Harmonic

Harmonic (pronounced hahr-mon-ik)

(1) In music, pertaining to harmony, as distinguished from melody and rhythm.  A harmonic is a periodic motion, the frequency of which is a whole-number multiple of some fundamental frequency. The motion of objects or substances that vibrate or oscillate in a regular fashion, such as the strings of musical instruments, can be analyzed as a combination of a fundamental frequency and higher harmonics.  Harmonics above the first harmonic (the fundamental frequency) in sound waves are called overtones. The first overtone is the second harmonic, the second overtone is the third harmonic, and so on.

(2) In music, marked by harmony; in harmony; concordant; consonant; pleasant to hear; harmonious; melodious.

(3) In music, the place where, on a bowed string instrument, a note in the harmonic series of a particular string can be played without the fundamental present.

(4) In physics, of, relating to, or noting a series of oscillations in which each oscillation has a frequency that is an integral multiple of the same basic frequency.

(5) In mathematics (1) (of a set of values), related in a manner analogous to the frequencies of tones that are consonant, (2) capable of being represented by sine and cosine functions and (3) (of a function) satisfying the Laplace equation; used to characterize various mathematical entities or relationships supposed to bear some resemblance to musical consonance; the harmonic polar line of an inflection point of a cubic curve is the component of the polar conic other than the tangent line.

(6) In Australianist linguistics, a technical term, of or relating to a generation an even number of generations distant from a particular person.

(7) In phonology, exhibiting or applying constraints on what vowels (eg front/back vowels only) may be found near each other and sometimes in the entire word.

(8) In many contexts, something recurring periodically

(9) In the slang of CB radio, one's child.

1560–1570: From the Latin harmonicus (relating to harmony) from the Ancient Greek ἁρμονικός (harmonikós) (harmonic, musical, skilled in music), from ἁρμονία (harmonía & harmonie).  From the 1660s it acquired the meaning "tuneful, harmonious; relating to harmony", synonymous with the earlier (circa 1500) armonical (tuneful, harmonious), the noun, short for harmonic tone, dating from 1777.  Harmony was first attested in 1602 and was from the Middle English armonye, from Old French harmonie & armonie, from the Latin harmonia, from the Ancient Greek ἁρμονία (harmonía) (joint, union, agreement, concord of sounds).  Related forms are the adverb harmonically and the unfortunate noun harmonicalness.  The old alternative spelling, harmonick, although still in use in the nineteenth century, is wholly obsolete.  Harmonic is a noun & adjective, harmonica & harmonicist are nouns and harmonically is an adverb; the noun plural is harmonics.

Harmonica was coined in 1762 by Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790) as the name for a glass harmonica, from the feminine of the Latin harmonicus.  The use to describe a "reeded mouth organ" is a creation of American English from 1873, displacing the earlier (1825) harmonicon.  The adjective enharmonic (referencing Greek music) is from the Late Latin enharmonicus, from the Ancient Greek enharmonikos, the construct being en- (the intensive prefix) + harmonikos.  From 1794 it picked up a technical use in music criticism to refer to reference to a modern music note that can be indicated in different ways (G sharp/A flat).  The adjective philharmonic (loving harmony or music) was invented in 1813 as the name of a London society founded for the purpose of promoting instrumental music and was from the 1739 French philharmonique, from the Italian filarmonico (literally "loving harmony") the construct being the Ancient Greek philos (loving) + harmonika (theory of harmony, music) from the neuter plural of harmonikos.  Over the centuries, the word philharmonic was adopted by many symphony orchestras and organisations devoted to fine music.

Engine harmony

Harmonic balancers are circular devices, made of rubber and metal, attached to the front-end of the crankshafts of internal combustion engines to help absorb vibrations.  During the combustion process, each piston is forced down the cylinder as a result of a pressure rise (induced by the explosion of the fuel-air mix) within the combustion chamber, the stroke imparting a sudden rotational force to the crankshaft which, although (hopefully) stiff and robust, is not perfectly rigid.  During these events, which happen thousands of times per minute, the crankshaft (in a process called torsional vibration) will twist slightly in response to each application of pressure which can be several tons.  The force of the combustion process causes the crankshaft slightly to deflect in the direction of the force and when that force ceases, the crankshaft springs back.  At certain frequencies the crank can resonate, worsening the vibration.  The harmonic balancer is the dampener which absorbs these forces.

ATI Performance part number 917562 (Super Damper, Standard Harmonic Balancer) for Ford 335 series (370/429/460/514 cubic inch V8).

The name harmonic balancer can be misleading in that most do not balance an engine, rather they absorb and remove unwanted vibration due to torsional twisting of the crankshaft and are thus vibration dampeners which is why some engineers prefer to call them dampeners.  In some engines though, a harmonic balancer can be part of the engine balancing strategy with weights added to the balancer to offset the weight of the pistons and conrods.  This is called external balancing, whereas internal balancing refers to the weight distribution of the crankshaft.

eHarmony

In 2009, a video surfaced of Lindsay Lohan which appeared to be a profile piece for the on-line dating site eHarmony.  Unfortunately, it was a spoof video for the site FunnyorDie.com but delivered with her usual comedic sense, the script included the lines:

Hi. I'm Lindsay and I'm recently single... I think... and I’m looking for someone with whom I can spend the rest of my life with, or at least the rest of my probation.

I’m an actress, a singer, an entrepreneur, and I have single-handedly kept 90 per cent of all gossip web sites in business.

I’m a workaholic, a shopaholic and, according to the state of California, an alcoholic, as well as a threat to all security guards if they work at hotels.  And to put all those rumors to rest, I am not broke.  I actually have over $400 in the bank and 20,000 Marlboro Miles, which I’m very proud of.

I'm looking for a compatible mate who likes a night out on the town (as long as he or she is driving), ankle monitoring bracelets and doesn’t have family members quick to issue restraining orders.

My dream date likes long walks on the beach, car chases on the Pacific Coast Highway, antiquing and passing out in Cadillac Escalades.

So, if you think you can handle a redhead with a little bit of sass, and by that I mean a redhead that’s crazy, we’ll crash a few parties, a car or two, but at the end of the day, I promise you I never lose my Google hits … just my underwear.

Appoggiatura

Appoggiatura (pronounced uh-poj-uh-too-r-uh or uh-poj-uh-tyoo- r-uh or ahp-pawd-jah-too-rah (Italian))

In musical composition, an ornament consisting of a non-harmonic note (short or long) preceding a harmonic one either before or on the stress (a note of embellishment preceding another note and taking a portion of its time).

1745-1755: From the Italian appoggiatura, from appoggiare (to lean; to prop; to support) from the Vulgar Latin appodiāre (present active infinitive of appodiō, from the Classical Latin podium) and related to the French appuyer, the Spanish apoyar and the Portuguese apoiar.  The meaning in music is for the sense of one note “propping up” another.

The Appoggiatura

As in many fields, fashions in music change.  There was a period, during the sixteenth century, when the rules of counterpoint were strict and discords permissible only if they were prepared and resolved in ways used in the previous sections; the only discord normally allowed on the strong beat was the suspension.  There the discord is prepared by the note being tied across from a weak to a strong beat and resolved onto the next weak beat; a type of syncopation.  In the mid-century however, there was a relaxation of the rules of voice leading which included experimentation with unprepared discords, the most important of which was the appoggiatura.  The appoggiatura started as a decorative note which displaced the first part of a note of a melody.  It occurred on the strong beat of the bar and could be either dissonant or consonant but in either case, the appoggiatura resolved (upwards or downwards) onto a consonance but, unlike the suspension, did not require to be prepared or tied from a previous note.  In order to overcome the earlier rule that all discords had to be prepared, the appoggiatura was originally shown as an ornament but later was written out in full.

An ornament: Bach, Orchestral Suite in B minor for flute and strings: Menuet.

That was just a fudge, a composer paying respect to a rule while breaking it because, as played, an appoggiatura is not a short ornament, it takes usually up a full half of the length of the note that it resolves onto and if resolved onto a note three beats long, it takes up a third or two thirds the length.  The appoggiatura is usually connected with the main harmony note by a slur and is normally played with a small degree of emphasis.

Haydn: Sonata in G major XVI:27 Allegro con Brio.

Haydn shows appoggiaturas at *1, *2 and *3, now written out in-full as was normal practice in the classical period. Their identity as elaborating notes is given away by the presence of the slurs.

The two superstars of the 1950s.  Maria Callas (1923-1977)  and Marilyn Monroe (1926-1962), back-stage after the "Happy Birthday Mr President" performance, Madison Square Garden, New York, 19 May 1962.  Within three months, Marilyn Monroe would be dead.

December 2 2023 marked the hundredth anniversary of the birth of the singer Maria Callas, the soprano who remains still more famous than any other and the subject of a cult, something attributable certainly to her art but the tempestuous life she led off the stage attracted many; in the very modern sense of the word, Callas was a celebrity.  What Callas is in 2023 is thus a construct, a mix of myth, discography, and public persona although it’s more correct to say she’s a number of constructs; the criteria of trained musicians and critics likely to differ from those who just listen.  She was neither the most technically accomplished nor the most refined singer and yet, as Sir Rudolf Bing (1902–1997; General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera in New York (the Met)) famously noted, “having once heard Callas, it was difficult to listen to anyone else sing the same music”.  That was because whatever the technical flaws or deliberate departures from what had become the accepted techniques of the mid-twentieth century, Callas brought to every performance a thrilling intensity which made the characters come alive in a way even the most virtuosic of her contemporaries couldn’t quite match.

The critics impressed only by technical ecstasy liked to label Callas a “singing actress” and there’s something in that but not in the way they mean; the “acting” wasn’t there to compensate for the voice, it was a part of the voice.  There are several recordings of the “madness” scene in Gaetano Donizetti's (1797–1848) Lucia di Lammermoor (1835) in which, as an exercise in singing, the performances are more accomplished yet it’s the Callas version which is the definitive because only she can send a shiver down the spine.  It was in the interpretation, just as it was when, in Giuseppe Verdi’s (1813–1901) Otello (1886), she played with layers of vocal tones variously to convey feelings of warm nostalgia, paranoia, depression and impending death.  Whatever was in the score to be expressed, it’s there but it wasn’t done with vocal pyrotechnics, indeed Callas, in both studio recordings and live performances often eschewed the cadential trills and appoggiature which, although unwritten, had entered Opera in the seventeenth century and become a signature of sopranos since at least the early nineteenth.  What she did with her voice has been called a kind of “operatic word-painting”, a lending of emotional depth which enabled her, more than any other to transcend the theatrical artificiality of opera and it’s this quality which means even roles for which she seemed an improbable choice (such as Giacomo Puccini’s (1858–1924) Madam Butterfly (1904)) demand attention.

Slant

Slant (pronounced slant or slahnt)

(1) A surface, structure, line etc at a slope or in an oblique direction.

(2) In (US) football, an offensive play in which the ball-carrier runs toward the line of scrimmage at an angle (known also as the “slant-in”, a pass pattern in which a receiver cuts diagonally across the middle of the field).

(3) In prosody, as “slant rhyme”, a synonym for the “half rhyme”, “near rhyme” & “quasi-rhyme” (a form of imperfect rhyme in which the final (coda) consonants of stressed syllables (and, in modern English poetry, any following syllables to the end of the words) are identical in sound, but the vowels of the stressed syllables are not.

(4) In typography, a synonym of slash ( / ⟩, particularly in its use to set off pronunciations from other text (not used in IT where the distinctions are between the forward-slash (/) and the back-slash (\) which nerds call respectively the slash and the slosh.

(5) In biology, a sloping surface in a culture medium.

(6) In hydro-carbon extraction, as “slant drilling”, a technique in which the drilling is undertaken at an oblique angle rather than the traditional vertical orientation.

(7) In extractive mining, as type of run in which a heading is driven diagonally between the dip and strike of a coal seam.

(8) In informal use, a glance or look.

(9) To veer or angle away from a given level or line, especially from a horizontal; slope (in to incline, to lean).

(10) Figuratively, to have or be influenced by a subjective point of view, bias, personal feeling or inclination etc (often as “slant towards”, “slanted view” etc); a mental leaning, bias, or distortion (“feminist slant”, “MAGA slant”, “liberal slant”, “business slant” et al).

(11) To cause to slope.

(12) Figuratively, to distort information by rendering it unfaithfully or incompletely, especially in order to reflect a particular viewpoint (more generously sometimes described as “spin” or “massaged”).  The concept is known also as “angle journalism” (the particular mood or vein in which something is written, edited, or published).  In Scots English, the meaning “to lie or exaggerate” captures the flavor.  When used to describe the composing, editing, or publishing of something to attract the interest of a specific sub-group (a “slanted” story), “slanted towards” is necessarily pejorative if used only to suggest something optimized to appeal to a certain market segment or demographic (ie it’s more like “aimed at” or “intended for”).

(13) In slang, as “slant eye” (a racial slur now listed as disparaging & offensive), a reference to people from the Far East (applied historically mostly to the Chinese & Japanese), based on the shape of the eyes.  The variants included “slit eye”, “slitty-eyed” & “slopehead”, all equally offensive and now proscribed.

(14) In painting (art) a pan with a sloped bottom used for holding paintbrushes; a depression on a palette with a sloping bottom for holding and mixing watercolors; a palette or similar container with slants or sloping depressions.

(15) In US regional slang, a sarcastic remark; shade, an indirect mocking insult (archaic).

(16) In US slang, an opportunity, particularly to go somewhere (now rare).

(17) In historic Australian colonial slang, a crime committed for the purpose of being apprehended and transported to a major settlement.

Circa 1480s: From the Middle English –slonte or -slonte, both aphetic (in phonetics, linguistics & prosody, “of, relating to, or formed by aphesis” (the loss of the initial unstressed vowel of a word)) variants of aslant, thought to be of Scandinavian origin.  The other influence was probably the earlier dialectical slent, from the Old Norse or another North Germanic source and cognate with the Old Norse slent, the Swedish slinta (to slip) and the Norwegian slenta (to fall on the side), from the Proto-Germanic slintaną (which, in turn, was probably in some way linked with aslant.  Slant & slanting are nouns, verbs & adjectives, slanted is a verb & adjective, slantish is an adjective, slantwise is an adjective & adverb and slantingly & slantly are adverbs; the noun plural is slants.  The pleasing adjective slantendicular is listed by some as non-standard and presumably is proscribed in geometry and mathematics because it's an oxymoron; it’s a portmanteau word, the construct being slant + (perp)endicular.  It may be useful however in commerce or engineering where it might be used to describe something like a tool with a shaft which at some point assumes an oblique or skewed angle.   So it’s there to be used and slantindicular should be applied to stuff which is neither wholly nor fully slanted and in architecture, such structures are numerous.  In commerce, it could be used as a noun.

The noun slant by the 1650s was used to mean “an oblique direction or plane” and began in geography & civil engineering (of landforms, notably ski-slopes), developed from the verb or its adjective.  The now familiar (in the Fox News sense) meaning “way of regarding something, a mental bias” dates from 1905 while the derogatory slang sense of “a person of Asian appearance” came into use some time in the 1940s, a direct descendent from the earlier "slant-eyes", documented since 1929.  The verb slant is documented since the 1520s in the sense of “obliquely to strike (against something)”, an alteration the late thirteenth century slenten (slip sideways), the origin of which is murky but etymologists have concluded it came (via a Scandinavian source (noting the Swedish slinta (to slip)) and the Norwegian slenta (to fall on one side), from the Proto-Germanic slintanan.  The intransitive sense of “to slope, to lie obliquely” was in use by the 1690s, while the transitive sense of “to give a sloping direction to” had emerged by the early nineteenth century.  As early as the late fifteenth century forms were in use as an adverb, the adjectival use attested from the 1610s.  The technical use in literary theory as “poetic slant rhyme” was first used in the mid 1920s (assonance or consonance) although such lines had appeared for centuries, used sometimes deliberately as a device, sometimes not.  In the following stanza by English poet Peter Redgrove (The Archaeologist, published in Dr Faust's Sea-Spiral Spirit (1972)), the second and third lines contain a form of slant rhyme while the first and fourth have pure rhymes:

So I take one of those thin plates
And fit it to a knuckled other,
Carefully, for it trembles on the edge of powder,
Restore the jaw and find the fangs their mates.

You are watching Fox.

While it’s unlikely volumes of the poetry of Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) sit upon the bookshelves of those members of the Fox News audience who have bookshelves, they likely would concur with her words: “Tell the truth but tell it slant.”  “Slanted reporting” has become something which in recent years has attracted much attention (and much hand-wringing by the usual suspects) as an increasingly polarization of positions has been alleged to be a feature of political discourse in the West.  There is little doubt the effect (as reported) is obvious but there’s some debate about both the mechanics and the implications of the phenomenon.  As long ago as 2018, a study found that although the tenor and volume of things on X (formerly known as Twitter) was found to be increasingly toxic and surging, the number of active users engaged in these political polemics was found to be tiny and their effect was distorted by (1) the huge number of tweets they tended to post, (2) the propensity of their fellow-travelers to re-tweet and (3) the use of bots which were more prolific still.  If anything, recent voting patterns suggest it would seem the views of the general population appear to be trending away from the extremes towards the more centralist positions offered by independents or small-parties, something most obvious in Australia where compulsory voting exists.  Outfits like Fox News offer a slanted take on just about everything (and promote country & western music which truly is inexcusable) but this is something which has been identifiable in the news media as long as it’s existed and their blatant bias is hardly subversive or threatening, simply because it is so blatant.  What was most interesting in what emerged from the recent defamation suit filed by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News suggested the network’s stance on things was motivated more by the financial imperative than ideological purity.  Intriguingly, what some analysts concluded was that if the universe shifted and the Fox News audience transformed into a bunch of seed-eating hippies, there would follow Fox’s editorial position, the slant being towards the advertising revenue rather than a particular world view.  Of course, there are some slants which are unalterable and dictated by ideological purity but with commercial media, it’s likely sometimes cause is confused with effect.

The Leaning Tower of Pisa (left) and Lindsay Lohan in The Parent Trap (1998) in front of London’s perpendicular Big Ben (1859) (right).  The architect’s original name for the latter was a typically succinct “Clock Tower”, chosen because it housed the “Great Bell of the Great Clock of Westminster” but it was in 2012 renamed “Elizabeth Tower”, marking the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II (1926-2022; Queen of the UK and other places, 1952-2022), something little noted by Londoners or those beyond who continue to prefer the nickname “Big Ben” although strictly speaking that’s a reference only to the “Great Bell” a 13.5 ton (13.7 tonne) casting in bell metal (a bronze which is an alloy of about 77% copper & 23% tin).  The origin of the nickname is contested but there are no romantic tales, all the possible inspirations being worthy white men as was the Victorian way.

Although in Italy alone there are seven leaning towers (three of which stand (ie lean) in Venice), it’s the torre di Pisa (Tower of Pisa) which is by far the best-known and a frequent Instagram prop.  Built between 1173-1372, the structure in the Piazza del Duomo (Pisa’s Cathedral Square) is the campanile (the freestanding bell tower) of the adjacent Pisa Cathedral and the famous lean of some 4^o (actually somewhat less than its greatest extent after more than a century of compensating engineering works) was apparent even during construction, the cause the softness of the sub-surface.  That geological feature has however contributed to the tower’s survival, the “rubber-like” sponginess below acting to absorb movement and despite a number of severe earthquakes in the region over the centuries, the tower remains.  It is of course known as the leaning tower than a sloping, oblique or slanted tower, probably because of the conventions of use which evolved in English.

The words “sloping”, “oblique”, “slanted”, & “leaning” all describe something not vertical or horizontal there tend to be nuances which dictate the choice of which to use.  Sloping generally is used of something which inclines or declines at a gentle or continuous angle, the implication being of a gradual or smooth transition from elevation to another, such as the way a hillside rises gradually rises to its summit.  Oblique is mostly a matter of specific angles and is thus common is mathematics, geometry and engineering.  Again, it’s a reference to something neither parallel nor perpendicular to a baseline but it tends to be restricted to something which can be defined with an exact measurement; in geometric or technical use, an oblique line or angle is one neither 90^o nor perfectly horizontal.  Slanted describes something positioned at a diagonal, often used to imply a more noticeable or sharp angle but also is widely used figuratively, metaphorically and in idiomatic phrases.  Leaning refers to something tilted or positioned at an angle due to external pressure, the object in an unstable position and in need of support.  The implication carried is that something which “slants” is designed thus to do while something which “leans” does so because of some design flaw or unexpected external force being applied so it’s the leaning and not the sloping tower of Pisa, even though the structure has assumed quite a slope.

Slanting Engines

On a slant: Diagram of the mounting of the M194 straight-six engine in the Le Mans winning Mercedes-Benz 300 SL (W194) canted at a 40^o slant (left); the Mercedes-Benz M196 straight-eight engine schematic (centre) and installed in a 1954 W196R "Streamliner" at a 53^o slant (right).  The two large donut-like objects at the front are the inboard, finned brake drums; at the time, the engineers maintained disk brakes were "not yet ready for use". 

There are “slant” engines and they exist in three configurations.  The first is simply a conventional in-line engine (straight-six, straight-eight etc) which, when installed in a vehicle, is fitted with the block canted to the left or right, the objective being a lower hood line which means a better aerodynamic outcome.  A classic example was the Mercedes-Benz W196R Formula One racing car (1954-1955) in which the straight-eight was canted to the right at a 53^o angle, the technique carried over when the same structure was used to produce the W196S (1955) used to contest the World Sports Car Championship.  Rather opportunistically, the W196S was dubbed the 300 SLR (one of which in 2022 became the world's most expensive used car, selling at a private auction for US$142 million) as a form of cross promotion with the 300 SL (W198, 1954-1956) Gullwing then in production, even though the two types shared little more than nuts, bolts and a resemblance.  The 300 SL did however also have its straight-six engine sitting at a slant, this time canted at a 50^o angle and although the factory never published an estimate of the reduction in drag, it’s long been presumed to be “at least several percent”.  Another advantage of the configuration was it made possible the use of “long-tube” runners for the induction system, taking advantage of the properties of fluid dynamics to permit them to be tuned either for mid-range torque or top-end power.  The concept used math which had been worked out in the nineteenth century and had often been used in competition but it wasn’t until 1959 when Chrysler in the US released their picturesque induction castings that the system, imaginatively named the “Sonoramic”, reached a wider audience.

Chrysler Slant Six (170 cid, 1963) schematic.

The “true” slant engines were those with a slanted block atop an otherwise conventional arrangement of components, the best known of which was Chrysler’s long-serving “Slant Six”, produced in displacements of 170 cubic inch (2.8 litre, 1959-1969), 198 cubic inch (3.2 litre, 1970-1974) and 225 cubic inch (3.7 litre, 1960-2000).  The block of the Slant Six was canted to the right at a 30^o and like Mercedes-Benz, Chrysler took advantage of the space created to the left to produce some wide induction runners, the most extravagant those used by the special Hyper Pack option package which used a four barrel carburetor, enabling the engine to produce power which made it competitive with many V8 powered machines.  Although the name “Slant Six” became famous, it was only in the mid-sixties it caught on, Plymouth originally calling the thing a 30-D (a reference to the a 30^o slant), hardly very catchy and something to which only engineers would relate and Slant Six was soon preferred although the aficionados really like “tower of power” and the engine even today still has a devoted following.

Chrysler Slant Six with Hyper Pak in 1962 Plymouth Valiant V-200.

Chrysler didn’t restrict the Sonoramics to the big-block V8s, using it also on the short-lived (1960-1962) Hyper Pak performance option for the both 170 cubic inch (2.8 litre, 1959-1969) and 225 cubic inch (3.7 litre, 1987-2000) versions of the Slant Six, the engineers taking advantage of the space afforded by the canted block to permit the curvaceous intake runners nearly to fill the engine bay.  The Hyper Pak wasn't seen in showrooms but was available as an over-the-counter kit (literally a cardboard box containing all necessary parts) from Dodge & Plymouth spare parts departments and its life was limited because it became a victim of its own success.  Although less suitable for street use because it turned the mild-mannered straight-six into something at its best at full throttle, in the race events for which it was eligible it proved unbeatable, dominating the competition for two years, compelling the sanctioning body cancel the series.

Manifold porn: The Slant Six's angle meant there was much space available to the left and a range of intake manifolds followed, some of which remain available to this day.  Using variations of the sonoramic tuning, manifolds were produced for single, two & four barrel carburetors and between 1965-1968, Chrysler's Argentine operation produced the Slant Six in a version with twin single barrel carburetors.  The use of the properties of fluid dynamics to gain power or torque as desired quickly was adopted by the industry as an engineering orthodoxy.

Some myths seem to have become attached to the Hyper-Pak.  What seems to be true is the original kit, sold in 1960 for the 170 engines used in competition, was a genuine homologation exercise and as well as the intake manifold & Carter AFB four barrel carburetor, it included all the internal parts such as the high-compression pistons, the high-lift camshaft and the valve train components needed to support the consequently higher engine speeds.  Because the competition rules allowed modifications to the exhaust system, on the track the cars ran tubular steel headers which fed an open exhaust, terminating in the racers' preferred “dump pipe”.  After the requisite number of “complete” kits were sold, thus fulfilling the homologation demands, the kits were reconfigured and included only the “bolt-on” parts such as the induction system and a camshaft which, while more aggressive than the standard unit, wasn’t as radical as the one used on the track but could be used in conjunction with the standard valve train and Chrysler’s TorqueFlite automatic, thus expanding the Hyper-Pak’s appeal.

At the same time, the availability was extended to the larger 225 which between 1961-1963 was also available with an aluminum block, thus becoming one of the small number of engines configured with the combination of an aluminum block with a cast-iron head.  US manufacturers were at the time aware the trend was for cars to continue getting bigger so they were interested in ways to reduce weight.  However, despite saving some 70 lbs (32 KG), Chrysler’s aluminum block was, like General Motors’ (GM) 215 cubic inch (3.5 litre) V8, short-lived (though the V8 after being sold to Rover enjoyed a long, lucrative and prolific second life, not finally laid to rest until 2006) for not only were teething troubles encountered with the still novel method of construction, the accountants made clear using cast iron was always going to be cheaper so the industry just accepted weight gain and whenever required, increased displacement to compensate, an approach which persisted until the first oil shock of the early 1970s.

1970 Dodge Challenger (1970-1974) with 225 Slant Six.

Until 1973, both the Challenger & the corporation's companion pony car (the Plymouth Barracuda (1964-1974)) was available with the Slant Six (198 & 225) although the fitment rate was under 10%, unlike the early pony cars (Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Camaro and the early Barracudas) where the six-cylinder versions would at times be close to 40% of production.  Many of the surviving Slant Six Challengers & Barracudas have been "re-purposed" as clones of the more desirable versions with big-block V8s.

Although it was the longer lived 225 version which gained the Slant Six its stellar reputation for durability and the ease with which additional power could be extracted, there's always been a following for the short-stroke 170 because of its European-like willingness to rev, the characteristics of the over-square engine (unique among the slant-six's three displacements (170-198-225)) unusually lively for a US straight-six.  Despite some aspects of the specification being modest (there were only four main bearings although they were the beefy units used in the 426 cubic inch Street Hemi V8), for much of its life it used a tough forged steel crankshaft and high-speed tolerant solid valve lifters; it proved a was a famously robust engine and one remarkably tolerant of neglect.  Despite that, after the Hyper Pak affair, Chrysler in the US showed little interest in any performance potential, knowing the US preference for V8s, something which doomed also Pontiac's short-lived single overhead camshaft (SOHC) straight-six (1966-1969).  A version of the 225 with a two-barrel carburetor (rated at 160 horsepower, an increase of 15 over the standard unit) was offered in some non-North American markets where V8 sales were not dominant and it proved very popular in South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Central & South America but only when tighter US emission regulations forced its adoption did a 225 with a two barrel carburetor appear in the home market though there it was installed to restore the power losses suffered after the emission control plumbing was added rather than seek gains.

Pontiac Trophy 4 cutaway.

Making a straight-eight or V8 by combining two in-line fours has been done a few times and many have been successful (although Triumph managed to create a truly horrid one for the otherwise lovely Stag).  Less common is making a four from an eight but that’s what Pontiac did when they conjured their 194.5 cubic inch (3.2 litre) four by using one bank of their 389 cubic inch (6.4 litre) Trophy V8 and it was (just about) literally cut in half, meaning the cylinders were canted to the right by 45^o (the V8 obviously in a conventional 90^o configuration.  To emphasize the family connection with the highly regarded Pontiac Trophy V8, the smaller offspring was called the Trophy 4 (although it was at time also dubbed the Indy 4 or Indianapolis 4 which even at the time sounded ambitious).  It did work and the economic advantages for the manufacturer (use of common components and the same assembly line) were compelling but the limitations inherent in a four-cylinder of such a large displacement were apparent in the rough-running and wear on critical parts and it was available only between 1961-1963, only in the compact Tempest.

Diagram showing balance shaft locations.

Large displacement four cylinder engines have been built.  Fiat in 1910 built two of their S76s to contest the world LSR (land speed record) and they were an hefty 28.4 litres (1730 cubic inch), the “Beast of Turin” using its then impressive 290 horsepower (216 kW) to attain a one-way speed of 132.27 mph (213 km/h) but, because it was not possible for the team to make the “return run” (ie in the opposite direction) within the stipulated one hour, the LSR remained with the Blitzen Benz which in 1909 had set a mark of 125.94 mph (202.65 km/h).  On land, never again would anyone build a four with the capacity to match the Beasts of Turin but units with displacements approaching 5.0 litres (305 cubic inch) were not uncommon during the inter-war years.  However, the technology of the internal combustion engine (ICE) greatly advanced during World War II (1939-1945) and one consequence of that was engine speeds rose and less displacement was required for a specific output, both factors which conspired to make the big fours unfashionable.  They did however make a comeback in the 1970s when the clever trick of “balance shafts” enabled the inherently chronic second order harmonic vibrations to be “dampened out” and Porsche between 1991-1995 produced a 3.0 litre (183 cubic inch) range which used the technique.  The balance shaft was invented early in the twentieth century by English engineer Frederick Lanchester (1868–1946) but it was Mitsubishi which in the 1970s patented their “Silent Shaft” system and although Porsche developed their own version, they worked out the Japanese design was superior so used that instead, paying Mitsubishi a small royalty (under US$10) for each one installed.  A balance shaft uses two counterweights (looking something like small hockey pucks with the shaft running through them), set some 1½ inches (40 mm) apart and turns at twice the engine-speed.  With one shaft mounted high on one side of the engine and the other low on the opposite side, the pair counter-rotates, balancing the large reciprocating mass.  

Vermiculate

Vermiculate pronounced ver-mik-yuh-leyt (verb) & ver-mik-yuh-lit or ver-mik-yuh-leyt (adjective)

(1) To work or ornament with wavy lines or markings resembling the form or tracks of a worm.

(2) Worm-eaten, or appearing as if worm-eaten.

(3) Figuratively, of thoughts, insinuating; subtly tortuous.

1595–1605: From the French vermiculaire (plural vermiculaires), from the Latin vermiculātus (in the form of worms; inlaid in wavy lines), past participle of vermiculor (I am full of worms; wormy) & vermiculārī (to be worm-eaten), from vermiculus (little worm; grub; wormlet), from vermis (worm), from the primitive Indo-European root wer (to turn; to bend.  The noun vermiculite describes the micaceous, hydrated silicate mineral and was named in 1814, based on its fibrous nature and the reaction observed when heated, the tendency being to expand into worm-like shapes; vermiculite is used in insulation and as a medium for planting.  Vermiculate, vermiculate & vermiculated are verbs & adjectives, vermiculation & vermiculite is a noun, vermicular & vermiculous are adjectives and vermiculating is a verb; the noun plural is vermiculations.

The adjective vermiculative (tending towards being vermiculated) is non-standard; when vermiculate & vermicular are used to refer to thought processes, the suggestion is of something tortuous, intricate or convoluted.  Other terms often used in this context include circuitous, convoluted, indirect, labyrinthine, meandering, serpentine, twisting, winding, coiled, curly, curved, sinuous, anfractuous, bent, crooked, flexuous, involute, mazy, meandrous & roundabout, all based on the picture of the irregular tunnels worms burrow in soil, the idea being of paths which are far from the shortest distance between the beginning and end of travel.  This is a figurative application of zoological behavior and not a slight on worms which have their own agenda.  Because it's so often used as a slight, it should probably not be used to describe deep or complex thoughts, however vermiculous they might appear.

Vermiculated terracotta block, Standard Oil Company Building, Jackson, Mississippi.

Although most associated with the vermiculated work seen in decorative stone masonry, the irregular grooves intended to resemble worm tracks have interested others including mathematicians and chaos theorists.  Engineers have also explored the idea and during the 1970s, tyres were developed with grooves cut in a random pattern (not to be confused with the asymmetric tread pattern Michelin introduced in (1965) on their XAS) rather than the usual structured geometric layout.  The idea was to lower the harmonic resonances created by the tendency of sound waves to be intensified by the recurring patterns; it was about reducing the noise generated and the theory proved sound, the acoustic difference detectable with the sensitive equipment used in laboratories but in real-world use the difference proved imperceptible.  The tyres were briefly available but, offering no advantage, the concept wasn’t pursued.

York Water Gate, England.

In architectural detailing, vermiculation is a form of surface rustication, used usually to create a decorative contrast between the rusticated work, ordinarily confined to the street level of a building (ie within the usual human field of vision) and the less finely dressed work above.  The effect is created with irregular holes and tracts being carved onto a façade, the purpose inherently decorative although some architects do like the idea of representing worms eating their way through the stone, collapsing a building into rubble and ruin, an allusion to the impermanence of architecture, conveying the message that all that is built must eventually crumble and fall.

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.

This notion of unavoidable impermanence has disturbed the minds of the more megalomaniacal in the profession, Albert Speer (1905–1981; Nazi court architect 1934-1942; later, as Nazi minister of armaments and war production 1942-1945 turning to war crimes & crimes against humanity) even presenting what he called Die Ruinenwerttheorie (a theory of ruin value) in which he argued it was important the monumental structures then being planned were designed in such as way that, thousands of years hence, as inevitability gradually they collapsed, what remained would be still aesthetically impressive and endure in this form even without maintenance.  Speer’s theory wasn’t new although the spin he felt compelled to attach was inventive.  What he stressed was that buildings designed in accordance with Ruinenwerttheorie were inherently finer works and more imposing during their period of use, an wise thing to emphasize because many less sophisticated types (and there were quite a few) the Führer’s entourage thought appalling the suggestion that anything in their “thousand year Reich” might one day crumble and fall.  Speer however was imagining his reputation surviving well beyond a single millennium and understood the mind of Hitler in such matters, appealing to his vision of what they were creating enduring as monuments to the greatness of the Third Reich, just as the ruins from Ancient Greek and Rome were symbolic of those civilizations.  Hitler concurred with Ruinenwerttheorie after Speer showed him a sketch of one of the gigantic works they planned as an ivy-covered ruin, the drawing very much in the vein of the pictures of Roman ruins well-known to the Führer.  What had scandalized his acolytes, pleased Hitler.

Red carpet vermiculation: Catherine O'Hara (b 1954), Venice International Film Festival, Venice, September 2024 (left) and Emmy Awards, Los Angeles, September 2024.  For red carpet (and related) purposes, the advantage of vermiculated fabric is it can be revealing or demure and, if need be, both within the same garment, the "look" defined merely by adjusting the channel widths. 

40 Bedford Square, London.

As a form of detailing, vermiculation became prevalent in the mid nineteenth century and in the technical language of architecture is often called vermicelli russification, the patterns typically deployed in stucco on cornerstones or keystones around a doorway, lending a bold textural interest to otherwise unrelentingly standardized surfaces, offering a juxtaposition with forms and lines derived from classical principles.  Although not popular as an embellishment until relatively recent times, the origin of the motif is ancient.  One of the first forms of formal architecture was the clay hut in which wormtracts were visible on the surface, made as the industrious little creatures weaved their way in and out of the earth that made up the structure.  Under the heat of the sun, the clay dried and the patterns set, creating what came to be thought an ornamental effect.  It’s from these modest structures that western architecture picked up the idea while constructing ever larger edifices, the vermiculation contrasting with the smooth, sanitized stone surfaces and becoming part of the grammar of classical buildings.

Irish Stock Exchange, Dublin.

Deconstructionists too have provided their own analysis of vermiculation beyond the relief provided from what can be an austere streetscape, claiming it “…represents a valuable counterpoint to symbolic representations of power and authority that pervade the architecture of many western cities”, one case-study focusing on the Irish Stock Exchange (1859) on Angelsea Street, Dublin which has strips of vermiculation on its granite façade.  That site was said to be a place “...where speculation of financial markets is the day’s work, the pattern might be cast as an unnoticed omen of the neoliberal collapse and loss of Irish economic sovereignty in late 2010”.  That’s probably about as abstract as anthropomorphism in stonework gets but there were in the early twentieth century those who devoted some effort to finding hidden meanings in the vermiculated patterns on the facades on Masonic lodges.  The findings were either never published or suppressed by the Freemasons.