Gene Husting built his (and pro-racing’s) first angle-winder car in late 1967, after he saw a picture of a 1/32 scale car built by Roy Moody in the Midwest. When he showed up at Gallagher’s J&J Raceway in California, the car, fitted with a Lancer McLaren M6 body, was improperly geared, but it showed great speed. To the great surprise of all present, Gene actually won the weekly pro-race with the car, humbling serious racers such as John Cukras and John Anderson.

The locals pros tried to find every and all reasons why the car was so fast, but centered about the “rocket” motor, ignoring that the speed of the car came form its faster cornering, allowing it to reach a greater top speed.

Bruce Paschal heard of this through the grapevine and called Husting, then talked him into sending the miracle car to him in Louisiana. Husting sent the car, then built another for himself, and yet another for John Cukras.

John proceeded to win every weekly race at Gallagher’s a total of 12 of them, setting a new record there. Then he built himself one, with a removable motor. John Anderson asked Husting to loan him the car, and with it, won another 13 weekly races in a row, beating Cukras’ record.

And this brings us to the famous USRA MC&S race, where the entire world of pro-racing changed forever, the angle-winder cars utterly humbling every and all in-lines, which became instantly obsolete.

The only surviving car of the 3 built by Husting is the Paschal car. It was returned to Gene a year ago by Bruce in an elegant gesture. Husting is very jealous and possessive of this car, possibly the most important car in the history of the hobby, but was kind enough to let me take more pictures of it today. Below are these pics, and I hope that you enjoy them. The body is the one painted by Kovacs and fitted to the car for the MC&S race (they ran coupes) and lettered to Paschal’s name.

The drop arm has limited drop and the front axle wire is soldered on top of it, very Dynamic-like.

The motor is a Pactra “Hemi X99” can with a Husting rewound, epoxy-ed and balanced armature, ARCO magnets without shim, Mabuchi FT16D end bell with Champion springs, post sleeves and brushes. Gears are 64-pitch Weldun steel pinion and anodized aluminum spur gear. Guide is a Cox “quick-change”, lead wires are Cox. Note the plastic axle spacers straight from regular kits… something that had already disappeared from serious “pro” racing cars for over 2 years…

The front end shows globs of solder, not because Husting was a klutz, but because he wanted to add weight, as much as possible on the drop arm, and at the same time make the car very impact resistant. It worked.

The front wheels are threaded Mini-Riggen with O-ring tires with longitudinal treads and brass adapter for 1/16″ piano wire mount. The rear wheels are Weldun with Associated blue rubber.

The steel plate over the end bell is a glue shield, and there is no problem to remove the end bell, no need to move anything else. However, the motor was never disassembled once in over 30 races this car ran with Husting, then Paschal who absolutely cleaned up with it for weeks, at his local raceway and everywhere he traveled.

The car appears crude, but is in fact well thought out, and certainly was at its time, the fastest and most efficient ever built, never mind its historic trend-setting quality.

The body is a Kovacs-painted Dynamic “Handling Bodies” Lola T70 MKIIIB coupe, painted to look like John Surtees Lola-Aston-Martin of the 1967 Le Mans race. The inlet trumpets are flared aluminum tubing. This car could have won Concours too as long as they did not turn it over…

Let Gene Husting tell the story himself:

MY ANGLEWINDER SLOT CARS
BY GENE HUSTING

After setting a Slot Car Drag Racing Record of .93 seconds, at J&J’s Raceway, in Long Beach, CA, a record that lasted for 24 years, I decided to also try, On Road Slot Car Racing, too. The on road racing at J&J’s, on the Blue King Track, was much more popular, and they seemed to be having much more fun, too. So, in between, my drag racing, I was also going to be doing road racing, too. I bought a car from John Cukras, and a Checkpoint motor from Bill Steube. It took me quite a while, but I finally started to make the A-Mains, at the weekly club races, which was where all the fast racers raced on Thursday nights. These were the best of the best. Mike and Billy Steube, John Cukras, Terry Schmid, Doug Henline, John Anderson, Mike Morrissey, etc, who were racing there. Of course I wasn’t beating any of those guys, but simply making the A-Mains with those guys, was a good feeling for me. During this time I was simply learning the Basics of On Road racing.

Then I began figuring out what these cars were doing, and I couldn’t figure out why they were made this way. For instance, when I started slot car drag racing, all of the dragsters had inline mounted motors. When the dragsters took off, you could see their tire’s traction pattern, on the black polished Formica track, that looked like a black mirror. It was like a series of wiggles, crossing the braided centerline of the track. Snaking down the track. This, of course, was not so good, so I started to make my dragsters longer, and longer, and the snaking became less and less, but it was still there. But, I was going faster than everyone else, because I always had the longest cars. What I finally realized, was that all of this snaking effect, was from an inline motor, which try’s to twist the chassis, on acceleration. Just like in your family Ford or Chevy car.

So, then I built the first “Sidewinder” dragster, and that car just jumped straight forward off of the starting line. It was simply too easy to win races. The dragster crowd, immediately caught on, and they all switched to Sidewinder mounted motors, too.

So, after I had done this, I started thinking about what was happening in my On Road Slot Car, and it was quite easy to come to the realization, that the inline road cars, were having the same problems, but it was not as easy to visually see it happening.

But, now I knew it was happening, and I started to figure out how to change the problem. I was going to build my own slot road racecar.

I started laying things out, but I soon realized there simply was not enough room to build a full sidewinder car. But, I figured I could get the same effect, by simply angling the motor a small amount, to fit it in the chassis. The overall effect on the car’s handling, would be almost identical to a full sidewinder car. That cured one major problem. There were a number of other handling problems, that needed help. But the other major problem that needed correcting, was the way the motor was mounted.

I would never ever even think of mounting my dragster motors by the end bell. To me, it would be unthinkable. Why in the world would I want to have the harmonics from the two gears, affecting the brush end of the motor shaft, which would cause the brushes to be bouncing off the commutator?

True, it wouldn’t be too much, the motor would still run. But, when you’re talking racing, it would be too much. So, I would merely solder in the can, at an angle, to get my desired gear ratio, of course.

Now, I knew the brushes would be making a constant uniform pressure on the commutator, giving me an ideal situation concerning power and commutator wear. I wanted the drop arm to be as low as possible, and I wanted to get a lot of extra weight on it, too, to be able to lower the center of gravity of the car. This was very important to the overall handling of the car. So, I added gobs of lead to the drop arm, and used it in such a manor as to strengthen some of the attached parts, making them more “bullet proof”. Sure, it made the car heavier, but I wasn’t drag racing here. I was Road Racing now, and handling meant more to me than a little extra weight. There’s a number of other things that I did to the chassis, to help the handling, that some of you have figured out now, and the rest of you are guessing at. I’ll leave you having your fun. This # 1 car wasn’t geared quite correctly, because when I went to pick up the Weldon gears from Jim Gallagher, the owner of J&J’s Raceway, he didn’t have the gear ratio that I wanted, so I took the lowest set of drag gears that he had, which were too high, and he told me would get me the other gears that I wanted. I mounted my new Kovacs painted McLaren sports car body, and I was off to the races. This time I easily qualified for the Main Event race. And, I FINISHED IN 3RD PLACE !!!

I was really surprised, as was everyone at the race! They all came by to look at the car, and they all had a number of reasons why it couldn’t work, and the reason why I finished in 3rd place, was because I had a really good motor. The next night, I received a call from Bruce Paschal, in New Orleans. We were friends, and what happened on Thursday night was now going around the country. Bruce said, that he had heard what was happening, and he wondered if he could borrow the car to try it out on his track. I said it’s a little over geared, but he said his track is a little longer, and it should be OK.

So, I agreed to send him the car, after I built a new car for me, with the correct gearing. So, I built an identical new car, with the correct gearing, and Thursday night I went to J&J’s again. John Cukras came over, and we were talking, and he noticed I had 2 cars now. He asked if he could run the 2nd car that night. I said sure, but it’s over geared a little. It’s the car I ran last week. He said “that’s OK, I just want to see what it feels like”.

So, I broke Terry Schmidt’s track record of 6.84, with a 6.73!!!

UNBELIEVABLE !!!!! This is something you only dream of, but can never happen. Cukras then tied my time with the other car. WOW!!.

I WON THE RACE BY 3 1/2 LAPS !!!!!!!!!! Another impossible dream come true!
After the race John Anderson came over and asked me if he could run the car the next week. I told John that this car was going to be sent to Bruce Paschal, tomorrow morning, but that I would build a 3rd car for him. I know. You’re all wondering why in the world wouldn’t I just keep on running the car by my self, and keep winning the aces. It would be the logical thing to normally do, however, I was getting started in R/C Car Racing, and it was getting uppermost on my mind. I just wanted something so simple, just someone to copy my car.

In the meantime, all the Pro Racers were busy building their own versions of their angle-winder cars, which were nothing like mine, for the upcoming Model Car Science Magazine, USRA Race. I didn’t race in these races, because I was the originator of these races, and I wrote up the article for these races.

After this race, everybody was racing their own versions of angle-winder cars.

THE STORY GETS EVEN BETTER !!!!

A week later, we’re back at J&J’s. I’m running the #2 car, and John Anderson is running the newest #3 car. John Anderson easily won the race, and I finished 2nd. Remember, all the Pro’s were now running their own versions of angle-winder cars. John asked me if he could keep running the car. He wanted to beat John Cukras’s record of winning 11 races in a row, at J&J’s, during the inline motor period. I said sure, and John went on to win 12 races in a row! And I finished 2nd, 11times.

I know, I know. You’re all wondering why didn’t I just drive, and I could have won all those races. It wasn’t about me. It was always about the car.

Even in spite of what John won, nobody else ever built a car like mine. Maybe it was because John kept telling them I built the fastest motors he had ever driven, while I’m telling them, it’s the car. Actually, the motors were more efficient being mounted on the can, but the car was so easy to drive, otherwise I couldn’t have finished behind John 11 times. Maybe we were both right.

Meanwhile, Bruce Paschal, to whom I sent car #1, was in his ’40’s, and his business took him all around the world. During his travels, he went to dozens of tracks, and Bruce said he never lost even one race during this time. And no one copied the car!!!

About 40 years later, someone else actually built, an accurate copy of my car, with help from Philippe De Lespinay. When Philippe heard that Steven O’Keefe, from Pennsylvania, wanted to build an EXACT copy of my car, Philippe provided Steven with detailed photos and detailed drawings, of car #1. Steven is a master craftsman.

But, this could not have happened, because I did not have the car, but out of the blue, Bruce Paschal and I came to visit with Philippe. Bruce had brought with him car # 1, that I had given to him eons ago, and he was gracious enough to give the car back to me. Unbelievable!

And, he also gave Philippe over two dozens very famous race cars, too.

CAN YOU BELIEVE ALL THE TWISTS AND TURNS IN THIS STORY? BUT, THEY’RE ALL DOCUMENTED!!!!
But, it still gets better. Before racing slot cars, I was racing real dragsters. I was the first one to build a longer dragster, by 3 feet longer. The very first time we ran it, at LIONS DRAG STRIP, in Long Beach, CA, we broke the track record, and were undefeated, for a whole year, until I retired from the real
car racing to go into slot cars, because of my growing family.

But, the same thing happened. NOBODY copied my car.

2 1/2 years later, Don Garlits, in Florida, made a car with the same longer wheelbase, matching mine. Garlits never saw my car. He did it all on his own. He is a truly great innovator.

By GENE HUSTING