Cams Tapestries
Description: As legend has it, Racer Brown wanted a better performing cam for his racer, but wanted something different than what was available, and decided to learn how to make his own and actually pulled it off, eventually creating new grinds for friends and club members. Turns out that he was considerably better at making cams than he would have guessed. Each grind he designed for each application was better than the last, and before he knew it, he had a full time business and Racer Brown Cams 1960 became synonymous with high performance racing engines throughout the '60s and well into the '70s.
Description: With the post-war auto racing boom in full swing, the custom ignition business Chuck Potvin started in high school quickly outgrew his parent's garage. In 1948 Chuck purchased a corner shop and decked it out with cam grinders, a homemade master cam generator, a dynamometer, and several lathes and began crafting his own cam grinds that, like his ignition systems, found a sweet spot in the market. While he made countless models over the years, the most popular was the 425 Eliminator, the cam that the first car to break the 160 mph barrier was running.
Description: Dempsey Wilson was an accomplished race car driver in the '50s and '60s who competed in the USAC Championship Car Series. He had over 30 starts, including the Indianapolis 500 in '58, '60, '61, and '63. Outside of racing, Wilson was a master machinist who custom-milled his own cams and ran a business called Dempsey Wilson Racing Cams in Hawthorne, California, which both made new camshafts and refurbished old ones. His primary clients were hot rodders and street racers, but he also did work for his fellow open-wheel racers, even providing some of his secret grinds to those he really liked.
Description: Ed Iskenderian was a Southern California hot rodder in the years leading up to WWII, working to make his roadster go faster. Post war, a high demand for parts from returning GIs eager to get back to hot rodding was so great that Iskenderian was faced with a long wait for a cam he wanted for his own car. Figuring he could do just as well himself, he bought a surplus cylindrical grinder, converted it into a cam-grinding machine, and went to work. He wasn’t just making a similar cam to those available at the time – he made them better. His cams made big power, and a business grew on the strength of that reputation that would succeed for decades to come, rightfully earning the title of America's fastest racing cams.
