Wow,I`d love to see your engine in person once you finish it just to see all the great fab work.I don`t know if you have ever heard of Nelson Racing Engines,but ck out the 2 engines he designed & built from scratch.One Hemi & another twin turbo based mtr that made over 2000hp & 1800 ft. lbs. of torque ,all at 6500 rpm,very impressive.I love it when guys like you & him experiment & come up with new things,thats real hot rodding like it got started in the 50s.Thats what keeps my interest up in this sport,innovation never stops,keep it up.
Yeah Tom Nelson is a baddass. Huge budgets and resources help of course, but he's a very smart man when it comes to engine design and the results obviously speak for themselves. TBH, Even if I could afford it I'm not sure I would want THAT much power since I have a hard time not getting tossed into jail or killing myself with 500-600 horsepower. 10 second street cars with overdrives capable of 150+ mph top speeds is plenty fast enough for me. My family never came from money so naturally I've been into improvising and making things work like the old hotrodders used to. Luckily for me I had some dough headed uncles who were gearheads during and after the musclecar heydays so I got to see plenty of trial and error type stupidity. They were not afraid to fail and performance and safetywise, they did things and fabricated some highly questionable parts, to say the least. However, over about the last 10-15 years or so I've finally faced up to and worked extremely hard to get over the inherent FEAR OF FAILURE when it comes to more extreme modifications. I wish I had taken more chances and learned more relevant skills that could have unlocked more of my hidden talent and engine building potential. May have even impacted my career choice or where we lived throughout the years. But you probably know how it is as you get older.. the brain keeps getting smarter but by the time you fully realize how fast your skill levels can grow and how they relate to the generally accepted "bar height".. you're energy levels and physical abilities start to fade away. That and nobody else younger will listen because they're all busy learning things that same long drawn out hard way too. Anywho.. good chatting with you, Dan.. now back to bringing the projects at hand to running reality.
I tell you what Gregg,I have a cam I wish you would try.It`s a late 60s early 70s Holmann Moody solid roller for a 289 or 302.When I get my short blk. together I will stick it in the blk. & try to figure out the duration & opening & closing points on the degree wheel.This is a max effort designed cam for drag racing in a small blk. Ford.If you are looking for power in the 8 to 10,000 rpm range,this thing will do it.In 1974 in a 67 Mustang @ 2800 lbs,4in. bore,standard stroke 289,experimental hds which you will never see,Offenhouser 360 equa flo,1150 Dom carb,old 1in 5/8s appliance headers,Borg Warner 4 spd. trans,5.14 detroit locker w/ 26 in tall slicks,car went 11.07 at over 120mph in the qtr.Back then very few 289s were that fast,it was kinda unheard of.With an engine like yours with todays parts & technology I can not imagine how fast this cam could make a small blk. go.You were nice enough to offer me valve springs to try,I`d send this to you with no strings attached.One thing though,if you have ANY weak points in your mtr,they will be exposed quickly as this thing has a ton of duration & lift,BOOM.It will rev as fast as a Pro Stock,It idles at 1800rpm & the original 289 would not idle below 1200 or eng. would die.This is not for the faint of heart,so if you want to go really fast you are more than welcome to try it.757-373-2694
lol.. made me feel all nostalgic again. Thanks much for the offer but that "restricted cylinder head" cam spec wouldn't even begin to work optimally with this cylinder head/engine combo anyways. The motor would very likely be spraying parts and oil in every and all directions if it got even remotely close to 10,000 rpm. And combining that big cam with these heads.. it would probably want to try and rev that high too! Plan on keeping the future AL blocked version in the very low 8,000 rpm range. Need some added endurance and I can't afford the parts needed to live up around pro-stock rpm levels anyways. Don't mind fiddling with it as I get older but want absolutely no part of "raceday teardowns" to make sure my 750lb valve springs are still holding up well enough for it to stay together during the next race. If I wanted to max the P38 cylinder heads out from an airflow/power capability standpoint?.. we're talking up near the 400cfm range, maybe even over that number with the high-port conversion set to maximum kill, with huge low lift flow numbers too. That bigger than average valve curtain window area, what this little 310" motors cylinder "see's", requires lower peak lifts and MUCH shorter duration numbers to reach up into the higher rpm ranges. Really don't want to risk pounding these heads up if this current mule block splits, crank, piston, or rod fails so I will keep it right at 7,000 rpm. Unless of course I overshoot and miss my cam selection and there's plenty more power left.. then I'll probably re-rationalize, "7,000 rpm.. or somewhere thereabouts". And then hopefully it still stays together long enough so I don't hear all those.. "told ya that would happen". lol
Thats me to Gregg,that is the reason why for the time being I`ll use the wimpy comp hr290 cam I have because I don`t want to tear my Blk. up.I still have every intention of building a 408 & using this Blk. as I already have the K-1 rods I bought,but the expense of the crank & pistons along w/ the internal balance is just beyond me right now because I still need to many other things.Just the torque converter,distributor & rear tires is $1500,you know how it goes everything just keeps adding up.
