FE Power Forums
FE Power Forums => FE Technical Forum => Topic started by: jayb on November 10, 2012, 09:12:11 AM
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This weekend Blair Patrick has made a trip up to Minnesota from Tennessee, to dyno a couple of rather interesting engines. One of Blair's customers, Rob (fetorino on our forum), has joined us from California because his engine is one of the ones we are dynoing. The first engine is a 352 stock eliminator engine, and the second is Rob's 496" tunnel port. We got going on this yesterday morning, and Blair was figuring about 350-375 horsepower for the stock eliminator motor, and 650-700 horsepower from the tunnel port.
We started yesterday with the stock eliminator motor. This is a very interesting combination because of the rules. Blair has to run the C4SE cast iron intake manifold that came stock on a '64 Galaxie (where the engine is destined to go), and while the cam can be a cheater cam, it is limited to the stock .408" lift! It also has to run the stock compression ratio (9.4:1 I think), and a very small (450 cfm) Holley carb, or else an Autolite 4100. Blair put quite a bit of duration in the cam to get it to run at the higher engine speeds and try to make the horsepower number. The engine is equipped with CP flat top pistons, Crower rods that meet the NHRA rules, and a stock 352 crank, plus rockers and shaft supports from Precision Oil Pumps. The engine uses a Crane distributor with locked out timing, run by my MSD Digital 6. Blair also brought a set of dyno headers for the engine. Here's a picture of the engine ready to run on the dyno:
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/352 stock eliminator.jpg)
I hadn't run anything on my dyno since last August, so it took us longer than anticipated to get the engine hooked up and ready to run, but we finally got the engine running and the cam broken in around 3:00 PM. Blair had fitted the engine with really wimpy break-in springs, around 100 pounds on the seat and 200 over the nose; they were just the inner spring from a fairly strong double spring that he had in stock. They looked pretty funny on the engine when we pulled the valve covers to change them; heres a photo (sorry its kind of dark):
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/breakin springs.jpg)
Those are some small diameter springs LOL! They don't look as small in the photo as they do in person, because Blair set this engine up to run with beehive springs from Comp Cams during normal operation, so the retainer is small in diameter. Blair and Rob spent the next couple of hours changing to the normal springs so we could make some dyno pulls. Here's a shot of the beehive springs installed on the engine:
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/beehive springs.jpg)
Once we had the springs installed we ran a total of 14 dyno pulls on this engine. We faced a few dyno issues (I had to clean a couple of the water filters) along the way, but other than that, once we got up and running everything seemed to go pretty well. We made 350 horsepower on the second pull, and then messed around with running different RPM ranges and timing to optimize the combination. Here's some data from pull #8, where we were getting the timing dialed in but only running to 6000 RPM:
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/BP352_08.jpg)
Looking at this data it didn't appear that the engine was really falling off too much in power, so we decided to run the remaining pulls over the 4500-6500 RPM range (this engine is expected to get a 5000 RPM converter, so data below 4500 RPM is probably not significant). After a little more tuning the best pull netted 363 HP, and this was with 44 degrees of total advance in the locked out distributor! I don't think I've ever run that much timing on an FE before. Here is the data:
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/BP352_12.jpg)
According to the A/F numbers on the dyno the engine was running kind of lean (~13.3:1 A/F), so for the last pull on the Holley carb we jetted up a couple of numbers in the primaries and secondaries. The A/F numbers came down quite a bit but we also lost some power, so maybe this engine wants to run on the lean side. This is a good example of how not every engine is the same, and you have to jet for horsepower, not A/F; air/fuel ratio is a guide only.
For the final pull on this engine we threw up a prayer and installed the 4100 Autolite carb. This was a bone stock carb that had been rebuilt, but it had promise because it flowed more air than the Holley carb. Here's a picture of the carb on the engine:
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/autolite 4100.jpg)
Surprisingly, this thing made 350 horsepower as it was, and it ran really lean, like 14:1 or higher! We think there is probably at least as much power in this carb as there is in the Holley once we get it jetted right. Here is the dyno data:
(http://fepower.net/Photos/Posts/BP352_14.jpg)
Today we are going to do the tunnel port engine, so I will post some results on that a little later, probably tomorrow morning. Stay tuned...
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jay were in MN are you from ? IM from the twin cities and would love to come watch/help/learn/meet you some time ....
p.s. ask him were to get a set of them nice valve covers ... I like them :P
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Jay, those numbers make me think that the 1960 352 Hi Po really did make 360 HP ......... even with the lousy aluminum intake.
Mark
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Dang, how cool is that having Blair at your place! Ask him how the 458 tri-power build is coming. ;D
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See the "Guess the tunnel port horsepower" thread for information on the tunnel port engine - Jay
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jay were in MN are you from ? IM from the twin cities and would love to come watch/help/learn/meet you some time ....
p.s. ask him were to get a set of them nice valve covers ... I like them :P
I'm also in the twin cities area, up in Rogers in the northwest corner of town. Where are you located?
FYI Blair has those covers manufactured to his specs and sells them for $550 per pair. You can order them from him; his email is captcj@hughes.net.
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That's the first time I've seen a shoe box on a dyno. Good numbers with hopes of more. I ran the crap out of one in high school. I had hell finding different size jets for it. Wound up drilling several sets and then sleeving a few sets too. ::)
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That was b better then what I thought! ??? That is cool..... Thanks for sharing Jay. I always love the write ups you do.
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Jay,
First off, thanks for showing us a "little motor". Second thing is, did the heads and intake have a lot of port work and bigger valves. Thanks, I enjoy your write-ups. Jim
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Glad you like the write-ups, Jim. According to Blair there was almost no work done on the heads. This is because stock heads are required for the stock eliminator class. The only thing that is allowed is a multi-angle valve job; valve sizes also must be stock.
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Cool data thanks Jay & thanks for the reminder on fordfe.com
Are those headers 2" OD, a guess?
I used the Gonkulator to try to "guess" the SecretCamSpecs, I know you cant say exactly but the Gonkulator wanted "big" duration as you hinted.
The HP and RPM matched up first time in the Gonkulator.
I had a harder time mathcing that 390ftlb at 3500rpm (wow) that's high.
Wonder if it has something to do with the collector design, or maybe the header tubes are smaller than they look.
So cool to see a 352 put out like that, stock compression/intake/heads/camlift/carb.
I've also had good luck with the 4100 Autolite at this power level, especially if the jetting is right. They are about 500cfm so you might gain another 5hp or so. But dyno aside, the Holleys tend to perk up better at the strip.
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The headers are stepped, 1 7/8" to 2" to 2 1/8". Blair was pretty sure that the engine would make more power if we had gone to smaller headers...
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Great information Jay, I was down at Blair's about a month ago and we talked about that 352 motor a bit, those are excellent numbers for a little motor with stock heads and an OEM 1964 iron intake, that motor with a C4 trans, in a Galaxie(on a diet/3,600 lbs.) is going into the mid 12's I believe.
He is currently working on a crossbolted 428/478 medium riser for me, can't wait to put that one into a 1967 Falcon I have here. Thill of a lifetime.
Jim M.
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Are the 4.255 tunnelport pistons an off the shelf item? If so who makes them?
I am in search of this piston with the same bore x stroke. Hoping I don't have to have them made!
Thanks
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Pretty sure that those were CP pistons, made to order for this engine. If you need the same dimensions I'm sure they could build more, but they are going to be a custom part, not off-the-shelf...
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Are the 4.255 tunnelport pistons an off the shelf item? If so who makes them?
I am in search of this piston with the same bore x stroke. Hoping I don't have to have them made!
Thanks
They are CP's. I had the heads at 72cc. The reverse dome (dish) design is one I use on all of my pump gas FE wedge applications. It usually takes 3-4 weeks to get them once I order. My "kit" in this case features Crower forged rods, RPM forged crank, and the CP pistons. The crank and rods are not the most expensive, but are higher quality than the typical Scat rod and cast crank. The CP pistons are the top of the food chain in my opinion.
I would like to say that I really enjoyed my visit to Jay's place, and also the week I spent with Rob Dickey on the excursion. Both Jay and Rob are great guys and we all had a good time. Rob's dry humor was contageous and we were all cracking jokes and jabbing each other pretty good by Sunday. Just like in the class racing community, the racing (and in this case the engine building), become secondary to the relationships that are built with people with a common interest. In the end, the people are much more important than the thing that brings us together.
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Captain,
I've read about your FE achievements in Jay's intake comparo book as well as the recent write up on Rob's Tunnelport. Could you tell us a little more about yourself, your racing accomplishments and your engine business? I'm assuming you do customer engines? Thanks!
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Captain,
I've read about your FE achievements in Jay's intake comparo book as well as the recent write up on Rob's Tunnelport. Could you tell us a little more about yourself, your racing accomplishments and your engine business? I'm assuming you do customer engines? Thanks!
Bruce, I have won some races, set a few NHRA records, and yes, we do engines for any FE application. I have to thank Jay for posting the info on this site, but I really don't want to "blow my horn" too loud. My grandmother used to say that actions speak louder than words, so I try not to spew too much about myself. At some point I plan to build a marketing webpage, but we just have not done that at this point. I would say that FE's are over 90% of what we do, maybe over 95%, so we are pretty well just an FE engine shop. We farm out cleaning, but everything else is done in-house at this point.
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Blair,
Thanks for the response. Could you tell us a little more about the 64 Galaxie stock eliminator car? How are those cars configured nowadays? Is it a new build or has it been around a while? What kind of performance are we talking about? Photos would be nice! I'm sure other forum members would be interested as well.
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Captain,
I've read about your FE achievements in Jay's intake comparo book as well as the recent write up on Rob's Tunnelport. Could you tell us a little more about yourself, your racing accomplishments and your engine business? I'm assuming you do customer engines? Thanks!
Bruce, I have won some races, set a few NHRA records, and yes, we do engines for any FE application. I have to thank Jay for posting the info on this site, but I really don't want to "blow my horn" too loud. My grandmother used to say that actions speak louder than words, so I try not to spew too much about myself. At some point I plan to build a marketing webpage, but we just have not done that at this point. I would say that FE's are over 90% of what we do, maybe over 95%, so we are pretty well just an FE engine shop. We farm out cleaning, but everything else is done in-house at this point.
Mr Modesty also built these.
http://fepower.net/simplemachinesforum/index.php?topic=222.0