our test book and unfortunately not all the prop info is there. Most of our best props were Seebold and Hopkins. Testing revealed that some of the best props weren't working that great all the time depending on the set up. Although we started running a couple of 3 bladed cleavers at the end of our career, I don't have any data on them. I think that your prop would be worth a good look on a C (500cc hydro) with a 15:16 lower unit or a B (350cc hydro) with a 15:16 lower unit. Maybe even a D (600cc hydro or the American class 700cc hydro) with a 15:16 lower unit.

Our Hopkins BRG1- PC11 prop worked good on a B with a 12:14 and C with 15:16. It was considered 7 X 13 with measurements of 12 1/2--11 1/2---14 7/8 across both blades. It was one of the few props that measured identical on each blade.

Hopkins BRG1-PKD 66 also ran good on both B and C with same gear ratios as above. It was a 7 X 13 measuring 12 11 and 14 1/2 on one blade and 12 1/2 11 1/2 and 14 1/2 on the other blade.

One of Marshall Grant's props.( K4-10), that ran good on our 4 carb, dual rotary valve engine with a 1:1 lower unit was a 6 7/8 diameter prop with blade readings of 11 10 7/8 15 and 11 11 7/8 15.

We had a lot of success with a Hopkins CDH prop, a Hopkins Baldy 4, a Seebold Super D Konig, and a Seebold 113 ssc that was a 7 X 13, but infortunately I don't have any other data for comparison on those.


Hi Wayne, thanks for the detailed reply on turning in the canal (!) and the props. I was at the OPC nationals for 4 days, worked much of the time on props. Had only two successes there but I saw Jim Booe for the first time since 1981 (Havasu), he talked long with me beside a table where my pitch gauges were used, and he told me two things, one really crucial, that I hadn't thought about. It's the sort of thing that makes me wish my legs were long enough to kick myself, because I know a lot about boat bottoms but never thought to apply all that knowledge to the high pressure face of a prop blade. 'D' in physics there for me, 'A' for Jim Booe!

I've written an article for the Antique Outboarder about our König and Arens factory visits and would like to quote you on how you turned in the canal! Hae you done anything with the König you bought? Best, Joe

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Feel free to quote me Joe, but I'm not sure that was the best way.:) It was the only way I figured I could do it having never driven a boat rigged that way before. I can't remember exactly how the steering was now, but it was very direct. I could not have turned one of my boats that way unless I had one of those "knuckle knockers" or whatever the 50's high school hot rodders had on the steering wheels of their 57 Chevy's. It would probably take a turn and a half of the steering wheel or so in one of my boats. I'm thinking that there was no pulley on the steering bar. What ever you spooled up on the drum turning left was directly fed back to the steering bar on the right without having been run through a pulley and tied off at the cockpit. This would be direct steering like with a rope tied to the front axle of a homemade derby car. I might be wrong about that setup, and maybe Steve Litzell could correct it, but the technique I used to get around a single pin in a narrow chute seemed to work O.K.

As far as the Konig goes, I tried cleaning the outside with different chemicals, but the rough casting and decades of castor oil baked and gummed in made it very hard. I didn't want to polish it smooth and I didn't want to disassemble it and soak it in some stuff Paul Christner told me about that would do the job. Then I thought that if I just cleaned the worst bit of it off and left the castor oil down in the niches, crannies, and lowest parts of the casting then there would still be a little bit left of Marshall Grant, my racing team, Harry Bartolomei, and the other owners left on it. I painted the stacks and elbows black, as well as the original style coils. I cleaned up the tower housing, but I have not found the seals and bearings for the lower unit yet. I got busy in the oilfield and have not yet gotten a bracket made to hang on the wall. I have the powerhead stored in my darkroom to keep it out of the dust. I do need to get the bracket made so I can put it all together.

You know Joe, I have thought about some things we could have done back in the day had we thought about it. A lot of the ideas have come from BRF members. Sometimes they say things that make you think, and you could have applied it to something you were having problems with. I still have a horsepower producing idea in my mind that would be legal and I think would significantly increase horsepower, but no one on our team had the ability or equipment to build it, and we didn't trust any outside source. It was toward the end of our racing career so we never tried it on boats, although it worked well in an oilfield application.

[ProHydroRacer]

Feel free to quote me Joe, but I'm not sure that was the best way.:) It was the only way I figured I could do it having never driven a boat rigged that way before. I can't remember exactly how the steering was now, but it was very direct. I could not have turned one of my boats that way unless I had one of those "knuckle knockers" or whatever the 50's high school hot rodders had on the steering wheels of their 57 Chevy's. It would probably take a turn and a half of the steering wheel or so in one of my boats. I'm thinking that there was no pulley on the steering bar. What ever you spooled up on the drum turning left was directly fed back to the steering bar on the right without having been run through a pulley and tied off at the cockpit. This would be direct steering like with a rope tied to the front axle of a homemade derby car. I might be wrong about that setup, and maybe Steve Litzell could correct it, but the technique I used to get around a single pin in a narrow chute seemed to work O.K.

As far as the Konig goes, I tried cleaning the outside with different chemicals, but the rough casting and decades of castor oil baked and gummed in made it very hard. I didn't want to polish it smooth and I didn't want to disassemble it and soak it in some stuff Paul Christner told me about that would do the job. Then I thought that if I just cleaned the worst bit of it off and left the castor oil down in the niches, crannies, and lowest parts of the casting then there would still be a little bit left of Marshall Grant, my racing team, Harry Bartolomei, and the other owners left on it. I painted the stacks and elbows black, as well as the original style coils. I cleaned up the tower housing, but I have not found the seals and bearings for the lower unit yet. I got busy in the oilfield and have not yet gotten a bracket made to hang on the wall. I have the powerhead stored in my darkroom to keep it out of the dust. I do need to get the bracket made so I can put it all together.

You know Joe, I have thought about some things we could have done back in the day had we thought about it. A lot of the ideas have come from BRF members. Sometimes they say things that make you think, and you could have applied it to something you were having problems with. I still have a horsepower producing idea in my mind that would be legal and I think would significantly increase horsepower, but no one on our team had the ability or equipment to build it, and we didn't trust any outside source. It was toward the end of our racing career so we never tried it on boats, although it worked well in an oilfield application.

I use Castoroil Super Clean, can be found at most auto part stores and sometime at Wal-Mart. Don't use on painted surfaces!!
Bill

[A/B Speedliner]

This VB70 Konig was castor stuck when purchased and the outside was also pretty nasty. I soaked it in t tub of kerosene for three weeks, took it apart and wiped it down with dry cotton rags. I painted the elbows and support black, replace ignition and down.

[Mark75H]

Sort of belongs on it's own castor stuck thread ... I have a 6 cylinder merc crankshaft, rods and pistons that are still castor stuck. Superclean did nothing at all for it. I'm afraid the castor has turned into some kind of polymer that there isn't a safe solvent for.

[A/B Speedliner]

Sam

Did you not read Waynes post about how he cleaned up his engine so I just thought I would add how I did cleaned up of the Konig I purchased. If you would stop and get off your high horse and read what is posted you would appear to be as inteligent as I know you are. You have a wealth of knowledge and we all appreciate your contributrions but your delivery needs to be improved.

David

[Mark75H]

Sam

Did you not read Waynes post about how he cleaned up his engine so I just thought I would add how I did cleaned up of the Konig I purchased. If you would stop and get off your high horse and read what is posted you would appear to be as inteligent as I know you are. You have a wealth of knowledge and we all appreciate your contributrions but your delivery needs to be improved.

David

I'll take your advice and try the kerosene.

[Mark75H]

Quickest 3 week test ever ... David's process works. I left my parts covered in grease and they almost wipe clean after sitting greased up for a long time (probably over a year). The longest I tried letting the other cleaners sit was a couple days and it was hard to remove the cleaner residue that did nothing for the super hard stuck stuff; it was worse than just waiting a few minutes or an hour.

I had even left kerosene in the cylinders for a month while the whole motor was together and ended up pressing the pistons out with grease pressure. After I got it apart I tried everything I could think of and everything that was suggested by others at the time. Nothing worked so I just greased it up and put it on the shelf. Today, the castor varnish - that appeared to be so hard and resistant to everything - will easily scratch off with your fingernail.

I'm going to have to dig up that other thread and update it with credit to David for giving us the process that works.

[F-12]

You can also try Simple Green Grill cleaner. I have had great results with it and even got a comment from John Schubert on how I got everything so clean. It sprays on, let it sit for a few minutes and clean it off with a terry cloth rag. The VB70 looks great by the way..........

[Steve Litzell]

Feel free to quote me Joe, but I'm not sure that was the best way.:) It was the only way I figured I could do it having never driven a boat rigged that way before. I can't remember exactly how the steering was now, but it was very direct. I could not have turned one of my boats that way unless I had one of those "knuckle knockers" or whatever the 50's high school hot rodders had on the steering wheels of their 57 Chevy's. It would probably take a turn and a half of the steering wheel or so in one of my boats. I'm thinking that there was no pulley on the steering bar. What ever you spooled up on the drum turning left was directly fed back to the steering bar on the right without having been run through a pulley and tied off at the cockpit. This would be direct steering like with a rope tied to the front axle of a homemade derby car. I might be wrong about that setup, and maybe Steve Litzell could correct it, but the technique I used to get around a single pin in a narrow chute seemed to work O.K.

As far as the Konig goes, I tried cleaning the outside with different chemicals, but the rough casting and decades of castor oil baked and gummed in made it very hard. I didn't want to polish it smooth and I didn't want to disassemble it and soak it in some stuff Paul Christner told me about that would do the job. Then I thought that if I just cleaned the worst bit of it off and left the castor oil down in the niches, crannies, and lowest parts of the casting then there would still be a little bit left of Marshall Grant, my racing team, Harry Bartolomei, and the other owners left on it. I painted the stacks and elbows black, as well as the original style coils. I cleaned up the tower housing, but I have not found the seals and bearings for the lower unit yet. I got busy in the oilfield and have not yet gotten a bracket made to hang on the wall. I have the powerhead stored in my darkroom to keep it out of the dust. I do need to get the bracket made so I can put it all together.

You know Joe, I have thought about some things we could have done back in the day had we thought about it. A lot of the ideas have come from BRF members. Sometimes they say things that make you think, and you could have applied it to something you were having problems with. I still have a horsepower producing idea in my mind that would be legal and I think would significantly increase horsepower, but no one on our team had the ability or equipment to build it, and we didn't trust any outside source. It was toward the end of our racing career so we never tried it on boats, although it worked well in an oilfield application.
Yea Wayne, you got it right on the steering, it was direct, and the boat I drove over there had about a 2.5 inch hub at the wheel end. With the torque of the D and the little hub, you had to be pretty tough to not only turn it but then straighten back up as well. The secret at the canal was go full speed down and let off complete and turn as you done that. This action spun out the boat basically and you had to pinch it then to come back. The race course than Han's put races on at had very narrow course widths. I always said it was like driving down a bowling alley lane on the front stretch through the ball return and then up the next alley to come back. This was done sometimes with 20 or so boats as you remember. On your caster cleaning thing, I start with laquer thinner to cut and soften the first layer and then use Wesley's Bleach White. You have to rinse off the Bleach white with water.Then spray some gun oil on it like break free. When i do resto stuff for customers I have a different process that make the Aluminum look new. I have another process for the exhausts stuff. If you send me a elbow I will do for you to see if you like it. Steve

[Master Oil Racing Team]

So I figured it pretty close Steve. I backed off a little bit sooner rather than driving into the pin and then making the turn. I feel what you are saying Steve. It's a spin out when you drive into a corner with the power off. The idea is that you know that and as soon as you make the turn....you are already set to head up the other straight.

Your description of the bowling alley race course was right on Steve. I appreciate the cleanup of castor oil also, but I decided that I would not clean it any more than I have. I cleaned it with lacquer thinner like Floyd Hopkins taught me and I always did that before a race. Like I told Joe Rome today...."The first layer of castor oil and grime belongs to Marshall Grant...the second layer was put down by me and Jack Chance...Harry Bartolomei added to it....etc.!" So I will keep the "patina" of the motor as it is. As far as other parts go, I will let you know. I guess it's better to finish my project on the Amazing Story thread. But you guys got me interested in competing that project.

ADD: Steve..I don't remember the size of the drum of the boats I drove at Dieter's. I never drove a D of his....only my own in Austria with a three pin turn. I did try to drive an OE in Berlin with a Konig on a Danisch Proprider, but we had no success. Tests were good, but motor prolems during the race. I did not remember any more trouble with holding against torque than I had with our American set ups, but then again...I didn't drive it that much, and I don't know that I had that small of a hub. Your insights and stories continue to amaze me.

[Tim Weber]

Cleaning?

I have a PR a ran across all gooped up. I called Blendzal and spoke to a tech guy on how to clean it up. He said that most cleaners are solvent based like acetone, laquer thinner
etc. He told me they would work to a point. He told me Castor oil is not a solvent based product. He suggested soaking the parts in menthanol since it's one of the few things that castor is soluable with. The other thing he metioned is Xylene.

I tried Xylene and yes it works but wow does it have some fumes. You better work outside with that stuff. I have the rotor to clean yet and I am going to try the menthanol soak on that. I've got lots of that so will give it a go and see.

Tim

[Mark75H]

Alcohol, xylene and toluene were among the solvents I had tried for hour and overnight soaks.

Nothing worked like time with simpler solvents. The aromatics and alcohol may work just as well with the same extended time exposure ... but for now I will be sticking (pun intended) with long term kerosene for internals and plain grease for external surfaces.

[Steve Litzell]

So I figured it pretty close Steve. I backed off a little bit sooner rather than driving into the pin and then making the turn. I feel what you are saying Steve. It's a spin out when you drive into a corner with the power off. The idea is that you know that and as soon as you make the turn....you are already set to head up the other straight.

Your description of the bowling alley race course was right on Steve. I appreciate the cleanup of castor oil also, but I decided that I would not clean it any more than I have. I cleaned it with lacquer thinner like Floyd Hopkins taught me and I always did that before a race. Like I told Joe Rome today...."The first layer of castor oil and grime belongs to Marshall Grant...the second layer was put down by me and Jack Chance...Harry Bartolomei added to it....etc.!" So I will keep the "patina" of the motor as it is. As far as other parts go, I will let you know. I guess it's better to finish my project on the Amazing Story thread. But you guys got me interested in competing that project.

ADD: Steve..I don't remember the size of the drum of the boats I drove at Dieter's. I never drove a D of his....only my own in Austria with a three pin turn. I did try to drive an OE in Berlin with a Konig on a Danisch Proprider, but we had no success. Tests were good, but motor prolems during the race. I did not remember any more trouble with holding against torque than I had with our American set ups, but then again...I didn't drive it that much, and I don't know that I had that small of a hub. Your insights and stories continue to amaze me.

Yea I drove a Danisch as well. It was 3 meters 20 If I remember correct, as Ralphs B boat was 3 meters 10 or 3 meters even. The first time I ever drove one was at Grine Austria. I had not driven a hydro in more than 15 years as I was always a runabout kind of guy. Ralph said "get in, Lay down and run it". I did not understand that these things few high off the water to go over the rough stuff. I though it was set up wrong and was going to blow over,So I went down my first test straight at full speed then all the way off , then full speed again slapping the boat on the water every time I done this. I guess it was a site to be seen as when I returned to starting jetty after a half a lap, Ralph, Hans and Douglas Willey were laffing their butts off at me. They then explained what to do and all was well with me in that boat until a Austrian used up my space in the first turn. But that's another story. There is a picture on this sight somewhere of my test in the canal with the D, and you can see I was Ok with the high flight of these boats.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I wish I could have been there with you guys Steve. Did you ever meet Bernie Danisch?

I seem to remember that every time we meet you remind me that only real men drive runabouts.:) I have to admit that even though all my wins at the begining of my career were in runabouts, I was never able to master them. Cockpits were too wide and I was too skinny. I shimmied around in the boat more than drove it.;)

Your mention of high flight on the canal with the D reminds me of the story you told Joe and myself at the end of the first DePue Reunion. You told us how Dieter called you "Boy" and he said before you got in the hydro to test...""Boy....you must watch my arms....If I do this (you explained dropping your arms down)... you must stop!" Everyone else had left the banquete and only you, Joe, Tim Butts, Fred Hauenstien and I were left standing out in front if you remember. Tim and Fred were talking when you told Joe and I about when Dieter spent six hours with the Politzie in Berlin trying to explaind why "Hans was not a criminal" when his proprider hydro blew over in the canal and stuffed itself through a Mercedes traveling over a bridge on the canal.:eek:

Tears came to my eyes when you told us that story Steve. And the way you told it with Dieter's accent was perfect. Joe and I could picture it in our minds exactly. We have often talked about how funny that story was and how you so accurately laid out the scene with your German accent.

[Steve Litzell]

I wish I could have been there with you guys Steve. Did you ever meet Bernie Danisch?

I seem to remember that every time we meet you remind me that only real men drive runabouts.:) I have to admit that even though all my wins at the begining of my career were in runabouts, I was never able to master them. Cockpits were too wide and I was too skinny. I shimmied around in the boat more than drove it.;)

Your mention of high flight on the canal with the D reminds me of the story you told Joe and myself at the end of the first DePue Reunion. You told us how Dieter called you "Boy" and he said before you got in the hydro to test...""Boy....you must watch my arms....If I do this (you explained dropping your arms down)... you must stop!" Everyone else had left the banquete and only you, Joe, Tim Butts, Fred Hauenstien and I were left standing out in front if you remember. Tim and Fred were talking when you told Joe and I about when Dieter spent six hours with the Politzie in Berlin trying to explaind why "Hans was not a criminal" when his proprider hydro blew over in the canal and stuffed itself through a Mercedes traveling over a bridge on the canal.:eek:

Tears came to my eyes when you told us that story Steve. And the way you told it with Dieter's accent was perfect. Joe and I could picture it in our minds exactly. We have often talked about how funny that story was and how you so accurately laid out the scene with your German accent.

Yes Wayne, I did meet Bernie several times. First was at the Nite Club with the telephones on the tables that you told about earlier. Ralph and myself had dinner with Bernie and many other drivers from the "EAST". Dieter had taken us to East Berlin for this and later we went to the club. Had a great time there but had to leave before Midnite as our visas were up then. I meet also Bern Beckhusson, (SP) the man that drove the A hydro with a Zimple Motor. I also was introduced to The man that made the Zimple motor, but he did not speak any english so it was up to Dieter to do this. At this time the zimple motors were very fast and having their way with the Konig drivers from the West. I was also introduced to a real fine East German lady from Lipzeig by Dieter. But that again is another story. Back to Bernie, I remember also at the factory we talked about boats and motors and had lunch around the corner of factory that Dieter took me to many times. This place was upstairs in a building and another business was down at street level as I remember. The lady that run the place was always very kind to me with my very bad German and she fed me well.;) Steve

[Smokin' Joe]

Yes Wayne, I did meet Bernie several times. First was at the Nite Club with the telephones on the tables that you told about earlier. Ralph and myself had dinner with Bernie and many other drivers from the "EAST". Dieter had taken us to East Berlin for this and later we went to the club. Had a great time there but had to leave before Midnite as our visas were up then. I meet also Bern Beckhusson, (SP) the man that drove the A hydro with a Zimple Motor. I also was introduced to The man that made the Zimple motor, but he did not speak any english so it was up to Dieter to do this. At this time the zimple motors were very fast and having their way with the Konig drivers from the West. I was also introduced to a real fine East German lady from Lipzeig by Dieter. But that again is another story. Back to Bernie, I remember also at the factory we talked about boats and motors and had lunch around the corner of factory that Dieter took me to many times. This place was upstairs in a building and another business was down at street level as I remember. The lady that run the place was always very kind to me with my very bad German and she fed me well.;) Steve

If it had been after 1986 you might have met a driver who built his own motors, Holger Arens. I can testify for German women, I became enchanted by one. We lived together, got married before our first son (May Fly III on this website) was born. Very independent, very active, very intelligent and very attractive they are!

[Steve Litzell]

If it had been after 1986 you might have met a driver who built his own motors, Holger Arens. I can testify for German women, I became enchanted by one. We lived together, got married before our first son (May Fly III on this website) was born. Very independent, very active, very intelligent and very attractive they are!

Yes Joe I know Holger as well. We meet first time in Year 2000 at Lakeland Fl for world Championships. He tasted my Mudslides there. His two drivers at the time were Oliver Lucas and Marion Young who just won the Formula 500 World Championships one week ago for the Demmler team and VRP Motors. The lady I meet in East Berlin too was a looker and later when we meet again I sent to her and her family a couple bags of groceries as the East had very little of what we see and can get every day. I think about her from time to time as I was the first American she had ever met:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek: but it sure was fun. Steve

[Smokin' Joe]

This is truly remarkable, chapter and verse from the beginning!
As always I am overwhelmed by the effort that has gone into acquiring this history. I will certainly use it believe me.
I understand that the factory was able to get back on its feet relatively quickly as Dieter and Rudolf had access to a vast Luftwaffe repair facility having undertaken the manufacture of aircraft parts during the war. Although all their own machine tools had been destroyed by a 500 pound bomb that blew up the factory the gear they needed was lying around waiting to be liberated. Or so the story goes.
Dieter's wife Flo told me that during the worst of the bombing Dieter stayed in Berlin with his father and that when everybody else was diving for cover he would make his way onto the nearest roof to watch the mayhem.
I am up against a bit of deadline pressure as I want to get my book out - called The Kiwi On The Koenig' the idea is to have it out for Christmas.
One interesting aspect of the story has been the places where Koenig engines ended up. On Speedway tracks in cars and bikes, on the grand prix motorcycle circuit, on the backs of hydfros of course and in the air. When Father Goose took his first trainees South beside an ultralite he was powered by Koenig.
Anyway, as always, thank you for your trouble. I know it's a consuming interest for all of you and that gathering the history is something you would want to do anyway but I still really appreciate the effort.


Who was Flo? There's a ca. 1955 picture of Dieter, rig, and Eleanora, and Daughter Marion looks (today) very much like Eleanora.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Joe...Flo was Eleanora! Dieter was not tall and She was shorter than Dieter. I didn't know her real name for many years. I was introduced to her as Flo, but I am not exactly sure of the spelling. It always sounded like Flo, but her nickname and what she went by according to Dieter is "flea" in German. Dieter took me to a "flea market" in Berlin beneath an elevated roadway and he told me that his wifes's nickname meant "flea". I don't know for sure the name in German of a flea. But Dieter told me that that's where the name Flo oringinated...the nickname flea.

[Smokin' Joe]

Joe...Flo was Eleanora! Dieter was not tall and She was shorter than Dieter. I didn't know her real name for many years. I was introduced to her as Flo, but I am not exactly sure of the spelling. It always sounded like Flo, but her nickname and what she went by according to Dieter is "flea" in German. Dieter took me to a "flea market" in Berlin beneath an elevated roadway and he told me that his wifes's nickname meant "flea". I don't know for sure the name in German of a flea. But Dieter told me that that's where the name Flo oringinated...the nickname flea.

Wayne, that clears it up. She was small (Peter is not so short, Marion is shorter.), 'Flohmarkt' means 'flea market'. She looks pretty nice. You probably know that 'König' means 'King'. There are a lot of Königs here (no relation to Dieter is likely) from the NE German migration to Tx. in the 19th century. Some of them still speak German, a lawyer here in Houston e.g. However, they mispronounce their name as 'Kehnig' in Tx. 'Kehnig' probably came from the Texans, who couldn't and (even if they could wouldn't) pronounce 'ö'. Just as Pennsylvania Germans were and are called 'Dutch' because 'the English' (that's what the Amish STILL call us) can't pronounce 'Deutsch'. Joe

[Smokin' Joe]

Tim,

I worked for Quincy Welding from 1962 to 1973, but I started racing as a pit crew member for Chambers Equipment Co. in 1958. I was 17 years old at the time.

Chambers was a Johnson dealership but we raced 2 "B" Mercurys, 1 "A" Mercury and 1 "A" Brand K .

I remember the crankplate on the flywheel of the "A" having the name KOENIG cast in it. I have been told by different people the spelling was always KONIG. I always knew they were wrong but didn't see the need to argue.

Thanks for confirming my memories.

Gene, German bureaucrats will not write ö, as in König in a passport or in documents even today because the rest of the world does not have the symbol. Internationally, König becomes Koenig. Computers today can handle ö, ü, and ä but they still write oe, ue, and ae for the rest of us. My wife's name is Küffner, her German pass has Kueffner, and Americans badly mispronounce it as cuff-ner. English doesn't have the right sounds, Scandinavians know how to say it all right. Joe

[Mark75H]

That's alright, the previous generation of Germans could not say "zoo"

There is no long o sound in German, their closest is our sound for a very short "zuh" kind of pronunciation. My step-mother says the long o was the last English sound she learned to correctly make.

[Smokin' Joe]

That's alright, the previous generation of Germans could not say "zoo"

There is no long o sound in German, their closest is our sound for a very short "zuh" kind of pronunciation. My step-mother says the long o was the last English sound she learned to correctly make.

Zoo in German is not pronounced like zoo in English. Spelling is the same. In fact, oo in
German word Zoo is pronounced exactly like the English long o (as in English 'ho').

[Lars Strom]

..Scandinavians know how to say it all right. Joe

Hehe..yes we do..

Regards

Lars Ström

[Smokin' Joe]

Hehe..yes we do..

Regards

Lars Ström

Alt i orden.
Hilsen,
Joe

[Master Oil Racing Team]

My first time in Berlin I had to transfer from the first bus I took to another at Banhof Zoo. The lady at the hostel I stayed at wrote down the instructions for me to get to Dieter's shop and she spoke english. The way she pronounced zoo was something like a combination of T and S at the same time. It was like tssoo. The oo was suppressed. It's kind of hard to explain without hearing the sound, but I caught on right away because the Z sound in german was similar to the pi looking symbol in the Russian alphabet which is sounded phonetically "tseh". It's all in the matter of hearing the words and doing certain things with your mouth and tongue that makes the difference.

[Smokin' Joe]

My first time in Berlin I had to transfer from the first bus I took to another at Banhof Zoo. The lady at the hostel I stayed at wrote down the instructions for me to get to Dieter's shop and she spoke english. The way she pronounced zoo was something like a combination of T and S at the same time. It was like tssoo. The oo was suppressed. It's kind of hard to explain without hearing the sound, but I caught on right away because the Z sound in german was similar to the pi looking symbol in the Russian alphabet which is sounded phonetically "tseh". It's all in the matter of hearing the words and doing certain things with your mouth and tongue that makes the difference.

German dialects vary very strongly, some are not mutually understandable. In the south (Bavaria, Tirol) 'Zoo' sounds like tsoo with oo pronounced like a long o in English.

So, like me, at some point in your past you studied Russian.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

When I was a high school sophomore Joe, the spanish class filled up before I got to sign up. When I was a junior I had to sign up for a language in order to complete the two year requirement and I wasn't about to take classes with a sophomore. The only other choices were Russian and Latin. Latin didn't sound very interesting. We had an exceptional teacher and there were only six in the class both years...a mixture of sophomores, juniors and seniors. He also taught the latin classes as well as calculus and some advanced physics course.

[Smokin' Joe]

When I was a high school sophomore Joe, the spanish class filled up before I got to sign up. When I was a junior I had to sign up for a language in order to complete the two year requirement and I wasn't about to take classes with a sophomore. The only other choices were Russian and Latin. Latin didn't sound very interesting. We had an exceptional teacher and there were only six in the class both years...a mixture of sophomores, juniors and seniors. He also taught the latin classes as well as calculus and some advanced physics course.

In Alice?!! Pretty unusual! Had to take 2 yrs. in univ. My dad said 'Don't take French or German, after WWII those languages are dead. Take Russian or Chinese.' Well, he was a bit off the mark on German ... . I learned to roll the r in Russian, liked the alphabet and the fact that the language is so phonetic. Teacher brought in Pravda an Izvesty regularly, he loved the language. I also liked Russian because there were so few in the class. I never got to where I could read without looking up every other word, though. Woman in our Austrian village had a Cossack boyfriend once, traveling singer. She bought a book and became fluent. When the village got 60 Chechnyan refugees from
Grozny (which the Russians used a advertising site to show effectiveness of their 'hail' rocket system) she was the only person around who could talk fluently with them. Well, too far afield, I could go on for too long.

[lcp]

anyone got picture of older 850 konig.i just wonder is thats boxes 4 or a inline 3 motor.hope some willing to share. regard .

[Lars Strom]

Here is a thread with lots of pictures of the OE/F3 Konig 850cc..

http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6727&page=20

[Smokin' Joe]

anyone got picture of older 850 konig.i just wonder is thats boxes 4 or a inline 3 motor.hope some willing to share. regard .

This is a sidetrack, but within the last few years there was a story in The Antique Outboarder about the 8-cyl. König.

[lcp]

thanks for the help.look like it is volvo penta.any idea how hard it is to get the parts for this motor these days?any source?regard.

[wolfgang]

thanks for the help.look like it is volvo penta.any idea how hard it is to get the parts for this motor these days?any source?regard.

The 65hp 3-cyl Koenig (available in 850 and 900cc versions) was a very strong contender in UIM Class SE (850cc), at the end of the `60s. It was sold as a "stock" motor and had a slightly higher cowling along the lines of that of the 40hp 700cc motor. That in turn formed the basis for the 2-cyl DU motor.

[lcp]

i was told there is 850 konig 4 cylinder boxer......anyone know about that....regard..

[Lars Strom]

The boxer was an 8 cylinder 850cc

[Mark75H]

It is a 350 on top of a 500.

There were also versions with reeds instead of rotary valve

[Dan M]

If I remember correctly, Konig did make a true 850 boxer back in the mid 70's. Jerry Peterson had one, and I think Elmer Grade also had one. Jerry blew his up at the UIM OE race in Dayton in the late 70's when he broke a prop shaft testing and over-reved it and twisted the crank and separated the cases. The motor was a "square type" block.

Dan:D

[Mark75H]

Correct again. It is a 6


i was told there is 850 konig 4 cylinder boxer......anyone know about that....regard..

As far as I know there was no 4 cylinder 850 ... 4 cylinder 750 (47.6 ci) boxer, yes


There was also an 850 inline 3 developed with Volvo I think mentioned earlier in this thread and an inline 3 850 pleasure motor that was successfully race in stock classes

[lcp]

so did u guy mean a 'true 850 konig' to be a boxer 4 or boxer 6? regard......cause someone tell me it a boxer 4.....

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

so did u guy mean a 'true 850 konig' to be a boxer 4 or boxer 6? regard......cause someone tell me it a boxer 4.....

The picture just posted by Sam certainly looks like a 6 cylinder with rotary valve & 3 carbs.

[Bill Van Steenwyk]

The "Boxer" opposed 6 was definitely built in an OF size, as that is the configuration that Hans Krage won the OF Championship at Firebird Lake in Phoenix in the mid 70's as described several times with photos in some of Wayne Baldwin posts on this site. With a small displacement change the same configuration would seem to have been very satisfactory and easily built for OE also, so I would not be surprised to know the opposed 6 was also built in an OE size. Was this not the engine configuration that Lars Strom ran the one season he drove for Volvo-Penta in OE, as he has discussed and put many photos and information up the last several years?

I also seem to remember a UIM OE championship, (or possibly just E Hydro) that was run at Alex in about the same time frame. That was won I believe by Tom Berry from Kansas City with an over-bored D Konig. Along in this same time frame (70's and possibly early 80's) there were some changes in APBA displacement ranges in the D, E,and F classes, to I believe bring us closer or in line with UIM displacement limits/ranges. This was in the same time frame Baldy Baldwin was promoting UIM racing at several locations, Dayton and Alex included. Included at the time was the race he promoted at Dayton with the controversy regards fuel use, gas versus methanol when the factories promoted a ban on methanol in favor of gas.

Wayne would surely be versed on the finer points as he ran these classes and based on the kind of records he kept and photos taken at the time would be an excellent source of information on this subject.

[Lars Strom]

Hi Bill,

No..Volvo Penta, Gothenburg did not let us use a boxer six for OE racing 1977.
I only raced the 3 cylinder OE Konig that year..because it had "some" connections with the Volvo Penta production 70 HP engine

[Steve Litzell]

Correct again. It is a 6



As far as I know there was no 4 cylinder 850 ... 4 cylinder 750 (47.6 ci) boxer, yes


There was also an 850 inline 3 developed with Volvo I think mentioned earlier in this thread and an inline 3 850 pleasure motor that was successfully race in stock classes

The 6 cylinder was two cylinders 64 mm and 4 cylinders 66. Is was infact the motor Hans won with in OF. As Bill said during this time we had big D's but they were run F class Nationally and CDF locally. We also had 750 or what we called big D. Bruce Nicholson made a 6 cylinder Radial that fit perfect in 750. This was also the time USA changed to cc's as opposed to cubic inches, so any motor over 700 but not 1100 was E or 850. The motors we have here that we call F Konigs are 748 cc's and were legal for 850. hence the VE in the serial number. Their were a few big boys at 67 to 68 mm bore with L rings that were brutal to crank but again these were VF models. I guess we forget when this happened and all A and C motors had 53.5 bores. When we went to cc's we could have the new standard bore motors of 54 mm. So At Walt's place we bore a hell of lot C and FA motors to the new standard bore of 54 mm. This all was done to allow the Mercs have a .030 bore over standard. This is also why our 125 and 250 class have higher bore limits than what is allowed in UIM. 8 cylinder 850 Konig was a stacked motor. I have this motor fro Uli Rochelle in my collection. The rotary valve was first, the reed valve was second, and fuel injected motor was third until UIM said no More of this Konig. Steve

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Glad to hear you chime in on this Steve. What you and Lars said is correct. I have sat on the sidelines up til now because I'm confused by the term "boxer". I have never heard that term regarding a Konig or any motor, so I was confused....still am. What is the definition of a "boxer" motor.:confused:

Another thing. We had several Konigs we ran in the F class, but in UIM they would have been classified OE. One was an overbored D, another was a square block made as an F with the Dykes rings which I guess was the one Steve referred to, and the dual rotary valve, 4 carb square block that Dieter built for Marshall Grant. We bought that from Marshall when he retired from racing in 1974. All of these were considered OE by UIM standards, and I don't remember the actual displacement, but they were at the low end of around 750cc's like Steve said. I wasn't sure if Icp meant the class designation of an OE 850cc class Konig, or if it was actually an 850cc displacement Konig.

The pictures I have of Roger Jenkins rotary valve OE Konig/Volvo Penta are 3 cylinder. The King Kong Konig that Hans won two consecutive OF World Championships with was a 6 cylinder opposed. It did exactly what Dan said Jerry Peterson's OE motor did whenever it was overrevved either on the bank or when a shear pin sheared or the lower unit would blow. Dan.....I never took pictures of Jerry's motor as far as I can remember. Could you describe it more in detail?

[Bill Van Steenwyk]

Wayne:

I have always understood the description of an engine as a "boxer" configuration is like the Porsche, VW, Subaru, etc. In other words an engine that is horizonally opposed like the Konig design. The BMW bikes also had the same design and that is where I first heard the term. Also most engines built by Continental and Lycoming for aircraft use are the same design, although I never heard them call a boxer type, but just opposed design.

Whether it has anything to do with how the engines are installed I have no idea, but most all of the engines of that design are installed laying down flat, at least the ones I am aware of. That type installation certainly has some advantages, one of course being low center of gravity.

[Dan M]

Wayne,

Best I can remember is that it was a true OE motor. 2 carbs,1 rotary valve. It was most likely stamped OF. Probably was a 750, but I thought it was 48 cu. inches(785cc's). Too many years ago. When Jerry over-reved, he had actually broken the prop shaft right at the end of the case. His best Pop Smith wheel went to the bottom of the lake. When we brought the boat up on shore, I could see light all the way through the cases when looking through the carbs. Harry Pasturczak had the cases in his shop for quite some time and was going to try to re-work them. Don't know if that ever happened. It was the Dayton race where Jeff Hutchins was running Elmer's OE against the tunnel boats and showed them the way around the course.;) Maybe Jerry can comment some time!

Dan

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Thanks Dan. That sounds like the standard 48 ci square block Konig with the big carbs, and not a full 850cc motor. I think that's what Jeff was driving also for Elmer. I hope Jerry gets on here and fills us in.

[Jerry Peterson]

Dan
You have an excellent recollection of Dayton in '78 with one exception.We actually went
through 2 lower units that day and sent my 2 best Pop Smith props to the bottom of the lake.When I took the first lower unit over to Dieter he shook his head and asked what modifications we had made to the engine.He then handed me a new lower unit.That shaft broke in the same place and thats when the crank wound up.
Doug Bindrim from New York purchased the engine from Scott Smith in about '72.He
won the APBA Nationals in F Runabout and put the engine in storage.He agreed to sell it to me in '78 when I returned to racing after several years as a spectator.
It was refered to as a 48" square block and was a torque monster and not a high rpm engine.The only others I was aware of were Marshall's dual rotary valve engine that Wayne
bought and the one that Elmer Grade had,although there may have been others.Maybe one on the west coast?
When Baldy became aware that I had that engine he insisted that that we come to Dayton
for the UIM race.Baldy was determined that a Konig was going to win OE that year.The class was restricted to gasoline but Baldy assured us Konig guys that our fuel samples
would be "misplaced"!
Baldy was the best promoter that we had in Pro Outboard Racing.What a great Guy!

[Steve Fales]

The 6 cylinder was two cylinders 64 mm and 4 cylinders 66. Is was infact the motor Hans won with in OF. As Bill said during this time we had big D's but they were run F class Nationally and CDF locally. We also had 750 or what we called big D. Bruce Nicholson made a 6 cylinder Radial that fit perfect in 750. This was also the time USA changed to cc's as opposed to cubic inches, so any motor over 700 but not 1100 was E or 850. The motors we have here that we call F Konigs are 748 cc's and were legal for 850. hence the VE in the serial number. Their were a few big boys at 67 to 68 mm bore with L rings that were brutal to crank but again these were VF models. I guess we forget when this happened and all A and C motors had 53.5 bores. When we went to cc's we could have the new standard bore motors of 54 mm. So At Walt's place we bore a hell of lot C and FA motors to the new standard bore of 54 mm. This all was done to allow the Mercs have a .030 bore over standard. This is also why our 125 and 250 class have higher bore limits than what is allowed in UIM. 8 cylinder 850 Konig was a stacked motor. I have this motor fro Uli Rochelle in my collection. The rotary valve was first, the reed valve was second, and fuel injected motor was third until UIM said no More of this Konig. Steve

The radial motor that Bruce N. built is at Bill Fales' sons house, Rick Fales (owner of Power-Mist Racing Fuel). We tested that motor in Hartford, CT back in the days with Mike Schmidt driving our boat. The motor blew two units that day and sent us packing. Maybe Mike could talk a little more about that day. When the motor came on pipe it really screamed.

[Original Looper 1]

http://hydroracer.net/forums/showthread.php?threadid=22973



Regards,

Paul

[Bob Rusnak]

I had one of those 48 ci Konig engines. It was bought from Dick O'Dea some time in the late 1970's. Dick actually replaced the sleeves with a slightly smaller bore as this increases the RMP. It was a brute with so much low end we just wired the pipes all the way forward. We raced it in 1100 (FRR) and then put it on a hydro and ran in the GP races here in the east coast. The GP races were any ci up to 1100 cc or 60 ci. They also payed good money for these GP races. Now it would be considered "Top Hydro" at the US Title Series Races. We took it to the 1987 Pro Nationals in DePue, Ill. and since it was not a true 48 ci engine anymore but was over 700 cc., I actually had no class. The rule book at that time stated that "D" was up to 700 cc. It also stated that "F" was 721 cc and up. Mine was 710. There was a meeting about this and was put in the 1100 class. The rule book was then changed. The engine was sold to a friend of mine who eventually sold it to Tom Goldstone from Calif. I heard they wanted to use it for a kilo run but that was the last I heard of it. It was very hard on lower unit gears. Did not get much life out of a set. We never did reach the potential of this animal. It was as fast as I ever wanted to go. It would have been a legal 850 engine but that class was dropped by the pro category. Somewhere I have some pictures of it laying around the shop........Bob N-96

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Hope you can find the pictures and post them Bob. Very interesting what you said. Indeed, that was during a transition period that had started in the late 70's when we went to CC's, but wanted to revive some of the old loopers and 44 deflectors to bring them back into racing. I'm wondering if Dick's motor started out as a 48 and he resleeved it to the smaller bore as you suggest, or maybe it might be one of the pre 72 motors such as our first F square block which was a 1970 model with the Dykes rings. We ended up resleeving it as well, then got some unfinished pistons from Scott, got some oversized rings and Walt Blankenstein rebored the sleeves, and turned the pistons to fit.

I was thinking about all this today on my way to San Antonio. I'm going to have to do some research. Find and post your pictures Bob.:cool:

[Bob Rusnak]

Wayne, in reply to your question, Dick had two of them when we went to his shop to buy one. We did have a choice of the two. Dick mentioned that he removed the sleeves from the 48 in block and replaced them with smaller ones. When the sleeves were out he did a lot of work inside. He had the pistons made for this engine and had several replacements made. Dick felt the large bore held back the rpm's which was correct. I guess on the runabout it was OK as Doug Bindrim proved but on the hydro, the higher rev's would be better. I believe Dick made this engine for the 850 class which never materialized. We were very successful with this engine here in the East Coast. Almost pulled off the Nationals in 1100 hydro but a broken pipe bracket put us in second to Bill Rucker. Later on we kept loosing the center main crank bearing. The crank was changed several times but felt the block's were not square anymore. I wish I knew where that engine is today. There is a big poster hanging up in my son's garage with the engine on the runabout. This was taken in the East Hatrford Marine Classic event in Conn. I will look through some of my pictures and see if I can find them on the Pugh Hydro.......Bob N-96

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Would you by any chance have the serial number of that motor Bob? Since you mentioned crank problems, that reminded me that those early motors came with the black crankshaft. A motor with that kind of power ruined the bearings very quickly. Also the "so called F Konigs" all came with a 1:1 unit. They never lasted very long under hard racing.

[Bob Rusnak]

Alan Ishii was reading this thread and sent me this picture of the big Konig on the Pugh Hydro. This was taken in Lakeland, Fl. in the late 1970's. It had Blankenstien heads on it. It was also a backwards block as you may notice in the picture. I had the 40 mm carbs on it in that picture. I can only imagine what it would do in the right hands. Again we never did slide the pipes, just wired them forward and if we put the big carbs on it who knows. You are right, we had 1-1 gears that did not last long. It had so much low end it was fun to drive.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Wow Bob...those Blankenstein heads really make that motor. Thanks Bob and you to Alan.

Jerry, I thank you much for the kind words about my Dad. And you were right. We wanted to beat OMC with the Konigs because of the illegal stunt they pulled at the last minute banning methanol. There were not many of those OE Konigs around, and I remember my Dad wanting you to come. I never did know what happened to your engine until now. As you remember the first three heats were so rough that the hydros did not go out. We were all so proud of Jeff going out in that final heat with a big win. The rest of us had already packed the trailers up.

There was a funny thread about cheating...accidentally, or on purpose. This was one time us Pro guys cheated as a group. It was a protest, and we had decided to, as you say, misplace the fuel samples. Even if we did decide to run them through the proper tests, it would have been later after winners had been decided. Then the disqualifications would have been after all the spectators were gone. We were mainly protesting the illegal actions of OMC, but the weather fouled up our plans. I had Jeff Hutchins fuel sample in my darkroom for many years. I finally threw it away, but I can't remember when. It was before BRF came about though and my packrat tendencies started to pay off.;):D

[Ed Provini]

Wayne and Bob,
I have an 850 Konig that I bought from Bunky Bowles who lived in the Richmond,Va. area.
R.C.Hawie borrowed it to run 1100 Runabout.
Ed Provini

[cdnmike]

Hi Konig enthusiasts. I came across this thread while searching for more info on Kim Newcombe after seeing the tragic movie about him 'Love, Speed, Loss'. I have to admit I'm not a huge boat enthusiast by any means, but I have followed and been involved with motorcycle road racing since the 70's. When Newcombe came onto the GP scene it was about the same time I had started production racing in canada and was starting to follow my british and GP racing heros via the Motorcycle News papers my mom and other relatives there sent me, and a few Castrol racing movies I had come across here.
When I first started seeing Kim's name and the odd pic in race results, I had no idea of who it was and assumed it to be some beautiful euro brand of frame (like a Harris or Bimota) with a conventional Yamaha or other motor. And to be honest, I thought that Konig was another German beer sponsor.
It wasn't until a bit later when I met up with a fellow Cdn at a US track, who just happened to race the same class as me and also lived very close to where I lived. We became friends and travelled to several races together. At some point he brought up the fact that he was going to europe for an extended visit with relatives and hoped to get some racing in over there with the help of his uncle who was also a racer, and his name was Rolf Steinhausen, a name I had never heard of as sidecar racing here was really in the dark ages compared to what was happening in europe with monocoque chassis and F1 like technology.
Anyway, to make a long story short, here are a couple of pics he brought back for me, as I don't think it was mentioned in this hugely interesting thread. The Konig engined sidecar that won the world championship in 1975/76.
Tim, if it isn't too late and you would like to use the pics in the book, I will contact my old friend to see if he has others or I can scan these in much higher resolution for you. I have others but I'd have to confirm if they are Konig, Yamaha or other engines.
Thanks for the memory shake up.
Mike

[Jeff Lytle]

This modified midget racer sported a 250cc Koenig racing boat engine from Germany, and was track champion at Indian Trail Speedway in 1970 and NC State paved track modified midget champion in 1972 at Two Flags Raceway. It was originally built by Jan Thomas who campaigned the car with Junior Neal, the class C open go cart national champion in 1969, winning about 90% of the feature races it entered (car number 7).

I bought the remains of the car after a bad accident
(t-boned) at Wayno Speedway in 1971, rebuilt it, and won the paved track championship in 1972 (car 54). Just after that I painted the car yellow, renamed it the Screamin’ Yellow Zonker and that’s how it ended its career on dirt at Rock Rest Speedway. Note: one peculiar feature of the car on pavement was that it got so much bite that it wanted to go on two wheels through the turns on pavement at Two Flags Raceway in Concord.

Bruce Kepley, Monroe, NC

[Lars Strom]

After a really tough racing season Dieter Konig asked me if I was ready to race the big race..
I said yes and asked Dieter Konigs sisters son Joachim Mareth to be my co-pilot.

There rest of the story here..http://svera.se/blogg/paris-6-hours/a-konig-outboard-in-paris-six-hours-1977/

[Jeff Lytle]

Off work today...........Just messing around:


51987


Looks pretty good if I do say so myself :cool:

[TheNatek]

5222752228522295223052231
Hello everybody.
Here we have a Konig from 1954, as from the serial number.
Can somebody help me identify the type, h.p, cubic cm, etc....

[Jeff Lytle]

What might that serial number be?

[TheNatek]

Hope it's a clear picture... :)
52232

[Lars Strom]

I am not 100% sure this is a König..but the famous driver holding his hand at the flywheel of the engine is Renato Molinari..I think it is 1981 or 82.

[ProHydroRacer]

I am not 100% sure this is a König..but the famous driver holding his hand at the flywheel of the engine is Renato Molinari..I think it is 1981 or 82.

KONIG it is!

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Bill is correct.

Now to cdnmike. Tim's book is published and on the shelves. But there are still people out there looking into the same story. I happen to be an outboard guy more familiar with Dieter's boat racing stuff, but I have been contacted by not only Tim, but a couple of other guys regarding the motorcycle aspect. You can PM me or e mail me at mort73@gmail.com. I can put you in touch with some guys interested in what you have. We would like to see more here too at BRF.

[wolfgang]

Bill is correct.

Now to cdnmike. Tim's book is published and on the shelves. But there are still people out there looking into the same story. I happen to be an outboard guy more familiar with Dieter's boat racing stuff, but I have been contacted by not only Tim, but a couple of other guys regarding the motorcycle aspect. You can PM me or e mail me at mort73@gmail.com. I can put you in touch with some guys interested in what you have. We would like to see more here too at BRF.

Wayne, can you please let us have full title, ISBN #, publisher and sellers (e.g. Amazon) of the book? I think this will be of interest for the potential overseas buyers. best regards, Wolfgang

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Hi Wolfgang. The author is Tim Hanna, but I don't know the name of the book. Ray Battersby had a copy picked up by a motorcycle friend of his who was traveling in New Zealand. As of the past summer the book was not available in the U.S. or Europe. I suspect it is the same for South Africa. The original title was supposed to be Kiwi on the Konig, but that is apparently not the name at publication. Ray sent me a PDF with the cover and some acknowledgements, but I can't find it. I haven't corresponded with Tim in awhile. I will see if I can find out all the info you ask.

[Bill Van Steenwyk]

Hi Wolfgang. The author is Tim Hanna, but I don't know the name of the book. Ray Battersby had a copy picked up by a motorcycle friend of his who was traveling in New Zealand. As of the past summer the book was not available in the U.S. or Europe. I suspect it is the same for South Africa. The original title was supposed to be Kiwi on the Konig, but that is apparently not the name at publication. Ray sent me a PDF with the cover and some acknowledgements, but I can't find it. I haven't corresponded with Tim in awhile. I will see if I can find out all the info you ask.



Hi Wayne:

Re corresponding with Tim Hannah:

I just ran across this thread a couple of weeks ago and realized that I had not seen anything about the book either, so I looked Tim up on the BRF members list and sent him a PM asking if the book had been published yet, and if so how to go about getting a copy. (have not looked for it on the net or Amazon as I do not remember the name either) As of this time I have not heard back from him, but don't know whether he is notified about PM's like I am if I get one. Mine show up on my e-mail that I have one. If you hear from him let me know as I would like to have a copy also.


ADDED LATER:

Looked Hannah up on Amazon as two other books he wrote are for sale there, but they only show the two, one published in 2003 about Burt Munro and the other about John Britten in 2006, so possibly it has not been published yet. The others were published by Penquin Publishing so he may use them again, or not.

[TheNatek]

5222752228522295223052231
Hello everybody.
Here we have a Konig from 1954, as from the serial number.
Can somebody help me identify the type, h.p, cubic cm, etc....

Nobody recognize this engine? Not any clue? Dis i post in the wrong topic?
Please,.... some advices...

[A/B Speedliner]

Wolfgang,
Your pictures did not come through so we can not see what you have. Try posting them again?
David

[Master Oil Racing Team]

The book has been published Bill Van. It is 500 plus pages. I haven't e mailed Tim yet. Maybe I will have time at the computer tonight..

[Sergio]

Wayne is correct, my pal's cousin hauled two copies of this weighty tome back from New Zealand, one for himself and one for me. I will not provide a review although I will comment on the book's physical attributes.

This softback book is 7.5" wide x 10" high x 1.5" thick and weighs 1.6kg (3.5lbs) It was published in 2010 by a company called Finish Line Productions and its ISBN is 9780473177461. In January 2012 the book cost NZ$35.

The book contains numerous half-tone photographs and a few colour photographs too. Sadly there is no Illustration list though Tim has listed the name of his illustration sources on the Title page. Neither is there a Contents listing the book's 43 Chapters but there is a brief Foreword by Janeen Newcombe followed by a lengthy Prologue by Tim Hanna and then you're right into Chapter 1- Opatija. Opatija? What does that taste like? I can hear some readers mouthing. Well to European motorcycle racing fans, Opatija was for some time the location of the Yugoslavian Grand Prix, a small town on the Adriatic coast in roughly the same area of the world as Venice. It is the circuit where Kim Newcombe took the König Grand Prix racer to its first and only Grand Prix victory in June 1973.

Whilst the inside of the rear cover provides the book's Acknowledgements, the book does not contain an Index of its contents. Those wanting fast access to learn what Tim has to say about specific people, events or topics will be devastated. The lack of such 'signposts' as a Contents list and Index, are not helped by the book's length which I accurately estimate to be over 400,000 words whereas most marque histories are in the 80,000 to 100,000 word range. So KIM is a L-o-o-o-o-o-n-g read and would have probably benefitted from editing. All you can do to find out what it says is to read it...

The first thing I noticed was the density of the text on each page (around 800 - around double the typical words per page). This provides another way of illustrating the sheer size of this volume (ha ha). A typical book may have 250 pages, this book is around four to five times more wordier and on that scale would have consisted of between 1,000 to 1,250 pages. The word density has a knock-on effect; each line contains almost double the industry standard words. What this means in practice (and why publishers have such guidelines) is that when the reader's eye reaches the end of a line and flicks backs to the start of the next line, it will often select the wrong line. This is very annoying.

I have to admit to not having read this book. I started and I gave up. My friend read it from cover to cover noting things that may be of specific interest to me in my own researches. Then we exchanged copies so that he has a pristine copy on his bookshelves and I have the copy that he read so diligently.

For those wishing to buy a copy for themselves, Google... "The Kiwi on the Konig" book ....using the quotation marks where shown and you will find plenty of returns. Here is one such link to a New Zealand bookshop selling this title for NZ$45.

http://www.wheelers.co.nz/books/9780473177461-kim-the-kiwi-on-the-konig/

Finally, I'd appreciate a PM from anyone has an email address for anybody involved with König in Berlin during the 1950s.

Happy reading!

[Sergio]

Finally, I'd appreciate a PM from anyone has an email address for anybody involved with König in Berlin during the 1950s.

Please ignore this request. I now have contact with Peter and his sister Margrit.

[Donald]

I suppose this is a good place to post this. On my recent visit to Berlin, Peer Krage asked me to see if there might be any interest in the bike or motor over here. I don't know all of the background of either, so I suggested he take emails from anyone interested and he can answer them as needed.
His email address is 911@krage-tuning.de 53613536145361553615536165361753618536195362053621

[Bill Van Steenwyk]

Ralph:

Do you know any history on the motor, i.e. what class it was designed for, if it was ever run or raced, on what type boat, speed, etc.

[Donald]

All I know is that the motor belongs to Hans Gessner, who was, along with Hans Krage and others who started MRC, an OMC dealer in Berlin. Peer is trying to sell it for him. I assume it is an 850cc.
Peer inherited the bike from Hans and restored it to it's present condition. I don't know the ccs, but it would have to be 350 or 500. For prices and more information you must email Peer.

[Mark75H]

the bike is the kind of thing Jay Leno collects. I would really like to see such a piece go to a real collector who would appreciate it and show it off the way he does.

[Bill Van Steenwyk]

the bike is the kind of thing Jay Leno collects. I would really like to see such a piece go to a real collector who would appreciate it and show it off the way he does.



Excellent idea Sam. Perhaps Peer could make an effort to contact him or his museum with information that it is for sale. Another possibility is the Motorcycle Museum at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Al. Eileen and I stopped there a couple of years ago on the way back from the World Championships at Lake Alfred. It has probably one of the largest exhibits of bikes of all types in the world. Don't know where they got it, but they have one of the Road Racing versions with a Konig 500CC engine in it.

I seem to remember Peer saying several years ago when he was in the US, that the BMW/Konig conversion had a 350cc engine in it.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Dieter was friends with the BMW motorcycle people. BMW motorcycles I believe were made in Berlin. Dieter showed me some of the machines that were given to him by BMW when they updated. That was in the days of two stroke and I have to think that Dieter probably traded off some good advice.

From Dieter's own mouth in 1975 he told me that BMW gave him two motorcycle frames. I don't know what year he was given them or when they were built. Nor who built them. After learning more about Kim Knewcombe after his death, I thought maybe he did, but the motorcycles I saw in Dieter's shop didn't look like the one in the above pictures. Steve Litzell could fill us in with more facts, but I remember what Dieter told me about the BMW frames. He said that he had a 350cc konig installed in his, and that Hans had a 500cc Konig in his. I can clearly remember that because I thought to myself when Dieter told me that, I thought to myself a 350 Konig would be a killer.....and Hans wanted more. It made sense knowing Hans.

[Donald]

If anyone knows collectors like Leno or museums that may have an interest in either the bike or motor, please pass it on to Peer.
Or have them contact Peer directly. Peer has a website for his business, www.krage-tuning.com .

[Jeff Lytle]

WOW! Thanks for those pics Ralph!

[Steve Litzell]

Dieter was friends with the BMW motorcycle people. BMW motorcycles I believe were made in Berlin. Dieter showed me some of the machines that were given to him by BMW when they updated. That was in the days of two stroke and I have to think that Dieter probably traded off some good advice.

From Dieter's own mouth in 1975 he told me that BMW gave him two motorcycle frames. I don't know what year he was given them or when they were built. Nor who built them. After learning more about Kim Knewcombe after his death, I thought maybe he did, but the motorcycles I saw in Dieter's shop didn't look like the one in the above pictures. Steve Litzell could fill us in with more facts, but I remember what Dieter told me about the BMW frames. He said that he had a 350cc konig installed in his, and that Hans had a 500cc Konig in his. I can clearly remember that because I thought to myself when Dieter told me that, I thought to myself a 350 Konig would be a killer.....and Hans wanted more. It made sense knowing Hans.


Really not much more to add to what has already been said. The bike i saw at factory had a D motor on it and was also a BMW Frame. The in house frames were made by Kim and Dieter I believe. Dieter only said little about this bike and when I asked about maybe riding it, with a very ashen look on his face, he sternly said NO! I do not want to hurt another friend. I left it at that and did not ask more about this. I did ask Uli and he gave to me a little history but we did not get into many details. I was more interested however in boat motors and the 8 cylinder that was being made at that time. I received my 8 cylinder from Uli Rochelle last week and it will look good next to my 8 cylinder I made and other Konig collector motors.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Wow Steve....an 8 cylinder Konig from Uli?...the one you made...plus the C you built for Louis? What else do you have? I hope you will post some pictures.

[Steve Litzell]

Wow Steve....an 8 cylinder Konig from Uli?...the one you made...plus the C you built for Louis? What else do you have? I hope you will post some pictures.
Hi Wayne, Yes I have a few and I will try to post, Did not know there was interest except to me and a few others. Steve

[smittythewelder]

There's a book, if you can find it, "Classic German Racing Motorcycles" by Mick Walker, that has info and pix on the Konig-powered bikes and sidehacks. A mechanic named, IIRC, Helmut Fath, built his own bikes and motors similar to Konig's.

[Bill Van Steenwyk]

Dieter was friends with the BMW motorcycle people. BMW motorcycles I believe were made in Berlin. Dieter showed me some of the machines that were given to him by BMW when they updated. That was in the days of two stroke and I have to think that Dieter probably traded off some good advice.

From Dieter's own mouth in 1975 he told me that BMW gave him two motorcycle frames. I don't know what year he was given them or when they were built. Nor who built them. After learning more about Kim Knewcombe after his death, I thought maybe he did, but the motorcycles I saw in Dieter's shop didn't look like the one in the above pictures. Steve Litzell could fill us in with more facts, but I remember what Dieter told me about the BMW frames. He said that he had a 350cc konig installed in his, and that Hans had a 500cc Konig in his. I can clearly remember that because I thought to myself when Dieter told me that, I thought to myself a 350 Konig would be a killer.....and Hans wanted more. It made sense knowing Hans.



Wayne:

You are correct in that the BMW/Konig that Peer Krage has is equipped with the 500CC version of the Konig motor.

There is another bike that is owned by Peter Konig that has the 350CC engine I referred to in an earlier post. When Peer Krage was here in the uS several years ago for a World Championship race, we had the pleasure of visiting with him away from the race course, and I was sure he mentioned a bike that had a 350CC motor.

It seems, from an e-mail conversation I have just had with him, that indeed as you mention, there were two frames given to Dieter by BMW. One frame was from a larger model of bike, and that one is the one Hans passed to Peer after his death. It has the 500CC motor. The other is a smaller frame from a BMW R 60 and that is the one with the 350CC motor that is with Peter Konig.

I gave Peer some further information regards the Barber Museum and he is going to try to contact them thru the Barber web site to see if there is interest, since they already have one of the road racing bikes with a Konig in it. There could possibly be interest in the motor owned by Herr Gessner also, as they do have a small display of older Johnson and Evinrude racing engines. When Eileen and I were there several years ago they were not available to inspect with the main display, but they could be seen from a staircase that gave a view of the workshop area where the bikes are rebuilt and maintained. We understood from a museum employee that as the outboard collection grew, it also could be added to the main display. The maintenance/rebuild area is generally not open to the public except for special events like bike race weekends or swap meets as EzyRider mentioned in his post about the museum.

[smittythewelder]

The book is available (when I return it) from the King County (WA) Library System, and has an entire chapter on Konig racing motorcycles and sidecars. This also makes reference to use of Konig engines in "midget" racecars. Whether this actually refers to karts, where a few racers adapted Konig and Anzani engines, or really to midgets I don't know.

[Peer Krage]

Hey Guy's it took some time but now i can give you an report on my website about the story of the König-BMW K500/1.
I hope it willfind your interest.Just look here "http://www.krage-tuning.de/bmw-koenig-en.html"

[Steve Litzell]

Hey Guy's it took some time but now i can give you an report on my website about the story of the König-BMW K500/1.
I hope it willfind your interest.Just look here "http://www.krage-tuning.de/bmw-koenig-en.html"

Peer, You should be very proud of this work on the Konig bike, It is a tribute to Hans and Dieter that you do this. I hope you and family are well and hope to see you soon, Steve

[Steve Litzell]

Well I have waited for a long time for this one for my collection. I finally acquired a 6 cylinder motor. I have been in contact with Uli Collaz and Uli Rochelle about this motor. Seems that there were maybe 5 of these made, all were made for the 850 class. The six that Hans Krage ran was a special made motor with 4 cylinders @ 66 mm and 2 cylinders @ 64 mm making 1000 cc's for OF class. The one I have was originally purchased by OMC for a study. It is in great shape and I'm very proud to have it in my collection with other Konig's from various time periods. I cannot wait to start on this to make like new again, It is believed to be the only one left as others were turned into beer money. Steve:rolleyes:

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Does it have a serial number Steve. And if so is it a special one, or like a regular number?

[Steve Litzell]

Does it have a serial number Steve. And if so is it a special one, or like a regular number?

It just has a four digit number on the case halves, It is not like all the V series motors with the class displacement and year model. Steve

[Master Oil Racing Team]

That's what I figured. A special number for Dieter to know.

[J-Dub]

So what's up Steve? No pictures??? What gives???:mad:

[Steve Litzell]

So what's up Steve? No pictures??? What gives???:mad:

Pictures are coming, getting stuff ready for races now, will get some shots of it next to the 8 cylinder as well. Can't wait to start on them to get them show worthy. Steve

[jackie wilson]

Just came across this thread and it brought back some nostalgia from the early 60's.
I used to smuggle parts from Dieter for W.S.Holland, who tonked drums for Johnny Cash,in those days you had to run the Russian controlled corridor and the searches by the border guards.
Dieter and GEORGE KRAAGE used to run in the European E Class with a 65hp twin, George would run a v bottom and Dieter a hydro. Remember when George sank the rig in Malaga in '68, Dieter made him dive for it , dry it out, race in the last heat.
It was an offshore course and it was rougher than a witches tit, I got beat into second spot by a guy that weighed in at 220 pounds.
Dieter always wanted to be first round in the Berlin 6 hours, usually held on the Wannasee
I got to know Kim Newcome and his girlfriend pretty well, Paddy Rolfe introduced us.
Sorry to poke my nose in, but it is an interesting site and Dieter was always a main player in outboard history.

[Smokin' Joe]

Just came across this thread and it brought back some nostalgia from the early 60's.
I used to smuggle parts from Dieter for W.S.Holland, who tonked drums for Johnny Cash,in those days you had to run the Russian controlled corridor and the searches by the border guards.
Dieter and GEORGE KRAAGE used to run in the European E Class with a 65hp twin, George would run a v bottom and Dieter a hydro. Remember when George sank the rig in Malaga in '68, Dieter made him dive for it , dry it out, race in the last heat.
It was an offshore course and it was rougher than a witches tit, I got beat into second spot by a guy that weighed in at 220 pounds.
Dieter always wanted to be first round in the Berlin 6 hours, usually held on the Wannasee
I got to know Kim Newcome and his girlfriend pretty well, Paddy Rolfe introduced us.
Sorry to poke my nose in, but it is an interesting site and Dieter was always a main player in outboard history.

Interesting post!

[jackie wilson]

Interesting post!

Read the first ten pages in bed, and got told go to sleep by Jilly my wife, saw it was 3am and realized she may have a point.
The distributer in England in the early days was ARTHUR BRAY of Poole, they were also the Mercury distributors. They were taken over by SOUTH WESTERN MARINE FACTORS.
PADDY ROLFE of P&R hydraulics took over as distributor (Dieter and Paddy were close friends and raced hydro's).
I managed to get the Konig dealership for the south of England and raced the 65 hp for a season.
Course it walked all over the 50hp Merc ( when I could start it ) and I sold a fair few motors.
I was a Merc dealer at the time, was told if I would drop Konig and go sole Mercury I would get a30% discount! the offer meant a great deal of extra money in those days, (I was selling over 200 units a year ).
The last bit is "off piste" but thought the Arthur Bray bit was relevant.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I agree with Joe. It is some very interesting posts. Correct me if I'm wrong Jackie, but I'm assuming that the George Kraage you wrote about is actually Hans George Krage. About medium height, stout, fierce on the race course and just as fierce with his laughing and drinking on the banks.

[jackie wilson]

I agree with Joe. It is some very interesting posts. Correct me if I'm wrong Jackie, but I'm assuming that the George Kraage you wrote about is actually Hans George Krage. About medium height, stout, fierce on the race course and just as fierce with his laughing and drinking on the banks.

That's the one, he used to build cranks with a club hammer and an eagle eye.
In the Malaga race ( when it was just a fishing town) in the early 60/ s he was vying for the lead, when he hit a huge roller, the boat took off, came down stern first and simply sank. We used to race in the Med all over Europe and weather conditions ranged from mirror calm to storm conditions, there was usually an offshore race as a supporting event ( joke).
Paramount in all these events was the wonderful comerarderie between competitors off all nations, there was never a language problem and food and drink in tiny restaurants after the events are treasured memories.
Still friends with the few that are still alive.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Before, and after the events Jackie.

Hans was also good with a hammer and backup on cars. Sandpaper, bondo, custom fittings and paint. He had a custom paint and body shop in West Berlin that specialized in Porsche's. As far as I know, that's all he worked on except for special projects of his own such as BMW motorcycle frames fitted with Konig motors. It was a small shop, but highly prized for the work he put out.

One early morning about one a.m. I was riding in what might be considered the backseat of a highly modified Porsche Carrera from Hans's shop when he swapped driver's seat with a girl in the passenger seat that wanted to see what it felt like to punch the throttle on a highly tuned machine. We were on the main drag of West Berlin. Kurfurstendamm, or Ku'damm, and right in the middle of town. Traffic was light. After switching places and settling in, she stomped the accelerator and worked competently through the gears. We were doing about 90 mph in three blocks, getting very light especially in the second intersection before she shut it down. She and Hans busted out laughing, and I was glad we weren't picked up by the politzei.

[jackie wilson]

Before, and after the events Jackie.

Hans was also good with a hammer and backup on cars. Sandpaper, bondo, custom fittings and paint. He had a custom paint and body shop in West Berlin that specialized in Porsche's. As far as I know, that's all he worked on except for special projects of his own such as BMW motorcycle frames fitted with Konig motors. It was a small shop, but highly prized for the work he put out.

One early morning about one a.m. I was riding in what might be considered the backseat of a highly modified Porsche Carrera from Hans's shop when he swapped driver's seat with a girl in the passenger seat that wanted to see what it felt like to punch the throttle on a highly tuned machine. We were on the main drag of West Berlin. Kurfurstendamm, or Ku'damm, and right in the middle of town. Traffic was light. After switching places and settling in, she stomped the accelerator and worked competently through the gears. We were doing about 90 mph in three blocks, getting very light especially in the second intersection before she shut it down. She and Hans busted out laughing, and I was glad we weren't picked up by the politzei.

What was it Perry Como used to croon,---------"MEMORIES ARE MADE OF THIS"-------or was it mamories, I forget.

[Lars Strom]

I think it is Dieter to the left in this picture.

[Steve Litzell]

Yes it is, Looks like Manfred Loth behind him And the brother of Hans son in law at the rope as it looks like Ronald to me. Steve

[Donald]

Yes it is, Looks like Manfred Loth behind him And the brother of Hans son in law at the rope as it looks like Ronald to me. Steve

You are right Steve, and that is Wolfgang Klein in the white jacket.

[smittythewelder]

I hope this is a new question. I tried the Search function, but saw nothing.

In the dim fog of my senior memory, it seems to me that I heard that Konig had built a few four-cylinder 250cc engines around 1970. I think these were the B/C/D/F rotary-valve four-cylinder, just sleeved down some more. That engine surely originated as a 500cc design, since that size had a "square" bore-stroke ratio of 54mmX54mm, which was considered ideal or nearly so at that time. Since all of this series of B/C/D/F engines retained the same 54mm stroke (correct me if that's wrong), a "VA" 250cc version would have had a bore-stroke of about 38mmX54mm. This sort of heavily "under-square" bore-stroke ratio had been fairly common in earlier days of racing 2-strokes, but was not favored by 1970. Yet maybe an under-square engine is not so bad as current fashion would have it. The VB 350cc engines were also quite under-square by the standards of their time and now (45mmX54mm, right?), but I hear that Dan Kirts was running his old VB with the best of the new Italian equipment, or very close, at a recent Nationals..

Anyway, do I remember correctly that there was a 4-cylinder A Konig, and if so, did anyone here have one or run against one, and how well did they work?

[Mark75H]

Yes, there was a VA. It was the least successful variant of the 4 cylinder "V" family.

[David Weaver]

I bought a VA around 1992. It was probably the last 4-cylinder 250 Konig sold new in the USA. We ran a ton of heats on it, but it was realistically outclassed by newer models at that time. I believe that these engines were introduced around 1978-1980. If you watch the OA/OB UIM video's from Dayton in 1982, you see several racing. I believe that I recall seeing two at the PRO Eastern Divisionals in Constantine in 1980. A couple were punched-out and used as 350's. Some 350's used the lighter cranks from the 250's to increase RPMs.

[Steve Litzell]

The Va was first used in 1983 I think but really 1984. Yes it was 38 mm bore and 54 stroke. Ralph Donald and I ran the first two in USA at Lakeland Fl in 84. The Va was a screamer but had near zero torque which made it very tough to drive. During testing before Lakeland, I think I used a 9" pitch wheel to get it up and over to where I could use the pipes, but it still was very tempermental to drive. Ralph on the other hand put his Konig unit with 16:21 gears on his and away he went. Deiter did not know at that time Ralph had 16:21 gears in his unit, But learned this later during our tests. By late 84 we had 11:15 gears introduced. This motor was meant to be ran full speed at all times for it's lack of torque would make the motor fall off the powerband. Only a few drivers could master the 38x54 VA. Before Deiters death and one of my last visits at the factory before his death, he showed me how he made the nearly square motor like the one Dan Kirts has. The motor Dan has is like the last invention of Deiter and like also the motor that his son Peter won the 0250 World championship with. Steve

[smittythewelder]

Interesting. Steve, are you saying that Dan Kirts has a square bore:stroke 250cc, or that the 350 he ran recently is "square" in this way?

[Steve Litzell]

He has a "A "(250) that is nearly square. I don't think he ever ran the A, don't remember, but I do know that it was a produced motor and the last invention of Deiter. Very soon after Deiters Death, peter his son introduced the ZA two cylinder opposed motor loosely based on Rotax cylinders. Casting was pretty crude as compaired to what Deiter had at the time. I think this motor was peter graduation project from school he did.

[Tim Small]

Steve, We ran the 4 cylinder 250 in Bakersfield in 82 when I drove for Elmer. I got 2nd to Denny. He was running one of the first opposed yamatos. If I remember, he beat me on time. We had to run a fuel pump on it to keep it from surging. Denny was running a piston port yamato. Bobby Wilson from Lakeland also had a 4 banger 250 the following year. I had won the 250 Nationals the previous year in Akworth with the 2 piper konig, but switched to the 4 cylinder the next year. I remember testing the 4 cylinder with Dieter and Elmer at lake matty on Friday before lakeland. Couldnt get any of our props to work so Deiter puts his wheel on and it was a rocket. I never really had much luck with the early 4 cylinder A.

[Steve Litzell]

Well Tim, The years they go by quick ya know and you may be right but for some reason 83 sticks in my mind. Damn things were pipey wern't they? Steve

[epugh66]

My brother Gary won the 250 nationals in 1987 with a diecast VA. In '88 or '89 Dieter gave me and Kirts the "new" VA to run at the nationals. I admired Dieter Konig, but I struggled with that engine. It wouldn't get going off of the corner's. With my ''parked" factory Yamato, I was on the pipe immediatly of the corner and had faster lap and sector times. I ran a Harrison mid section that allowed me to interchange powerheads and lower units in a matter of minutes, so we could do back to back comparisons. Dieter assured me that if I pulled the pipe in slowly, I could match the engines power to the boats need to accelerate. I said if I did that, all the Yamato drivers will be in the next turn before I'm on the pipe.

I quit.

Dieter came back and convinced me to run his engine and I would. However, my deal was that I had to share it with a dugout driver. I believe they stuck the engine in one of the heats, they may have even won a heat, I don't remember.

I believe I struggled through in 5-6 or 7.

[epugh66]

I used to smuggle parts from Dieter for W.S.Holland, who tonked drums for Johnny Cash,
usually held on the Wannasee


'Ol Fluke ! my Dad built him a couple of boats to run some Twister's or C6's on.
The Wannsee, long live "The Shark boat" it's a tourist boat that cruises by.

[epugh66]

Anyway, back on topic. It was an honor to race against and with the Konig's. Dieter allowed us to stay in his house and work out of the factory on several occaisions and Peter used a Pugh Boat Works boat in 250cc when he raced in the USA. That's the same boat Dan Kirts raced in the 1993 0-250 WC and was a front runner after day one. He recieved a DQ because the team took the boat out of "Parc Ferme" over night for repairs.... gotta love rule book racing! Kirts was using the opposed twin 250cc with Rotax power valves for that event.

[Jeff Lytle]

I did do an interview with Dieter the year before, and also took some pictures but I never submitted them. It was a feeling of getting things ready for racing and the history was later. When you were done.

Would still love to hear / see this interview Wayne

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I was able to actually get the tape put back on the spool Jeff. I rewound it close to the beginning with a pencil and new eraser so I wouldn't pull the tape off again. I don't have time to transcribe it. I tried to make a digital recording, but the quality was terrible. I went through it all last year to see if Dieter had mentioned anything about a guy named Zimmerman per request of BRF member Sergio. There was no mention of that name, nor did I recollect Dieter mentioning anything about him and his work on rotary valves. I guess I need to find some better way to hook up from the cassette tape to the computer other than RCA connectors. There were only RCA connectors and a mic connection on cassette players in 1975. Sergio gave a suggestion on how I might do it, but I lost the cable I thought might work. I really do need to get this done Jeff, because on the other side I also interviewed Kurt Mischke, Hans Krage, Gerry Drake and Karl Bartel at the 1975 Berlin Boat Show. All of them have passed with the exception that I do not know whether or not Karl Balrtel is still with us. On that tape Karl tells about when he is floating in the water dead while Kurt was leading a race when Kurt suddenly backed off the throttle, turned to the infield and slowly made his way to where Karl was drifting. Karl was puzzled, and after Kurt came up next to him and killed his engine, Karl asked Kurt why he did that. Kurt replied that he had thrown and blade off his prop, then decided to come over to see if Karl happened to have a cigarette on him. A bittersweet funny story as years after it was told Kurt died of lung cancer.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

An old racing buddy and I hooked up this past summer. I never actually raced against him, although he did race boats, motorcycles and karts, it was his Dad and Uncle I raced with when I first started. Steve Wetherbee also pitted for me a few times and worked at Emmord's Marine......the boat and motorcycle shop my Dad and Joe Hendricks bought from Ralph Emmord in 1968. More to come about Steve. He has bought a couple of motors and a boat with some history, and is restoring them, along with some family owned stuff. Steve bought a Konig powerhead some weeks ago and it arrived in Corpus Christi, Texas while he and his wife were up at his Dad Alex's ranch during Thanksgiving. Steve brought this Konig by my house this afternoon, and I took some photos to post here to get more info about it going. Please excuse our reflections. I didn't bother with polaroid filters because ....didn't have time to look for them. Dumperjack and Steve Litzell....please tell us what you know.

[Steve Litzell]

That is part of (motor only) a side board model motor. It is mounted to a board that goes across the transom. I have one of these in my collection. It has a long driveshaft tube and the motor sits on a locking tilting deal that you can set the prop in the water at about any angle. I think they were maybe about 3 Hp. Many parts missing there on that one but a nice example non the less. I see that someone has polished the tank which removed the " KONIG" waterslide decal. I have spent a little time to make mine run, interesting little motor. Steve

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Steve W and I know that it is a side board motor Steve. Mainly we were wondering about when it was made based on any differences you might find between earlier and later models. What parts are missing besides the rest of the mounting bracket, driveshaft and tube?. Steve has a Bosch spark plug coming, and wants to find out what the drive components look like, dimensions, etc so he can make them. Do you know how to interpret the serial number? Was there a system to maybe figure out when this one was built? Could you post some pictures of yours?

[Steve Litzell]

Hi Wayne, I will get some pictures of mine over holidays as like you I work a lot at this time. I'm not sure when Konig stopped with making these but by the mag parts i would say late forties and early fifties as Dieter was a young man of about twenty something then and factory was doing many pleasure type engines. These are really cool motors and how they work, typical of simple engineering. Because I'm a computer idiot, I may send to you Wayne the pictures and you can post. Steve

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Send me the pictures Steve, and I will get them posted. I think Steve Wetherbee will want to talk to you about how to get or make parts to get his konig right.

[Steve Litzell]

Send me the pictures Steve, and I will get them posted. I think Steve Wetherbee will want to talk to you about how to get or make parts to get his konig right.

No Problem Wayne, you have my number and private email, Steve

[Ed Provini]

No Problem Wayne, you have my number and private email, Steve

Wayne,
There are pictures of the motor you are asking about on the Quincy Looper website.You will find them in the Quincy vs.Konig area.
Thank You,
Ed Provini

[wolfgang]

Steve W and I know that it is a side board motor Steve. Mainly we were wondering about when it was made based on any differences you might find between earlier and later models. What parts are missing besides the rest of the mounting bracket, driveshaft and tube?. Steve has a Bosch spark plug coming, and wants to find out what the drive components look like, dimensions, etc so he can make them. Do you know how to interpret the serial number? Was there a system to maybe figure out when this one was built? Could you post some pictures of yours?

My dad had one of those in the fifties. Motors were normally mounted on a tube (pipe), which attached to the gunnels of a kajak (Paddelboot) with cast aluminium hook-like clamps. Tube protruded right (or left side of cockpit, with motor hanging over starboard (or port) side. It was a crossflow (Nasenkolben) design similar to the early race (and standard) motors. Produced after the war, into the fifties. Indestructible, if cared for. Dad built a car-top boat (ma gave preference to caravanning over boating), and I traded the motor in for part payment for a 18hp Johnson. Rgds, Wolfgang

[Danny Pigott]

I remember seeing a few of them in the 50's . Was the 3 cylinder C Konig the first 3 cyl. racing engine?

[Mark75H]

There was an earlier Konig 3 cylinder racer before the inline 3 of the 1950's ... the 1930's Konig triple was a radial

I believe these were the first racing triples.

[Steve Litzell]

The hectamotor was not a racer, First race motor was 175 about 1937 or so, Dieter was the racer maker much to the dismay of Rudolf, he made the pleasure motors. Dieters sister set a record with the first racer after the war, Then came the war, After the war they started the racer motor stuff again as well as pleasure motor work. First A was about 1947, The B was already made in it's modular design. That design opened up the other classes as things improved lifestyle wise after the war. Steve

[Gene East]

Steve,

When you were in Germany, did you ever hear of a truck wheel manufacturer named Konig? I do realize Konig is a popular name in Germany, but I didn't expect to see that name in an American tire shop

I had some work done on my pickup yesterday and there it was. I mentioned to the service manager (Glenn Predmore) my involvement with boat racing. He asked if I knew Jim Schoch. Duh! Small world!

He asked a lot of questions about boat racing. I gave him the web site address. He sounded very interested and promised to check us out.

[Smokin' Joe]

König means king, very common name in N. Germany. There are many Königs/Koenigs in Texas. No relation to Dieter. Norwegian is Kong so King Kong is King King or Kong Kong.


Steve,

When you were in Germany, did you ever hear of a truck wheel manufacturer named Konig? I do realize Konig is a popular name in Germany, but I didn't expect to see that name in an American tire shop

I had some work done on my pickup yesterday and there it was. I mentioned to the service manager (Glenn Predmore) my involvement with boat racing. He asked if I knew Jim Schoch. Duh! Small world!

He asked a lot of questions about boat racing. I gave him the web site address. He sounded very interested and promised to check us out.

[Steve Litzell]

Yes I have heard of the wheel maker Gene, They are popular with the small car crowd here. I have even drank Koing beer as well, Steve

[J-Dub]

I have been accused to have been "Drinking the Kool-Aid", Konig being just one flavor...:cool:

J-Dub

[racewright]

West Coast Kool Aide ,Makes sense.

[F-12]

And a few flavors makes you test the water in many forms. Fast is fast no matter how you look at it. Thanks for bringing fast here on BRF, J-Dub..

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Never seen a Konig beer, although there are many heavy duty Koenig lift tail gates for pickups down here. Guess they are the preferred brand because they work very well.

My favorite brew is Berliner Kindl. Still got some of the little pads?? you set them on. Steve...you remember the Berliner Weisse? A pilsner that was colored red or green on May Day? Debbie and I gave it a taste because of the tradition, but I never figured out if it was a German tradition or a Commie one because of May Day.

[Racer4s]

Steve Litzell,
I've enjoyed reading about the history of the different Konig motors and inside stories that you have about you and Ralph's times with Dieter. My Dad never ran Alky that I know of, but he did have a Quincy 30H and 44 that he raced in NOA Mod. I do remember a 20H showed up in his workshop in our basement once that was setup on alky. Him and his racing sponsor, Ted Flowers, had picked it up at a pro race in Zanesville, OH. I don't think he ever ran it, though.
You mentioned in an earlier post about TQ midgets. I remember a TQ racer named Ronnie Ambrose, from Owensboro, KY in the mid to late 80's that ran a Konig in his TQ with the UMRA Association here in the Midwest. He just dominated for several years. Everybody else was running the Honda 750 motorcycle motors. I think one year he won like 25 out of 30 features. Nobody could beat him so they finally outlawed 2-strokes to stop him. Why nobody copied what he did, I just don't understand. Did you work on those motors? Or know what he was using?


Brent Simmons

[Steve Litzell]

Hi Brent, yes I knew also Ron. I heard from his son a couple years ago and talked about his Dads racing days. The Tq used D and E motors depending on track rules about displacement. This car was sold to a couple of racers outWest. They had me go through their motor back in 91 or so and then flew me out there for testing and racing. Owner was in Arizona,and we then flew to California for testing and racing. We went to three different tracks one being the last race for Astoria I believe. Good time and much was learned.Ron started out in Karts and I have some old mags with pictures of Ron in his Konig Powerd cart. I just did a couple Fa Konig that are for cartsfor a couple of vintage racers from out west. Wayne, I do remember the beer you speak of but my preference was Sulthiess, it was a dark beer and was only in Berlin. Three of them would set you on your *** for sure, six or more made you not work well next day. I promise to get you pictures of my sideboard. Steve

[Master Oil Racing Team]

That's why I preferred Berliner Kindl over Schultheiss. It is a nice smooth pilsner.

[Steve Litzell]

I think your getting weak on me Wayne😁Wish we could have a schlite together now, steve🍻

[1100r]

Bull Moose I haven't had any of the beers you guys are speaking of but I could go for a couple of your mud slides you used to make. Happy New Year my friend!!,

[Racer4s]

Thanks, Steve
I heard that Ron had sold it to someone out west, but I never did hear anything more about the outfit or how it did. Ron had a couple son's that also ended up racing. I remember Ron was so pissed about his konig being outlawed, that he refused to run a Honda motor like everyone else. Instead, he built a Suzuki (that no one had ever run before) and beat all of the Honda's.
In the mid 60's I remember my dad helped put a 30h or 44 in a TQ for a local racer named Thompson. It was very fast and very loud. I don't really remember how well it did, but I know one time they were able to get Indy racer Sonny Yates for a race down in Kentucky. They cleaned house but I think that was the only time they were able to put Sonny Yates in the car. Brent

[Steve Litzell]

I still make mudslides Todd! And Brent, the guys I helped out west back in early eighties did well also until USAC out laced all two strokes in TQ. The four cycle boys wined to much I guess,Steve

[Bob Dunlap]

Here's an old Konig B I've had forever. Dieter brought it over in 56 I think, to a friend of my Dad's and the guy never raced. I don't think the motor has ever been ran here. You can see it has the original spark plugs and shipping crate.

[smittythewelder]

You've got some cool stuff, Dunlap (some of the rest of you might want to see Bob's photos of his A Anzani restoration on another thread here). Was the welded steel tube towerhousing original to that engine? I know the earlier examples of the same motor were shipped with the cast aluminum "stock" towerhousing. I think your engine might be a later one because of the barrel valve Konig carburetors, whereas some others, which I believe were earlier, used the same 25mm slide-type Bings that also were used on the A motors for several years. I don't ask things like this to be picky about your restoration, Bob. There always has been so much mixing and matching of components on all alky engines that I'd personally tend to accept nearly any combination of parts on a restoration as legitimate and even "period-correct".
How did the best examples of the Konig crossflow B engines do against the best alky B Mercs and Champs of the same late-'50s era? The Konigs should have had a little better intake arrangement with the double rotary valves, but the way they then sent the air/fuel charge through windows in the piston looked rather restrictive. What was the bottom line? Schubert? Litzell?

In the mid-Sixties, J. Dub's grandpa, Bill Myers, a great guy then in his Fifties, was running a crossflow B Konig on a Charleton hydro in Reg. 10. Boat was mahogany and pea-green, the Myers clan's "team color."

[Steve Litzell]

The Konig were fast and depending on driver won, the big change was going from two carb B's to the single carb model, when the Quincy looper cane about it ruled until 67 when the first four cylinder B Konig came out with the rotary valve. Then the race was on until the early70's. and the square Block B pretty much sealed the deal. Steve

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

The Konig were fast and depending on driver won, the big change was going from two carb B's to the single carb model, when the Quincy looper cane about it ruled until 67 when the first four cylinder B Konig came out with the rotary valve. Then the race was on until the early70's. and the square Block B pretty much sealed the deal. Steve
See,I let Steve take the lead here. In 1968 the Loopers stil lruled. I won the nationals at Depue with a Looper.No fluke either.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I think you jumped the gun on this one John.:) Go back and reread Steve's post. What he is saying is that loopers ruled the roost until 1968 when the 4 cylinder rotary valve Konigs came out. Then it was game on. Until then the loopers had no real competition against the two cylinder internal rotary valve Konigs. After that, there was real competition between the two and whoever had the best set up, good start, drove hard etc. got the win. In 1968 you won with your looper against other drivers with both Quincy Loopers AND competitive four cylinder Konigs. It wasn't until the square blocks came out that Konig dominated.

[Steve Litzell]

Wayne read that correct John, your win was no fluke, but the new square block was a much better motor and between that one and the new cast inron cylinder Fa, they pretty much killed the flatheads. In the A class alone, I remember testing at a famous lake in Lakeland with Walt, and a couple drivers with these new A's were some 7 to 8 mph faster than the good A's form Quincy, and they were running like crap and not clean, When Walt done his thing with them and Made them run clean, they were quickly into the 80 mph range and we ran out of boat quick, Hello John Yale. The new B motors were also the same, The only saving grace we had in A, was the Konig. With its small retainer bearing was quickly over come by the power of the "New A". They would only last about 6 heats and they would shuck a retainer.Hello Walt Blankenstein, he found a rod bearing from a Suzuki dirt bike that fit and had taller rollers. That added durability to the motors and ended the failures and sealed the deal in Konig domination. I remember running in elimination heats and just hoping for the Konigs to fail. Worked sometimes and others not. The flathead was a very good engine, and it gave Konig many troubles over the years, even the Quincy Mercs did for that matter. One time when Dieter was staying at my house in Florida, he was commenting about my mail Box. My Mail box stand was my A Looper. Held my mail box up for almost twenty years before I moved to Georgia. Brought it with me, today it is a running and restored example of the Quincy Flathead. Hell I even sold it at one time and it came back to me, but that is another story in itself. Steve

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

Wayne read that correct John, your win was no fluke, but the new square block was a much better motor and between that one and the new cast inron cylinder Fa, they pretty much killed the flatheads. In the A class alone, I remember testing at a famous lake in Lakeland with Walt, and a couple drivers with these new A's were some 7 to 8 mph faster than the good A's form Quincy, and they were running like crap and not clean, When Walt done his thing with them and Made them run clean, they were quickly into the 80 mph range and we ran out of boat quick, Hello John Yale. The new B motors were also the same, The only saving grace we had in A, was the Konig. With its small retainer bearing was quickly over come by the power of the "New A". They would only last about 6 heats and they would shuck a retainer.Hello Walt Blankenstein, he found a rod bearing from a Suzuki dirt bike that fit and had taller rollers. That added durability to the motors and ended the failures and sealed the deal in Konig domination. I remember running in elimination heats and just hoping for the Konigs to fail. Worked sometimes and others not. The flathead was a very good engine, and it gave Konig many troubles over the years, even the Quincy Mercs did for that matter. One time when Dieter was staying at my house in Florida, he was commenting about my mail Box. My Mail box stand was my A Looper. Held my mail box up for almost twenty years before I moved to Georgia. Brought it with me, today it is a running and restored example of the Quincy Flathead. Hell I even sold it at one time and it came back to me, but that is another story in itself. Steve
I actually was not debating the years when the square block surfaced.Not sure of the year. After the 1968 season I traded one of my B loopers to a friend. O'Dea talked me into getting one of the early FA's Scott Smith imported. While I should have won the 1969 national championship I had a 1st & 3rd. Wal man had. 1st & 2nd. My overall time was less then Gerry's. I have a time sheets as evidence. You know the ones Gloria always provided. And, most importantly while testing prior to the drivers meeting with Simon's prop I only saw 77 on my speedometer as fast as my B Looper Oh yeah retainers didn't last long, but we did better then 6 heats

[smittythewelder]

The Konig were fast and depending on driver won, the big change was going from two carb B's to the single carb model, when the Quincy looper cane about it ruled until 67 when the first four cylinder B Konig came out with the rotary valve. Then the race was on until the early70's. and the square Block B pretty much sealed the deal. Steve

Are we talking apples and oranges? I was wondering about the competitiveness of the deflector B Konig (two carbs, each feeding one rotary valve) against the other crossflow motors of the day (late Fifties). The one-carb FB Konig was entirely different, with a "big" single 32mm carb feeding thru two rotary valves via a siameezed intake, and with Schnurle loop scavenging, a much more powerful engine. I know you know all this, Steve, but I wanted to clarify the question: How good was the deflector Konig against the best Champs and Mercs?



As to relative performance of the various loop scavenged B motors of the Sixties, things were a little different out here in Reg. 10 in the Sixties/early-'70s, possibly because we had two top tuners, Jim Hallum and Ron Anderson. Each of them reworked a B Quincy, and those were the two fastest Loopers in the Region, but they still wouldn't keep up with the Anzanis built by the same two men. Neither of them ever built an FB (two cylinder) Konig, which might have been even a little faster. My notion, though I never had one, would be to start with an FC Konig and sleeve it down to take FB pistons (FC and FB had same stroke), which would have resulted in an aluminum uni-block engine without the separate heavy iron cylinders flopping around as in the factory FB. This might have been a good Restricted B engine years later. Anyway, Hallum finally built a first-gen (round-block?) VB Konig four for Walin which outran every other B in the region, won two Nationals, and set a comp. record, which is the end of the story I know.

Zak used to moly-coat those poor little aluminum A Konig retainers, and slot the big end of the rods, as ways to make the later versions survive the increased hp. Funny thing, as I recall, up to somewhere in the early '60s the FA konigs came with good long rod bearing rollers and steel retainers. When Hallum was helping motorcycle roadracer Jim Dunn build his privateer 250cc X-6 Suzuki that outran the factory 250s at Daytona, they made similar steel cages last longer by silver-plating them. Silver-plated titanium bearing cages would've been better yet, but there was a reason racers called that substance "unobtanium."

[Steve Litzell]

Are we talking apples and oranges? I was wondering about the competitiveness of the deflector B Konig (two carbs, each feeding one rotary valve) against the other crossflow motors of the day (late Fifties). The one-carb FB Konig was entirely different, with a "big" single 32mm carb feeding thru two rotary valves via a siameezed intake, and with Schnurle loop scavenging, a much more powerful engine. I know you know all this, Steve, but I wanted to clarify the question: How good was the deflector Konig against the best Champs and Mercs?



As to relative performance of the various loop scavenged B motors of the Sixties, things were a little different out here in Reg. 10 in the Sixties/early-'70s, possibly because we had two top tuners, Jim Hallum and Ron Anderson. Each of them reworked a B Quincy, and those were the two fastest Loopers in the Region, but they still wouldn't keep up with the Anzanis built by the same two men. Neither of them ever built an FB (two cylinder) Konig, which might have been even a little faster. My notion, though I never had one, would be to start with an FC Konig and sleeve it down to take FB pistons (FC and FB had same stroke), which would have resulted in an aluminum uni-block engine without the separate heavy iron cylinders flopping around as in the factory FB. This might have been a good Restricted B engine years later. Anyway, Hallum finally built a first-gen (round-block?) VB Konig four for Walin which outran every other B in the region, won two Nationals, and set a comp. record, which is the end of the story I know.

Zak used to moly-coat those poor little aluminum A Konig retainers, and slot the big end of the rods, as ways to make the later versions survive the increased hp. Funny thing, as I recall, up to somewhere in the early '60s the FA konigs came with good long rod bearing rollers and steel retainers. When Hallum was helping motorcycle roadracer Jim Dunn build his privateer 250cc X-6 Suzuki that outran the factory 250s at Daytona, they made similar steel cages last longer by silver-plating them. Silver-plated titanium bearing cages would've been better yet, but there was a reason racers called that substance "unobtanium."

Deflector for deflector the Konig was better than the say Quincy Mercs ( not loopers). The two carb B had two rotaryvalves, they were at the bottom of each case where as the single carb B had a rotaryvalve on both sides of center case. The two Carb B was both a deflector and with updated loop cylinders as they were all interchangeable. The C was also both loop and deflector. Your idea Smitty of making a B out of a FC would of been just a single carb B at the time. Keep in mind these motors only reved to about 9800 or so. The problem with the A motors was the early type had a very short bearing like the first four cylinders had. As the power came up, the limit speed of the bearing was overcome. Later versions had a taller bearing maybe like what you described. This bearing problem still exists today with current motors like the Konny motor. These motors have reached the limit speeds of bearings and durability is now a problem. Hope this answers your questions. Steve

[smittythewelder]

Thanks for the info on relative performance, Steve. Who had the fast deflector Konigs in the country, any names we'd know? FWIW, did you know that Turner made pistons for the deflector B? They looked to me like they might have been a little better than the ones Scott Smith had, slightly bigger windows. I didn't get into racing until '65, so I never saw the all-crossflow years. The Rautenburg brothers had been running and selling Konigs (mostly A's) for a few years by that time, and we also had Anzanis. As to the various configurations of the various two cylinder Konigs, I have Bill Myers old deflector powerhead in a box along with odd FB and FC parts, and some of my own FA stuff. Yeah, my notion of an FC sleeved to FB would only have had one carb, but there was room for it to have had a 40mm bore or even bigger. That's why I thought it might have been a good Restricted B, given the rules for that class. But for that matter, the sleeved FC block might have been adaptable to the 2-carb deflector 'case with some welding on the 'case, if two carbs were wanted.


The problem with the A motors was the early type had a very short bearing like the first four cylinders had. As the power came up, the limit speed of the bearing was overcome. Later versions had a taller bearing maybe like what you described.

https://www.google.com/search?q=2-stroke+rod+bearings&biw=1853&bih=866&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjf9MyAk4TSAhVPVWMKHYEWAyUQ_AUIBygC#imgr c=7Dx0x2JYdDmPmM:

Now IF that link works (look at the big photo for the KTM350 bearing), the big-end bearing in the photos looks roughly like those that came with the A Konigs in the Fifties until maybe '62, as I recall it. Nice tall flat-ended rollers (remember Zak always called them "rolls") in a formed steel cage. For some reason Konig then went to aluminum cages and very short rollers which had perfectly half-round ends on them. A few years later, maybe '67 or so, we got back a tiny little amount of roller length when the ends of the rollers were made more nearly flat, less hemispherical, with the aluminum cages modified to suit this alteration. These aluminum cages were the ones that Zak moly-coated; I still have a few, though I eventually learned to moly-coat parts on my own, using an airbrush, an old phonograph turntable, and supplies from an outfit called Kal-Gard. Anyway, the rollers still looked absurdly short (especially as they were running in Zak's slotted rods), but maybe they were used until the end of the A Konig years unless Herkler came up with something better (after my time) ??? What I'm saying is that the very earliest FAs, with the megaphones or the first skinny expansion chambers, had what appeared to my ignorant self to be the best big-end bearings of the entire engine series ('57 to what, '78?).

Lots of silly detail and what does it matter now, but that's how I recall it, and I do have some dusty boxes with examples.

[RickM]

I realize this is avery old thread but I stumbled upon it looking for parts for my Konig SD570 four cylinder radial engine. From what I have heard is that Peter still has several parts available and is willing to sell them. Could someone please point me in the direction of how I can make contact with Peter or his sister Marion? It would be greatly appriciated.

Thanks,
RickM



A week ago our son Hans and I visited Holger Arens at his factory in east Berlin. We'll post photos and a story later. He told us that the König factory is still there on Friedrich Olbricht Damm, the doors were simply shut when Dieter died, and that son Peter König occasionally sells some motor parts to König enthusiasts. That was during our annual vacation on the east German island Hiddensee ne of Berlin.

On the way back from Hiddensee to Austria yesterday we stopped and (with Wayne Baldwin's help with the address) finally found the factory's back entrance just before Peter and his sister Marion were about to drive away. I immediately recognized Peter from photos of Dieter. Peter asked who am I, noticed my Johnson cap, and was immediately very friendly (as was Marion) to an old boat racer. They had a duty to perform but nevertheless took time to show us the factory (I didn't find out if they speak English, but having grown up in west Berlin I assume that they do). As we walked inside the factory I said to Peter 'Wir sind auf heilige Grund' ('We're on holy ground'). When he took me into the test room he finally responded, 'Jetzt sind wir auf heilige Grund' ('Now we're on holy ground'). There were a pair of expansion chambers attached to a hose to send the exhaust out of the building. I didn't see the dyno but it was surely there. In another room we looked at rows of blocks and powerheads, a few with v-block reeds (experimental) but most with rotary valves. There were also the air cooled plane motors. Near the end Marion brought out a box of props, König, Wald (east German) and Dewald. There was an unworked König prop casting among the lot. Peter vaguely recalls being with his father once when the metal was poured (Marion thinks the molds may still exist) but he doesn't recall the foundry. The König prop has a blade shape that I'd build, so I bought it. I don't know which class motor it fits, will put it on my pitch gauge when I get back to Houston and then Wayne can tell me the class. It was a very pleasant and important experience for me to see the old factory, rows of parts complete with machines. Peter didn't want photos made of the machines because of what he saw as Unordnung. My German wife took one photo, she didn't hear him say that, and the machine shop looked fine to both of us.

The first photo shows the front, today, of the former factory building. The König entrance is at rear. Between the used car business and König is a small metal works. Wayne has posted (pg. 1) a photo of the front of the building from 1977, and fantastic photos from the inside. Presumably, that was during Wayne's trip to Berlin when he and Dieter went to a race in Austria on the Donau/Danube. I didn't ask Peter and Marion if the rent out the rest of the building, or simply sold it.

I told Peter I'll try to visit again next summer. Marion was kind enough to give me a stack of König decals before we left, now I'll have to put them on a JohnRude! Unless there are enough parts left in the stock to assemble a complete König. I'm wondering if the old 3 cyl. 500 cc model might be possible but would settle for a Boxer.... .

As an anecdote, I told Peter I was a factory-trained Mercury mechanic at age 14 and cringed every time I saw a König speed record listed in the NOA record book. that brought a smile.

Joe McCauley

PS I learned later via email that Peter is fluent in English.

[Steve Litzell]

I realize this is avery old thread but I stumbled upon it looking for parts for my Konig SD570 four cylinder radial engine. From what I have heard is that Peter still has several parts available and is willing to sell them. Could someone please point me in the direction of how I can make contact with Peter or his sister Marion? It would be greatly appriciated.

Thanks,
RickM

That is going to take a higher authority than anyone here as Peter has been dead for maybe 5 years now. Factory is closed and Marion is hard to get hold of, man that rents space there knows little of what is there, maybe you could say what you need and I can help, Steve

[Smokin' Joe]

That is going to take a higher authority than anyone here as Peter has been dead for maybe 5 years now. Factory is closed and Marion is hard to get hold of, man that rents space there knows little of what is there, maybe you could say what you need and I can help, Steve

Peter died a few years ago. You'd need to look up Marion in the Berlin phone book
or other info. We were in the factory in 2011.
Joe