I've had a blast restoring my 70 Challenger Vert. Originally a 318/727 car I cloned it into a 440 RT/ 4 speed. Started with a 440 Truck engine out of a motor home, kept the cast crank, bored 15 thou over. had the heads totally rebuilt and taken down 50 thou, steel head gaskets, edelbrock performer intake, Hedman Headers. MSD dist, single wire Powermaster alt and Blaster coil. Just had it Dynoed at 304 HP at the wheels. Really disappointed ----- Thoughts?????. I know I can spend big bucks from here, but I was expected more at this point
I have a similar 451 with 906's, performer, and stock big block a body exhaust manifolds. It makes right at 300hp to the wheels on a chassis dyno as it is driven off the street, heat soaked and all. Uncorking the 2.25" repro exhaust is work 20rwhp.
If you have a smaller cam (xe294h w/ 1.6's here) and headers compare to my manifolds I'd guess you might find 15-25 tops at the wheels. What RPM did you pull it to?
The 451 in my dart made a hair under 500hp/500tq on a realistic engine dyno with a Performer RPM and 1-7/8" dyno headers. I figured the manifolds -50hp, intake -15, full exhaust -25hp, factory magnum air cleaner -10hp and don't forget the accessory drives for a very believable 100hp loss at the flywheel. That leaves us with 400hp going into the clutch.
400x.80=320rwhp on a perfect day. Take a car driven in off the street (heat soaked) on an 85 deg. day and 300ish at the wheels isn't out of the ball park.
