I've always been a Ford guy but you got to have much respect for Smokey yunick.Smokey, Arnie bestwick, Carroll Shelby, Dick Landy, Ralph Moody, these guys and many more were inovators, American originals. Where would the racing world be today without these guys and their relentless work and innovation. Smokey was mainly a GM guy but did do some work for Ford and Chysler, he was quoted as saying a engine doesn't know what name it is or what brand it is, it's up to you to make it run, they all have potential to make power.He and these other guys truly enjoyed what they done and made a good living at it a life well lived.
Smokey Yunick, A man with 1 life, and managed to live 3 inside of the 1. My hero, since I feel in love with cars. The era was the early 70s. I still miss hearing his straight forward, don't give a damn answers to anyone interviewing him. Long live Mr. Smokey Yunick.
I would like this man to know that he was well liked by many I just wanted to stop and say hi God bless smokey yunick truly truly one of the best at game
Smokey Yunick was to car racing what Kelly Johnson (designer of the SR71 blackbird) was to aviation. Both were geniuses who thought way, way outside the box, and built or designed superior products.
He was the cornerstone of my engine studies in the 70's and went on to build top fuel engines. I credit most everything good I learned from him. Thanks Smokey
I got to see Smokey during the 1998 Daytona speed weeks at the auto trade show. I was too young to know who he was then but I remembered. One day I started reading up and learning about his ideas. Was an absolute brilliant Man.
No doubt about it, Smokey was the man. Smokey wasn't years ahead, he was decades ahead of his time. There will never be another Smokey Yunick. He was always three steps ahead of everybody else. I feel we are fortunate to have seen Smokey in our life time as people like him are rare. So I say Thank You Smokey for your great books, Thank You for the great races. Thank you for being here, Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us. You earned entrace to heaven. Rest In Peace Smokey. We miss you.
...Anyone here who doesn't know anything about Smokey Yunick owe's it to themselves to discover the most innovative mechanical mind ever to turn a wrench in the USA - before all the rest... his pedigree stands for itself... and anyone who raced agin' him were soon to find out... from Bill Francis...
Legend, Hero, Patriot, Genius, and a real American! Smokey would have run for President on the No BULL ticket and we would once again be the greatest nation in the world by a large margin.....
Smokey was the man. He never held back on what he had to say. He flat told it like it was. He put that same attitude and passion towards his mechanical skills, it was all No Nonsense.
Smokey , the world needs to know what you have done for America and freedom, and that includes the freedom to become a Racer and or any other thing your heart desiers . Thank you for all you have done for our freedom
I liked Smokie since that first interview with Benny he lights his pipe and waits we gotta go thru that again and then he starts...thanks guys good stuff good fun...
Smokey is a legend, came up in the right era. Society couldn't handle him now with the way things are unfortunately in my opinion. I'm glad he was here and gave us so much! My buddy Dan and I came across his book power secrets and it changed our lives! Since then I've tried to learn as much as I can from him! Thanks smokey!
Could Have Been NASCAR' S Stand Up Comedian,But Thank God ,He Stuck W/ Turning Wrenches & Racing.One of Racing's Most Innovative Genius's in the Shop & In A Race Car.His Comment About Bill France,Jr.Still Cracks Me Up " He' d Have To Stay in 4 th Grade 3-4 more Years To Earn An IDIOT' S License"!!
if there was no rule against it = legal. rule= interpret it to your advantage. being smart enough to win your argument helps. your argument doesn't win work on another "rule"
I've been studying Smokey Yunicks Hot Vapor Car, Gasoline Vaporization Fuel System extensively, and have much to learn. A brilliant man indeed. His knowledge of fuel systems and the internal combustion engine that moves every mass produced automobile on this planet, was beyond what most poeple know today, that work on engines. Genius only begins to describe this man.
Smokey is an honest to God hero. My daddy built race cars and lived wild. He had a Smokey streak in him. It's everything I ever looked up to. A racer, a genius, and a gentleman. I'd be honored to meet those three things.
A pain in big Bill Frances ass. This man single handedly wrote the Nascar rule book , lol. A legend for sure , thanks for posting this. America's greatest generation.
Smokey loved the race media and he was one himself with many articles and his books published. And funny as hell as you all can see. Honored to call him a friend as we both wrote for Circle Track magazine in the 1980s.
Smoky taught us all how to race the physics book . Truthfully thats what we do cause who understands it best and thinks in synergy is who Wins . Thanks Smokey for the eye opening......
Thunder Heads410 Made me think of mombacks. Those are the guys standing behind your truck as you back up, waving their hand and saying momback momback.
He's another guy who had more good ideas than college graduate engineers. The air force must have been something back then because look at all the amazing people from his generation that came from the air force. I know in ww2 they did some out of the box stuff that's common today. The schools back then spent a good amount of time teaching trades and kids left knowing how to produce something. I was a kid who wasn't happy to be in high school over 20yrs ago because my school was wealthy from having a nuclear power plant at the edge of town but had nothing for me. They focused on sports and flash, we had a mostly woodshop with some metal fab equipment but it was deemed too dangerous for us to use most of the equipment. I've talked to several people involved with schools about kids like I was and try telling them to offer classes that get them a job. Not chorus or sci-fi novel class. I get tired of the kids coming out in worse shape and teachers demanding more $$. I don't know what joining the service to learn this stuff does anymore. Put the kids with the sense through the trades classes and give them something they can use. We pay for it and I've been telling people we need to demand they change it. I can't be the only frustrated person looking at what local schools cost for what we get
What a smart guy and u can tell he's living in the moment a lotta smart people can do fancy stuff but don't get right on it have that common sense to fix it at that time before it breaks...
Smokey Yunick. Broke the rules before the rules were wrote. Many times it was show me in the rule book. No problem they put it in the rulebook. He'd give they something else to think next race.
I followed Smoky when he wrote a question and answer for HOT ROD MAGIZINE from the 60s to the 70s, I wish I STILL had them ,I would look back when I had a problem with one of my race cars there was 2 Chevrolet race mechanics that had wins I ran Ford and Dodge in 1976 you could buy a Dodge Dart or a Plymouth Volare without a running gear for 8 thousand or a fully turn key for 12 to 14 thousand so I bought 3 of each the Plymouth was 3 miles per hour faster than the Dodge on 3 quarter mile tracks it would whip a Chevrolet 1 half mile tracks it was who got to turn 1 first and that was the way the race was won they had the power to stay with each other but no room to pass just had to ride it out 1and a half mile tracks it was on the old 340s with a 4 speed quick change rear-end took about a hour sometimes longer to change them out but that's the way it was started racing the old flat heads old Fords take a85 horse block and put the 110 horse crank and pistons and a bucket full of camshafts trial and error grandfather could look at the track and get the cam out of the bucket. Greeze the cam throw it out and we were always in the top 5 till the end of the season miss them days in my 70s now and forgot more than most people know
I might have a cxouple of suggestions that will improve your setup. My brother and his friend made a headgasket with four sets of platinum points equally mounted around the cylinder. It was layered in between the gasket material like a circuit board. So instead of firing from the spark plug it fired from each set of points. The platinum points had no place to hold any carbon build up so would not foul out like a spark plug. and firing the gas mixture with four sets of spark burned the fuel vapor quicker and more completely.(old airplanes had two sparkplugs per cylinder) Giving an increase of power with less fuel consumtion and less emissions. My idea to add to this is to reduce fuel droplet size thus increasing surface area of the fuel by using an ultrasonic mister which instantly vaporizes a drop of liquid to a finer mist than a carburator is capable of. This should also increase power while decreasing consumption andEmmisions. The reason you do not see this gasket method of spark on the market now is a sparkplug company bought their patent. Their was a drawback to the design they had not worked out at the time and that was that the gasket was thicker and you had to torque it down just right or it would blow the gasket. But this was 40 years ago and we have much better materials to work with now. I really hope you read this or anyone else . It could be an easy add on for cars well worth the cost for the increased economy and decrease of emmisions. Hopefully give a little more time for the transition to the totally electric cars that are coming. Jake The Snake Was interested in the gasket for his race cars as it would have been a huge advantage. So if you need an investor you might want to try him. It also goes to show how money trumps humanityand that big corporations (Firestone) are more concerned with the bottom line than reducing polution to save mankind. We really need to institute a crimes against humanity law for people like that and Big Pharma who suppress or overprice discoveries that benefit life.. Please send a comment should you read this. I like to think I am at least trying yo help.
They should have given him the Trophy and the Prize money for first palce at the 1966 Daytona 500 before they disqualified his geniously desinged car..! It would have been such a thrill to see him beat the multi million dollar Car factory built teams with the car he built in his Best Dam Garage in Town .. He was a General Motors Heavy Duty Truck Dealer for a few years..
SUPERGEARSAMN France assholes Nascar is shit with all the crazy rule's. Some rule's are good but you can't fart without them making a rule about it. They should change the name to what it is Iroc racing.
4:13 I'm a little confused about his comment about flying with the Flying Tigers. They disbanded in 1942 and Smokey didn't go to the Pacific theater until after VE day in 1945.
If you can’t handle the truth don’t ask R Smoke and Tom Jones of the surfers understood the Atomization of gas and nitro methane I wish science ad saved their brains for future developement
I've always been a Ford guy but you got to have much respect for Smokey yunick.Smokey, Arnie bestwick, Carroll Shelby, Dick Landy, Ralph Moody, these guys and many more were inovators, American originals. Where would the racing world be today without these guys and their relentless work and innovation. Smokey was mainly a GM guy but did do some work for Ford and Chysler, he was quoted as saying a engine doesn't know what name it is or what brand it is, it's up to you to make it run, they all have potential to make power.He and these other guys truly enjoyed what they done and made a good living at it a life well lived.
Smokey was a genius . Never got the credit he deserves.
In any successful society we NEED to HONOR our absolute HEROIC LEGEND SMOKEY THE ABSOLUTE LEGEND YUNICK.
Smokey Yunick, A man with 1 life, and managed to live 3 inside of the 1. My hero, since I feel in love with cars. The era was the early 70s. I still miss hearing his straight forward, don't give a damn answers to anyone interviewing him. Long live Mr. Smokey Yunick.
A great speaker too! What a man. RIP Henry.
I would like this man to know that he was well liked by many I just wanted to stop and say hi God bless smokey yunick truly truly one of the best at game
Love this guy. Damn genious. RIP Smokey.
Legend.. any mechanic like me should admire this Man.. we need more people like this in the world
Can we still admire him if we're a mechanic unlike you?
I agree 🙏🏻
@@ecosse1982 I agree with you and id like to be a mechanic like smokey the absolute LEGENDARY LEGEND yunick.
It's up to you, your call
Smokey Yunick was to car racing what Kelly Johnson (designer of the SR71 blackbird) was to aviation. Both were geniuses who thought way, way outside the box, and built or designed superior products.
Karl Braun
Not to mention, In my personal opinion, Henry & Kelly were ahead of their times. We need a Smokey in NASCAR & motorsports today..
Very well said. The perfect comparison.
👍 Very apropos.
If Smokey had not been a mechanical genius, he could have been a standup comedian. 😂
Agreed.
He was the cornerstone of my engine studies in the 70's and went on to build top fuel engines. I credit most everything good I learned from him. Thanks Smokey
Damn I did not know much about Smokie before but the more he talks the more I like him and appreciate him...THANKS
Love this man love this video God bless Smokey yunick again fucken love this man
I got to see Smokey during the 1998 Daytona speed weeks at the auto trade show. I was too young to know who he was then but I remembered. One day I started reading up and learning about his ideas. Was an absolute brilliant Man.
A genius engineer and a real character.Straight talking and to the point.
A Outstanding man , a outstanding legend .
No doubt about it, Smokey was the man. Smokey wasn't years ahead, he was decades ahead of his time. There will never be another Smokey Yunick. He was always three steps ahead of everybody else. I feel we are fortunate to have seen Smokey in our life time as people like him are rare. So I say Thank You Smokey for your great books, Thank You for the great races. Thank you for being here, Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us. You earned entrace to heaven. Rest In Peace Smokey. We miss you.
...Anyone here who doesn't know anything about Smokey Yunick owe's it to themselves to discover the most innovative mechanical mind ever to turn a wrench in the USA - before all the rest... his pedigree stands for itself... and anyone who raced agin' him were soon to find out... from Bill Francis...
Ya like his HVE Hot Vapor Engine
Legend, Hero, Patriot, Genius, and a real American! Smokey would have run for President on the No BULL ticket and we would once again be the greatest nation in the world by a large margin.....
Smokey was the man. He never held back on what he had to say. He flat told it like it was.
He put that same attitude and passion towards his mechanical skills, it was all No Nonsense.
DoubleVisionandco True to this day I have problems for trying to be like him.
He sacrificed everything by telling the truth. What a good man. I miss him. So many technicians today have no clue who he is and it's a damn shame.
Smokey , the world needs to know what you have done for America and freedom, and that includes the freedom to become a Racer and or any other thing your heart desiers . Thank you for all you have done for our freedom
I liked Smokie since that first interview with Benny he lights his pipe and waits we gotta go thru that again and then he starts...thanks guys good stuff good fun...
Smokey is a legend, came up in the right era. Society couldn't handle him now with the way things are unfortunately in my opinion. I'm glad he was here and gave us so much! My buddy Dan and I came across his book power secrets and it changed our lives! Since then I've tried to learn as much as I can from him! Thanks smokey!
Could Have Been NASCAR' S Stand Up Comedian,But Thank God ,He Stuck W/ Turning Wrenches & Racing.One of Racing's Most Innovative Genius's in the Shop & In A Race Car.His Comment About Bill France,Jr.Still Cracks Me Up " He' d Have To Stay in 4 th Grade 3-4 more Years To Earn An IDIOT' S License"!!
What is with the 8 dumb downs ? This man is one of the greatest men in the automotive racing world!!!!
A great man and i miss him
Smokey didn’t invent or write the rules of racing, but we wouldn’t have a lot of those rules without him.
william Green yeah, Smokey was the reason for rules.
if there was no rule against it = legal. rule= interpret it to your advantage. being smart enough to win your argument helps. your argument doesn't win work on another "rule"
He definitely wrote a lot of them by-proxy.
So it was him!
One word describes this man.
G.O.A.T.
They don't make em like Smokey no more.
Tremendous loss to the automotive industry when Smokey passed....
One of car racing's All Time Greats...
I've been studying Smokey Yunicks Hot Vapor Car, Gasoline Vaporization Fuel System extensively, and have much to learn. A brilliant man indeed. His knowledge of fuel systems and the internal combustion engine that moves every mass produced automobile on this planet, was beyond what most poeple know today, that work on engines. Genius only begins to describe this man.
Smokey is an honest to God hero. My daddy built race cars and lived wild. He had a Smokey streak in him. It's everything I ever looked up to. A racer, a genius, and a gentleman.
I'd be honored to meet those three things.
Great video of Old Smokey, he was a jokester and a mechanical genius! There's no longer real men like that around these days!
A pain in big Bill Frances ass. This man single handedly wrote the Nascar rule book , lol. A legend for sure , thanks for posting this. America's greatest generation.
wish there was more stuff on him on line...what a fascinating guy
RESPECT .... LEGEND ...
that is the greatest acceptance speech I've ever seen I wish I knew smokey yunick I'm going to share this with my son he is Big Nascar fan also
Smokey loved the race media and he was one himself with many articles and his books published. And funny as hell as you all can see. Honored to call him a friend as we both wrote for Circle Track magazine in the 1980s.
"Like" is not a strong enough word here. Hell I got tears in my eyes...
Agreed
People from that part of Europe are the hardest working and most determined people around . This guy didn't know the Word QUIT !
If you can find a copy of his book, enjoy a good read of his adventures! Wonderful memories of the man.
Smoky taught us all how to race the physics book . Truthfully thats what we do cause who understands it best and thinks in synergy is who Wins . Thanks Smokey for the eye opening......
Should of been inducted the first year, and that he wasn’t is pretty much an insult! He was THE INNOVATOR in nascar.
"Racers were one notch below a Moenbacker. You know what a Moenbacker is? ... Hell, we couldn't stay in the good hotels..."
That's funny
Thunder Heads410
Made me think of mombacks.
Those are the guys standing behind your truck as you back up, waving their hand and saying momback momback.
Best part of the speach I crack up everytime
Smokey was the man, best damn garage in town
one of the greatest americans to ever live! sheer genius.
I never heard of him before but he is my new hero!
I'll tell ya' somethin' for nothin', that Yunick's got some balls!
Omg the French foreign legion the flying tigers and a bomber pilot. WOW.
Reading his book - this absolutely hilarious, pure gold
has my picture made with smokey at darlington he was such a nice man he passed right after goldsmitth was my favorite smokey driver
Brilliant man.
never heard of Smokey? Really? He is (was) the master of "Power Secrets" - a book he wrote. Dude was amazing. Absolutly amazing.
Love you
MAN ! Thanks for the help.
Power Secrets!
wow i love this vid!!! thank you so much for posting it!!
The best EVER
Legend 😍
Pure Genius.
He's another guy who had more good ideas than college graduate engineers. The air force must have been something back then because look at all the amazing people from his generation that came from the air force. I know in ww2 they did some out of the box stuff that's common today. The schools back then spent a good amount of time teaching trades and kids left knowing how to produce something. I was a kid who wasn't happy to be in high school over 20yrs ago because my school was wealthy from having a nuclear power plant at the edge of town but had nothing for me. They focused on sports and flash, we had a mostly woodshop with some metal fab equipment but it was deemed too dangerous for us to use most of the equipment. I've talked to several people involved with schools about kids like I was and try telling them to offer classes that get them a job. Not chorus or sci-fi novel class. I get tired of the kids coming out in worse shape and teachers demanding more $$. I don't know what joining the service to learn this stuff does anymore. Put the kids with the sense through the trades classes and give them something they can use. We pay for it and I've been telling people we need to demand they change it. I can't be the only frustrated person looking at what local schools cost for what we get
What a smart guy and u can tell he's living in the moment a lotta smart people can do fancy stuff but don't get right on it have that common sense to fix it at that time before it breaks...
Smokey Yunick. Broke the rules before the rules were wrote.
Many times it was show me in the rule book. No problem they put it in the rulebook. He'd give they something else to think next race.
Smokey was a helluva a man!
one of the top 5 NASCAR personalities
We need Smokie today.
What a hero! Loved this vid. You couldn't say a lot of what he said these days...you'd get canceled and kicked out.
Helluva man
I would've liked to have known him. Known and worked with.
The Pontiac Firebird is the USAF Thunderbirds
I followed Smoky when he wrote a question and answer for HOT ROD MAGIZINE from the 60s to the 70s, I wish I STILL had them ,I would look back when I had a problem with one of my race cars there was 2 Chevrolet race mechanics that had wins I ran Ford and Dodge in 1976 you could buy a Dodge Dart or a Plymouth Volare without a running gear for 8 thousand or a fully turn key for 12 to 14 thousand so I bought 3 of each the Plymouth was 3 miles per hour faster than the Dodge on 3 quarter mile tracks it would whip a Chevrolet 1 half mile tracks it was who got to turn 1 first and that was the way the race was won they had the power to stay with each other but no room to pass just had to ride it out 1and a half mile tracks it was on the old 340s with a 4 speed quick change rear-end took about a hour sometimes longer to change them out but that's the way it was started racing the old flat heads old Fords take a85 horse block and put the 110 horse crank and pistons and a bucket full of camshafts trial and error grandfather could look at the track and get the cam out of the bucket. Greeze the cam throw it out and we were always in the top 5 till the end of the season miss them days in my 70s now and forgot more than most people know
Trailblazer legend 😀
Smokey was a great guy comical guy
I’m hoping NASCAR can overcome the personality conflicts of the past and do the right thing and get him inducted into their Hall.
Smokey wasn't Southern, but he'd been down here long enough to speak Southern.
He said "Auight" instead of Alright. Only Southerners say that.
damn right
Dont get me wrong Smokey was and still is the man, but David Vizard is still kickin, and putting up videos on youtube.
What a crack up!
If there was a short cut, he found it.
Country @ss Smokey out smarted the engineers…
Wonder where the vest is today?
When is he gonna be in HOF rest of are from that Era
What a guy& so was Jack Walkins & don’t forget Elmer Snyder (un-sprung)
Tell you what, since you want to get that technical with it you figure it out.
I might have a cxouple of suggestions that will improve your setup. My brother and his friend made a headgasket with four sets of platinum points equally mounted around the cylinder. It was layered in between the gasket material like a circuit board. So instead of firing from the spark plug it fired from each set of points. The platinum points had no place to hold any carbon build up so would not foul out like a spark plug. and firing the gas mixture with four sets of spark burned the fuel vapor quicker and more completely.(old airplanes had two sparkplugs per cylinder)
Giving an increase of power with less fuel consumtion and less emissions. My idea to add to this is to reduce fuel droplet size thus increasing surface area of the fuel by using an ultrasonic mister which instantly vaporizes a drop of liquid to a finer mist than a carburator is capable of. This should also increase power while decreasing consumption andEmmisions. The reason you do not see this gasket method of spark on the market now is a sparkplug company bought their patent. Their was a drawback to the design they had not worked out at the time and that was that the gasket was thicker and you had to torque it down just right or it would blow the gasket. But this was 40 years ago and we have much better materials to work with now. I really hope you read this or anyone else . It could be an easy add on for cars well worth the cost for the increased economy and decrease of emmisions. Hopefully give a little more time for the transition to the totally electric cars that are coming. Jake The Snake Was interested in the gasket for his race cars as it would have been a huge advantage. So if you need an investor you might want to try him. It also goes to show how money trumps humanityand that big corporations (Firestone) are more concerned with the bottom line than reducing polution to save mankind. We really need to institute a crimes against humanity law for people like that and Big Pharma who suppress or overprice discoveries that benefit life.. Please send a comment should you read this. I like to think I am at least trying yo help.
Interesting concept.
0:12-0:19😂😂high af idk how I found this dude
Why u people give dislikes idk this simple man's mind was way beyond ur intellectual understanding
The thumbs down must have all come from the France family.
They should have given him the Trophy and the Prize money for first palce at the 1966 Daytona 500 before they disqualified his geniously desinged car..!
It would have been such a thrill to see him beat the multi million dollar Car factory built teams with the car he built in his Best Dam Garage in Town ..
He was a General Motors Heavy Duty Truck Dealer for a few years..
(Awesome)
Aren't decades years?
The ultimate Over-Engineer.
His best has TAZ on the bottom of it ?!?!? Hahahaahhah!!!!!
The France Fanily couldn't have a mechanic being larger than life
SUPERGEARSAMN France assholes Nascar is shit with all the crazy rule's. Some rule's are good but you can't fart without them making a rule about it. They should change the name to what it is Iroc racing.
@@edwardmartinez199 rules are the "know nothings" way to control the sport and possibly the outcome.
France Sr was half cool #2 was soso but Jr super asshole.
@@Mr39036ce yes sir.
NASCARP
4:13 I'm a little confused about his comment about flying with the Flying Tigers. They disbanded in 1942 and Smokey didn't go to the Pacific theater until after VE day in 1945.
Damn it, Danny is right; Smokey was fuckin' funny and honest.
Thanks Bruce 😅
If you can’t handle the truth don’t ask R Smoke and Tom Jones of the surfers understood the Atomization of gas and nitro methane I wish science ad saved their brains for future developement
Wow he says they have to be killed tobe mentioned and THEY LAUGH smh.
Why this man isn’t in NASCAR HOF is beyond me. Ridiculous. You want famous...this guy is famous.
I know mr yunick when I was a kid my dad would take his cars there to get fix
He is as funny as he is innovative.