Out with the old.

This is my little update change over. 496 rb quickest run was 10.94 but want to go a bit quicker. So with a deal from an awesome person in a man called Tom aka camastomcat we struck a deal for one of his predator motors to go into my 70 Cuda street car. Its been a bit of a challenge here and there but its getting close to driveable.

The new one.

That should pick it up a little bit! Nice setup!

It should do, gone up to 598" hope it may crack an 8 eventually.

I remember Tom telling me he had sold one to a guy in Australlia. IM sure it will be a big step up from what you had for sure

Yes it's going to be a big learning curve that's for sure. A big shout out to Tom as well for a man i never met he bent over backwards for me on this deal just from phone calls and emails. When we meet up one day i will be buying the beers.

That is awesome.....I love those engines. And look at all the room around it in there....What kind of power are you expecting out of it, and what compression?

Al, Is this Utah Toms Predator motor?

Dragula, i moved the engine to the center to free up some room on the passenger side for the headers but they are very tall. I have a 4" reverse cowl and the top of the carb sit's level with the top of it. Compression is 14.3 to 1 will be using E85. Cab it was Tom's alloy block engine.

Still on stock front ? I'd be interested to see where the headers go, been wondering about these heads myself.

What I did with my engine plate was to better center my engine like you did.....I think I moved it over an inch to the drivers side......Then, because I had a Magnum force setup in the car, I lowered it as far as I possibly could. Literally, the oil filter spin on plate, I ground the bottom lip off it, and it basically touches the k-member....That allowed as much room as possible around the engine and heads, and hood clearance for the carb.....

Tig, stock front suspension K member just had to cut the driver side engine mount down to allow for the oil pump. Moving the motor to the center freed up a lot of room on the passenger side. We will try 2 1/8 primarys into 2 1/4 into 4" collector and see how it goes. An after market front end would be nice but the cost held that back for now.

One look at that intake and nobody is going to want to race you anymore! That engine looks serious. I see you used one of my engine plates so thanks for the business.

Yes Andy one of your plates but i did modify it a little to move it over. Getting the exhuast done in a couple of weeks then to the auto electrician and then hub dyno. Hopefully making some noise by the end of next month.

Looking good .
Running Willowbank ?

Tex

Willowbank and Warwick Tex.

Neat

Tex

We managed to get 2 1/4 in to work with stock suspension and stock engine position in our ebody. Though we did have to cut away the D/S engine mount on the K frame to clear the dual line oiling system. Works with 385cc 572-13 heads and 600 -13 X heads. We recently fitted a QA1 crossmember after a big wheelstand cracked the stock one, it didn't put the suspension back in the same place and the headers fouled on stuff they never used to, BUT the geometery is WAY better. Just something to be aware of when you start hammering on some $2K custom stainless headers, DAMHIK
BTW we have to run stock style suspension in one of the classes we run in over here, otherwise we'd do away with the torsion bars.

It should make some serious #'s on the hub dyno.

Racerx it should make some good numbers it was on the dyno when built and ran some nice number without being pushed real hard. It has been detuned a bit from how Tom had it in his dragster so i can run some street duties. Tig the class i'll be looking at running doesn't require stock stuff but it would be easier the for the header builder if the steering box and torsion bars weren't there but he will have to make them fit

Got an update. Motor is in, headers and full exhuast done. Had it on a hub dyno and had lean issues with the 1050 we had converted to E85 seems we couldn't get to run rich enough so we got a new billet 1250 from APD speced to the motor. It didn't work out really right so with another conversation with APD we got it sorted. 900 hp to the hubs on E85 through full 4" exhuast system with an x pipe to th er back bumper.

Yeah I can imagine that a single carb which feeds 1000 hp worth of E85 isn't going to be off the shelf! I'm surprised you even found a single carb that was up to the task. The needle and seats must be the size of a garden hose. Surprised you didn't go with EFI. High pressure fuel injection would make it easier to feed that much fuel.

I did think of injection but went carb way. Quite a bit of playing with the new carb to get it right. Couldn't get it to run without being lean. Kept putting fuel into it and still with 178 jets in the front and 198 in the back and still couldn't get it under 13.6 afr's. We looked at the fuel pump thinking it wasn't keeping up but did couple of different tests and that wasn't it. Put the pressure at the regulator up to 12 psi from 6 and that actually helped but not enough. Took the info back APD and they said convert it over to a 3 circuit and that fixed it, dropped the jets right down and could get the afr's a lot better but it doesn't like being too rich drops a bunch of power.

Any pic's of the said street car?

Those aren't jets..............those are pipe fittings.
YOWZA !!

The air cleaner is out the top now

Nice ride

Looking forward to a track report.

Nice ride. Can't even imagine jumping through hoops to get this type of build done in Australia. Very impressive.
Doug

Sweet ride ride man And to think 900 horses to the hub Wow.

Thanks everyone for their comments on the car. Getting the engine built and over here was pretty easy especially with Tom the original owner was awesome to deal with and did a lot of leg work to get the deal done. Next steps will be to get it teched then to the track.

Yeah a three circuit will dump fuel in like a fire hose. Okay for drag racing but you'll never want to drive on the street at part throttle with a three circuit! The engine will flood big time.

Top job fella Looks the dogs mate Got any pics of the engine bay / headers ?

Beautiful car and engine! I'll be looking forward to the track results.
Wow, dream build.

.

Is this car caged?

Wow Tig, this is the first I have seen of this thread! I've been feeling like kind of an outcast here since I went with brand X. Your installation looks bad a$$ and I am sure you will get into the 8's with some chassis tuning. I would love to come visit and watch you smoke the competition. That wasn't my fastest Predator, but it was the best. I must say, it looks happy in the Cuda. I always wanted one of those! Keep us posted.

Could not of got this far without your help Camastomcat. Yes it does have a cage that cert to 8.0. I think i have to the power to run in the high 8's but will take a bit of work with leaf springs and 275 radials but thats how i want to do it.

Cool Good Luck

Are you trying to take the Cuda out this weekend Tig?

I took the car out Sunday arvo for a cruise and had cooling issues, but i do only have 2 x 10" fans so I'll try 2 x 12" fans and try them. I"ll be a few weeks off getting it to the track due to work commitments

If you don't mind trimming the folded over edges off the frame where the radiator resides, and welding the seem back up, I will give you the part # of the biggest rad that will fit in there and the fans. I managed to get my iron block 605 Hemi to cool on the street finally.

Your really going to try and hook all that motor on 275's?

Make sure you aren't moving too much water. Sometimes you need to reduce the water flow to allow the radiator to cool.

That is a myth

I will give the bigger fans and a modified alloy shroud a go first and see what happens if that doesn't work i will check into bigger radiator. Yeah i reckon i can get it down with 275's just going to take some planning.

I couldn't get a small block Cuda to hook on those. Got flagged for going thru the traps side ways...

Some guys go fast on a Redline Bias Ply street tire, and some can't get a 14x32 to work (myself included). It's all about power management.

So your comment is based on what facts?

I can site more sources but this has a lot of good info and probably the best explanation I have read. Scroll way down to "myths"


http://www.billavista.com/tech/Articles/Cooling_Bible/index.html

Old wives tales die hard.....

Not really sure what they know or don't know. All I can say is I have been drag racing competitively for 35 years. I have had many cooling problems in the past. Why do you suppose modern passenger cars have thermostats, for looks? They restrict flow until the desired engine comes up to temperature and then open to half of the flow that they would have if it was removed. Try taking it out sometime. Do it on your racecar preferably. See what happens. I have restricted flow on every one of my race engines ever since I took my thermostat out to help my overheating problems. I have an 1180 HP dragster that I am able to hot lap because the water flow is restricted, and it has a 21"X17" 2 core radiator. I turn the fan on at the end of the run and the temp goes from 195* in the heat to 170* by the time I get to my trailer. That's all I am saying so Tig might want to try that if the fans doesn't get it done. It works for me so take it for what free information is worth. I personally think your wives tale, is a wives tale.

It's clear you didn't bother to read what I linked which makes me wonder, why ask the question if you aren't willing to learn the answer?

You're drawing the wrong conclusions from your experience.

If you want to know the answer to your thermostat question, ask again in a manner that is not condescending.

Whether you need a thermostat or not, is really a matter of what you need to accomplish and the capability of your cooling system. If you need or want your engine to come up to a particular operating temperature as quickly as possible and stay at that fairly precise temp, (provided that you have a properly-sized and efficient heat exchanger (radiator)), you need a thermostat. That’s why all vehicles come with them as standard equipment. If your cooling system is not adequate to function properly with a thermostat (because they are a flow restrictor, even when fully open), or you need to operate at a temperature that is lower than what a typical thermostat is designed for, removing the thermostat might help you achieve your goal. You just lose the ability to control the coolant temperature (unless you’re using fan controls to control temp). If your cooling system is still not able to prevent an overheating condition after removing the thermostat, you need to improve the capacity/efficiency of the cooling system.

i agree with the above, but the best results will have the fan, thermostat, and/or the restrictor [or none] working together as a team to get the desired results one is after.