Topic: The Zen of Speed Racer

[burmashave]

Release of the Speed Racer movie means that the original Speed Racer DVD collections are now in the bargain bin!

I grew up on Speed Racer. I've always credited my driving abilities to my avid watching of Speed Racer when I was about 8. Way back then, I learned that it's important to nail both the brake and clutch when going into a spin, and I also learned that when cars crash, the people don't come out like accordions before popping back into shape. On the Speed Racer show, the cars crash and the drivers crawl out in flames before dying.

Now that I'm older, but not wiser, I've noticed some very cool things in the show:
       
- When Speed describes his car, he mentions it has dual overhead cams. The show was made in 1967.
- Mentions are made to other performance components, such as superchargers.
- While driving with a racing coach, the coach tells Speed to use engine braking as he enters the turn (something I wouldn't do).
- More importantly, the coach tells Speed to use his heel and toe in the curve (otherwise known as "toe 'n heeling," something I do).
- Speed takes his car to the track for test laps one day because Pops Racer (Speed's dad) had replaced the carburators.
- Cafe Racers with mounted machine guns!!! Say no more!

Speed's car was very fanciful, however, several of his innovations have been achieved:
     
1) His automatic jacks were designed to make it easy to work on the car. Indy and/or Formula cars have used internally mounted pneumatic jacks for pit stops.
2) When underwater, the Mach 5 doesn't use an optical periscope. Rather, a video periscope is deployed as on our newest attack submarines.
3) Speed's special homing pigeon provides some of the capabilities provided by our man-portable UAV's (unmanned aerial vehicles).

You can catch some episodes on hulu.com (hat tip to Firecracker). All the videos on hulu.com are posted legally by copyright holders.

Any other Speed Racer fans out there?

[333]

Not so much.  It was cool, no question.  A lot of sci-fi has come to pass.  Discovery(?) did a whole hour on how Star Trek has "changed" our world.  Two of the Trek ones  come to mind: our PDA= that clipboard computer Kirk used, and the hypo spray used in sick bay, while requires serious compressed air, is a reality.  And the "special homing pigeon" has been depicted in many sci-fi shows/movies.

Speilberg has said that one of sci-fi's purposes is to inspire reality from fiction.

[mystic_1]

I want the big buzz saws that popped out of the front fender.  My commute would be SO much easier

mystic_1

[6pkrunner]

I had known that Peugeot was he first to use hemispherical heads in the very early 1900s, and had thought that Alfa was the first for DOHC in the early 50s, but.....

"The first DOHC engines were two- or four-valve per cylinder designs from companies like Fiat (1912), Peugeot Grand Prix (1913, 4 valve), Alfa Romeo GP (1914, 4 valve) and 6C (1925), Maserati Tipo 26 (1926), Bugatti Type 51 (1931), and Audi. Most Ferraris used two-valve DOHC engines as well."

As for the advent of the PDA, I think that it was just a natural branch evolution of the PC more than any inspiration from Star Trek. Bill Shatner may disagree.

[burmashave]

Thanks for the scoop. I hear what you're saying in that Speed Racer wasn't exactly ground breaking in terms of technology, and I don't mean to say that any real inventions were inspired by the show. It just seems cool that a few of the car features have been in some way realized. Of course we've accomplished these innovations only in limited ways, which is to say that Formula cars cannot use internal jacks to jump over other cars. Along with mystic, I await the buzz saws, or at least a performance car that works well underwater.

I feel that science fiction shows, such as Star Trek cherry pick innovations that have come to pass when touting a show. It's easy to ignore all the innovations that will never happen.

As for the car lingo, I'm surprised to hear now terms and phrases that were completely lost upon me as an 8-year old. I may well be wrong, and often have been, but I was thinking that the term "dual overhead cams" was something with which the general public wasn't familiar in the late 1960's. I would think that few drivers today know what "toe 'n heeling" means. Again, the lingo is more cool than earth shattering, especially because the terms are sprinkled here and there amongst the fantastical.

[754]

You could get an OHC firebird back then, had to be some double-knockers in the 60,s, maybe Jaguar, for sure some Italian jobs...

 In 67 Honda had a Black Bomber double-knocker..