More on "Slower" cars beating "Faster" ones....

Following up on the last post I wanted to add a few things. There's more to winning a drag race than just horsepower. Besides power to weight ratio and gearing, there's a lot of other factors that come into play that people don't think of. The state of tune of the cars,traction, driver ability and how much testing has the driver done to maximize his car's performance. Here's a few more real-world examples or how supposedly "slower" cars walked away from "faster" ones. A friend of mine had a 1970 340 Dart Swinger. It had a Torqueflite and 3.55:1 gears. Being a light car-about 2,900 lbs, it was really quick. He worked on his launch and driving technique. He figured out the car launched quickest if he just punched it from a stop. If he "powerbraked" it-i.e. loaded the converter against the brakes-it would do an impressive burnout but that wasn't conducive to a quick 0-60 time. By just flooring it off-idle it would spin the tires for maybe 30 ft, just enough to get the engine up on it's torque curve and the car moving with alarcity. He also found it ran quickest if he shifted manually between 5,800-6,200 rpm. He beat a lot of big-block cars like SS396  Chevelles, 400 Firebirds, and even a 428 Mustang because the drivers of those cars totally fried their tires off the line. By the time they were done smoking the tires, he had a two or three car length lead that they couldn't get back. The 428 Mustang actually pulled almost even with a serious top-end push, but still couldn't overcome the "holeshot" to pass him! Another guy we knew had a 304 Gremlin that he stuffed a 401 out of a wrecked Matador police car into that was really quick, and he got beat by the Dart for the same reason. He fried his tires on launch and couldn't make it up on the top-end. My 403 Olds / TH350 powered '77 T/A beat many a shocked "5.0" Mustang driver in stoplight gran prix's. My T/A did have headers and a Holley Street Dominator intake and a TransGo shift kit which helped-drop the T/A's 1/4 mile time from something like 16.3 stock to consistent 14.9s. However-if you read old road tests of '87-93 "5.0" Mustangs Hot Rod was the quickest with a 14.72 and Road and Track was the slowest with a 15.29. My T/A's time falls smack-dab in the middle of those. I should have got beat once in a while. I never did-and it's the same reason. The Mustang drivers would pop the clutch about three grand,incinerate their tires for 200 feet, and shift at or near their 5,700 rpm redline. By the time their wheelspin stopped, I was too far ahead. Give anything 400 cubes a 2 or 3 car length lead and unless you've got something REALLY strong-i.e.-427 Stingray,LS6 Chevelle, Hemi 'Cuda-your not getting it back. I even told a couple of these guys to read Car Craft's test of a "5.0". CC testers discovered that if you popped the clutch at anything over 2,500 rpm, you were going to fry the tires. They found they got the best launch by slipping the clutch at 1,800-2,200 rpm and then hitting it. They also discovered that while the 302 would rev to 5,500 or so,it's tractor-like torque curve gave the best times when they short-shifted about 4,800-5,000 rpm. These Mustang driver's wouldn't listen-they'd continue to fry their tires anytime they raced someone, and if they got beat they'd talk about getting a performance prom chip or a bigger cam, or swapping the 3.08:1 gears for some 3.73:1s. They weren't grasping the problem. It doesn't matter how much power you have, if you can't put it to the ground!! Another guy I knew had an LB9 TPI 305 IROC-Z. He blew the doors off many shocked "5.0" owners, and gave some Corvette and Grand National owners a run for the money they'd never forget. How? The first thing he did was get a Hypertech High-Performance PROM chip-which bumped the timing and upped the fuel curve. He also installed a 160 degree thermostat and a fan switch that kicked the fan on at 185 degrees instead of 220. These two simple mods made a HUGE improvement. Stock LB9's with 195 T-stats and the fan not kicking on until 220-would run ok cold. When they got hot-they'd be on the verge of vapor lock-sometimes stumbling on acceleration. Swapping the t-stat and the fan switch allowed the engine to run cooler, and take full advantage of the cooler, denser fuel charge. He also had a TransGo shift kit that made a HUGE difference. Stock Camaros and Firebirds with LG4 / L69 /LB9 305s and TH700R4's had a problem. The transmissions would not upshift from 3rd to 4th above about 2/3 throttle. This prevented you from making a balls-out top-end run. If you had your foot to the floor, the trans would stay in 3rd gear. Let off, and it would upshift into 4th. Ugh! Further, they would only kick down to second from third. The only time the trans would go into low gear is if you came to a complete, dead stop. If you were going 5 mph-and punched it, you'd still be in 2nd!!  The shift kit solved this and allowed automatic kickdown into 1st gear below 15-20 mph, and it allowed full-throttle upshifts into 4th. It may sound simple-but if you drove a stocker-and then drove this car-you'd swear it was a chipped L98 350 model, not a 305!!  It ran that good. In fact-he beat some utterly shocked stock L98 IROC / T/A owners. I had a guy who came in my shop with a nice 396 / TH400 '66 Impala SS. He just bought the car, and was very disappointed in the car's performance. He said it couldn't even spin the tires on dry pavement. My dad and I had the rep as "The" musclecar guys to go to, so he came to us. I assured him we could fix his Ills. Upon inspection I found that the car was suffering from major neglect. The points were closing up, the vacuum advance was unplugged, the timing was way too slow,the carburator was way too rich,the kickdown wasn't hooked up. All simple fixes. I put new points in and set the dwell, cleaned and hooked up the vacuum advance,set the timing to factory specs,and leaned out the carb, and hooked up the kickdown. The difference was huge. Now the car would smoke the tires as long as you wanted to stay on the throttle,lay 15-20 ft of rubber on the 1-2 shift,and pull hard to about 5,500 rpm. The owner was blown away. "What did you do?" "Swap in new 427 crate engine?" He was so happy that he tipped me $100 over the bill I charged him. The point I'm making is-if someone spends the time to fine-tune their car and their driving technique, they are going to be very hard to beat. Especially if their opponent in the "faster" car has neglected his car's state of tune, and / or just punches it and has no idea what shift points or launch technique is best for his car. Mastermind      

It's all about power to weight ratio and mechanical advantage...

I've had a lot of people call me out for telling stories about "slower" cars beating "faster" ones in a drag race. These people are often abusive and insulting in their language, and it's kind of funny, because they don't realize how ignorant they sound. Most of them are only going on factory hp ratings and nothing else. Any experienced racer knows that the real formula is power to weight ratio. All other things being equal-a 3,000 lb car with a 300 hp engine will run just as fast as a 4,000 lb car with a 400 hp engine. The "all other things being equal" is important too. What about mechanical advantage? What if the 3,000 lb car had a 4-speed and 4.11:1 gears and the 4,000 lb car had an automatic and 3.23:1 gears?  Or vice-versa?  Remember when I talked about the L79 327 '66 Nova beating the W30 455 1970 442?  That's a perfect example. Here's a couple about mechanical advantage. One of these geniuses said I was lying when I said my dad's 1965 376 hp Tri-Power 421 Catalina 2+2 beat a friends 1967 390 hp 427 Impala SS in a drag race, both from a light and from a 20 mph roll. Why would I lie? 1st off-the power was totally equal-( 14 hp won't make any difference in real-world conditions ) 421 cubes vs 427 completely equal. Weight? Both cars weighed about 4,400 lbs. However-the Impala had 3.31:1 gears and the 2+2 had 3.90:1 gears. Both cars had TH400 automatics. However-the 2+2 had a TransGo shift kit. Not only would it shift automatically at 5,600 rpm under full-throttle acceleration, it would automatically kick down to low gear if you floored it under 15-20 mph. This made a huge difference if you were coming up to a red light, preparing to stop,and the light suddenly turns green and you punch it. Most other cars with stock automatics will drop from 3rd to 2nd under these conditions. It's simple-the 2+2, being in low gear is going to accelerate harder than the Impala which is still in 2nd. That's exactly how the race from a 20 mph roll went. When we tried again from a dead stop, I jumped him a car length and a half off the line. At the top of second gear-by now both the 421 and the 427 were pulling like locomotives on the mountain of torque they both posessed and he made up about half of that. And that was it. I held on to that half a car length lead until well over 100 mph when we both let off. That's the 3.90:1 gears advantage over the 3.31:1s. People don't realize it-but gears give you a boost all through the range, not just off the line. I learned this when I swapped the 3.23:1 gears in my Hurst / Olds for some 4.10:1s. I honestly didn't notice a difference in low gear. The 455 had enough torque to launch the car regardless of gearing. However-the difference was HUGE in 2nd and 3rd!!  So hopefully-anyone with common sense can see how the 2+2 could beat the Impala. The other one was probably the same idiot who said there was no way My Ram Air III 400 1969 GTO Judge could beat my buddy's 1969 440 Six-Pack Super Bee. The GTO was rated at 366 hp, the Super Bee at 390. Again-not enough to make a difference. Both cars weighed about 3,700 lbs. However-my GTO had a 4-speed and 4.33:1 gears. The Super Bee had a Torqueflite and 3.23:1 gears. Any racer would say that right there gives me the win. But wait-I also had N50X15 Mickey Thompson "Hot-n-Sticky" tires on the back of my car, and I had Lakewood coil-spring traction bars. The Super Bee had stock suspension, and GR70-15 Sears Radials. Stiffer gears,larger, stickier tires,and a drag-race oriented suspension would give me a substantial advantage. But wait-my engine wasn't stock. I had a larger than stock Crane Cam, Hooker headers,and an Offenhauser dual-quad intake with two Carter AFBs. So yeah,buddy-I'm lying. There's no way my hopped up,traction barred,4.33:1 geared, 4-speed GTO could beat a bone-stock, automatic, 3.23:1 geared Super Bee!!  As Ditka said- "Come on Man!!"  Some Ford guys I know had a drag race and I had to laugh at the loser. He had a nice 1972 Mustang Mach 1 with a 351CJ, rated at 266 hp, an automatic and 3.00:1 gears. He talked trash incessantly to his buddy-who had a nice 1966 Mustang GT with the 225 hp 289, a C4 and unkown gearing.       They finally raced, and the '66 beat him by about two car lengths. How? Power to weight ratio. The '66 Mustang weighed about 2,900 lbs. The '72 weighed about 3,700. 41 rated hp wasn't enough to overcome 800 extra pounds!!! Further-the '66 launched with very little wheelspin. The '72 lit up the tires off the line which also hurt. Any way-the owner of the '72 was fixated on two things-351 cubes vs 289, and 266 hp vs 225. He didn't think of anything else while he was trash-talking. Like a weight difference of 800 lbs, and traction!!  So think of the total packages before you start trash talking based only on hp ratings! You might be surprised and embarrased.  Mastermind

Mick, Waylon and Dennis and why musclecar drivers get in trouble....

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste...."  The opening line of "Sympathy for the Devil." sung by Mick Jagger...                                                                                                                      ""Not guilty I said" "You've got the wrong man, no one touched that pistol but the Devil's Right Hand..." Excerpt from "The Devil's Right Hand" sung by Waylon Jennings.                                                                    HR relations counselor-"So what seems to be the problem, Mr. Leary?" "My boss thinks I'm having trouble getting along with my co-workers." "You fuckin' asshole!"  Comedy skit by Dennis Leary.                   These three things will tell you how musclecars have their irresistable allure,and why they can't be driven slow, and why-Stephen King's "Christine" aside-they are definitely male, and malevolent, and "Jules Wallet" from "Pulp Fiction". ( The one that says "Bad Mo$#%6ucker on it ). It doesn't start when your 16 or 25 or 45. It starts when your about six or eight. All little boys are aware of and interested in cars, and if their dad or big brother or uncle or cousin is a gear head-their cursed for life. I remember my dad's 1964 GTO. It was green, which wasn't particularly cool. But it had black interior with bucket seats and those round guages in that engine-turned panel, and that chrome console with the chrome Hurst shifter sticking up through it. It had American Racing Torq-Thrust mags on it, and glasspacks and loud exhaust. That thing sounded SO nasty. It wasn't a tri-power-just the 325 hp 4bbl 389, but with the Muncie 4-speed and 4.33:1 gears it was ungodly fast. All the boys in the neighborhood wanted to ride in it. When my mom drove it and picked me up from school sometimes she'd work the clutch and let me shift it. That was so damn cool!!  I've driven all kinds musclecars and sports cars over the course of my life, and nothing gets my blood up like the feel of Hurst-shifted "Rock Crusher". The feeling of power is like racking the slide on a 12-guage shotgun. A lot of my dad's friends were gearheads. His buddy Paul had a 340 hp / 4-speed '63 Split Window Corvette Stingray. Dave had a 400, 4-speed '67 Firebird convertible that I thought was awesome, even though the GTO could beat it in a drag race. ( I think the 'Bird had 3.36:1 gears; no match for the Goat's 4.33:1s in a drag ) and his pal Jan had a for-real 289 Shelby Cobra. My mom's best friend's brother had a 409 Impala. I remember when my dad's pal Sonny got a brand-new 1970 SS396 Chevelle. It was silver with black stripes. I loved how the "Cowl Induction" hood flap would open and close when he revved the engine. It was an automatic, but I loved that chrome console and the "Horseshoe" shifter. And it would smoke those F70-14 Firestone Wide Ovals as long as he wanted to stay on the throttle. So cool. I said in an earlier post that my dad was an expert on multi-carb setups and that people brought him GTOs,Hemis, 406 Galaxies, and Porsche 911s and Datsun 240Z's-anything with multiple carbs-he had the rep as "The Man" to bring it to for maximum performance. I wrote about staying at the shop with him til midnight tuning a 440 / Six-Pack GTX and a Hemi Road Runner that were going to have a match race the next day.  Growing up around those guys-there was no way I was going to be a VW or Toyota driver!!  And the Movies-"Bullitt", "Vanishing Point","The Seven-Ups", "White Lightning", "The Last American Hero". "Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry". What boy could watch those flicks and NOT fantasize about being a badass-with your foot to the floor  and a hot chick beside you? When I got my Judge I lost my driver's liscence in less than a year. "No one touched that Hurst shifter but the Devil's right hand...."   Musclecars are so sexy.....Just sitting in one idling-it's like your holding the leash on a 120 lb Rotwieler who wants to run. You can barely hold it back. And god help you if another musclecar or a rice-rocket or BMW pulls up next to you at a light and gives you a look of disdain. Mick's word's ring in your ears-"If you meet me, show some courtesy, some sympathy and respect." "Use all your well learned politics, or I'll lay your soul to waste!!"  Dennis Leary's mouth starts going. "You gonna take that shit?"  "Blow that yuppie scum's doors off."  "Your not?" "Then trade me in for a Honda Civic you pussy." "Maybe someone with balls will buy me." Then he starts quoting Jules from "Pulp Fiction" "I will strike down with great vengenance and furious anger, anyone who threatens the righteous man who is my driver...." Your left foot slams the clutch to the floor, cha-ching-the shifter slams from neutral into first, your right foot brings the revs up,Dennis and Sam Jackson start high-fiving each other.....The light turns green and you smite the infidel challenger in biblical fashion. If your lucky. If your not lucky their will be sirens coming up behind you, and you'll have to explain about the Devil's right hand. But going to court and traffic school and paying the fine won't stop you the next time.....Mick and Dennis and Sam and Waylon won't let you.....Mastermind      

One Piece at a time...

Johnny Cash had a hit song about an auto worker who stole parts over his long career and built a car for no cost. It was called "One Piece at a Time." I've always thought it would be cool to build a hot rod with various parts and not worry about what was "correct" or "original."  Like maybe a Pontiac Ventura ( Pontiac's version of the Nova ) built with a snarling 455 Pontiac under hood with Trans-Am suspension and 4-wheel disc brakes-( any suspension or brake parts that fit the F-bodies-Camaro / Firebird will fit the X-bodies-Nova / Ventura / Omega ). I'd also put cool stuff in the interior like swivel bucket seats out of '73-77 "A" bodies, a Formula steering wheel and a Mopar Pistol-Grip Hurst shifter stick on the Muncie 4-speed or Richmond 5-speed. Some radiused and flared fenders to clear huge tires all around, and some front and rear spoilers, and maybe a Trans-Am style "Shaker" hood scoop, and a sinister monochromatic black paint job. Or maybe a '70-71 Ford Torino with all the chrome removed and hidden door handles and front and rear spoilers, with huge tires and side-exit exhaust and a snarling 351C under the hood-sort of a "Mad Max" interceptor tribute. Or a '71-74 AMC Javelin done in red, white and blue with side-pipes and Minilite wheels like Mark Donohue's Trans-Am champion. With an Edelbrock headed, nasty 360 AMC V8 or a 440 Mopar swapped in-AMC's use Torqueflite trannys anyway. Or a '67-70 Cougar done in Nascar style with a "Mock Boss" 351 ( Edelbrock and Trick Flow offer hi-performance aluminum heads that fit Windsor blocks and Edelbrock makes a compatible manifold so you could build a "Boss" 302 or 351 ) under the hood and a 5-speed manual, a Shaker Hood and some monochromatic paint. A change from the cookie-cutter Chevelles, Camaros and Mustangs, etc. Mastermind

More on taking advantage of the "Original Type" rule...

The last couple posts weve talked about the Pure Stock drags,Musclepalooza, etc and how people maximize their performance and still stay within the rules. Once you've made your decision on a car-a '71 Chevelle might be a better choice than a '68-since you could get a 454 in a '71 model and the largest engine available in a '68 was a 396. On the other hand-a 3,400 lb '65 GTO with a 389 bored to 404 inches,a hot cam and ported intake and exhaust manifolds,and reworked 3-2bbls with mechanical linkage,a 4-speed and 3.90:1 or 4.33:1 gears will probably run a lot quicker than a 4,070 lb '71 GTO with a 455HO, a TH400 and 3.55:1s!!  Weve been over that-let's assume you've chosen a car-whatever it may be-and now you have to get it race-ready. There's several areas where a little tweaking can net you big gains. # 1. Induction. The rule saying the carburator has to be the original type allows you some room. For example the Carter AVS 4bbl that came on 383-440 Mopars from 1966-71 had very crisp low-end throttle response and good drivability. However-they only flowed about 585 cfm. A 440 V8 with a 585 cfm carb is like a 250 lb man trying to run while breathing through a straw. Fortunately Edelbrock's Thunder AVS series will fit nicely inside the rules and their's an 800 cfm version available. Simply switching to the 800 cfm carb will help you pick up as much as 25 hp and 30 lbs of torque. You can also play with spacers and jetting. Some cars run best with no spacer-some run better with a 1" or 2" spacer under the carb. Some cars run better with an open spacer, and some run better with a 4-hole spacer. You just have to invest the time to see what combination gives you the best e.t. The Carter AFB 4bbl that was on many 389 and 421 Catalinas and '64-66 GTOs, 409 Impalas, and many Ford and Chrysler applications in the '60s only flowed 500 or 625 cfm. Switching to a 750 cfm AFB or Edelbrock Performer ( which is an AFB under the Edelbrock name ) will give you a substantial gain. Ditto for dual-quad applications. Your 409 Chevy, 421 Pontiac or 426 Hemi will breathe better by switching the 500 or 625 cfm carbs for 750s. Especially for 4-speed applications-switching from vacuum to mechanical linkage on dual-quad and tri-power setups is usually good for a few tenths. The second part is the intakes. For example if you have a disco-era T/A or Formula Firebird with a 400 Pontiac-the 1975-79 intakes have a very restrictive throttle opening-the EGR valve intrudes so much that a spread-bore Holley carb won't bolt on. They severely restrict power above 3,500-4,000 rpm. The rules say the intake has to be the original type. That's easy-an Iron manifold that mounts a Quadrajet. Their are millions of Pontiac Q-jet intakes in junkyards and swap meets of '67-74 vintage that will bolt right on and allow the engine to pull hard to 5,700 rpm. This isn't an isolated example. Since the LS6 454 was slated to be available in the Camaro and the Nova as well as the Chevelle-the intake was lowered to clear the low hood of the new for 1970 Camaro. The intake is so flat that fuel has to flow UPHILL from the carb to the intake ports!! Since the early '70's stock class LS6 racers figured out that the taller '66-69 aluminum intake used on L78 and L72 396s and 427s is worth 20 hp and 25 lbs of torque over the flat LS6 intake. And their easy to find-GMPP sells this rectangular port high-rise intake to this day. If your building a "Tribute" or clone-remember cars don't have to be numbers-matching-you can run any engine / drivetrain combo that was optional on that model that year. Like I said in an earlier post you could put a Mopar Performance 426 crate Hemi into a '68 Dart if you wanted to. Let's say your building a Super Duty 421 Catalina clone. The chances of you finding a running or rebuildable 421 with 1962 or 63 date codes is almost nil. You have a better chance of being struck by lightning on the golf course. However their are millions of 400 Pontiacs out there and Kaufmann and Butler performance and others sell cranks and rotating assemblys to turn a 400 into a 428 or 455. Your allowed 15 inches from stock. You could easily build a 434 inch Pontiac with 6.8 inch rods ( stock is 6.675 ) and custom pistons. The heads have to be the original type-cast iron. You don't have to run '59-66 "Bathtub" heads with tiny ports and 1.96 / 1.66 valves. You could run 6X's ( which breathe better than any factory head except RAIV's ) with 2.11 / 1.77 valves. Your never going to find an original dual-quad Super Duty intake. However-Offenhauser made an excellent dual-quad Pontiac Intake up until a few years ago-I had one on my Judge back in the day, and I have one in a box in my garage right now. And Edelbrock still sells their excellent P65 dual-quad Pontiac intake. Either of these would fall under the "Original Type" rule. So would an Edelbrock Dual-quad intake for 348 / 409 Chevys or one for Chrysler Hemis. If you were building a Thunderbolt Fairlane clone-you could use a 390 instead of a 427 ( FE engines are externally identical ) and put a pair of Holleys on an Edelbrock intake. See what I'm saying?  # 2. Cylinder heads. Original type means exactly that. So if your car had iron heads from the factory-you can't use aluminum ones. But like I pointed out-you could put 6X heads off a '77 T/A on a 389 in a '64 GTO if you wanted to. Their both cast iron-but the 6X's breathe way better than the '64 heads!!  Like I mentioned the guy wanting to build a Nova-you can use Vortec heads on a small-block Chevy. You could use '92 and later "Magnum" heads on a 340 or 360 Mopar. ( They will bolt up to '91 and earlier blocks. You will need a "Magnum" style intake. ) Ford racers have known for years that "Explorer" heads-that came on late '90's and early 2000's 302 powered Explorers breathe better than any factory 289 / 302 head-even "GT40s" sold by Ford SVT. These would give your '60's 289 Mustang or late '80's "5.0" quite a boost. If you have a T/A or Formula Firebird with a 403 Olds V8-you can use the heads off a '68-72 350 Olds. Their 70cc combustion chambers will boost compression from 7.9:1 to 9.0:1 ( 403s have 83cc chambers ), and the earlier heads have larger 2.00 / 1.60 valves. You'll have to re-tap the bolt holes-'75 and later Olds 350 / 403s use larger bolts than '74 and earlier models but any machine shop can easily handle that. I think the difference is either 7/16 to 1/2 inch, or 1/2 inch to 9/16; I'll have to look it up. Also the Edelbrock catalog and Mondello Performance's catalog has this information as well. You'll have to use an Electric fuel pump if you do this-but you can also put 455 heads on a 350 / 403. ( You'll need custom pistons to get any kind of compression however, but it's do-able ) You can see regardless of manufacturer-you have a lot of leeway with cylinder head choices to make maximum power. # 3. Cams. This is easy-if the car had a hydraulic cam originally you have to run a hydraulic cam, no solid lifters. If the car had a solid-lifter cam from the factory you can't run a roller. That's it. Their's no limit on lift and duration. So you can run as radical a cam as your combination can handle. Because you have to run stock exhaust manifolds a lot of guys run dual-pattern cams-that have more duration and lift on the exhaust side to compensate for the restricted exhaust.  # 4. Exhaust. You have to run "stock type" exhaust manifolds which usually means cast iron. But their are several companies that sell "Ram Air III" exhaust manifolds for Pontiacs, and ported and extrude-honed manifolds for small-block Chevy, Ford and Chrysler stock class circle track racers. Any machine shop can port-match your manifolds to the heads. After that-you can run 2 1/2 or 3" inch pipes with a crossover and any mufflers you like. The exhaust won't be nearly as restricted as you think. # 5. Drivetrain. If you have an automatic-you can run a higher stall speed torque converter and still be legal. You can also run any axle ratio as long the rear end is the stock type. So let's say you had a '69 SS396 Chevelle with a TH400. Your saying it's an L78 spec car. You've already got the good aluminum intake and 780 Holley, and since you can run a solid lifter cam you've upgraded from the mild L78 cam to the super-hot L88 cam. To take full advantage of these changes you'll also need a 3,500 rpm converter and some 4.56:1 gears. Trust me-trying to run an L88 cam with 3.31:1 gears and a stock converter-the car would fall flat on it's face-it would actually be quicker stock!!  The entire combination has to be coordinated. See what I'm saying?  # 6. Driving technique. Here's where you have to do a lot of trial and error. If the car is a 4-speed does it launch better by dropping the clutch or by slipping it? At 2,000 rpm? or 3,000? or more? If it's an automatic-does it launch better by just floorboarding it, or by loading the converter against the brakes?  You have to play with shift points and see what gets you the best times. I know with one of my 403 Firebirds it ran fastest if I shifted the TH350 manually at 4,900 rpm ( 1-2 ) and 4,400 rpm ( 2-3 ). A buddy had a "5.0" Mustang. It would rev to 5,800 rpm or so-but he found he cut quicker 1/4 mile times by short-shifting it at 5,200. My brother's GTO would shift automatically at 5,400 rpm, but he went quicker if he held it in gear to 5,800-6,000 and shifted manually. So you can run just as fast as the guys in the magazines-but you'll have to put in a lot of work. Mastermind            

Choose your car carefully if you want to win at Muscle Car drags...

After the last post I had some people ask me what car I thought would be the best to run at the Pure Stock drags or MusclePalooza, etc. The fact is there's no easy answer. The main thing is to read the rulebook carefully on what is and isn't allowed. And sometimes it's just simple math-power to weight ratio. I remember a few years ago I was at one of these events and a guy in a '66 L79 Nova was matched up against a guy with a '70 W30 442. Even the announcer made a joke-"A small-block Nova tugging on Superman's cape?"  The crowd,the announcer, the 442 owner and everyone but me was shocked when the Nova won easily. I said before the race that the Nova was going to win. My friends grilled me, thinking I had some inside information. I didn't. I just did the math. A 1970 442 W30 has a 455 V8 rated at 370 hp and weighs about 4,000 lbs. A 1966 L79 Nova has a 327 V8 rated at 350 hp and weighs about 3,000 lbs. All other things being equal-the 350 hp 3,000 lb car is going to run faster than the 370 hp 4,000 lb car. 20 hp isn't enough to overcome 1,000 lbs of extra weight!!  Now factor in a couple of things we didn't know before we talked to the owners of the cars-the 442 was an automatic with 3.42:1 gears and the Nova was a 4-speed with 4.11:1s-it really comes into focus. Unless the guy in the Nova redlighted or missed a shift, the 442 had no chance. The Nova had the same amount of power, 1,000 lbs less weight to pull and the mechanical advantage of 4.11:1 gears. I talked with the Nova owner for a bit. His car was a for-real, numbers-matching L79. He said however that he was going to buy another '66-67 Nova-maybe even a six-cylinder car-and build an even nastier racer for the next year. He explained that he knew the rulebook backwards and forwards, but he didn't want to modify the L79. He said he could build another 327 to the letter of the rules that would easily have 450+ hp instead of 350 and still be legal. I asked him to explain. Like we discussed in the last post-the rules allowed quite a bit of leeway. Since the cars didn't have to be numbers-mtaching-he was going to get a 350 block and use a 3.25 inch stroke crank with 6 inch rods ( stock is 5.7 ) and custom pistons. The heads have to be the original "type"-which means Iron-no aluminum. However he could get a set of Iron Vortec heads-their 64cc combustion chambers would give him 11:1 compression with his custom pistons, and we all know that Vortecs breathe better than any other factory head and many aftermarket ones. The heads alone would be worth 30-40 hp over stock 327 / 350 heads. He'd need a Vortec bolt-pattern intake-but again the rules say the manifold has to be the original type. He's claiming to build an L79 spec car-they had aluminum intakes from the factory. And GMPP sells aluminum high-rise Vortec bolt-pattern intakes for small-block Chevys. He could probably slip an Edelbrock or Weiand through-the original "type" rule doesn't dictate brand-and Mopar guys with 340 and 440 Six-Packs have Edelbrock intakes and Shelby Mustang owners have Shelby intakes-but with a GM part number there'd be no argument whatsoever. L79s had Holley 4bbls from the factory-so he could run a 780 cfm 3310, or he said-since the rules again said-"Orignal Type"-he could get away with running an 850 cfm Double-Pumper!!  The rulebook said nothing about how many accelerator pumps the carb could have!! Ditto for the cam-it would have to be a flat-tappet hydraulic design-no rollers-but he could a super-hot Comp Cams 292H Magnum-that would make quite a bit more power than the old "350hp" 327 factory cam. To take advantage of all this extra power he was going to use 4.56:1 gears instead of 4.11s. Now that would be one badass ride that would smite a lot of big-block cars in biblical fashion!!  Am I saying that a '66 Nova is the best choice? No, I'm saying think of the total package-always remembering power to weight ratio. Think of this-cars don't have to be numbers-matching as long as the engine / drivtrain combo was optional on that car that year you can build it-so-you could put a Mopar Performance 426 crate Hemi into a '68 Dart-think that would dominate??!!!  Also-think of this-a 1971 Formula Firebird would be a much better choice than a 1970 model. Because the body is exactly the same-the car is pretty light for a Pontiac-about 3,600 lbs-less than later models with heavy 5-mph bumpers-and the 455 was available in '71. The largest engine available in 1970 was a 400. Remember the rules-15 inches-think a 'Bird with a 470 inch Pontiac V8 with longer rods,12:1 compression,a stompin' cam and ported intake and exhaust manifolds with a TH400 and a high-stall converter and some 4.33:1 gears wouldn't be Jules' Wallet?  ( For those who haven't seen "Pulp Fiction-that means "Bad MotherF$%er" )  And a lot quicker than a 416 inch '70 model?  Or how about a 1969-1970 Nova SS? A 396 Rat motor was optional those years-'71 and later, a 350 was the biggest engine available. For Ford guys a '69-70 Mustang might be the best choice-the mighty 428CJ was the top dog. ( No one is going to build or buy a Boss 429 for this stuff ). In '64-66 a 289 was the big V8. In 67-68 you could get a 390-and most '71-73s have 351C's. ( The 429 was optional in '71, but it would be hard to build one. ) So in my mind the '69-70 would be the first choice. And the 15 inch rule goes both ways-so you could get a 390 truck block bore it .060-.080 over and use a custom crank and pistons and have like 415 inches-within 13 of 428-so still legal. A lightweight '71 340 Duster might be a better choice than a heavy 440 '74 Charger. See what I'm saying?  So read the rules religiously and then decide-the "bigger is better" axiom isn't always true. Mastermind      

As "Harry Hogge" said..."There's nothing stock about a stock car..."

I've had a lot of people ask me how participants of the Pure Stock Drags and other similar events run such blistering times-often a full second or more quicker than any road tests from magazines back in the day. There are many reasons for this and I'll explain them. In the Tom Cruise racing blockbuster "Days of Thunder"-grizzled crew chief "Harry Hogge"-brilliantly played by Robert Duvall-said-"There's nothing stock about a stock car." Truer words were never spoken. # 1. The Rules. Often the rules for these events are based on the NHRA's Stock Class or Super Stock class rules. These guidelines give builders quite a bit of latitude. I'll use a couple of recent champions to illustrate. One was a Ram Air IV Firebird. The rulebook says that engines have to be within 15 cubic inches of original. Pontiac 400s are actually 401 cubic inches. So he can build an engine 416 cubes and still be legal. 400 Pontiacs have a 4.12 inch bore and a 3.75 inch stroke, and connecting rods 6.675 inches in length. He achieved 416 inches by boring the block .030 over and by using a custom 3.79 inch stroke crank. He also used 6.800 inch connecting rods and custom pistons. This may sound like small "technicalities" but experienced engine builders will tell you that a longer stroke and longer connecting rods build a lot of torque all through the range. This why small-block Chevy racers in NASCAR have used 6 inch rods for years. ( Stock length is 5.7 ). So already-with a little machine work on the bottom end this car has a substantial advantage. All other things being equal-do you think an engine with 15 extra cubes and longer rods is going to run harder than a bone-stock one?  The rulebook say the cam has to be the "Original Type". What this means is if the car had a hydraulic cam from the factory then you have to run a hydraulic cam-no solid lifters. If the car had a solid-lifter cam from the factory, you can't run a roller. The loophole is their are no limits on duration and lift. An RAIV from the factory has a cam with 308 / 320 advertised duration ( 231 / 240 @.050 ) and .470 lift with 1.5:1 rockers. ( .520 with 1.65:1 rockers.) This guy was running a cam with 253 duration ( @.050 ) and .575 lift with 1.5 rockers. Think an extra .105 in lift will make some extra power? Especially on the top-end?  The rulebook says that cylinder heads have to be the original type. Meaning if the car had iron heads, you can't run aluminum ones. For Pontiacs it says the minimum combustion chamber volume allowed is 62cc. 1969-70 RAIVs had 10.75:1 compression with 72cc combustion chambers. By milling the heads to get to 62cc-he effectively raised compression to roughly  12:1. The intake manifold has to be the original type. RAIV's had an aluminum intake-so he can run a factory RAIV / 455 HO piece or run a repro RAIV intake from AMEs or NPD or other Pontiac resto houses. However-the intakes can be port-matched, and the only limitation is the stock hood has to close-no scoops or bulges allowed. That means he can use a 1" or 2" inch spacer under the carb as long as the air cleaner clears the hood. The carb has to be the original type-a Quadrajet-but he's running a custom one that flows nearly 1000 cfm ( stock is 750 cfm ) and has a larger .149 needle and seat so he can run extra fuel pressure-9 psi. ( Stock is 5-6 psi ). He's running a 4,300 rpm torque converter and 5.14:1 gears. Now do you see the difference? Of how this car, with 15 extra cubes,a much hotter cam, higher compression ratio, a ported intake, a larger carb,extra fuel pressure, a high-stall converter and 5.14:1 gears can run low 11s while a stocker with 3.90:1 gears can only run in the 13s?  The other example is an L88 Corvette. This one also runs low 11s. Now L88s were pretty radical from the factory-they had 12:1 compression, a hot solid-lifter cam and an 830cfm Holley on an aluminum intake. However- the rules allow up to 13.5:1 compression for L88 spec cars!!  Again-the cam has to be a flat-tappet solid lifter design-but there's no limit on lift or duration. The Chevrolet "off-road" cam has something like 258 duration ( @.050 ) and over .600 lift! He's got a port-matched intake, and the custom Holley carb flows over 950 cfm. He's also running a 4,500 rpm converter and 4.88:1 gears. That's how he rips off consistent 11.40s while the stocker tested by Hot Rod with a TH400 and 3.36:1 gears back in the day ran mid 13s. ( Another L88 / 4-speed 'Vette test car with 4.56:1 gears did run in the 12s; but that's still a far cry from 11.40s ). Are these guys cheating?  No-they are within the rules to the letter. Are their cars "Pure Stock?"  Hell no!!!  # 2. The second factor is tuning and testing. These guys spend umpteen hours tuning and testing. The grand champion a few years ago was a 428CJ Mustang. Musclecar Review had an interview with him. He had changed cams a lot and found that Lunati's version of the factory CJ cam gave him much more power than the stock Ford cam or the Crane "Blueprint" series or the Comp Cams version, epecially above 5,000 rpm. That's costly and time-consuming, but the edge it gave him was undeniable. His intake and exhaust manifolds were port-matched and extrude-honed for maximum flow. He re-jetted the carb for altitude and specific conditions at each track he raced on. He had changed leaf springs many times- and found that a set originally off a 390 Cougar gave him the best launch. He played with shift points and found that the car ran hardest if he shifted the C6 manually at 6,200 rpm ( 1-2 ) and 6,500 rpm ( 2-3 ). All this work will definitely give him an edge over another 428 Mustang or LS6 Chevelle or Six-Pack Road Runner or whatever-who just goes to the event, pulls to the line and punches it!!!  So you can go that fast-if you want to invest the time and money. But don't feel bad if your lovingly restored stocker can't come close to these "Ringers".  Mastermind         

Be honest with yourself about what you really want....You'll be much happier in the long run...

Maybe my last few posts confused some people. I'm not saying don't get an ultra premium model, and I'm not saying "settle" for something lesser. I'm saying be reasonable about what your actually going to do with the car. If you want a $100,000 piece of garage jewelry that's only driven on and off the trailer or to shows then get whatever you want. If your not driving it, then it doesn't matter what equipment it has. If you only want a race car-it's only use is going to be at the Pure Stock Drags or similar events-then you can buy or build anything you want. For example-you could put a Mopar Performance Crate Hemi in a '71 Charger and run that because a Hemi was AVAILABLE that year. They don't require that cars be numbers-matching. That's how the current champ got his "L88" 'Vette in. It was a 390 hp car, and he rebuilt the engine to L88 specs. On the other hand you couldn't run a 454 in a '69 Chevelle or a 455 in a '69 GTO because those engines weren't optional in those cars. You could however run an L72 spec 427 in a '69 Chevelle because their were a few 427 cars built in the COPO program, and Don Yenko and Nickey Chevrolet built a few. You could run a Ram Air IV spec 400 in the GTO because the RAIV was an option. Under these circumstances the sky is the limit. But if your going to drive the car at all-I know no one is using these cars as daily transportation-but a lot of people like to take a 200 mile trip on a Sunday, or after drving an econobox or an old pickup to work all week-just want take the hot rod out and like the GTO song-"Turn it on, Wind it up, blow it out" up a country road. For those people-you need have some common sense. I've touched on it before it's worth re-visiting. If you live in Arizona or Florida or Las Vegas or anywhere that it gets 100 degrees in the summer-it might behoove you to get a car with working or at least repairable Air Conditioning. If you live in a big-city with a lot of stop-n-go traffic like San Francisco or Los Angeles-an automatic transmission might be a better choice than a 4-speed. If you live out in the country 30 or more miles from the nearest town-and do a lot of highway driving-a car with 3.23:1 gears is going to be a lot more pleasant to drive than one with 4.10:1s!!  And a base-model may make a nicer driver. For example a '69 GTO with properly tuned 350 hp 400, a TH400 and standard 3.36:1 gears or a 4-speed and 3.55:1s is going to be plenty fast. The engine will idle smoothly and it will literally spin the tires as long as you want to stay on the throttle. If you really, truly "need" something faster-then you "need" a top fuel dragster, a competent therapist, or a cage. Now a Ram Air IV model is going to be a handful. There's a reason they were only available with 3.90:1 or 4.33:1 gears. They have a rough idle,if you launch below 2,500-3,000 rpm itll bog; 3,000 or more and you'll fry the tires. ( Automatics had a special 2,800 rpm converter from the factory; you still have to be careful-"powerbrake" it too long and you'll fry the tires badly ). Your giving up quite a bit of low-end and mid-range torque for top-end rush. Yeah, it's faster in a drag race. Under any other conditions it's a pain in the ass. This is not an isolated example. Like I said in an earlier post-a Boss 302 is peaky-has very little torque below 3,000 rpm, and isn't any quicker than a 351W or 351C Mach 1. The 351W that's the standard engine in a 1969 Mach 1 is rated at 290 hp-the same as the Boss-yes I know the "Boss" was under-rated just like the 302 Chevy in the Z/28-but the 351W has 385 lbs of torque. It's a much better street engine, idles smoother, has gobs of torque, is perfect with an automatic and really sweet with a 4-speed. If your going to drive the car at all you'll be much happier with the 351 Mach 1. A lot of people don't realize that the Chrysler 426 Hemi was invented to do one thing-go 200 mph at Daytona. Nascar rules back then said if you wanted to race them, you had to sell a certain number to the public. Either in Nascar or NHRA Drag Racing-no one disputes the Hemi's "King Kong" status. But a 440 or even a 383 is a much better street engine. Read old road tests-often the 383 and 440 models are quicker in the 1/4 and have much better drivability. The huge Hemi ports and valves that helped attain that incredible speed at Daytona are actually a hindrance in a street car. Popular Hot Rodding tested a '69 Charger with a Hemi and a Torqueflite and 3.23:1 gears. They said it was like running with one flat tire. They couldn't break out of the 14s and went through the traps still in 2nd gear. They said the car needed a 4-speed and some 4.30:1 gears to really run to it's potential, or at least a higher-stall converter and some 4.10:1s. Meanwhile-the 440 GTX they tested was raved about as was the 383 Super Bee. They said both were better street machines than the Hemi Charger, and were quicker even though they too had 3.23:1 and 3.54:1 gears. Ditto for the Boss 429. It was invented strictly as a Hemi Fighter for Nascar. In street trim,with muffled exhausts-they don't run as fast a the 428 wedge. They don't run as fast as a 390!!  Be brutally honest with yourself about what you really want, especially since your spending major bucks. Mastermind          

Did you marry your wife because you thought she'd give you an easy divorce??

You may laugh at the title of this post, but I ask that question a lot. The reason is I am sick to death of people making decisions on whether or not to buy a certain car, or paint it a certain color or change the wheels or whatever based on how it impacts the cars resale value. Why is everyone so damn worried about what the car will be worth if or when they get rid of it?  And you know what? Barring major butchery-like the idiot that "Pro Streeted" a '63 Split Window Stingray, or the guy who put a 389 Pontiac into a '57 T-Bird-pretty much anything you do isn't going to affect the value of the car that much. Think about it-if your looking for a '69 GTO is the fact that it does or doesn't have the hood tach a deal breaker? What about a vinyl top? What if it has Cragar S/S mags on it? Are you really going to not buy a numbers-matching, 4-speed LS6 Chevelle because it has a Hurst shifter instead of the awful factory Muncie unit?  Or an HEI distributor instead of a point type?  Are you going to turn up your nose at a documented, for real Boss 351 Mustang because it has a 750 Holley Carb on it instead of the awful Autolite 4300 4bbl??  Or a set of headers?  Probably not. I've touched on this before-but is a '65 GTO worth more or less with a Tri-Power setup on it, even if the car didn't have it originally? 999 out of 1,000 people would say more. So screw the one guy who says it isn't. Then let him either chase down an iron Pontiac intake and a Carter AFB with 1964 or 65 date codes and put it back to original if he buys the car, or he can just not buy the car and keep searching for one that meets his exacting standards!!  Here's a few cases of this insanity. A guy I knew had a '79 Trans-Am with the 403 Olds / TH350 powertrain. We were looking at an issue of High Performance Pontiac magazine and they had an article on the "Macho T/A's". "Man I love the graphics and color scheme of those cars."' he said. "Even today, they look badass just sitting still." "Dennis Mecham authorized Phoenix Graphics to sell the stencils for people restoring a "Macho" or anyone who just likes the look." "You could paint your car like that." I said. "And ruin it's value??!! he said, aghast. "I hate to break this to you-but nobody cares that much about a 403 / automatic disco era T/A that it's going to matter if it's painted a non-original color." "I'm not trying to insult your car-I had a 403 T/A I really liked, that was originally blue that I had done in black and gold SE style-but it's not like it's a 400, 4-speed, 4-wheel disc braked, WS6, 10th Anniversary model." "Or a white and blue 1970 Ram Air IV, or a Buccaneer Red SD-455 '73." "Those I wouldn't change the color on, any others, who cares?"  Another guy had a Verduro Green '69 GTO. I hated that color back in the '60's. That's about the ugliest color GM ever came up with, and unfortunately a lot of GTOs and Firebirds got that color in the late '60's. My cousin has a '67 Firebird that was originally a 326 and was that color. It's now red and has a 400 under the hood. He likes it much better now, and so do the people who offer to buy it every Hot August Nights, even though it's not "just as it left the factory". Anyhow, back to the guy with the green GTO. He was saying how much he loved the look of a Carousel Red Judge that we saw at HAN. "Your cars's got black interior, and Year One sells the spoiler and stripes and emblems." "Do yours that way." Again-he acted like I'd slapped his mother. "And ruin it's value?"  "You'd actually increase it's value." I said. "Trust me-I know a ton of Pontiac enthusiasts-and every damn one of them would much rather have a Carousel Red GTO in full Judge regalia-even it's not a "real" Judge over an "original" green one." "I wouldn't." he sneered. "Then you one out of a million." "Personally, I wouldn't drive around in a car painted a color I didn't like, just so some asshole who may or may not want to buy it will deem it "correct". I've also seen people pass up cars they loved, because again-some asshold told them a different model will be worth more at resale time. That's shrewd-spend thousands of dollars on a car you don't really want-so you can recoup your investment when you get rid of it!!  Idiot # 1. fell in love with a gorgeous 340, 4-speed red and black '71 Dodge Demon that had bucket seats, the "Pistol Grip" Hurst shifter, a "Tuff" steering wheel, the Go-Wing spolier, and brand-new T/A radials on Center Line Auto Drag wheels. It was a great-looking car. And it had headers on it, and a "Six-Pack" setup, and sounded nasty. On the advice of his asshole buddy who claims to be a Mopar "expert"-he isn't-he passed on it and bought a drab brown, dog-dish hubcapped,bench seat,column-shifted automatic,383 '69 Road Runner. Because his buddy told him that "B" bodies are the most valued Chryslers-and the "A" bodies aren't worth anything. Really?  Then why do I see restored 340 Dusters selling for $30,000 in Hemmings? Or 383 Darts for $50,000??  Anyhow-for months afterward-we'd see the red Demon driving around town, and every time he'd say "Damn!" "I should have bought that car." "That is the coolest looking little car." He was really crushed one day when we pulled up next to the guy at a light, and the Demon outran his "high value" Road Runner!  "Why did I listen to that asshole??!! he said, pounding his fist on the dash of the Road Runner,which did nothing but bruise the side of his hand. "I asked you that question back in August". I said. F%6k you! was his response. Idiot # 2. Passed up a gorgeous 400, 4-speed, T-Topped '77 Formula and paid more money for an automatic, hardtop '403 Olds / TH350 '78 T/A-because some "expert" told him that T/A's are always worth more than Formulas. Idiot # 3. Wanted a red and black 71-73 Mach 1 Mustang with Magnum 500 wheels, and a two-tone red and black interior. He passed up a nice blue and silver, 4-speed,Q-code 351CJ '73 because he just "Had" to have the red and black combo. We actually found a '72 Mach 1 with that exact color combination and interior on a "U-sell it" car lot. We called the number and the owner came over, and the price was quite reasonable. He didn't buy it, because the engine was a 351C with a 2 barrel carb!!!  I tried to talk him into it. "For god's sake" I said. "An Edelbrock Performer intake costs about $200 through Summitt,and a Holley or Edelbrock 4bbl costs about $350." "For less than $600 this car will really rock." "Where are you going to find another one with this exact color combo in great condition at a fair price?"  "It don't get better than this." He passed it up!!!  And then bitched about it for about two years after. "I should have bought that car." You think???  So use your head-and get the car YOU want-not one you think some other asshole MIGHT want to buy down the road!!!  Mastermind        

In praise of less than "King Kong" models....

In the last post I talked about lowering your sights a little and finding a car you could live with. As gearheads we tend to always lust after the biggest and baddest of anything, but that isn't always pracitcal. I was talking to a friend the other day and we were discussing how we'd like to have a '60's 427 Stingray to play with. I said I'd be fine with a 10:1 390 hp 4bbl model or a 400 hp Tri-Power model, because they could run on pump gas,and with a hydraulic cam would be pretty much maintenance free,and would still be fast enough that I wouldn't have to take crap from little boys in WRX's or soccer moms in Hemi Cherokees, and would be fun to cruise up to tahoe or to the wine country in the summertime. My pal brought up an article about the Pure Stock drags champion. The champ has an L88 ( not numbers matching, but built to L88 specs ) '69 'Vette that ran a blistering 11.43 at the Pure Stock drags. "I couldn't afford a for-real L88 but I could build a 390 hp model to those specs." My friend said. "You could, if like this guy you only raced it." I said. "But it's totally impractical if you intend to drive the car at all." "Why would you say that?" he asked, dead serious. "Did you read the spec sheet?" "First off, it's got 12.5:1 compression." "You'd either have to run racing gas or put two cans of octane booster in every tankful." "The cam recommends open exhausts, and solid lifters need regular lash adjustments to get optimum performance." "And it's got 4.56:1 gears." "Do you really want the motor buzzing at 4,000 rpm on the freeway?" "I get that nothing feels like a Rat motor-but if you want to drive it at all-I just think you'd be happier with a milder 427 combo-or maybe even a LS5 454 / TH400 '70-72 model." "I never thought about that." he said. "Your right-unless it's a trailer queen the lesser powered model would better." That got us to talking about some other people we knew who made the choice for a lesser model in the name of drivability. One guy had a '69 Shelby GT350 Mustang that he absolutely loves, and drives often during Hot August nights and sunny weekend days in the spring, summer and fall. It goes in storage every winter and never sees rain or snow. Another mutual friend had ribbed him about how for the price he paid for the Shelby-he could have bought a Boss 302. "Yeah, I thought about that." "I even test drove a Boss 302." "There's a reason most of them have 3.90:1 or 4.30:1 gears." "They have very little torque below 3 grand." "The motor is peaky,has 11:1 compression and solid lifters, and if you read old road tests their not any quicker than a 351W or 351C Mach 1." "If the Boss has got 3.50:1 gears their not as fast as a 4-speed / 351 Mach 1." "The 351 in the Shelby idles smooth, has lots of low-end torque-if your in any gear but fourth around town you can just accelerate without having to downshift,the 3.25:1 gears are a nice compromise between jackrabbit starts and easy freeway cruising, and it has power steering, and A/C." "Sort of a "Gentleman's hot rod" like a Hurst / Olds." "No, I don't regret not getting the Boss." "The Shelby's just as elite, but much more user-friendly." "And I've played grab-ass with Boss owners at Mustang club meets." The Shelby'll give 'em a run."  Similar words from an Olds 442 owner. He had seriously considered a W31 Cutlass. If you don't know the W31 package took a strippy Cutlass / F85 coupe and added a hopped up 350-special big valve heads,a 308 degree cam, an aluminum high-rise intake, special exhaust manifolds. They were only available with a 4-speed and 3.90:1 or 4.33:1 gears, and couldn't be ordered with power brakes because the lumpy cam didn't make enough vacuum to operate them! They were blisteringly fast and grossly under-rated at 325 hp. The base model Cutlass / sedan / station wagon 350 was rated at 310 hp; all those go-fast goodies are only worth 15 hp? Puhleeze. Anyhow-like the Mustang guy-he drove a couple W31s, was impressed with how quick they were, and ended up buying a a 400 / TH400 442 that had A/C, power steering, power brakes, power windows,and an AM / FM radio with a still functioning power antenna. "With 350 hp and 440 lbs ft of torque, the 442 will literally spin it's tires as long as I want to stay on the throttle." he said. And it's a nice car to drive-the 3.23:1 gears give it good oomph off the line and easy cruising on the freeway." "Plus 5,700 rpm is something like 138 mph." "Its got some serious top-end." "The W31 was a rocket through the 1/4-but with 4.33:1 gears you were all done by 110." "You'd almost run out of rpm before the end of the 1/4." "And it was so low geared, that around town even if you weren't hot rodding, you were always shifting."  "Plus the motor was buzzing at 3,800 rpm on the freeway, and even though it had front disc brakes, and would stop, I didn't like the pedal feel." "The 442's brakes feel a lot better even if they don't actually stop any quicker, and it's only spinning about 2,500 rpm on the freeway." "The W31's a great street fighter or drag racer, but under any other driving conditions the big-block 442 is much more pleasant to drive." "I haven't raced a W31 yet, but I bet my 442 would beat one or at least give it a helluva run."  Actor Barry Newman who along with Stuntman Carey Loftin did some of the driving in the cult-classic "Vanishing Point"-said in an interview with Muscle Car Review-"There were 5 Challengers" "4 were 440 / 4-speeds, and the Camera car was a 383 / Automatic." "They were powerful-you'd pop the clutch in first, and it would almost rear back." "But I tell you, I honestly think the 383 would run just as fast as the 440s." "That 383 was a great running car."  Good advice from real people. I'm not saying DON'T buy an L88 'Vette, or a Boss 429 or a Hemi Charger, or whatever-if you want one and can afford it-by all means get one. I'm just saying that you may be happier in the long run with something that isn't "King Kong". Especially if your going to drive the car more than on and off the trailer!  Mastermind            

Lower your sights a little and you may find your dream car...

I ran a post a while back saying "There is no used car factory". I ran this because I get so tired of listening to people lament that they can't find a car they want and they've been looking for five years,etc, etc. The bottom line is these people are too picky. If you read Hemmings Motor News, or AttaBuy, or go on the internet everyday there are hundreds of very cool musclecars out there in great condition at fair prices. However-the chance of you finding your exact dream car-with the engine, transmission, axle ratio,exterior color, interior color, wheels, etc-is almost nil. You have a better chance of being struck by lightning on the golf course. However-if you lower your sights a little-you can get something really cool that you can love for years to come. Here's a few examples-let's say a 1970 LS6 454 Chevelle is your dream car. Good luck with that-Since Chevrolet only built 4478 of them-even if you had an unlimited bankroll the problem would be finding one for sale at any price. By contrast Chevrolet built 49,826 SS396 models that year. They are the exact same car except for the engine. And stock or modified-do you really NEED more punch than a 396 has to offer? This isn't an isolated example. 1969 GTO Judge lights your fire? Same deal-of the 72,225 GTOs built in 1969 only 6,833 were Judge models. "Gotta Have" a Boss 302 Mustang? Ford only built 1,603 in 1969 and another 7113 in 1970. By contrast-Ford built over 70,000 fastback Mustangs in 1969 alone-most of them with 351W power-which is a much better street engine if you plan to drive the car at all. The point I'm making is by accepting less than the ultra-premium model-you've increased your chances of finding a car tenfold. And that's if your stuck on a one or two year model. Which brings up the next point. Consider different model years of the same car. If our Chevelle enthusiast would consider an 1968 or 1969 SS396-he just upped his chances by 58,000 ( 1968) and 86,000 ( 1969 ) more choices. Our GTO enthusiast if he would accept a '68 or a '70 model just upped his chances of finding a car by 87,000 ( 1968 ) and 40,149 ( 1970 ). 1970-73 Trans-Am is your dream car? Good luck as Pontiac only built about 10,000 in those four years. However-from 1974-1979 Pontiac built over 350,000 T/A's nearly all of them with 400 Pontiac power, and with very little work-an axle-ratio change and an intake manifold and dual exhaust-could easily equal or surpass the performance of the rarer and much more expensive earlier models. Again consider less than the premium model. Of the 243,000 Camaros sold in 1969, only 19,000 were Z/28 models. Fewer than that were SS396 models. That means there are about 200,000 '69 Camaros out there, nearly all of them with 350 V8 motivation-and you couldn't ask for a better base for a street machine. We all agree that a Formula 400 Firebird packs all the punch that a T/A does-without the bells and whistles. Some people actually like the cleaner styling of the Formulas better. Any Hemi powered Chrysler vehicle is priced in the stratosphere and 440 / Six-Packs are getting there. However-I see 383 and 440 4bbl 'Cudas, Challengers, Road Runners and Chargers all the time for sale at reasonable prices. And what about a 340 model?  340 'Cudas and Challengers are the best handling, best balanced E-Bodies if you ask me. From '71 on you could get a 340 in a Charger or Road Runner. And what about 400 models from '72-74? A 400 is just a bored out 383. Also consider "Sister" cars. A big-block was only available in the Camaro until 1972 and in very limited numbers. However you could get a 455 in a Firebird Formula or Trans-Am up until 1976, and the 400 was available until 1979. If you can't find a deal on a 400 Firebird you aren't looking past the end of your nose. 396 and 454 Monte Carlos built from 1970-75 are rare and priced accordingly. However, a Pontiac Gran Prix is to the Monte Carlo what the Firebird is to the Camaro. The better buy of the two. From 1969-76 400 power was standard all years, and a fair number of '70-76 "SJ" models had 455s!  My sister had a '72 GP in high school. It felt like a GTO. It had power everything, and she showed her taillights to many a shocked Camaro and Mustang driver. The Cougar is to the Mustang the same thing. From 1967-73-Cougars usually had upgraded interiors, larger engines, and cool options like factory A/C, disc brakes, guages, etc. In 1974 they went to the much heavier and uglier Lincoln MKIV platform and performance Cougars were gone. Even a pre-"Charlie's Angels" Farrah-Fawcett-Majors barefoot in a bikini in the ads couldn't sell them. Anyhow-be reasonable-I know a guy who wanted a '70-72 LT-1 powered Z/28 Camaro. He passed on an unrestored, but exceptionally well-maintained '70 model because it was an automatic. He passed up a 4-speed '72 model because it had Cragar mags on it and traction bars, and a 750 Holley double-pumper carb instead of the stock 780 3310. He also turned up his nose at a gorgeous low-mileage, 4-speed '73 model because it was an L82. ( The LT-1 had a solid-lifter cam and a 780 Holley on an aluminum intake. L82's had a hydraulic cam out of the 350 hp L46 and a Quadrajet on an iron manifold ). That was several years ago-and to this day he still hasn't found a Z/28 up to his standards!!  I knew another guy who wanted a '68-70 GTO with the 400 / 4-speed combo. He passed on a gorgeous '68 model because it didn't have the hood tach and front disc brakes. He passed up an awesome 455 powered '70 model because it was an automatic. When he turned up his nose at a gorgeous triple-white, 400,4-speed, '71 LeMans Sport Convertible done in full "Judge" regalia-because "Its a fake" I wanted to kill him. I told him I'd no longer look at cars with him, because he was completley unreasonable in his expectations. That too, was years ago-and he still doesn't own a GTO or any other musclecar. Idiot # 3. wanted a '68-70 Bullitt / Dukes of Hazzard / F&F  Charger. He passed up a nice '69 model that had a KILLER 440 in it and Cragar mags and brand-new T/A radials because the engine wasn't original. He passed up a one-owner, little old lady gem of a '68, because it had bench seats and a two-barrel carb on the 383. He also passed on a beautiful Torch Red '68 model with Center Line Wheels and a 383 / 4-speed powertrain because it had a little rust in the trunk. What '60's Mopar, or any other 50 year old car that hasn't had a frame-off resto doesn't???  Really?? A 50 year old car had a small amount of rust?  So when you hear some asshole whining about how hard it is to find a musclecar-it's because he's too picky. Don't fall into that trap. Mastermind  

What's the first modification you should do? It varies depending on the car.....

People ask me all the time "What's the first thing I should do to improve the performance of my musclecar?" I assume they want some stock answer-like headers or a carb and intake or whatever. But the truth is it varies greatly depending on the car. For example if you have a late '60's or early '70's Chevelle or Camaro with a 4-speed-the first thing you should do is replace the awful Muncie or Inland shift linkage with a Hurst Competition Plus. For some insane reason-these linkages were body mounted, and would bind up under load. Forget powershifting at 6,000 rpm; you'd be lucky if you could change gears at 3,500-4,000 if you had your foot in it. Small-block Novas and Camaros that had Saginaw 4-speeds were just as bad. If you had a GTO or a Firebird or an Olds 442-they had a Hurst shifter from the factory that was transmission mounted and could she shifted quickly at any speed. If you have a disco-era Pontiac Trans-Am with an automatic transmission, the first mod you need to make is an axle ratio change. These cars had salt-flats gearing like 2.41:1 or 2.56:1. Swapping for something in the 3.23:1 to 3.73:1 range will give a stunning improvement in 0-60 and 1/4 mile times without hurting gas mileage or drivability too much. 4-speed models, the shoe is on the other foot-they came from the factory with 3.23:1 or 3.42:1 gears. For them the first thing I would do is get an Edelbrock Performer intake. The factory '75-79 intakes have a restrictive throttle opening that really limits power above 4,000 rpm. The point I'm making is the gear change on the TH350 models would net a bigger improvement than changing the intake. On the stick models that already had decent gearing-the intake would net a big improvement. Even bigger than opening up the exhaust-which should be the second mod. See what I'm saying?  If you have a 1970-73 351C Mustang-a lot of these cars had 2bbl-carburation-obviously the first thing should be to get a 4bbl carb and intake. If the car has a 4bbl from the factory and an automatic trans, then the first thing I'd do is add a B&M or TransGo shift improver kit. If you have a 440,4-speed Road Runner or a 396 / 4-speed Camaro or a 455 / 4-speed Trans-Am-or any other big-block car with a manual trans and leaf-spring rear suspension that has traction problems-the first thing I'd do is get a set of traction bars or a pinion snubber. You don't need more power-you need to put what you have to the ground before you start adding more tire-shredding power and torque!!  If you have any '60's or early '70's Chrysler musclecar-the first thing I'd do is get a Mopar Performance or MSD electronic distributor!!  Or if you want to stay "period correct" and still use points-then I'd get an Accel or Mallory high-performance point-type distributor. The reason is factory Mopar points were awful. They'd close up and bounce above about 4,500 rpm. You never saw a Mopar racer without extra points in his toolbox-and they were usually Accel or Mallory!!  So you can see every car is unique in their weaknesses that I would fix first. Do some research before you throw away money on something that doesn't offer a huge bang for the buck. Mastermind      

Still more on Road Test "ringers".....

I guess the magazine writers and engineers-being gearheads at heart sometimes just want to see what potential a certain vehicle has. And the manufacturers like it-it helps sell the cars. But it does create confusion for the public. They wonder why the showroom examples can't come close to the magazine test cars or prototypes performance. Here's a few more examples. # 1. 1973 Trans-Am. Hot Rod and Car and Driver both tested an SD-455 T/A prototype. Hot Rod recorded a 13.54 1/4 mile e.t. and C/D recorded a 13.75. The 2/10ths difference may have just been track conditions, or wind, or driver technique. It was the same car-in the pictures of both magazines the licensce plate number is the same! The reason I say this car is a "ringer" is early SD455 prototypes had the Ram Air IV cam which had 308 / 320 advertised duration and .470 lift. The cars barely passed smog with this long-duration cam. Pontiac engineers thought this was too close for comfort with the EPA and for production examples the cam was swapped for the much milder RAIII cam-which had 301/313 advertised duration and only .414 lift. Hp was down-rated from 310 to 290 as well. However-Pontiac also had trouble with the connecting rod supplier and with EGR valve function. This was why the engine wasn't EPA certified until April 1973, and in the Firebird line only-( initial 1973 sales literature listed the SD-455 as available in the Grand Am, Gran Prix, and GTO as well ). this is why only 295 were built-252 in T/A's and another 43 in Formulas. Further-although the road tests were published in the April and May issues-the actual testing ws done in January-with the red T/A that had the RAIV cam and a 3.42:1 axle ratio. Production TH400 examples,besides having the milder cam also had 3.08:1 gears if ordered with A/C. No one knows what happened to the Hot Rod / C/D test mule. Some say a Pontiac executive bought it, others say it was crushed. Regardless-other magazines that tested other SD455 T/A's in '73 or '74 ran low 14s. Great performance for a 3,800 lb car with 8.4:1 compression-but nowhere near the blistering times of the red "prototype".  # 2. 1973 Olds 442. Motor Trend had a 1973 Performance car comparison. The silver and red Cutlass 442 blew the doors off all comers which included an SD-455 Trans-Am, a 454 Corvette,a 440 Dodge Charger,a 429 Torino, a 351CJ Mustang and a 401 / 4-speed Javelin AMX. The MT writers were shocked by this and did some checking. One of the Olds engineers let it slip that the badass 442 in fact had the super-hot 328 duration "W30" cam out of the 1970 442-and also had a 2,800 rpm torque converter, a Hurst shift kit in the TH400 and 3.42:1 gears. This one ripped off a string of 14.01s with the best run being a 13.82. Production models that had a much milder cam, a converter with 1,000 rpm LESS stall speed and 3.08:1 gears could only run 14.90 and 14.65 in other magazine tests. # 3. 1978 Z/28 Camaro. Popular Hot Rodding raved about their Z/28 test car that ran a blistering 14.34 in the 1/4. However-DKM incorporated who had great success selling the "Macho T/A's"-decided to do a Camaro. This test car was a "Macho Z" prototype-and had the full "Macho T/A" treatment-which included a re-curved distributor, a re-jetted carb, and Hooker Headers with real dual exhausts and 2 catalytic converters. This is why production examples could only run times ranging from 15.21 to 15.60!!   The Mecham brothers sold about 300 Macho T/A's a year from '77-79. For some reason Chevy dealers weren't interested like Pontiac dealers. As far as I know this prototype is the only known "Macho Z" to exist. Car Craft also tested a Corvette that the Mecham brothers "Macho-ized"-with the headers and tuning, and a Doug Nash 5-speed that they called the L82-S. The magazine raved about it's performance-but again I've never seen an L82-S anywhere else. # 4. 1987 Buick Grand National. Most GN's ran 14.30s in road tests. Awfully quick for a 3,500 lb car with Turbo V6. However High-Performance Cars magazine ran a blistering 13.85 at Englishtown. This was accomplished by swapping the 195 degree thermostat for a 160 degree unit, and changing to a switch that kicked the fan on at 185 instead of 220. They also filled the tank with 104 octane unleaded racing gas and put wet towels on the intake between runs. The 104 octane gas meant no detonation-which meant the knock sensor and the ECM wouldn't retard the timing-and the cooler, denser fuel mixture-180 versus 220-also helped immensly. This is why other magazine testers-running at 220 degrees on 87 or 91 octane gas were half a second slower!!  What's the old saying-"It's only cheating if you get caught..."  Mastermind          

More on road test "ringers" and production cars...

Like I said in the last post people love to spout numbers and stats-but they don't always have all the information. And this is why "civilian" cars can never match magazine test cars. After 40+ years Jim Wangers finally admitted that Car and Driver's May 1964 GTO test car that ran a blistering 4.6 second 0-60 time and a 13.1 second 1/4 was a ringer. Royal Pontiac had pulled the 389 and replaced it with a blueprinted 421. That's why showroom examples and other test cars could only run mid-14s!!  Chrysler did it when they introduced the 440 Six-pack. Their "prototype" that ran high 12s "Under controlled conditions, with a professional driver" is almost as bad. The controlled conditions being the engine had been brought to "The top of specifications"-i.e. blueprinted-the distributor custom curved,the carbs custom jetted,and the car had a 4-speed, 4.30:1 gears, a pinion snubber, and wrinklewall slicks. And the "Professional Driver" was Pro Stock Drag Racing champion Ronnie Sox. Gee, wonder why my buddys 440+6 Super Bee with a torqueflite,3.23:1 gears and street tires was a full second slower!!  Hot Rod's '69 Z/28 test car ran a blistering 13.11 et. They said "We almost made the 12s". With headers, rejetting the carb, recurving the distributor,adding traction bars and swapping the 3.73:1 gears for 4.88:1s!!!  Wonder why production examples could only run low 14s?  A couple of import tests are just as bad. Mitsubishi's claim of a 13.75 1/4 mile time for the 3000GTVR4 Turbo takes real cojones to say with a straight face. The "controlled conditions consisted of the engineers disabling the rev limiter, disabling the knock sensor,filling the tank with 104 octane racing gas, and lowring the tire pressure to 15 psi. The "professional driver" then popped the clutch at 6,200 rpm and powershifted at 7,000, which blew the $5769 tranaxle after three runs. Now how many people are going to run around with 15 psi in their tires, full of race gas, and drop the clutch at 6,200 rpm to jump someone from a light?  That's why production examples could only run high 14s. Car and Driver admitted that their Subaru WRX STI's blistering 5.3 second 0-60 time and 13.7 second 1/4 mile time was acheived by dropping the clutch at 5,400 rpm, and shifting at 7,000-500 rpm over the redline on the tach. The writer said he wouldn't recommend such a brutal launch if you wanted the drivetrain to last. When they launched at a more reasonable rpm-say 3,000-3,500 and shifted at or below the 6,500 rpm redline-the times were 5.8 seconds to 60 and 14.3 in the 1/4. Still quick-but more than 1/2 a second slower than the published time!!!  Even some punk kids I know that have WRX's don't go around dropping the clutch at 5,400 rpm!!  Hot Rod did it in a "Crate Motor Shootout." They tested a bunch of GMPP engines-small-blocks, big-blocks, and LS motors in a '69 Chevelle they had. Besides having a ladder bar rear suspension and wrinklewall slicks-the test mule also had 4.30:1 gears and a TCI TH400 with a 4,800 rpm converter and a trans-brake!!  Now Joe average goes and buys ZZ4 350 or a ZZ427 and puts it in his Camaro or Chevelle and is mystified when his times aren't even close. You think a 4,800 rpm converter and a trans-brake might skew the 60 ft and 1/4 mile times a tad?  Think a car with a stock converter or even a 3 grand one is going to be a bit slower??!!!  So read the fine print and be sure your comparing "apples to apples" before you quote performance figures for any given car. Mastermind  

No,your car is or wasn't that fast......

I get so tired of people pulling numbers out of their ass. I blame the "Fast&Furious" movies for a lot of this with their constant spouting about "10 second" cars. Almost daily I overhear some idiot claiming to have 500 or 600 hp-yet he can't produce a dyno sheet!!  Or claiming some blistering 1/4 mile time, and again-can't produce a timeslip!!  These idiots don't realize that 1/10 of a second equals one car length in a drag race. So if your car runs say a 13.8 and someone elses car runs a 13.5-he'll beat you by three car lengths. If the other guys car runs a 13.0-that's an 8 car length ass-whippin'!!  I love old musclecars-but there were very few that could run low 13s off the showroom floor and easily drop into the 12s or high 11s with maybe headers, slicks and traction bars. Hemi 'Cudas, LS6 Chevelles, W30 442s, RAIV GTOs, 440 Six-Pack Mopars,427 'Vettes, and  428CJ Mustangs-but that's about it. And these cars were just as rare new as they are now. Whether it's their car or their father's or older brothers-most people's "Musclecar Memories" involve "entry level" musclecars-389 GTOs,396 Chevelles,383 Road Runners, etc. Or 340 Dusters, 351 Mustangs,350 Camaros, 400 Firebirds, etc. Tales of nearly pulling the front wheels,being pushed back in the seat and third gear rubber seem silly when someone pulls out a yellowed, dog-eared copy of Hot Rod or Car Life and find that the machine in question ran in the 14.60's. I also love it when people pull up old "ringer" road tests and quote them. My personal favorite is the Mopar guys who claim that the Dodge Li'l Red Express pickup was the fastest american car in 1978-even quicker than an L82 Corvette or a WS6 Trans-Am!! This comes from a November 1977 Car and Driver article called "Double the Double Nickel"-they tested a bunch of cars that could run 110 mph or faster. They did have a Corvette and a Trans-Am, and the "Prototype" Li'l Red Truck did win a 3-way drag race. However-the "Prototype" had a 360 V8 with NASCAR spec "W2" heads,a hot cam out of the old 340 Six-Pack, and a 4160 Double-Pumper Holley carb mounted on a single-plane aluminum Holley "Street Dominator" intake, and catalyst-free dual exhausts, and a 2,500 rpm torque converter!!!  No surprise that production examples with a garden-variety 360 with stock 318 /360 heads,a lazy cam,and a Carter Thermo-Quad mounted on a Iron intake with an EGR valve, and a stock torque converter were substantially slower!!  A close 2nd is the "stock" '91 Mustang tested by Car Craft that ran a blistering 14.03 in the 1/4-when every other magazine that tested a "5.0" between '87 and '93-ran between 14.72 ( Hot Rod ) and 15.29 ( Road and Track ). CC's mule was "stock"-except for a K&N airbox and filter,a Flowmaster cat-back exhaust system, swapping the 2.73:1 gears for some 3.55:1s,and swapping the stock 225/60R15 radials for some 235/60R15 M&H drag tires!!  I mean if your going to nit-pick....The point I'm making is you can love your car-you don't have to exaggerate it's performance!!  Mastermind

R.I.P. Vic Edelbrock...

I was saddened to hear about the recent passing of Vic Edelbrock Jr. He was 81. His father, Vic Sr. founded the company, making intake manifolds and other race parts for flathead Fords. Vic Sr was very involved in the Southern California racing scene in the '40's and 50's. Vic Jr. was only 26 when he took over the company in 1962 following his father's untimely death at age 49. At the urging of friend Bob Joehnk Edelbrock began producing a high-perfromance intake for the Small-Block Chevy-which had quickly replaced the flathead Ford as "The" performance engine. Through the '60's the company blossomed making perfromance intake manifolds for virtually everything-big-block Chevys, Pontiacs, Oldsmobiles, Buicks, Fords, Chryslers,AMC's,. In the '70's Vic became the leader of SEMA and fought the good fight against ever-tightening emissions standards and states trying to outlaw cars that were modified. Edelbrock's SP2P manifold that was introduced in 1975 not only increased performance, but also improved the gas mileage and drivability of the test mule. Vic was one of the strongest allies of the performance industry and fought hard to get Edelbrock products and those of other companies exemptions or certificates of legality from CARB ( California Air Resources Board ) and the EPA. Through the late '70's and into the '80's Edelbrock continued to develop new products that increased performance and were emissions legal. They introduced hi-performance aluminum cylinder heads and began producing camshafts as well. Edelbrock was the first company to come up with the "package" approach to performance-camshaft, cylinder heads and carb and intake all dyno matched for your specific needs-towing, street perfromance, drag racing, circle-track racing whatever. The Performer Packages were good from off-idle to 5,500 rpm and were great for street cars or for trucks and 4x4s-anything that need more low-end and mid-range torque. Their Torker II and Performer RPM packages had a lumpier idle and were good up to 6,500 rpm. The Victor packages were for racing only and were good to 8,000 rpm and beyond. The company also began producing carburators the Performer line of carbs were basically an improved Carter AFB-they had no gaskets below the float level-no leaking, and you could change jets without removing the carb from the engine. The real beauty of them however-was you usually didn't have to re-jet them they just flat worked out of the box. Bolt them on and go. They also had the Thunder AVS line which was basically and improved Carter AVS like the legendary 383 and 440 Magnum Mopars had. Their adjustable secondary air valve made them even more versatile, and tuner-friendly. Through the '90's and into the 2000's the company continued to expand-making intake manifolds, throttle-bodys, and other parts that worked in conjunction with factory fuel-injection systems. They began producing superchargers for popular cars and trucks,and even began making shocks and suspension parts doe popular cars and trucks. Edelbrock got in on the ground floor of the import-tuner market. They were one of the first companys to offer hi-performance intakes for Hondas, Toyotas,Nissans, and VW's. They developed nitrous-oxide injection systems and also began offering hi-performance Chevy and Ford crate engines. Vic stayed active in racing and the show scene. Whether at the Monterey Historics, or a NASCAR event, or the Hot Rod power tour or Hot August Nights-Edelbrock always had a huge display and hospitality tent, and Vic was always there bench-racing with people shaking hands and telling stories. He was never too busy to talk to someone or answer a tech question. He will be sorely missed by everyone who knew him and the automotive industry as a whole. May he rest in Valhalla!  Mastermind  

More on "Good Deals" and "Budget" projects....

Sometimes when reading the buff magazines and their "Budget" projects you think "Who's budget?" Jay Leno's?  Donald Trump's?  Here's a couple that had me shaking my head. One was "Junkyard Jewel". This one featured a 455 Pontiac that they bought from duh-a junkyard. When they were done they were happy that it made 440 hp and 460 lbs ft of torque. and it cost "only" $4,400! Really. The 400 in my brother's GTO made 381 hp and 430 lbs of torque and cost $1,900 to build. If we really needed the extra 59 hp and 30 lbs of torque-I think we could get it for a lot less than another $2,500!!  Part of the reason the 455 was more than double the cost of our 400 was the magazine used Edelbrock heads which cost over 2 grand a pair for Pontiacs. Our whole engine build didn't cost 2 grand. I realize the magazines have to showcase their advertisers products to stay in business, but in this case-the 455 came out of a '76 Gran Prix-it had 6X heads on it. Which except for RAIV's ( which the Edelbrocks are patterned after ) are the best breathing factory heads to start with. I know '76 455s had an anemic 7.6:1 compression ratio. But they were completely rebuilding the engine. Pontiac heads can be milled .060 to raise the compression a full point, and they were getting new pistons anyway. With the head work and custom pistons they could have easily raised the compression to something in the 9-9.5:1 range which is about all you can run with pump gas and iron heads anyway. Even if the Edelbrock heads were worth 40 hp and 50 lbs of torque-which the difference is probably more like 25 hp 30 lbs ft-but I'm just saying-they'd have still had over 400 hp and 400 lbs of torque and the whole project would have cost like $2,200 instead $4,400. Half the cost. I'm not slamming Edelbrock heads-I think their great, have used them in the past and probably will in the future-I just think on a project where you were trying to keep costs to a minimum spending $2,000+ for a set of heads you don't really need is frivolous. Another one was hopping up a ZZ4 crate engine. If you don't know-the ZZ4 was very popular 350 Chevy crate engine. They were pretty hopped up from the factory. They had 10:1 Keith Black pistons, L98 Corvette aluminum heads, a roller cam with .474 / .510 lift, and the original Z/28 / LT-1 style aluminum intake with a 770 Holley carb. They were rated at 355 hp and 418 lbs of torque. What made them such an awesome street engine was they had more than 350 lbs of torque from 1,800-5,200 rpm. I had one in my Hurst / Olds for a while after I grenaded the 455. If I didn't tell people-when they drove the car-they'd swear it was a good running 455 Olds. They were shocked to see a small-block Chevy under the hood, and that it had that much low-end torque. Anyhow Hot Rod did this article on hopping one up. A single-plane intake and a bigger cam netted them another 70 hp. 425 hp from a still streetable engine is pretty damn good. They wanted to increase the output by 100 hp. They added a set of bigger Trick Flow aluminum heads. This got them another 40 peak hp and attained their goal. However- here's the kicker. The 40 hp increase came  at 6,100 rpm!!. On the dyno sheet the "Antiquated" L98 heads were equal to or within 5 hp and 5 lbs of torque at every rpm up to 4,600!!  Now how often are you going to be above 4,700 rpm? The Trick Flows didn't show more than 25 more hp until over 5,000 rpm.  In an all-out race car-yes that might be worth it. In a street / strip machine, maybe not. Further, the Trick Flow heads cost $1,400. For $1,400 they could have got a 200+hp nitrous system, a higher stall converter, some stiffer rear end gears,-all stuff that would have netted a larger performance increase than 40 hp in a 500 rpm window on the top end. And agian- a ZZ4 crate engine cost about 5 grand to begin with. Now you want to throw another 2 grand plus at it?  And now my question is if you have that much money and need to go that fast, why aren't you buying a 454 instead of a 350?  By contrast another magazine did a budget 350 buildup. They bought a short-block from Pep Boys for $650. They bought some Vortec heads from Scoggin-Dickey, and an Edelbrock Vortec-compatible Performer RPM manifold, a hot roller cam, and some hooker headers. It dyno'd at 395 hp and 410 lbs of torque and cost $2,600. Now that's a "budget" build. All I'm saying is be careful and don't fall into "Gotta Haves". For example-I'll use the ubiquitous small-block Chevy. Every time you read an article about hot-rodding a small-block Chevy you see this list of "gotta haves". "You gotta have a 4-bolt main block"  "you gotta have a forged crank" "You gotta have "Pink" rods" "You gotta have 2.02 heads with screw in studs" etc, etc. Their half-right. If your building a NASCAR Nextel Cup engine that has to go 7,800 rpm for 500 miles at Daytona-yes you need all the beef you can get. But for a street car that only sees the occasional weekend trip to the drags-or even a "Street Stock" or "Hobby Stock" circle track racer that runs a 50 lap main event on a 1/4 mile or 1/2 mile track-you don't need any of that. Two-bolt main blocks and cast cranks are fine as long as rpms don't constantly go over 6,500. Cast pistons are fine. "Standard" heads and "Hi-Performance" heads have exactly the same size intake and exhaust ports. Standard heads have 1.94 / 1.50 intake and exhaust valves. Hi-Perf heads have. 2.02 / 1.60 valves. Any competent machine shop can easily put the larger valves into standard heads. As for screw in studs-my friends and I have raced cars for over 30 years,and I have NEVER seen a pressed in stud pull out of a head. Not ever. I've seen broken pushrods, broken rocker arms, broken valvesprings, but I have never seen a stud pull out of a head. I've also never seen a cast crank fail. I've seen spun main bearings and spun rod bearings-but that has nothing to do with whether the crank is cast or forged. You don't need to spend a ton of money on custom rods. Stock Chevy rods are virtually bullet-proof. Chrome-moly rod bolts are good insurance. regardless of make-95% of rod failure occurs at the bolt.  But if you don't know this and no one tells you-you'll innocently spend hundreds or even thousands that you dont' need to. That's all I'm saying. So do some research before you plunk down your credit card or hard-earned cash on some "Gotta Have" that you don't really need.        

"Good deals" should be stuff "Joe Average" can find....

A lot of the buff magazines are crying the blues about circulation being down, and they claim it's because the "Baby Boomers" are getting older and retiring, that the "Millennials" don't care about cars,etc,etc. The real problem is their stale and put out the same dreck month after month. I've said it a million times a couple of them should change their names to "Modern Fuelie Swap Monthly". I am sick to death of seeing old Camaros and Chevelles with LS motors, old Mustangs with Coyotes, and Old Mopars with 5,7 / 6.1 / 6.4 liter Hemis. I'm a hardcore gearhead-I was writing tech articles for Popular Hot Rodding when I was in junior high-If I'm sick of it, I'm certain the average casual reader wants to vomit day-glo. I'm also sick of cars that people have over 100 grand invested in. If your lucky enough to have that much expendable income-good for you. Enjoy it. But the average guy who lives on 15 bucks an hour doesn't want to read about some other asshole's "Toy" that cost 150K!! I'll give Hot Rod some credit- a while back they did a big article featuring reader's cars and the rule was you couldn't have more than $25,000 in the car-including the original purchase price. Now that was nice-these were cars that anybody could afford to buy and build. There was guy with a '76 Trans-Am that had a Herb Adams VSE suspension and a stompin' 455 under the hood. There was a guy with a Supercharged '92 Mustang GT that ran in the 11s, and a guy with an '84 Chevy Stepside pickup that had a 454 in it and ran in the 12s. There was a guy with a '71 Pontiac Gran Prix that ran in the 12s-with a 455, a TH400 and 3.55:1 gears. These were all very cool rides, and they were affordable. Anyhow what irks me the most are some of their "How To" articles or new "Project" cars. You know "12 seconds for $1,200" or "10 seconds for 10,000" or "Budget" engine build. Don't get me wrong-I don't mind if someone says they bought a set of used headers for $40 at a swap meet,or their buddy sold them a used Edelbrock manifold for $50, or gave them a used 750 Holley carb. That stuff happens all the time. What drives me up the wall is in the middle of their "Budget" build article-"Hey-what about that set of ported and polished Brodix aluminum heads that we almost forgot we had?" "Joe's brother not only gave us the disc-braked,3.73:1 geared posi rear end out of his wrecked Trans-Am, he helped us put it in the Camaro and bought the beer!"  Ugh. The two biggest offenders are Super Chevy and Mopar Action. Super Chevy ran the "10 seconds for $10,000" thing. I was find with seven grand for a 550 hp 406 inch Dart small block Chevy crate engine that was complete from carb to oil pan. That's reasonable. What made me want to firebomb their offices was the "engineless" '79 Camaro they bought to put it in. This car had a currie 9 inch Ford rear end with 4.88:1 gears, a TCI built powerglide with a 3,800 rpm converter, and 8-point roll cage,a safety fuel cell,Competition Engineering traction bars,and Center Line Wheels with Moroso drag front tires and BFG drag radials in the rear. For $2,700??!!!  The Currie 9 inch rear alone with GM mounting points costs $3,300 in Summitt!!!  The TCI tranny and converter is close to 2 grand, the tires and wheels another $1,500, the traction bars and the roll cage another grand, and the fuel cell another $500. Gee, I'd like to buy a car with 8 grand worth of custom parts in it for $2,700!!! "We only went $700 over budget".  I was livid. No one could duplicate that build for under $20,000-double their claim. Mopar action did the same thing. They had a "Budget" buildup of a 440. It started out ok-they bought a used 440 out of a '77 Chrysler Imperial in a junkyard for $300. Then they took the block to a machine shop to have it bored .030 over and cleaned up. Standard operating procedure. They ordered forged TRW pistons instead of cast, in case they decided to put nitrous on it later. No problem there. Then it began. They decided to use a forged crank and a set of "Six-Pack" rods with ARP chrome-moly rod bolts that they had "Laying Around". Check Summitt-a forged steel 440 crank from Eagle is $1,200, and a set of Eagle forged rods is another $600. Then they bought a big cam and some Edelbrock heads and instead of the Performer RPM / 850 Holley induction they were thinking of-"Hey what about that "Six-Pack" setup we also had "Laying Around?" Edelbrock still sells the manifold, Holley still sells the carbs, and Mopar performance sells the throttle linkage and the air cleaner. If you have to buy all that stuff retail-it would cost you $2,300 for a complete "Six-Pack" setup. Add the $1,800 for the crank and rods. How nice that they had $4,100 in premium parts just "Laying Around!!" That's the kind of shit that pisses people off immensely. Sure-when I managed a Pep Boys service center I once bought an LT-1 350 Chevy engine for $160. Some idiot had bought one of our $699 "Long Block" rebuilt 350 Chevy specials and turned this in for the "core". After seeing the camel-hump heads and 4-bolt mains, I triple checked the numbers on the block heads. Great googliemooglie-it was a for real LT-1! I asked the store manager if I could have it. He said sure, as long I paid the company the $160 "core charge". I paid him and turned handsprings all the way home. But that's not something you run across every day. "Good deals" should be something the average Joe can find at a awap meet or a junkyard-not a "Moon Rock" Mastermind         

Consider your whole package before you throw parts at it....

I talk to a lot of people who unfortunately-spend big dollars on speed parts for their car and then are severely disappointed in the car's performance. Often, the car doesn't even run as good as it did in stock trim. The reason is these people buy stuff that they read about in a magazine, or they listen to a friend, and they don't have all the information needed. Part of the problem is they read the buff magazines, but they either don't read the whole article, or they don't assimilate the information properly. A perfect case in point-Car Craft recently ran an article comparing various single-plane intake manifolds. They said the one that offered the most "Bang for the Buck" was the Edelbrock Torker II. That it would work equally well on a stock engine or a wild one. The hp and torque champ was a Holley / Keith Dorton unit. They said that while this intake worked well on their test mule, it wasn't really a streetable intake. The reason is the test mule was an 11.4:1 compression 406 inch smal-block chevy with 215cc intake port aluminum heads and a cam with 242 duration ( @.050 ) and .600 lift!!  Now 99% of the people reading that article aren't going to have an engine anywhere near that radical. But-he races off to Summitt Racing or Jeg's and orders up a Keith Dorton intake and an 750 Double-pumper Holley, because the article said that was the hp and torque champ. He puts it on his 8.2:1 compression L48 350 in his '78 Camaro that's an automatic with 2.73:1 gears and has stock 153cc heads and a cam with .390 / 410 lift.  It bogs off the line, doesn't begin to do anything until 4,000 rpm, and because of the lazy stock cam, is all done in by 5,000 or so. He's pissed. He should have read the article and the box the manifold came in. The Dorton intake is basically a NASCAR manifold-much like the Edelbrock Victor Jr-it's designed to make power from 3,500-8,000 rpm!!  This guy would have been much happier with an Edelbrock Performer and a 600 cfm vacuum-secondary carb. The car would have showed a noticeable improvement in power and torque from idle on up. If he "had" to have a single-plane-he could have got by with the Torker II and a vacuum-secondary carb. It would have had a little less bottom-end torque than the Performer, but it would "hit" like "gangbusters" at 2,500 rpm and pull hard to 5,500 or whenever his valvesprings gave up. Not Ideal-but the car would have been faster than stock and the guy would have been happy for the most part. Now the guys sells the Dorton intake and double-pumper to his buddy who has a '79 Corvette. The buddy's 'Vette really rocks with this setup. How is that possible? The buddy's 'Vette is an L82 that has 9:1 compression, "2.02" heads, and a cam with 224 duration (@.050 ) and .450 / .460 lift. It's a 4-speed with 3.70:1 gears. He drops the clutch at 3,500-4,000 rpm, it rockets out of the hole and pulls hard to 6,500 rpm. The T10 4-speed has about 1,500 rpm drop between gears-so he hits 2nd and subsequent gears at 5,000 rpm in the thick of the manifold's torque band. It works because the L82 has the cam and the heads and the gearing to take advantage of the manifold's power band. And with a stick-the driver can launch at whatever rpm he wants by manipulating the clutch, and he can rev the motor up at the line to "clean out" the carb. You can't do that with an automatic. Ironically-if the 'Vette was an automatic-it would still work ok. Not as good as with the 4-speed-but the L82 package would have 3.55:1 gears with the TH350-close enough to 3.70-and they came from the factory with a 2,500 rpm converter. Enough to get the car moving and up on it's torque curve. Much better than the guy's Camaro that had 2.73;1s and a converter that stalled about 1,600 rpm. See what I'm saying?  Here's another example. Guy has a 389 Tri-Power, 4-speed '65 GTO with 3.90:1 gears. He slaps a Ram Air IV cam into it that has 308 / 320 duration ( 231 / 240 @.050 ) and .470 lift with his 1.5 rockers. It has a badass lope but idles at 900 rpm. He pops the clutch at 3,200 rpm and shifts at 5,800. The M21 rock-crusher has a 1,400 rpm drop between gears so he's hitting 2nd at 4,400 right where the power and torque are the strongest. The car is way quicker in the 1/4, launches fine on the center 2bbl, really rips on the street. His buddy puts the same cam into his '77 T/A with an automatic and 2.56:1 gears and it absolutely kills what performance the car did have. It won't idle, you have to kick it into neutral at a stoplight to not creep into the car in front of you,and it's actually slower than stock. Here's why. The 389 in the GTO had 10.75:1 compression, a stick, and 3.90:1 gears. The huge cam-even if it lowered static compression by a full point-the car still had 9.5-9.75:1 compression. The 3.90:1 gears covered the lack of bottom end torque and got the motor into it's powerband quickly. ( There's a reason RAIV's were only available with 3.90 or 4.33 gears! ). Idle quality didn't matter-because again the driver can launch at whatever rpm he wants by manipulating the clutch. Now in the '77 T/A-the 400 had 8.0:1 compression. If the big cam cost it a point-now your static compression ratio is 7:1. Your going to lose what little power you had. Further-the choppy idle won't work with a stock converter, and the salt-flats 2.56:1 gears can't cover the off-the-line bog. The T/A driver would be much better off with the Edelbrock Performer Cam, or the factory "068" cam-both of which build massive low-end and mid-range torque. The only way the T/A driver could use the RAIV cam would be if he got some 72cc chamber Edelbrock or factory heads ( or milled his .060 to raise the compression over 9:1 ) and installed a 2,500 rpm converter and some 3.42:1 or 3.73:1 gears. It still wouldn't be as strong as the high-compression, 4-speed, stiffly geared GTO-but it would be pretty damn quick and definitely wouldn't bog. I know another guy who had a 390 hp 427 Stingray that nearly ruined it-he was going to install a Lunati "L88" spec cam. Thankfully-I talked him out of it. I pointed out-Lunati's catalog said the cam worked best with open exhausts and 4.56:1 gears!!!  Didn't that throw up a red flag?  Regardless of the 427's massive torque-this cam would have made his car-which had Q-jet on an iron intake, stock iron exhaust manifolds and a 4-speed with 3.36:1 gears-run like shit. It wouldn't have been as quick as it was stock. The spec sheet for the cam showed it idled about 1,500 rpm and made power from 4,000-8,000 rpm. "Bigger" isn't always better. Sometimes,it's better to err on the side of caution. Especially with cams and carbs and intakes. Comp Cams has their "Thumper" line which gives you the sound-but still has acceptable low and mid-range torque if you have to have everyone hear your car going "pocketa-pocketa-pocketa" at idle. And think of this-if a Super Stock Firebird can run 11.30s with a Quadrajet on an iron manifold-why do you need a tunnel-ram and dual 660 Holleys?  I'm all for "Restification" and more speed-but be reasonable and do some research before you start throwing parts at your car. Mastermind