Dual Plane Intake Porting Pics

I'm more seriously starting to grind on my stock dual plane intake. I plan on running in the FAST class at some point.

I've extensively searched for any good port pics from anyone who's ever extensively ported a dual plane intake. I've found plenty of pics of plenum work but, no good pics of port work. I'm interested to see how deep most are able to get down into the ports.

I don't care if the pics are of an aftermarket intake or stock. Does anyone have any they can post?

Thanks!

I don't think the serious work that is done is accessed through either the plenum or the port window.

Brzezinski cuts them open and closes them again, yes it's not legal. Some of Vizard's work has pics of Wilson-modified SBC dual plane to both improve flow and equalize runner CFMs, not what you'd expect. The upper vs. lower plenum characteristics (height and volume) make this tough to do.
I generally radius anything I can reach, do some directional blending where it looks like the flow "wants" to go, but nothing major - I just don't know enough.

what motor you talking? Most fast engine builders send out to get extrude honed. Hemi's get cut up and rewelded.

Please tell me it’s not true. Those guys wouldn’t really cheat, would they. Lol.

in f.a.s.t that's not cheating only in pure stock

My experience is with stock cast iron intakes on limited pulling truck engines. First extrude honing is like a stream washing out the curves in a river, not the best way to get what you want. I put the manifold in a mill and removed 65% of the center divider. then what I tried to do was radius the upper roof transitions of the runners and plenum. If you put the manifold on a flow bench you will see that lots more air flows along the roof compared to the floor. Second try and get the runners to flow as close to each other as possible, with a dual plane, it will never be perfect. Third texture the floor of the plenum and runners, so that the fuel that falls out of the air stream will be quickly atomized again, I use a carbide that has some chipped flutes, just run it back and forth. I don't have dyno numbers, but the guy went from being last in the points, to third in the points in one year. His competitors paid the fees to have the intake removed and inspected, it was legal. I did three more manifolds after that for other guys in the class.

https://www.castheads.com/manifolds-carb/intake-manifolds/ported-intake-manifolds/

I ported an Air Gap intake for better distribution.....Also added a 1" open spacer....Man what a difference. Cut the center divider down and radiused everything so it blended as well as it could. ...

Extrude hone works very well too.....I would do all of the stuff I did, and then send it out for that....

I appreciate everyone's feedback and pics.

As someone pointed out, in the FAST class, you can modify the factory manifold pretty much however you'd like so; it could be cut up, worked and welded back together. It just needs to be stock appearing.

To be clear, I'm not trying to get every last HP out of the thing because I do plan on street driving it too. My goal is to hit 11.50-11.70 on a relatively sticky tire and whatever it runs on the bias ply while running in the FAST class is what it runs. In the past, Dwayne has pointed out that this should be doable with fairly standard port work on the intake. For example, Harry's old bee ran 11.40's with a modified intake that was not cut up, modified and welded back together.

I've attached some pics of my progress so far. In the first pic, I've tried to show the casting line of an un-touched port and how much extra material is present. In the second, I've tried to show in another port (as best as I can with a crappy camera) that I've removed all the material on the one side of the casting line (probably about 1/16) and blended the whole wall. I've been able to get down into the other side of the port relatively far but, I can't capture a good pic of it; I just wish I could get further.

In these two pics, I’m showing how I’ve opened the upper plenum completely up, removed the divider and begun softening all the turns where the plenum begins entry into the ports which includes the roof. I have a performer RPM sitting right next to this thing so; I’ve really studied the transitions in the plenum and have tried to copy it as best as possible in the stock manifold.

Here's some more. Just can't get great pics with the camera I have.

FYI- All of this has been done with Sears and Harbor Freight dremmels and a bunch of bits I've inherited over the years so; nothing special. I did just splurge and purchased a 6 inch long cutting burr but, the collet size is 1/4 so; I really don't have a good tool to chuck it up in. I've been using a standard battery operated drill. Real pro stuff here.

Actually...... on legal tires, Harry’s best was in the 11.50’s, at MIR on a pretty good day.

However, I seem to recall him telling me it went 7.10-7.15 in the 1/8 on small slicks.

With sticky tires you could run mid-11’s pretty easy with 500ft/lbs, 475hp..... Std corrected off the dyno...... in a 3700lb car at a track that’s less than 1000ft elevation, in “reasonable” air.

How much you lose with the bias plies will depend on how well you get that part sorted out.

“If it were me”, I’d pick up another intake if you don’t have one....... do a back to back test against the stock one on the chassis dyno.

To quote Rodney Carrington, "I feel like I’m sharing too much with you people" but, my car budget has taken a hit this year. Everything seems to snowball.

Last year, my Fiancé and I decided that we’re not going anywhere for awhile so; I said, fine, I’m building a garage addition.

I went from picture number 1 to picture number 2.

I’m not a pro at anything but, I hate to pay for anything I believe I’m capable of doing myself so; I did the siding work with the help of my future father in law. By myself, I redid all the trim with pvc composite. I ripped all the existing soffit down and redid all of it and finished the new section, added all new facial board and trim, I wired some new lights and fixed some electrical issues. I’ve done a lot of grading but, still have more and yard work to do in the fall. I also hauled in about 2 ton of asphalt millings to finish between the garage and the fence. I was responsible for removing all the excess dirt so; one load at a time, I’ve been shoveling it in my truck and driving it to friend’s properties and leveling their yards. I’ve taken 15 loads out; I have about 6 more. I plan on leveling my back yard with the remainder of the dirt.

I’ve been itching to tinker and work with the intake but, I don’t have a good work space set up so; hours of this work to place with the intake on the ground and me on my knees working.

After awhile, I got tired of that so; I channeled my inner Bob Vila and built a pro intake porting bench in the garage with scrape left over from the garage build.

Since my budget is blown, insulation and other work in the garage has not been completed so; I’m working in very comfortable temperatures.

Now I just need to channel my inner Dwayne Porter and get this intake knocked out.

I have a lot of that covered Dwayne. We're under 800ft elevation; the car weighs 3467 without me in it. The car made 42x ft/lbs on a chassis dyno but, I'm down on HP which I believe I can make up with a cam swap. I have the bone stock intake sitting on the numbers matching block stashed in a corner.

I put K&G CNC 906 heads on it last year but, I picked up valve train instability around 5600-5700 rpm whereas before, I went as high as 6300 with no sign of issues. The consensus on the board was the springs on the new heads are controlling the valves better. I have a XE comp cam in the thing and it seems to be a standard occurrence. I've really grown to hate the cam over the years; noisy, clattery piece. The cam is a little on the small side too with only 230’s duration at 50 and .480-.490 lift.

At the time of the head swap, I also put a dp4b on the car. I ran 12.48 last year on American Racer L60's.

The plan is to get the intake done, give you a call for a solid flat tappet cam, get a new converter and throw all this together with a FAST approved carb; I’m running a Holley right now.

There are just a lot of things contending for my money right now and I’m trying to catch up from the garage.

You’re probably already aware of it, but there’s a guy running in Supercar with a 451 in a 68RR....... and I don’t think he’s dipped into the 11’s yet..... but he’s knocking on the door(with legal tires). I think he’ll probably get it this fall.

He does a lot of his own work too.

I think he had some pics of his manifold posted somewhere.

Nice work on the garage

I believe I saw some pics and posts from that guy on FBBO. I'll have to look around to see if I can find any of his intake manifold pics.

Thanks for the kind words about the garage!

Can you mill the bottom of the intake out and hog away and then make an aluminum insert into the bottom? If they only look at the intake as installed, the door is wide open. I think you would need a flow bench to test every move. You could have hundreds of hours in an intake like that.

In FAST, anything along those lines would be legal........ as long as it looked stock once installed on the motor with the carb in place.

I think it’s real easy to reach the point of extremely diminishing returns when it comes to modifying the stock iron intakes, especially when you factor in that both sides of the motor(intake and exhaust) are pretty heavily restricted.

You could use something like a Performer RPM as the (unattainable) benchmark to gauge how well you’re doing with your efforts in modifying the stock piece.

I’d say the three increments to baseline would be:
- an unmodified stock intake
- a DP4B with some mild port matching and mild divider work
- the ootb RPM

With all other aspects of the car “correct”, this would give you an idea of how much ET is on the table.

If the RPM was only worth say .15 in the 1/4 mile over the untouched stock piece........ how much time and effort do you wan to invest in it?

I would think the mildly tweaked DP4B would be the best indication of what you could expect out of the reworked stock piece.

Attached is a pic of the one on Harry’s Bee.
He did the bulk of the work himself........ I pretty much just smoothed over the rough edges and did the port matching, and I didn’t go all that far inside the runners either.

I will say if I had one to do from scratch, I’d do the plenum a little differently....... whether that would actually be an improvement or not is a different story.

Oh, and working on an iron manifold with a carbide in a drill, while kneeling....... in 90deg heat???
N-F’n-W!!

I think we all understand that a 180° dual plane manifold cannot be made to flow as evenly across all of the ports as a single plane, that in addition to A > B comparisons there might be a significant different between the 4 fed by the left side of the carburetor and its plenum, and the 4 fed by the other, and that the highest flow to the best cylinder won't be comparable? I have more detail on this on my page here (I also ran this in "MoPar Action"): http://victorylibrary.com/mopar/intake-tech-c.htm#dp
I'm curious about something else: the actual cylinder pressure.
If the weakest cylinder has lower % VE, this means it will not be as "full" of mixture (same volume, lower mass) when the intake valve closes. The actual output of that cylinder will be lower.
The question: are any stock manifolds so bad that this may be a problem? It might show up as a colder plug in a weak cylinder.

[img]https://flic.kr/p/2gG9seA[/img]
[img]https://flic.kr/p/2gG9sio[/img]

[img]https://flic.kr/p/2gG9siU[/img]

Working on right now. Still a few days from completion but gives a good idea where it’s heading. This is for a 383 vid motor with under 10:1 compression.

Bill

Any other mods to that 383 to go along with the intake?

This belongs to the maroon 68 RR. I think he’s getting serious on a build. He got his trans done at Atwoods and had them put 4.10’s in. It’s a start. Having done a few of these now I’m seeing some things I’d like to try out for my intake over the winter. Also, I’ll be contacting you about a roller cam too. 👍🏽

Bill

I like that little lip you leave at the upper/lower plenum transition.

I don’t know if it helps or not, but I like the idea of it.

Could you run a 400 intake that had a TQ on it? Plenum might be much bigger

Intake has to be correct for the car it’s in. 68/69 383’s use the 301 intake.

Bill

Do you find that the upper or lower plane gets more flow?
More work on the more restrictive plane would be needed.

Bill

if you find a link to the guys 451 build can you post a link?

like you, i'm working on finishing up a garage...then planning to get to work on my slightly ratty 67 coronet. Not looking to do a FAST build but probably 70's street racer style (to an extent), might build a 451 for it so i'm always looking at those builds.

Basically, the 4 runners that have the sharpest turn coming out of the plenum flow the least...... the “inner” runners.
3,5,4,6.
I’d have to dig out my notes since I did that testing quite a while ago, but that’s how I remember it.
Not really much difference between upper and lower.

That’s tested as bolted to a ported head, and comparing how much flow is lost with the manifold in place(and it loses a bunch).

The overall best one I’ve tested was extensively modified by Jim Sieler for his Dart.
His motor was a very high effort build with several pretty high dollar parts in it....... and it made quite good power on the dyno.
He never quite got the car sorted out well enough to use all the power he had.
I’m sure if he would have stuck with it, there would have been some very low 11-sec ET’s...... and maybe even a “10” at MIR on a killer day.

He’s also a fun guy to have around at the track....... wish he was still playing in those classes.


It’s roadrunner2’s motor, in his car.

Edit: this is why it’s best not to go by memory.......
On a mildly reworked 301, all the ports lost about 20-21% compared to the head by itself(about 50cfm).
It looks like the % of loss is within about 1% for all runners, on one that has what I would consider a “normal” amount of rework.
At that level of rework, on a head that flows solidly over 280cfm, its about an 18cfm improvement avg for all 8 runners over the untouched manifold.

Jim’s intake averaged 13cfm better than the one with the “normal” rework, although some of his ports flowed over 30cfm better than the same runner on the one with normal porting.
What brought the average down was there were two runners that showed minimal improvement at all over the stock intake.
Runners #1 and #7.

To put it in perspective, the 8cyl flow average for the head with a radius plate was 286.7cfm.

The intake was tested bolted to the head with all ports blocked off except the one being tested, and a Holley 1000cfm 4150 carb mounted to the carb pad.

The 8cyl flow average for the stock manifold was 212.8cfm.

The 8cyl flow average for the normally ported manifold was 230.7cfm.

The 8cyl flow average for an ootb Performer RPM was 250.6cfm.

If Jim could have picked up #1 and #7 about 15cfm..... the 8cyl flow average would have been right there with the RPM.

Some of the runners on a cleaned up Victor only lost a few cfm compared to the head with the radius plate.

Thanks Fast 68, that's is some great info!

That guy is me.

you have a thread on a forum with details? or i can send a PM, just curious about the build details and what the curve looks like...

Thanks. Would not have guessed it.

That’s exactly the info I wanted, thanks D.

Bill

I don’t really like porting intake manifolds, so I don’t do much of it.

One thing I found interesting when testing manifolds is that they “usually” result in some amount of loss in flow from the head, when attached....... even when they are capable of flowing way more than the head they’re attached to.

Years ago I was messing with some std port Indy SR heads. I got them to flow in the 340 range, and was testing some manifolds on them.
An M1 single plane with very minimal plenum deburring and a gasket match would flow a little over 300cfm when attached to the head.
Or rather, the head would flow a little over 300 with the manifold attached.

So, we know the intake is good for over 300....... and yet when you bolt it to an unported 906 head that only flows in the 230’s...... the head still loses flow.

On those 286cfm 906’s in my previous post, that same M1 intake that was passing 300+ cfm when on the SR’s, knocked the 8cyl avg down to 263cfm.

I enjoy doing intakes. I’ll probably have a collection of different one that all performed exactly the same, tho not for lack of trying. My guess, uneducated, is the longer combined runners carry more volume with more weight and inertia. Combined with adding turns and more drag along a longer surface. 🤔

Bill

I call intake porting my no brainer work and will grab one on an evening I’m into listening to some good music and sipping on an adult beverage. I know want I want to aim for so I lay it all out with blueing and go to town. I usually have a small or big block head with known flow numbers mounted on my flowbench so set up time is reduced.

I’m happy to let you guys get aaaaaaaallll the manifold porting........ especially the stock iron ones.

My suspicion is that most of what’s been done with these 301 intakes would end up making similar power(with the exception of the JS piece).
Unless you happen to come up with something substantially better, I think it might be pretty hard to quantify the differences when the measuring tool is a 3500lb car running on tires with limited traction....... in different weather conditions....... at different tracks.
And let’s not forget the restrictive exhaust manifolds added to the mix.

Some little tweak that could be worth 3-5hp just gets lost in all the variables.

That was awesome

I remember you telling me that at some point in the past. I guess the advantage for my doing an intake is I haven't managed to eff up the SSR or screw up a valve seat when doing an intake manifold.

So just an update and a little info about what is possible with the stock intake and exhaust manifolds.
I’m replacing the 10:1 451 talked about earlier in the tread. That engine did push my 68 Road Runner to an 11.63 @ 119.
The new engine is a 499” with 14:1 compression the same heads intake carb and ignition from my 451. Cam is a moderate solid roller designed by Dwayne Porter. Intake is extensively worked with the sharp turns removed and rounded. In legal form on the dyno including air cleaner but no alternator or mufflers pulled over 560 hp and over 570 ft lbs. testing spacers, carbs and other stuff I don’t want to talk about power and torque were much better. Bottom line is 600+ hp is available through the factory iron if you do it right.

Bill

Like the Hemi Vanke intake hat I’m looking to do now, pretty much cut out the same way

This where you should be looking. AFR's between cylinders can vary greatly and there is a reason factory carbs came with booster tangs to improve distribution. Something to think about:

DC 34 Bulletin tech archives

Look at the booster mods for for Holley on page 20.

Have fun.

So, you’re saying you saw 600+hp on the dyno while still using the reworked stock intake manifold and exhaust manifolds on the motor?

But... dual plane cylinder-to-cylinder (and bank-to-bank) distribution changes more than other designs:
1. with RPM
2. with engine vacuum

Working to correct runners WOT at peak may give a big flat spot somewhere, fuel drop-out, black & white plugs.

harder than it looks.

I heard Brzezinski did good work on dual plane iron manifolds: https://tinyurl.com/y7xvcsas

In other words, it's a fairly decent running 383

First thing I thought about that plain Jane 66 Malibo BIG cubes, 600+

Hope the new engine pays dividends. Probably not going to be as easy to hook as the old engine. Keep us updated.

Well, a little slower than what I'd like but, I've been progressing too.

The intake I was working on, that I mentioned in this thread, is about done. I had everything finished other than the port match. I Dykam'd it up, bolted it on and wouldn't you know it, it cracked up one of the ports when I bolted it on. I finished the port match on that port and took it to a guy that has been cast iron welding since 1972 and he said no problem. The intake has been welded for a few weeks and I plan to go pick it up on Thursday.

Like roadrunner2, I too called Dwayne for a custom ground cam but, mine is a solid flat tappet.

I took the heads back to K&G to be set up for the new cam, they are ready and I'll pick those up on Thursday too.

Hope to have the engine back together in the next month or so.

If everything goes as planned, I plan on breaking the new cam in on an engine dyno and making some pulls.

With the info roadrunner2 provided, it will be interesting to see the differences between a pretty mild combo like mine and what he has. Mine's 470 inches, only around 9.35:1 and again, a solid flat tappet. Everything else should be comparable; well, probably not the intake, sounds like some major voodoo going on there.

Nice thread GUYS!

Loving all the stock talk, just like in the 60' lol...

We have a Superstock class in the UK thats pretty free thinking...

Gonna run my 440 71 GTX with a sixpack iron manifold, originally a iron 4bbl with a Thermoquad.
I know its cheating but I'm up against guys with 572 KB hemi's with twin dominators...
(Yep they call that Superstock over here)

Just as expected

Any updates on your build this year?

Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, when I took the old cam out, I found 2 cam bearings that were trashed; 1 looked like it could have spun at any point.

I took the short block to the machine shop for a freshen up, where it has sat the whole year. I talked to the shop owner in September and he said he'd call me in October to discuss a game plan; I haven't heard from him and really need to call to check in.

The shop owner has other business ventures and some areas of his businesses were crippled this year by all the Covid fall out. To be clear, I'm not upset with him at all, it's happened to so many.

I've been busy with a kitchen remodel and other house updates, so; I've not been too worried about it because I've got so many other things that are consuming my time right now. I'm starting to itch to get the engine stuff all taken care of though.

Minus any new bearings or rings, I have everything to put it back together, so; I would assume that once the machine work is done, it should be relatively quick.

What was your fastest time with the new setup this year?

I ran the old motor again this year (451” 10:1). It did improve to an 11.51 @ 119.78 besting all the 383builds before it. New motor spun a bearing on its first outing. Culprit was loose lifter galleys and a too inattentive driver. Once it got warm the oil pressure went down the drain. Maybe I’ll get it out next year, maybe I’ll work on putting the little motor into the 11.20s.

Bill

Congrats on the 11.51 Bill

Nice job!!

I second Dwayne, congrats on that time!

That's really impressive for what your combination is.

Thanks guys. I’ve worked hard on this car. Had to as I’m mentally unable to work smart. Ram a bunch of 11.5 ET at the FAST race at MIR but couldn’t get a decent 60’. Replaced the rear shocks and am heading to Cecil county on the 20th to see it I can put a complete run together.

that's awesome. good job and great looking car there!!

Bringing it back from the dead.

Some serious "life got in the way" stuff happened but, I got a call last night. The engine is on the dyno, some pulls and tunning have occurred. So far, 460hp and 505 ft lbs is where it's at. I was told that it's pretty dialed in but, some more might be had with some final tweaks. Sounds like things might change a few numbers but, it's pretty close to being where it's going to be.

To reiterate/clarify, this is a 470 with 9.35:1 compression, a solid flat tappet that Dwayne spec'd for me (mid .500 lift and 250ish duration at .050), stock intake that I ported, K&G CNC ported 906's, etc. Everything is in FAST legal form, other than the dyno headers on it. So, probably knock around 25hp off of it when I throw the exhaust manifolds on when it goes in the car.

It's not set in stone but, final tweaks on the dyno may occur tomorrow. If so, I'll load it up and bring it home.

I'll post the final results when I know them.

She's at home in the garage.

Made 3-4 pulls this morning. The dyno operator had everything sorted before I got there.

It made 460hp @ 5500 & 508ftlbs @ 4200.

35 degrees of timing was the sweet spot. Run on 93 pump gas from the local pump.

I'm pretty happy with it but, did expect just a little more hp. Guess you can't expect too much with a boat anchor intake.

Hey, it’s running, and no holes in the pan....... that’s a win.

High compression is a staple of many of the better running FAST combos.
Was the intent to always have it end up that low?

Dwayne, the engine was originally built, on a budget, to be street able piece that runs on pump gas and sees the track on occasion. I kind of got interested in the FAST class after everything was bought and paid for.

I want the car to remain pump gas friendly and something that I can just get in a drive 2-3 hours if I want to. I don't know if I will ever get more serious with the combo, maybe someday.

Very cool. It will be great to see what it runs.

Making over 400 hp with that intake, exhaust, running on pump gas is no small feat, IMO

How high did they take it on the dyno?

I saw 6100-6200 on a few of the pulls I saw.

For the pull that made 460hp

5500 - 460.4
5600 - 460.3
5700 - 459
5800 - 455.8
5900 - 450.6
6000 - 447.4

The reason I asked about whether or not the 9.35:1 was the original CR target is........ it seems like the cam duration might be a tad long for only 9.35:1.

With the restricted intake and exhaust, combined with the modest CR, the running dynamic CR starts to taper off pretty quickly once the limited airflow really starts kicking in.

Sometimes running a little less duration will spike up the peak TQ numbers, and if the shape of the curve after peak(same drop in tq/rpm) is maintained, it can yield a higher peak hp number.

I refer to that as, “start high......end high”.
It’s usually only applicable to the types of builds that peak pretty early and make more tq than hp....... which are basically always airflow limited in someway or another.

Those are good numbers for a streetable combo. With a sorted chassis and practice that will get you into the 11s.

Bill

Dwayne, the compression ratio is the original target.

If I'm understanding you correctly, if the cam had a little less duration, it would potentially pick up peak torque and HP and carry the gains for a little longer? Would that be less duration on both intake and exhaust? How many degrees smaller are we thinking? How much of a gain are we thinking? Also, I know this is all a guess, but what are your general thoughts? I appreciate your input and always like the opportunity to learn.

Thanks, Bill!

What are the plans for the new engine, have you been working on it at all after the issues?

Finally have all the parts for rebuilding it. It should be on track before the snow flies.

Bill

Not exactly......... and without testing you wouldn’t know for sure.
And since the intent is to run it with ex manifolds, it would need to be tested that way.

What I’m saying is........ a shorter duration cam “might” make a higher peak tq number.
“If” that happened, and the fall off after peak tq was the same drop in tq/rpm as the current cam, for enough rpm after peaking........ it could end up making more hp.
But.... We’re not talking big changes here.
And I’m not really advocating you change anything........ I’m more just “thinking out loud”.
Again, the test would only be valid if you used the ex manifolds.
Trying to do R&D for an ex manifold combo........ by testing with headers...... is pointless.

Thanks for clarifying!

I was bummed we didn't get to test it with the manifolds. We'll just have to see what it does at the track.

Just took it out on its maiden voyage. Put down an 11.28 and 11.21 both at 121.5. I’m pretty happy with that being the starting point for this build. Air was good but there was a head wind.

Bill

Nice job!!

Did it go back on the dyno?

That's awesome, way to go!

I fired mine up in the car on Friday night. I proceeded to work on the carb most of Saturday and got it about right where I want it at WOT, maybe just a touch more fuel is needed. I'd like to get the idle AFR down a little and I have one spot of the throttle at cruise RPM where it's running lean. It's really close.

I noticed my brakes were a little weird a few times when I was out but, would then be fine the next time I stepped on them, I thought "I need to look at those soon". Fired it up after cool down to pull in the garage, put it in drive and I have no brakes. I'd opened my fence to pull back behind my house but, planned on stopping, closing the gate and opening the garage door. The garage door was not open yet. I acted quickly and swung the car right between my garage and a tree, through some gravel, over my man door walkway, into my back yard and was able to slow down enough to slam it in park. I didn't hit anything and was lucky; maybe I needed to change my shorts but, everything else is okay. Pumped the brakes again and they were back. I backed out of my back yard back onto the driveway, opened the garage and almost began to pull it in but, decided to shut it off and push it in.

Pulled all the drums off yesterday, inspected everything and could find nothing wrong or leaking. The fluid was bad and the front bowl on the MC was almost empty, so; I sucked the fluid out of the MC, filled it up and started to bleed the brakes. The pedal was really good and then, all of the sudden, here and there, the pedal would just go to the floor easy. My wife was pumping and was yelling at me, "you're not getting the bleeder tight enough". I would tighten it some more and we'd be good and then, poof, we're not good again. I came to the front of the car and everything was fine, pedal was great and then all of the sudden, bang, it goes to the floor again and you can hear a slight leaking air sound. It would happen every 10-15 pumps. I got in the car and pumped the crap out of them, and everything felt great and then, bang, it goes to the floor and you hear the air sound again. [censored]!. I inspect everything again and this time, I see fluid on the back of the firewall leaking inside the car; it wasn't wet there at the beginning of the day. So, the MC is bad; I ordered a new one last night. It did what it did infrequently when I was driving it; I assume a seal is compromised but, just not all the way gone yet.

Could have been real bad if this had happened during the testing of the day.

The car has been in my family since 99, I have not once used the emergency brake, can't remember if my Dad ever used it, and have no idea if it's operational. It's probably time to see if it works. Hindsight, I'm glad I didn't try it because if it's not operational, the time I spent trying it would have probably been enough that I would have crashed into the door, most likely gone through it or pushed it off the tracks and into my truck, which is about 2 feet from my Wife's Mustang right now, so; it may have taken damage too.

No. Built it identical to the old one.

Bill

Wow. That’s crazy. In the end lucky won out and you lived to fight another day.

Bill

Curious , why wasn't the testing done solely with the exh manifolds?

Bill do you have a picture of what was stamped on the ID pad of that block? Chrysler did some goofy stuff saving blocks and had oversize lifters to fit in oversize bores, the 400 block we used for enginemasters had some odd scuffing of the lifters before we had the block bushed if I'm remembering right ..

The engine builder and dyno operator wanted to monitor EGT's and the dyno headers were set up for that. Things really didn't go as planned with the dyno, I felt like I was kind of at the owner's mercy on when we could get the engine in. I did think about bringing the maniflods and head pipes with me to make a few pulls with them but, I knew he had other things going on that day and just didn't bring them or ask if we could switch things over.

I will check. But that block was decked severely and was probably erased.

Bill

Not a big deal , mostly curiosity , I don't think I've seen one yet that was marked for the oversize lifters.