CAN YOU MAKE BIG HP WITH A SMALL CAM

Using stock production block, no stroker kit, no power adders, a reasonable set of head and a relatively true Mopar, can good HP be made with either SB or BB to move a 3000 lbs car into the 9's and be a dependable lower maintenance car?

9s in the 1/8 mile or the 1/4?

1/4

I bought my first 440 "race" engine from a guy running Super Gas with it at 145 plus. Ported iron heads, stock block, stroke, etc. My Challenger was a bit (4-500pds.???) heavier than his Daytona and I ran a smaller cam but would run 10.0's at 135-137. I still have the oil pump and hand grinded upon Harland Sharp roller rockers from it. Sold the epoxied, cracked, etc. cyl. heads. This thankfully happened on the starting line after a .001 light...

It takes approx 725Hp to make a 3400lb car go 9.90, a stock block just won't take that kind of power, for any length of time. see the above post.

FWIW, I'd be surprised if this one made 600HP. It ran really good for a long time.

Remember the cam specs?

My math says 650 HP to go 9.90 in a 3400lb car

Your math is closer.

Absolutely I could do it with a 360 of you consider a 610 roller a small cam. I do.

Define "Big HP"
Define "Small cam"
Define "Reasonable heads"
Define "Dependable"
Define "Lower Maintenance"
Define "Into the Nines"

All these things mean different things to different people.

My old Edelbrock RPM headed 440 had the old NF-69 Ultradyne .640 lift solid, Isky ductile rockers, Ross 11.5 pistons. To some that's a small cam, to others it may be huge. It went one 9.96, and one 9.98 in my 2950lb Challenger, so you could say it went "into the nines", but I've got 600 time slips between 10.02 and 10.45.

"Dependable"? In 6 years of racing, every failure was directly attributable to my penchant to occasionally hit it with 275-475 horses worth of spray. The Isky ductiles never moved, and I only ran the valves three times in those six seasons.

"Lower maintenance"? Oil change every 75 passes, a set of plugs once a season. Keeping the air bleeds blown out on the dominator was more effort than anything else.

I'm going to say this as simply as I can. Every single stock stroke 440 block that has been broken at this horsepower level, has been broken by detonation, not because it was making too much power. Period. End of story. But racers prefer to blame the parts than own up to the fact that their tune-up was off. Not saying it wasn't a great tune-up on that cold day in October with mine shaft air and c-12 in the tank, but when you drag it back out in may and the DA is three thousand foot higher, and all you could grab was av-gas...you better back it off some.

If I was starting fresh right now with a stock stroke 440, I think I'd do the Trick Flow 240's a mid 650 lift solid, with another pair of isky ductile rockers, and keep the compression around 11 to 1. It wouldn't run 9s all year long at 3000lb pounds, but it would do it in cool air.

He said a 3000 pound car guys

HP that moves a 3000 lbs car into the 9's during the heat of the summer.
No B1 or Indy heads that are more than $2500.00 ready to run- not requiring special intake, rockers, headers, etc.
590 or less cam and flat tappet.
Your not under the hood after each pass adjusting valves and it doesn't eat parts after every 10-20 passes.
904 or 727.

Are you asking me? When I owned the engine it had this one. It still lives in my Dart street car! The guy I bought it from had something larger. It was some oddball thing I sold long ago.

Yes. Thought that might remember.

About 600-650 HP to do the job. Factory SB or BB not up to the task? I think this is why I'm looking to run the number w/o beating the motor up. John, wasn't your son running 10.00 with a stock 360 block and your magical heads?

Sure a MP purple .590 440 around 10.9 comp with a 4500 stall vert @ 3000#, no problem. SB, a lot tougher, most likely not.

You are adding to many rules but I will say yes I can with Edelbrock heads

My small block is .600 lift with crane golds, beehive springs and is street reliable.

As reliable as the .630-.650 lift solids we've been running in our big blocks have been, I'll likely never go smaller again.

Nines in the dog days of summer requires 9.60 capability in mine shaft conditions.


My Dad's Challenger is an old school example, but it had parts that made it a little more difficult than it has to be now.

Stock stroke 440, Indy SR heads with 1.5 crane golds (non-offset) Indy intake 10.50 dominator. 2 1/8 headers (likely too big) and the Hughes STL6872.
We ported the roofs of the SR heads to match the max wedge intake, but left the width alone. The car had a 2.03 low gear set glide, and a 5200 stall converter. With a 4.56 gear and 29.5-11.5 slicks, it was animal, running 9.60-9.70 in the 137 range.

Alas Dad wanted low tens, and a car that didn't move around on the track, so we put in 4.10's and 14X32 slicks. He was happy, his four sons...not so much. That motor would absolutely come alive from 6400 to 7200...fun stuff. Memory serves, with Dad aboard that car was around 2850 though.

Yes I'm sure it can be done but if it is your first rodeo it might take a few tries before you find the correct combo. My pump gas low deck 470 makes around 700 hp with out of the box Trick Flow 240 heads. I'm running a roller cam so you'll give up some power with a flat tappet but not a huge amount. A ported intake manifold is a good way to pick up some power. EFI would solve a bunch of issues and help make the engine really reliable. So yeah, I'd say it could be done but probably best to team up with someone who has done it before so you aren't doing all the R&D yourself.

You should go back and play in the sand box!!!!!

I think about 500 at the crank without alot of maintenance with a good set of even econo W2-s.

450 is alot easier and can be semi maintenance free


There are so many factual proven builds to be found on the web with et-s or dyno numbers that are easy to copy.

Ya want big hp with a small cam, build it well and spray the hell out of it.

What do you have now, what are you hoping to reuse, and what's your budget?

I have an early thick 360 block, and a 440 short block that needs a refresh or rebuild, bracket cam and stock RPM heads(I bought the short block used from a friend).

Dave,... that is an impressive photo for how to break a crankshaft!! I didn't think anyone could break one into that many pieces. I'm saving a copy of the photo for inspiration. Good Job

What do you call a small cam because I have a 440 with a mopar 557 cam and I think its small, another with 274 and 282 @.50 duration and .590/603 lift and I think it's a street strip cam.

So just what is a small cam.

440 .060 over Ross domed Pistons, unported edelbrocks, crane golds, comp .650 McCandless grind, 950 Holley, m1 intake, 2" headers. 3150 lbs 8" converter, SS springs, 4.56 gear. 10 teens at 132- 133 in 93-95 degree summer heat. Do a low block 470, port the heads and intake. With a 3000 lbs car I believe you would be well into the 9's. The 60 fits were 1.38-1.40.

Cams to big. Lol. He added silly rules after starting the post. 590 max lift. I guess he's afraid he might have to set the valves twice a year.

.590 with 915's? Lmao

That all stayed together believe it or not...Didn't come apart until I unbolted it. There is actually some blood drops on the pieces as the sumbith cut me while getting it apart. Part of it was wedged pretty good. It wasn't even loud, it just quit. The loudest, crappiest, scariest thing was shearing the ring gear! I thought the whole car blew up like a BOMB!

Wait until you break the rear drive shaft yoke in high gear above 6500 RPM, that has been my worse race car experience so far
I had to tighten almost every fastener in that car, every one

If you are willing to allow a stroker in a 440 block, since the investment in a new crank is important, it should be doable with a hydraulic cam!
I built a 4inch stroke 440 ,475 cubes, .540 lift, 268 @ .050 hyd cam, 750 alky carb, 12/1 compression, 440-c bowlported heads on methanol that went 10.10 at 3180 lbs. Fix all that was wrong with that combo, like go bigger carb, 1.6 rockers, more cubes, and it would do the job, and not have to rev over 6200 rpm. I was shifting mine at 5800 to 6,000.

Hey Cab,.. bet that experience was pretty high on the 'Pucker Factor' as well correct? I have a friend who broke the rear ring gear (probably like D Hall's experience) and It scared Him pretty good!

3000lb demon. 360/418--587 cast iron heads, home ported--.590 Racer brown solid flat tappet-- STX-22--13 to1 CR--timing set at 28*--crank trigger--9.68 at 136mph--1.260 best 60 ft, probably better but tripped the 60ft. timers with rear tires often. 2600+ passes and counting. Went as many as 4 years without pulling a valve cover off. Pistons and crank never out of block since day1. Dropped a valve in late 2017 but short block survived with only a minor gouge out of cylinder wall. Put a lesser set of heads on it to finish the season, raced it the next night, and still ran some low 6.20s 1/8th mile.

Now this gets to the heart of my post. I had found several SB builds but none have achieved this kind of performance with a cam under a .600 roller.

Yes, my mates 3150lbs Dart>

440ci, Eddy MCH 320cfm heads
12.7:1CR, DC.590 SFT purple, stock iron adj rockers
Victor Intake, 1050 Dom.
2" hdrs, 727, made an on track 599 flyhp.
Hemi pick-up
5000 stall, 4.56/13x31's, SS springs
good dble adj shocks.
ran 10.10's, take off 150lbs = 9's.
Hardly ever touched it.

Now this gets to the heart of my post. I had found several SB builds but none have achieved this kind of performance with a cam under a .600 roller. [/quote




Lots of ways to get the same results. That combo was a high compression stroker. Pick your poison

Your lucky you ask for no power adder

What seems like a big cam in one engine is not really big in another, my 410 SB in my dakota seems pretty big to me at 221@.050 .575 lift, has nice rumble at idle, then on the other hand I have a similar cam in a 5.7 hemi and the engine barely quivers at idle and you would never guess it had a cam that size in it, the thing idles almost like stock. It don't make any sense to me as the 410 has more compression, more cubes, a lot more velocity in the ports... it runs incredible but the cam is much more noticable in there.

I ran the CC .650" 290@.050 sft in my stock 440SP motor, didn't class that as big at all, it ticked over at 900rpm, sweet as, even without the CR it really needed,

Car was 3000lbs race weight, ran a best of 11.2@118 with stock 906 heads.

Added a pair of 2.14/1.81 mildly ported 906's, (probably 255cfm) went 10.7@125 which would've gone 10.5's with more air in slicks, and a few tweeks, was in 1990 and knowledge wasn't what it is today.

So working on that gain from stock 215>220cfm 906's > to BV 255cfm 906's = .5/sec gain, what would it run today with a pair of Trickflow 240's, (328@.650) 10.0's?...the cam/converter/gears/tyres were there for it....just theorizing....would love to get that back and run it today with the 240's to see, and all this from a stock balanced s-pack bottom end, a crappy Team G, small 850DP and just 10:1CR....anyone reckon I could've got into the 10.0's?

So if thats not big what is your definition of big?

So if thats not big what is your definition of big?




Some of you guys should have raced with us in the 70's and 80's and you would get a better understanding of how you have to work with JUNK or within the rules. my Duster ran 9.82 back then at 2950 weight with a .030 over 440 block, 906 heads, stock crank, stock rods, TRW heavy weight pistons, and super stock springs. To get there I used a tunnel ram with two 750 holleys and a 750 lift cam. So with today's way better chassis, tires, HEADS, intakes, cams, and pistons it would be a "cakewalk". A 650 lift cam is not big.

My solid tappet cam in my 451 is .640 advertised lift @ 260/264 and pushed my 3800lb Coronet to 10.38s at 128. I'm sure .38 could be found losing that 800lbs.

the .650 dont seem big to me, it was the 290@.050 thats big

What is the original posters' version of small?

The largest and most successful cam that I used for both SB/BB was the MP 590. I made good power and it had longevity. These were back in the 80's when iron heads were all we had. With better flowing heads, intakes, carbs ignition system, etc as per present day, I thought that a cam in the 550-580 range could get the job done and be reliable(500-700 passes per refresh). I did my fair amount of power and breakage issues with my hemi MP car and my VW powered Gasser. Been there, done that, and that's how I race anymore.

....exactly. We had about 6 Koffel iron 451's over here in cars at £5000 a pop in the 80's, they had max ported heads, ultra thin rings and .750 roller cams, they managed 10.0's in most of the cars that were lucky enough to afford to run them. The MP .590 with 271@.050 is a good cam but its done in most race 440's at around 6500ish with Good modern heads, if you wanna run in the 9's@3000lbs+ you gotta turn one more than that unless your light.

My junk 440 with junk 906's was still pulling like crazy at 6700 in the traps with 290@.050

I got one heck of a laugh years ago (1980's). While I was laid off from the steel mill I picked up a job at a local transmission shop pulling and replacing transmissions to stay out of the bars every night. This place was owned and operated by several dirt track racers so "dirt track" books were laying around. I picked one up and it was discussing camshafts and how they work. Towards the end of the article it touched on drag racing. The author wrote " I don't know how these drag racing machines even start with these BIG, sometimes up to .750 lift even start. LOL. Boy he should see what we are running now.

.590 flat tappet, 3000# sb or bb

In one of the old Smokey Yunick books I have, he commented on how he didn't know how drag racing valve trains even held up given the extra lift and spring loads they used compared to the roundy-round engines he specialized in. I think at that time a .600"-ish SFT cam was probably typical for his stuff, so a more aggressive solid roller with .750" lift and 600#s open pressure would have seemed... "different", for sure.

Todays technology and ramp designs are nothing like what was available ten to fifteen years ago, I have a solid roller Ultra Dyne, Bullitt cam in my new bracket motor with Jesel paired shaft rocker system, once the motor starts to spin over I can NOT feel the valve springs(325 Lbs. on the seats and 840 Lbs opend at .780 lift) working at all
I'm waiting to see if I dyno this rascal first or put it in the bracket car to see what it does at the track

From Vizard:
1. huge rocker ratio
2. tiny LSA
3. shorten duration

I like the way he thinks

On his BBC mule engines, this had the effect of increasing torque all over, needing less valve spring, and making the same max power at lower RPM with better idle quality and part-throttle manners.
His opinion is that you HAVE to initiate intake flow ASAP or the rest of the intake cycle is playing catch-up, so big OL + 1.9:1 rockers get the valve open around TDC really quick & far.

I have seen a 383 with AVS carb runs 9s in a 1969 Cuda, just look at Super Stock, lots of iron heads and small cams going fast.

Back in the early 2000, SS cars were running .750+ lifts. I doubt that have gotten smaller.

Ok, and that would be a Big cam, not a small cam. But your def was .590 or below, that's even a big cam by most. ???

One mag article reported Paul Rossi's 440 ss motor was using a .750 lift roller, and .035 lash, which would be more in line with Vizards methods.

Crane R286 .750 lift roller was the baseline 440 Superstock cam in the late 70's.

Mark Heffington owner and designer of Cam Dynamics made that lift possible with his lobe designs, no one else could make the valve heads stay on the valves back then with that much lift Hence Harvey Crane buying out the completion to get his technology

I still have 3 of those cams on my shelf in different centerlines. Lol