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REAR VIEW: The neutered turbine

Thursday, 01 December 2016


Robin Miller / Images by IMS Photo, Marshall Pruett
When: 1969

Where: Indianapolis Motor Speedway
What: Qualifying
Who: Al Miller & Jack Adams' turbine

Even though Parnelli Jones and Joe Leonard fell agonizingly short of Victory Lane, their turbine-powered cars scared the hell out of the United States Auto Club in 1967 and 1968. So by the time 1969 rolled around, that engine had been neutered.

The annulus area started at 25.9 inches in '67 and was chopped all the way to 11.8 by May of '69 when veteran Al Miller arrived at IMS to drive Jack Adams' car, which was designed by Professor Glenn Bryant and sported an Allison aircraft engine. It was a slender, cigar-shaped chassis more than four feet longer than a conventional car.
It looked like some kind of missile but, sadly, was lost in space.
Miller, a four-time Indy starter, could only go 180mph on the straightaways while his piston-engine competition was cresting 210mph. He did manage to qualify at 156.440, but that wound up being 4mph too slow and was bumped.
It wouldn't have mattered anyway, because USAC disqualified the run a few hours later when it was found Miller's team had tried to cheat the intake rule.
"That's laughable," Miller said afterward. "We supposedly broke the rules and we're still 4mph too slow because the thing is such a pig down the straightaway."
Adams returned in 1970 with Jigger Sirois in a different turbine, but he could only run 157 mph, and that proved to be the final act at Indy for the quiet engine that made a lot of noise but never won a race.