Why are there so few turbo and blower cars out there? I can understand class rules and such but if you're out there trying to run a street strip car it's much easier to make power and the cars are far more streetable in many cases.
Build a typical 9:1 engine making 450 hp and it'll run forever. Add 7 lbs of boost and you're over 600 hp. Slide that up to 10 lbs of boost and you're crowding 800.
Engines like this do not need exotic parts. They run fine with flat hydraulic cams and stock stamped rockers. There's little need to run them over 6000. Knowing that RPM is what kills engines you can see they lead a relatively easy life as far as internal forces go.
In fact, when rods fail it's usually on the exhaust stroke where the crank throws the piston into the head and the rod can't snatch it back down. In a turbo car there is pressure in the exhaust and that actually helps reduce the force on the rod a wee bit.
Fuel injection is nice but you can get blow through carbs all day long.
Yes, there's a little more plumbing involved but it's not that hard.
Thoughts?
All this, yet I’ve read your post about a big inch NA engine. So what gives???
I wanted to put the Imperial back together so I could get the project out of the way for my far more important roadster build. The plans were for a nice sedate high efficiency (relatively speaking) high torque 440. Then, we found some wide spots in the bores and it had to be punched out instead of the simple hone that was planned.
I had been somewhat wavering in the past about repowering the car. A Cummins would have been beastly but a little too tall. Gen 3s are REALLY tempting but there's nobody home at low RPM. You've got to spin them to get torque and that's not where the Imperial lives. I needed to stick with the bigger engines.
After a lot of soul searching and long discussions with some close friends it became evident that a sedate motor in the Imperial would bore me and I'd lose interest. After all, the engine has been out nearly 5 years. I've had little desire to put a low output motor back together. The car has little to no value other than as an organ donor so I might as well enjoy my car and build it my way.
I've done the turbo thing but that didn't feel right for this car. It's a plus sized model (to be generous) and therefore needs a plus sized engine. I considered a 500" engine and ran that idea around a bit. After some head scratching I figured the 512 would be a little better route. That didn't last too long. I'm building this thing for fun. Kind of a silly but functional project so I decided to get silly with it. A 543 stroker was clearly the proper way to go. It fits the nature of the build. I can still use the car as it was intended while enjoying the stupid amounts of torque that give me that warm fuzzy feeling.
In short, it's a nonsensical build for a nonsensical car that can still perform it's duties as intended. The biggest penalties will be at the gas pump.
I think it would be fun to drop the turbos on the car but packaging would be more work than I care to take on right now. This thing has power brakes, power steering, A/C, cruise control, and all the other luxuries. The engine sits so far back in the car (and the hood opening is so low) that simple maintenance is already rather difficult. The air cleaner stud is 36" from the tip of the front looping bumper (think 70 Charger). It's so far back I have to pull the engine from the side. There's a whopping 12" between the open hood and the air cleaner stud. In stock form half the plugs must be removed from underneath the car and through the fender wells. Tossing turbo manifolds on this one and trying to route the plumbing around everything on the engine and accessories would be rather time consuming.
I'm getting a lot of peer pressure to turbo the 543 but with the 4.5" stroke I'd drive it too hard. If I did manage to keep it between the ditches it wouldn't take me long to over rev it and throw the crankshaft at an unsuspecting motorist.
