I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this but I was bored and started entertaining thoughts about the possibility of a Tomahawk on the street. It occurred to me that the torque potential of a 535 Tomahawk engine (Bore = Stroke = 4.40 in) would allow a builder to match the stock 70 GS455's 510 ft-lb @ 2800 rpm while making the top end a lot healthier. I found myself thinking of starting off with a TA Stage 2 Street Eliminator heads, an SP1 intake and a Hydraulic roller cam. Then a few questions came up: What sort of cam grind will allow me to maximize power while still exceeding 500 ft-lb @ 2800 rpm? How big should the primary tubes on my full length headers be? Would the standard sized TA Competition headers (primary tube diameter 2.0 in) be a good compromise or should I go for larger 2 1/8 Super Comps? How large should the exhaust pipes be? How much power might an engine like this produce? To be clear this isn't something I could see myself doing. At this time a healthy Buick 350 would be as much engine as I could handle. Still, I am an engineer and I'm curious. What do you think?
I don't think you need a Tomahawk to get there. This is the lower pull Dyno sheet from my 470 with an SP1 intake and 230* of intake duration.
Yea if that's all you want a 470 or 482 with the correct cam and compression will easily get you there
I think Larry is exactly right and he dyno'ed with warm air and cool oil. After your build being an Engineer you will be able to compare Tomahawk torque to your locomotive and give us the news since I have not been able to butt dyno mine yet. Your curiosity is similar to mine so I have been having Arizona Mike build me one similar to your hypothetical discription, it should run really well as he has been working on it for over a year and a half now, but wheel find out, someday. With an SP2, Stage 3 heads, a few more cubes and a TA 284-88R solid roller the computer models it at 675 lbft @ 2800 RPM and 728 lbft at 4500 RPM, you should be able to break some serious parts with that if you don't hit the rims first. Actuals like Royden Hardcastle's build exceed the models predictions, in some upside down Newton Meter OZ way, maybe it spins backwards down there or something. I put the models 3.5" calculated exhaust pipe diameter on my 540" Vette, works good, works even better cranking the radio knob all the way 'round to the right so you can almost still hear your tunes. Hope your still really bored so this reply doesnt effect you none, say hello to Pandora for me.
My Tomahawk build actually sounds similar, (535 CI, Stge 2 TR heads, SP2 intake, hydraulic roller cam), but mine will be around 9.5:1 compression with an Fr1 ProCharger. This is a street/strip engine and I am serious when I say it will be street driven. I'm anticipating in the 1100-1200 HP range with 10 pounds of boost. My goal is to have a legitimate 8 second street driven Buick.
You boosted guys.........LOL. Looking forward to seeing it Steve Yep its called "Upsidedownium" All jokes aside, your torque goal will be smashed with a Tomahawk! Ours makes 835ft/lb and you feel all of it. We run a small cam, a copy of the famed TA308s and it is really driveable. There are plenty of videos on our youtube channel that show this. Cheers
What's keeping a Tomahawk build to it's potential of 732 CI.? Lack of flow to the available heads that we have now? or the $$$ involved for a custom crank and pistons?
You would be building it and holding it back at the same time. If you’re building a TA block,your capabilities are way beyond a stock 455.
That requires the tall deck/raised cam block.. so at that point you throw the timing cover and oil pan out... and really have to do some serious fabrication. And who builds a Tomahawk and does not use a custom crank and pistons? That's a given, I have built a number of them now.. Short-block prices for a Tomahawk, start at 15K.. and that is less the oil $900 oil pan and $700 timing cover.. A nice option for racers and money is no object street car guys, but for most of us, not reality. JW
My 535 made (steel block w/fill and a girdle) Stage 2 street eliminator heads 12.8 to 1 made 848 hp at 6300 and 808 lbs of torque and we drove it on the street regularly.
LOL You know it. I cant seem to get the Catlin car down the street yet tho… LOL The teal Green 70 car has an F1X in its near future too.
If you happen to acquire a Tomahawk block,don’t sell yourself short by installing entry-level parts into it. For example: I have a Moldex crank in one of my stock-block builds,and it is an upgrade from a factory crank,but that is an entry-level crank. I would NOT put that into a higher-end build. I would get another Velasco crank,like one of my other engines has,or a Bryant,with hollow mains,extra counterweight,and some other bells and whistles. It’s all a plus.
This just proves my point.....for 99,%of us a moldex crank wouldn't be entertaining level, but the best we could swallow
And that’s fine. I just see a lot of misleading info out there where some people think that is the best that a certain part can get. It’s a domino effect. If I get this,then I will get this,then I will get this... I thought about this more than once lately. Since I am refreshing the stock-block engine,I could get a Tomahawk block for that,but I wouldn’t be happy with the result because it wouldn’t have the desired parts in it.
