Orange County is where the test session was.

There were some pictures of his old small block mopar heads floating around on Facebook this week

I was at the Winter nationals that year and was amazed at Glidden's small block. I saw both of his motors. One was declared to be 337 ci, the other was a little different. Both or at least one of them used cast iron rockers. The lift and duration on the cam shaft seemed to me be very big. Exhaust manifolds were big, at least 2".

Mostly, the motors were pretty plain, but running, they were something else. Could not tell what had been done to the W2 cylinder heads.

Heard he'd straightened the push rod angles.

Spoke with Dave Koffel that day. He said that they tested a 318-3 motor to over 9000 RPM with no ill affects. I think he said all they did was change the compression ratio and use a larger oil pan. Can't recall if they altered the oiling to the lifters. Who ever knew.

I had the pleasure of Bob throwing us out of his pit space at the Mopar nationals one year....

We were teasing him about the Mopar shirt he was wearing! He had like no sense of humor!

Not taking ANYTHING away from Bob but at least some of his success with the Fords in the mid-late 70's could be at least in part due to the other ford teams (Gapp & Roush and Don Nicholson at least partially) backing out of Pro Stock.

Gapp & Roush were VERY TOUGH for anyone to beat until they backed out out of frustration with the ever-changing rules. We know the rest of the Roush story

Nicholson's engine builder was some kid named Jon Kaase, I think DD figured out it was way more luctrative to do the Southern Style "Run watcha brung!" IHRA Match Racing instead of going full time NHRA with the cleveland powered 70 Mustang. That led very quickly to the IHRA 700 then unlimited cube "Mountain Motor" racing of the early to mid 80's ....and brother, let me tell you that was some EXCITING Racing. It also led to the NHRA standardizing on the 500", 2350 pound recipie they run to this day.

There was so much $$$ and excitement in it that both Glidden and WJ raced both circuits with seperate NHRA and IHRA cars (WJ ran Jerome Bradford's Monte Carlo) which had to be physically and mentally taxing to do. It's also what brought WJ and Greg Anderson from Minnesota to Georgia. And Ronnie Sox drove Dean Thompson's 814" Kaase powered 82 Mustang which had a Roush Powered Mopar Missle Tribute Paint job.

This was a very long time ago, but at one time Jim Hale in Arkansas had some of Bob's SBM cylinder heads and perhaps a complete engine.

I don't think Jim ever did anything with them and I don't know who he sold them to. It is unlikely but possible he still has them.

Bill

I didn't know he was sticking with Mopar a second year, before the bankruptcy forced his hand.
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Sorry for the ugly link. Not sure what happened there. If you read through the comments on the poll page, you will find one that works.

That's some cool history right there! Thank you Streetwize! I hate to throw this out there but I think at one time Bob was accused of having nitro in the crankcase?
RIP Bob Glidden

My favorite is the Arrow hands down.
I was at Pomona when that car debuted, and even though I was 15 at the time, it seemed so surreal that a SBM was dominating pro stock that way.
Bob got off the throttle early on every pass in eliminations that I saw.
He succeeded with the same X block and W2 head castings that Chrysler's braintrust of engineers had failed with.
In the late 70's my dad's modified eliminator heads were done by Jim Razor at Mullen & Co. in Culver City, CA. There was a SBM block there that had all the cylinder walls removed, just a big oval hole from end to end. Didn't know it at the time, but it was Glidden's block, obviously getting some thick sleeve work done.

And the Arrow went to Paul Gentilozzi for a short time, then to Jerry Hurley, and was driven by Dempsey Hardy and Sonny Ray in modified and comp eliminator

I saw Sox match racing Jenkins (Can't remember who was driving for Grump) at Motion Raceway with that car. It was a good looking car for sure.

From what I understand the block was highly modified including changing the lifter angles.

Wow!!!!! The Arrow not only won, it won big

As it should. Glidden dominated with that car.

I'm just kinda surprised the Ford guys didn't come out.

Didn't Landy try that without much success?

I think there were so many Fords he did so well with it split the vote up. I was sure his undefeated Fairmont would win, but glad to see the Arrow pull it off.

Geezz...who would drive a fugly Arrow....lol

Yes, there was a magazine article that Dandy Dick moved the lifter valley around. It was in an old SS?DI.

Sox and Martin also had a sb mopar PS...

That's correct, Landy did it first, only with success.
The article was in a SS/DI, I still have that issue packed away. Best drag race car mag ever, hated it when they closed it down.