Ed Pink 1931-2025

 

RRDC President, Bobby Rahal, on remembering engine builder Ed Pink.

“We lost another valuable RRDC member in late April, when Southern California engine guru Ed Pink passed away at the age of 94.

“Ed was one of the most prolific and successful engine builders on the drag racing scene from the ’60s on. He also created and developed successful sports car and ndy”Car engines and even Porsche flat 6s for Singer and their recommissioned 911s. 

“A quiet genius, Ed powered such legends as Don Garlits and Don Prudhomme to NHRA Top Fuel Championships as well as multiple Funny Car crowns. 

“We at the RRDC extend our condolences to Sylvia Pink and their family.”

Bobby Rahal, RRDC president

Frank Honsowetz, RRDC Member and General Manager of Ed Pink Racing Engines, Remembers Ed Pink

Ed Pink’s career goes back to even before he began building the 392 and 426 cid Chrysler Hemis for drag racing in the 1960’s, along with his success with a single-overhead-cam Ford engine in drag racing, particularly with Don Prudhomme.

I don’t think most people know that the original Cosworth DFX IndyCar engine was actually developed by Vel’s Parnelli Jones Racing.  In that era Ed built drag race engines for VPJ.  When Cosworth established a facility to build the DFX engines within miles of Parnelli’s place, a couple of ex-VPJ employees became the original Cosworth employees and knew of Ed’s engine facility so they recruited Ed to become involved in the very early production of the DFX.

Ed built DFX engines through about 1990 when Ford bought Cosworth and they started the engine lease program with the new XB eliminating independent engine builders. Ed moved on and was sought out again, this time to build engines for Jim Busby’s BF Goodrich IMSA GTP Porsche 962s.

Ed worked on that program for several years and then produced the engines for the IMSA GTP Pontiac Spice program. 

In the mid-nineties, when I first met him, I was trying to figure out how to execute the IRL Infiniti Indy Car program.  I went to talk to Ed about some products that he was making that we could incorporate in the program.  Once I got there and saw his facility, I realized how much more capability was there.

That’s when I made the deal with him to become involved in the Infiniti Indy Car engine program.  That program went from 1996 to 2001, and when I told Ed I was leaving Nissan, he asked me to come work for him.

 I worked for Ed on some very interesting programs. We did the engines for Steve Lewis’s incredibly successful 9 Racing USAC Midget racing team, initially using FORD-based engines and later designing and producing the TRD Midget race engines.  The shop also built championship winning TRD, Ford and Chevrolet V-8 race engines for USAC Silver Crown competition. Ed Pink Racing Engines later became even more diverse, building all forms of engines for numerous projects.

Ed sold Ed Pink Racing Engines to Tom Malloy in 2008, but did not stop building engines until recently, finishing his last engine build at the age of 92.

Something many people don’t know about Ed, but one of his most significant traits was that every engine project, everything the shop did had to be perfect. And there were no exceptions, ever. There was no cutting corners.  There was no rushing a job to meet a schedule.  There was no good enough is good enough.

That did not exist in the shop.

Everything had to be perfect and it’s something that I believe made him and the business so successful.