This color educational/promotional film is about Firestone creating a safer fuel system in cars. There is no copyright at the beginning or end of the film so the date of the production is around 1967 as 1966 is mentioned in the film.
A racing car slams into a wall during a race and is engulfed in flames. As speed increases so does danger (:12-:1:01). The United States Auto Club asked Firestone to design a crash resistant fuel system. Shots of inside the Firestone factory as products are being worked on (1:02-1:52). Title card: Ounces of Prevention, presented by Firestone & Scott Paper Company. Workers at Firestone shake hands at a board meeting (1:53-2:13). Scientists/engineers work at the Firestone plant and do experiments with fuel and fire. A board meeting explains what must be prevented to make the fuel system safer. Shots of jumbo jets taking off (2:14-4:20). Phoenix International Raceway. A camera was mounted onto a car to monitor the fuel tank. The car races at speeds up to 140mph. An experiment with hollow plastic balls had little effectiveness with fuel surge (4:21-5:50). A screen is considered, Scott Paper Company works with Firestone. Safe foam was considered due to its weight. How safe foam is made is explained and shown. Tests are run on the foam by engineers (5:51-8:26). Fuel has no reaction with safe foam. The foam seems to help contain the fuel surge (8:27-9:00). Back at the Phoenix Int’l Raceway, the foam is used and the camera mounted again. On the track the foam controls the foam surge. Tests are performed on tanks with the foam and without, the foam ones come through without incident (9:01-9:55). The foam is tested and seems to block an explosion (9:56-10:38). Ft. Stockton, Texas on Firestone’s test track, the fuel tanks filled with safe foam have no incidents. Besides cars, the foam is used on Military vehicles as a test in Atlantic City, NJ (10:39-13:01). Safe foam is easily packed into a fuel cell. By 1965 all championship cars were required to have bladder type fuel cells. At the 1966 Indianapolis 500, these fuel cells were seen as preventing what could have been a catastrophic conflagration and no drivers were hurt in a pileup. Firestone received numerous awards for this design (13:02-14:37).
Sports cars have these fuel cells now as well. A spectacular crash occurs and causes a fire only in the car without the fuel cell protection (14:38-15:10). With this new protective safe foam, crashes don’t spell tragedy anymore – shots of racing cars crashing. A smashed car is towed away (15:11-16:08). End credits (16:09-16:14).
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
