Posted by chris s denver (IP: 216.98.199.140) on November 22, 2000 at 03:29:36:
In Reply to: Re: 302 vs. 351 posted by chris s denver on November 21, 2000 at 02:51:44:
I said aproximately since all things being euqal, a 14 sec car here could do even better than a 10 depending on air temp at the time and various other things....
next the flow on the street is more important if he is going to drive it on the street. you wouldn't even see much of a difference on the street, you would at the track...
Also if you had headers in some states, you are risking emmission problems. Put some on in Denver and you get a much more of a hassle.
Don't know if that is a factor but might be for some people.
I have not had to make ANY modifications to my strut towers. I may be an exception to some rule, but before the motor mounts were moved up 6" i still didn't have to do any mods.
As for flaming me, i am not worried about it, i know that when i hit the track my car does exactly what i want..goes fast. My heads are ported well enough and modified enough that when i am ready to take the car off the street completely, i can change a few things to make it run 10's at this altitude. Calculators are one thing, the real test is in doing it.
I don't know the cost of a crank kit and all the other stuff to stroke a 302, but seems to me, a 351w would be cheaper. As far as sounding like crap...mine sounds really good and right now i only have the balance tube in place and the rest is single stock exhaust... i shot my 4grand in where it needed to be not in bolt ons. I bored the engine my self and milled the heads myself and assembled the bottom half myself and ported the intake myself... the heads i left to the man that can make them flow...I said i opted for the stock exhaust manifolds so i didn't have to modify the strut towers, however, i called tubular exhaust and they said no mods were nessisary. There are 2 guys that race here that have 351w in their mavs, one has a set of hookers for a truck and all he did was pound 2-2inch circles in on one spot on each tower. He did it in 15 minuets with a torch and a small sledge..
It's easy to tell others how to spend their money, i might put headers on later, for now, the biggest bang for the buck wasn't headers.
I Put my engine specs into desktop dyno and got some figures that sounded good. Wow i thought great and pluged them into another and another etc... iwill be running 12s yowsa....yehaw but the reality is that the programs can only estimate.. I saw somebody that was afraid to add a 9" rearend for the weight problem, I was afraid not to as the power the engine will make might snap an axle like my friends did. He paid $1900 to put in hardend axles to prevent itagain. I paid $29.95 for a used 3rd member and bought new gears, and install kit and a few additional parts..total under $450 and now I have 4.1:1 gears and I really don't have to worry about my axles ever again.
Spend your money where you want, it's up to you, take advice with the knowledge that what you want may not be what other like and vice versa...
Why is Drag racing dying?? it used tobe you modded your engine yourself and not just bolt on stuff. Now it's reversed.
If your running on the street, you won't see much of a difference in putting on headers if that is the only mod you do. Headers look cool and can make more power yes i didn't say that they didn't.. removing any obstruction in the intake or exhaust path will help the overall power. At what point in the power curve will you see it? 2300rpm or 6500rpm? That is what is most important...At the mile high nationals, the jegs car came off the line just a touch behind, they won because they had the top end when the other car didn't... on the street it is somewhat different depending on weather or not you want to race from light to light or on the highway...
everything is subjective what do you want to accomplish with it... most of the time in all the things that ihave seen people asking for help on, the person doesn't have any objective listed so the people just start throwing out comments that may be totaly off.
sorry but to me i think that if your going to give people advice and they might actually go out and spend their hard earned money, you might be more careful. Just my $1.01
I can also stroke my engine out to almost a 400 later if I wanted...:)
Hope none of you take offense.
I am tired, working 7 days a week and building engines one place and managing another place, and getting 5-6 hours sleep so if i sound like a ripe old assh#$%, please forgive. I know that what i have said is also in hotrod and other mags. i don't have any reason tomake it up.
chris