pparaska

I think a "Ultra-Finish Plateau Soft Hone", Goodson catalog pg 94 and good moly rings are another way to go for a good ring seal (assuming it was honed with deck plates). Also, Total Seal has QuickSeat dry powder that is supposed to get a better seal on the rings. I'm trying this on my 400.

Another option: G-Force T-5. Lighter than a T-56 and Tremec TKO, shifts great, can handle "600hp and 500lb-ft" Can get a complete one, of have one rebuilt. I have one, it's not in the car yet. http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=99499 http://www.g-forcetransmissions.com/tran_gt-5.asp

I have a ton of money in my Z. I have a Hagerty Policy on it for $40K - AGREED value. They WILL pay that if it's totalled, stolen, etc. They have an excellent rep for paying up. In fact, they gladly handled the case even though GEICO admitted all fault when their insured rear ended my Z - and cut me a check for the total amount that the body shop quoted and subsequently had to adjust - without batting an eye. Of course, they then went to GEICO and got it out of them. Saved me tons of headaches!!!! I think the fact that these cars ARE so old and that some of us put lots of money in them - making them 10 or 20 times what the NADA book might say they are worth is all the MORE reason you should NOT discount an AGREED value policy. And for all the reasons people above spoke of - a STATED VALUE policy is of dubious value for these cars - you are at the mercy of the adjuster and company as to whether they will pay anything like the STATED value of the car. Either go AGREED value if you have more money than you'd be willing to lose by taking a low NADA price for the car if something happens, or get and standard policy if you can swallow that risk. And I wouldn't give GEICO one penny of my money - there are other companies like Erie that give great rates and pay up and have a great rep, yet they don't give the police LIDAR and RADAR guns to bring peoples rates up with.... As for the original question, you might be best off getting a real beater to drive around in some of the time, insure that with a cheap rate through a regular company, and then go to one of the specialty car insurers to insure your now "pleasure use" Z.

Mike, I did't THINK that you would go for anyone having rights to the data. I was worried when the article was mentioned. An article would be great! But not if they said that we couldn't post it here, after a few months or something to keep sales of the mag up.

Well, old, worn MSD 8.5s were probably the reason I always had a noisy rpm signal, etc. with my Megasquirt. Thanks for the tips, BRAAP and Grumpyvette.

Welcome to the site! Tough one. I like to build it myself. But if you buy, you get at least some of the work and parts you need with the deal, and it could speed things up, even if you pull the engine and trans and install another. Try searching for key words to this question - it will not be easy to separate the wheat from the chaff for this search, but you are by far the first to ask it. Good luck!

Compared to the work involved with cutting out the floor where the subframe connectors go, making up the 2x3" subframe connectors on my site, and adding gussets like I show to the engine frame rails and T/C buckets, how much LESS work is it to install the BD subframe connectors?

On the testing you did on the headlight covers, did you test them sealed well to the body, or leave a gap around the edge? Some of the ones I've seen come with a gasket, but it doesn't seal perfectly, since water collects on the headlight nacelle in front of the headlight.

rudypoochris, those are R160's I assume?

Retro body kit - I like it. Looks great with the G-nose and that paint, IMO!

As has been pointed out, visible light is not needed to transfer heat through radiation. Photons transmit across distances (no atmosphere needed, obviously - or else the sun would not warm the earth) at many different wavelengths, only a tiny portion of which is visible (~0.4 to ~0.7 microns wavelength). The electromagnetic spectrum is huge. If it weren't, the Standard Missile 3 (SM-3) that launched from the USS Lake Erie the other day would not have slammed into it's target, another missile, 100+km above the earth's surface. The SM-3 uses an infrared seeker at it's tip to look for warm things against a very cold sky. Infrared is a longer wavelength than visible light - you can't see the photons that vibrate at those frequencies (have wavelengths >0.7 and up to about 350 microns) - but basically most radiative heat transfer happens due to those photons. There are coatings that are black yet have a VERY low emissivity, like 0.15 or so. An emissivity of close to 1.0 is what most natural substances have. It's not that simple though. Texture, chemistry and other things make it not so simple as to say one color is that much better than another. Techline coatings has different coatings for the bottom and top of the intake manifold. There is more to these than just emmisivity if I recall correctly

Cool. My hat is off to you guys!

Way to go, guys! I need to go check out the photos thread this evening!

I found a very slightly used (like it was put on an engine and run a few hours) 0-80511 HP series 830 DP with annular boosters, $425 shipped. It was taken apart and non-stick gaskets put on, inspected, put on the engine and run a few times in the garage. Then the guy got a 950 HP vac sec carb that he would be a better match to his 454 Chevelle race car, so the 830 is just sitting. Now for some additional real-world input to my carb sizing question: I was talking to a well know racer yesterday at the Burtonsville, MD shopping center cruise-in. This guy has been at this for nearly 30 years and has always had one of the fastest street cars in Maryland. I gave him the specs on the engine, and he said he would use (tada) an 830HP with annular boosters! He asked what the heads were, how they flowed, compression, cam, intake, displacement, gears, weight, tire size. That's about the 5th person whose told me the 830 will be fine, based on their experience with the 830HP annular carb on engines of this displacement, etc. Pretty wild that he suggested just the carb I had a line on! BTW, he runs a 69 Camaro with a 447 ci SBC that has engine-dynoed right at 800 HP, or 1340 HP on the 3 stages of Nitrous. !!!! I didn't even ask what it ran in the 1/4. I also spoke with a crew chief and engine builder for several fastest street car competition teams, one of his past efforts won the competition in recent years. He has 30 years of experience in building competitive racing and hot street/strip engines professionally, Cobras, etc. So I tend to trust his judgement. He feels that the 830HP annular may not have quite as crisp a throttle response as a 750, but would work well on my combination and need little if any tuning beyond jets, idle mixture and speed screws, and possibly squirter size. I am capable of handling that but can call on his expertise if needed since he is local. He felt confident that it was not too much carb. In fact he pointed out that the annular boosters, due to reducing the WOT flow over downleg boosters, would possible steal a few HP. He felt that for my purposes it was a fair trade as the mixture quality from the annular boosters would help part-trottle distribution over the downlegs. I certainly will be using it in a part throttle mode most of the time! The last 5 HP aren't important to me, but the last 20 or more are. So I suppose my mind is made up to go for the 0-80511 830HP with annulars, especially since the seller is willing to take it back if it doesn't work out, and is selling it for what I feel is a reasonable sum. Part of the equation is price. $425 for a basically new 0-80511 is not a bad deal to be able to get into an HP carb. If it's close to optimal and tunable without a bunch of machining, etc, then I am ready to go with it. I also have a good assortment of tuning parts for Holleys, and that figures in as well. I plan to use my Innovative LC-1 WBO2 sensor to optimize the circuits for idle, cruise, acceleration. What I'm looking for is a decent place to start with carb selection that may not be the OPTIMAL carb (tough to say what that is with a tri-purpose car!) that is tunable and affordable. Now for the geeky stuff: I hate reading nomograms! So I took the one on the second page of this Holley document on carb selection (for sizing mechanical secondary Holleys): http://holley.com/data/TechService/Tech nical/Selec... ...and fit a second order polynomial to the inputs (minimum WOT rpm and displacement in cubic inches): cfm = 0.000886*WOTrpm*disp + 0.000159*disp^2 + 0.0000066*WOTrpm^2 - 0.345*disp - 0.0554*WOTrpm + 439 Checking it against that nomogram, it seems to reproduce the results of drawing a line across from WOTrpm through disp to find the cfm needed, within +/- 6 cfm, when I checked it against the 10 data pairs I used to read off the graph and then check it. It all really hinges on how closely you read that graph to come up with the input data, and how accurate the data they used to make the graph with actually was. I used a graph that I tweaked to exactly match each of the 3 axes of the original graph, zoomed in to very precisely read the data off of lines I drew from several WOTrpm/displacemt pairs over to the cfm axes, as well as one graph for each axes to find the non-linear formula for each of those. Like I said, I geeked out. Here's a spreadsheet I made up to do the calcuations: http://alteredz.com/tools/HolleyMechSecSizing.xls All of my work is shown on the calcs sheet, if you want to check my math Just put the WOTrpm (minimum rpm for WOT use) and displacement (in cubic inches) in the yellow boxes and the answer appears in the magenta cell to the right of those. Watch out, we have no idea how accurate the data in that original graph is! Also, they make no mention of whether the type of boosters are, the throttle plate size, or the venturi size. I believe all of these play in the selection. Also, note that Holley and BG may have a name for a carb based on a cfm number but the total cfm they flow can largely differ. BG's 650 DP Mighty Demon flows 830 according to them, so if you pull 830 off of that graph, you'd want a 650 Mighty Demon! Anyway, for minimum WOT rpm of 1500 and my engines 407ci displacement, I get an answer of 798cfm. So an 830 might be a touch big . Or not. (See discussion above). For a 355 at 1500, it's 740cfm. So that's where I am - kind of sold that an 830 HP with annular boosters will work well for my application, but with the ability to sell it back to the guy for the same money if it doesn't work. I'd then probably go to a 750 HP.

Some of us think even brand loyalty, or even country-of-origin loyalty is NOT fine. That's why we keep these parts of arguments out of the posts on HybridZ (if we are following the rules, anyway). It's all tech here, no purist whining, Chevy vs Ford, etc. We speak from facts, and if we don't have the facts correct, we welcome others correcting us so we can all learn. Funny you mention the side oiler 427 Cobra. My neighbor has a REPLICA 427 center oiler Cobra, and refused to put Japanese branded (Toyo or Nitto) tires on it since it was a (copy of an) American Icon. So he spent twice as much for tires of equal performance and quality that were an American brand. Same guy has HD motorcycles and makes sure all the parts he BUYS for it are made in the US. This is fine, it's his money and his choice. And sometimes we make choices based on things other than what is technically adequate, best, or the best financial deal.

6" rods. Not only is the rod angularity lessened, improving piston ring seal, etc. but the pistons will be lighter too. Probe makes a 383 piston for a 6" rod that has no ring supports, since it uses a tight, high ring package. Granted, the oil ring is 1/8", but still has good control, from my experience with this design in a 400. Either 6" or step down to the 5.7" 350 rod. The angulartiy will be higher, piston heavier, but not horrible. I'd stay away from the 5.565" 400 rod though, for all the reasons above.

Cubes are so easy to make torque and power with. I don't care what kind of drivetrain it is - if it fits well, is cheap, and doesn't put too much weight on the front end, I love it. The 440 swap is too cool! BRAAP, last November during an discussion with my x2b about me wanting to buy a used 3 series 4dr BMW for $17K (she said it was a sports car and not practical), it got a bit heated and my x2b told me pack my bags. I did.

John, I agree - it needs more cam - maybe when the money for that falls out of the tree! Seriously though, the engine was very mild with that cam (Cam Motion Tight Lash Soild Roller, 244/249 @ .050", 274/279 @ .020", 0.577/0.570" lift (1.5:1), 112 LSA, using 1.52:1 rockers). I was surprised. The 331 (.030" over 327), with almost identical .020" duration, a lot less lift (.510/.501) and 236/244 @.050 and different heads (could have been part of it) was almost unstreetable. 75 more cubic inches in the 406, along with 53 degrees overlap at .020" versus 57 for the roller in the 406, and the 406 was just a ton milder. IT NEEDS MORE CAM!!! LOL NOt really sure - I think all it really needs is a tighter LSA, like about 105 or 106 LSA I agree that if you are hitting 7000 at the end of a straight, then the power peak could be a few hundred rpm less than 6700, and the area under the torque curve would be probably greater with less cam (less duration, less overlap, etc.). Ever thought about using Vizards "chose an appropriate LSA and overlap, then let the duration fall where it may" method of cam selection? Wow, I took my own thread off-topic! LOL

Found the following thread on Chevytalk.org. Interesting. http://www.chevytalk.org/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/156966 The thing I found most interesting and gratifying is this link in that thread: http://www.mid-lift.com/intro-mid-lift.htm I have thought for a while that the whole "the witness mark from the rocker must be exactly centered on the valve tip" was not correct. I had thought that what was really important was to have the smallest travel of the rocker across the valve tip. Seems Miller agrees. I mean, you need to have the roller NEAR the center so that you don't get close to the edge and peen over the valve tip, run off the edge, etc., but being exactly in the center is not the "Best" thing, IMO. To bad I don't have a spare 8 or 900 bucks sitting around for those neat rockers! LOL

Interesting, thanks, John. I have 52 cubes more engine, and a bit milder cam. Big difference is the Victor JR, which I MIGHT replace with an air gap, but probably not unless I find one cheap (I know, not likely!) So I'm thinking this 830DP annular may work. Thanks, John!

Cool. I found the 15lb "up through 1985" flywheel under part number 6515 for the same exact price (59.99 + 145.00 core charge). Mine is maybe not so hot looking and I may just take it in as a core and get a new one! http://autozone.com/R,APP1099301/vehicleId,1144203/initialAction,partProductDetail/store,2821/partType,00906/shopping/partProductDetail.htm

"I don't except your version of reality and chose to substitute my own."

Look above the door catch in the 3rd photo. The jamb looks to be rusty where I've never seen it before. And to have the door strike that rusty on the inside, I'm wondering what the rest of the metal looks like INSIDE. The problem with these old Zs is that the inside of the rockers, engine frame rails, etc. just has a light zinc coating that goes away pretty quickly if kept in a humid envirnoment. That's what I would expect the environment that Z must have been in for a while for the inside of that strike to get rusted like that. Just a red flag that would make me want to REALLY go over this car carefully with an eye for hidden rust (from the inside out. Check the engine compartment frame rails very closely, the floor stiffeners (frame rails), rockers, etc.

Definitely could be that I hosed something up. I had a bunch of trouble with the process. After etching the tank, it flash rusted. That could have been the problem.

Hey John, how happy are you with the throttle response with the HP830 annular? The ability to get a clean idle? Transition circuit action? Thanks, Pete