I don't remember any particular Clyde story about one of the engines so if you want to share it with me please do. If you would rather do it in private that's ok - just send me a note. Obviously, there are a NUMBER of stories I really can't tell in the open without getting OK's from those involved...
Joe Pappas
Joe, I don't think I will offend anyone so I'll share the story with the group. Clyde was talking about the huge advantages of having direct factory involvement (as you have elaborated on in this thread), and chuckling about some of the downfalls. It seems that Donnie had a match race coming up (75-76 as I recall) and Clyde needed to get a motor together. Due to a variety of factors, all he could do is a 437 ci motor using some older ported '65 aluminum heads that were pretty rough looking, a somewhat mismatched tunnel ram, a leaky block (too much milling on the sides), and a somewhat unbalanced rotating assembly (not sure why). Well, the motor was one of those screamers and served Donnie well at subsequent match races.
The factory was wondering what Donnie and Clyde had done with this motor and asked (I had the impression from Clyde that the sponsor asking is the same as directing?) that the motor be sent to Chrysler for a dyno run and then a disassembly and analysis.
Well, when Donnie and Clyde got the motor back (and it was assembled), it would not fall off a turnip truck. It ran horrible! Clyde claimed that he took the motor apart and was surprised that the heads seemed to have been sent to Mullens for the most current porting along with the manifold, that the rotating assembly was now balanced correctly, and the sides of the block had nice aluminum plates screwed on and sealed to stop the water leaks. Someone had taken alot of time to make the "wrong" things right, and lost one of those seemingly magical combinations of parts that just "works." He really missed that motor!
