Man Finds Treasure Trove of Old-School Hemi Engine Parts

Not all treasure is buried. Sometimes it’s above ground and behind a door, like this jackpot of vintage Hemi engine components.

Psychological thrillers and horror movies make it seem as if only horrific things and awful secrets are behind closed doors. But that’s not always true. Most of the time, what’s hidden behind a closed door is harmless, such as someone making a sandwich or a family playing a board game together. Sometimes if you open a certain door, you find a wonderful surprise, such as a treasure trove of parts to old Hemi engines.

According to Hot Rod, that’s exactly what Brad Toles, the owner of All American Classic Car Restoration in Palm Springs, California, found inside a Mopar fan’s garage. “Uncovered in this unassuming two-car garage included everything ranging from Kellogg cranks and a full assortment of classic Hemi intake manifolds to a turn key original crossram-equipped Hemi engine and 33 ‘matching number’ sets of Hemi/Carter carburetors!”

Toles’ big find was remarkable for two main reasons. One is age. Chrysler built its street Hemis back in the mid-1960s and through the early 1970s; Hot Rod estimates they manufactured less than 11,000 of them. That means that era of Hemi is roughly 50 years old. The second is the way 426-cubic-inch Hemis were typically used back in the day. It should come as no surprise that they didn’t lead easy lives, many of them winding up in hard-driven street cars, at best, and dragsters, at worst.

Toles managed to find a cache of parts that survived the passage of half a century and avoided the abuse and violent deaths that has claimed the lives of many old-school Hemi components. Each carburetor was tagged with its part number and date code. Instead of being piled together, the distributors were separated and placed standing up on custom wood blocks. One of those was a 16-plug race unit with two distributors mounted at a 90-degree angle to each other.

Certain shelves contained factory orange dual-carb intake manifolds. The end of one held a neat stack of 426 connecting rods. A lot of cool stuff was closest to the garage floor, including a forged crankshaft for a 340, original steel cylinder heads, and a Mopar K-member for an E-Body.

Not everything Toles saw was a standalone part. On top of one pallet was an early version of a Stage III Keith Black engine built for drag racing.

Of course, Toles did more than just look. He made sure to leave with some new parts which could very well wind up in his builds at All American Classic Car Restoration…or in his personal cars.

Photos: Hot Rod

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Derek Shiekhi

Derek Shiekhi's father raised him on cars. As a boy, Derek accompanied his dad as he bought classics such as post-WWII GM trucks and early Ford Mustang convertibles.

After loving cars for years and getting a bachelor's degree in Business Management, Derek decided to get an associate degree in journalism. His networking put him in contact with the editor of the Austin-American Statesman newspaper, who hired him to write freelance about automotive culture and events in Austin, Texas in 2013. One particular story led to him getting a certificate for learning the foundations of road racing.

While watching TV with his parents one fateful evening, he saw a commercial that changed his life. In it, Jeep touted the Wrangler as the Texas Auto Writers Association's "SUV of Texas." Derek knew he had to join the organization if he was going to advance as an automotive writer. He joined the Texas Auto Writers Association (TAWA) in 2014 and was fortunate to meet several nice people who connected him to the representatives of several automakers and the people who could give him access to press vehicles (the first one he ever got the keys to was a Lexus LX 570). He's now a regular at TAWA's two main events: the Texas Auto Roundup in the spring and the Texas Truck Rodeo in the fall.

Over the past several years, Derek has learned how to drive off-road in various four-wheel-drive SUVs (he even camped out for two nights in a Land Rover), and driven around various tracks in hot hatches, muscle cars, and exotics. Several of his pieces, including his article about the 2015 Ford F-150 being crowned TAWA's 2014 "Truck of Texas" and his review of the Alfa Romeo 4C Spider, have won awards in TAWA's annual Excellence in Craft Competition. Last year, his JK Forum profile of Wagonmaster, a business that restores Jeep Wagoneers, won prizes in TAWA’s signature writing contest and its pickup- and SUV-focused Texas Truck Invitational.

In addition to writing for a variety of Internet Brands sites, including JK Forum, H-D Forums, The Mustang Source, Mustang Forums, LS1Tech, HondaTech, Jaguar Forums, YotaTech, and Ford Truck Enthusiasts. Derek also started There Will Be Cars on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.

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