Wrong . The Golden Hawk by far .Supercharged by a McCulloch blower . A road going Nascar ! 4.7 litre close to 300 bhp in a light body . 125mph and 0 to 60 mph in under 8 seconds in 1957 My father owned two of them , looking at the performance figures you can see why the latter Lark Hawk was a disappointment ! 1st photo Mum at Noosa heads around 1957 2nd photo me and mum at the a family farm at Shoreham 1958. Built around 800 supercharged cars in either Auto form or 3 speed manual. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Front end heavy ? I remember years ago my father telling me how he would bring back Franklin Caravans from Ballarat towed behind a Golden Hawk for his yard in Hawthorn , sitting on 80mph and passing current Holden/Ford/Morris ect up the hills around the Bacchus Marsh and the other drivers jaws would drop ............often a tandem caravan.
No sir not in the Caddy's case. Shed loads of grunt and if you were coming on the GG I'd tell you the story of my hilarious trip home from Sydeney to Atherton in mine!
SAE HP was measured off the flywheel on an engine dyno, usually without the full exhaust system. Subtract 30% for rear wheel hp. I think this was standard practice for most manufacturers up to the early 70's, be they American or European. SAE standards specified the ambient temperature and humidity so results were comparable.
GM used gross up until 1971, and yes, then we got the SAE net. So we got to see the 270hp Corvette of 71 drop to 200hp the following year with no real world change in performance etc. That's 25% just on measurement changes, and then we still get to take into account drivetrain loss. So my basic point was that a car advertised with 300hp then is nothing like 300hp now. I probably could have worded it better, but I was going for hyperbole (and I am being careful to compare only 71 to 72, as 70 models had higher compression which was dropped in 71 models due to emissions etc, whereas 71 to 72 the engines themselves were VERY similar, just now using net vs gross.)
Please us non Ferrari owners offer so much more then the average Ferrari punter .. Image Unavailable, Please Login
