A VERY BRIEF INCH PINCHER HISTORY LESSON
T
here have been only three Inch Pincher drag cars, but body variations in those through the years muddy the picture a bit. The first was a ’56 Oval Darrell Vittone (son of EMPI founder Joe Vittone) once used as a daily driver. Dan Gurney road-raced it in the Bahamas (with Dean Lowry overseeing) in both ’63 and ’64. The Oval’s rear window was eventually taken out in favor of a bigger early-’60s window, and the roof was covered with vinyl in a multi-colored flower motif to go along with the orange ‘n’ flame paint scheme. By 1971, Darrell had built EMPI’s next racecar using the pan from the original Inch Pincher and a chopped ’59 body with a Plexiglas moonroof. It was raced once at the ’71 Winternationals in an all-white paint job with Inch Pincher, Too! lettered on the doors. When it showed up at the next race it was covered with the nowfamous multi-panel, multi-colored paint job done by Rollin “Molly” Sanders. It was also an EMPI-owned vehicle and, when EMPI was sold to Filter Dynamics in 1971, the car went with the sale.
Darrell continued to race the car for the by New York-based Richard Guarino, 1971–72 season (winning the Eliminator who ran Competition Car Parts — and class at the ’72 Winternationals), but an EMPI dealer. The Inch Pincher III soon left EMPI to start his own business is currently in Japan and owned by named Race FLAT4. As for Shop. After 1972, the first two Inch Filter Dynamics Pinchers, folks “in promoted their the know” about products using such things mostly the Inch Pincher agree the first Too! at various and second Inch racing events Pincher bodies no with different longer exist. drivers, but it In the early never achieved ’90s, to help the stature it had highlight the when Darrell debut of their raced it. The new BRM-type car was sold to wheel, FLAT4 different drivers built a clone of The Santana crank pulley, 48 Weber IDAs, and blue fuel line were found on over the next Inch Pincher, Too!, the original Inch Pincher II. The 1995cc few years and it which you see motor (82 x 88) is set up with a 9:1 apparently has here. It’s pretty compression. been lost to time. faithful to the The Inch original, though Pincher III, a copper-colored ’52 Splitsome of the original race stickers have window, was driven on the East Coast been changed to FLAT4 stickers.
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