Geez, you guys crack me up! Don't tell me you've all gone Purist on me! Better be careful, it's an extremely insidious disease and you don't even see it creeping up on you. Then one day as you sit contemplating your "hot rod" you discover that it's now possible to buy OEM tire air or factory original wiring harness smoke, and you want it! By then it's far too late to recover. Your only recourse is to sell every single item you possess that is even remotely connected with the disease and start over with a new pastime. Radical surgery is the only solution that has ever been known to work. Better nip it in the bud! Believe me it will only get worse. And just pray to the car gods that you aren't already too far gone for remediation to have any effect. Hey, we're all in this together, and we're pulling for you.p Jim
I am a Buick 350 racer. The thing I like about the 350Buick over other motor is this is the only engine that I know of that will leave the starting line from a 600 rpm dead idle with a q-jet and pull the front tires a foot in the air. Try that with a 350 chevy! Dan
this is one of my favo-RIGHT threads ! we are all here because we don't want to be at "v8chev.com" or where ever it is those guys go . different drummer for us - and this proves it . different ideas expressed = activity = progress . i kinda ditched the 455/nailhead direction for the car because : A - lighter motor , little more vehicle balance B - decent flowin stock heads with a little work C - bottom half of the motor is similar to the v6 which will take some abuse with minor mods D - lack of bolt on performance parts = chance to be creative and to do a little old school stock part modifications where needed . not that i wouldn't mind some bolt on parts ! plus had a few 300's/350's before - comfort level high . carry on . del
I would be really careful about putting down the 350. If you think about it, the 350 is exactly like the 231, with a couple exceptions. LONG stroke, and factory heads that have the potential to flow significantly more than the v6with the right porter. Now, if someone with some turbo and fab experience and some money were to put together a nice forged bottom end, and some turbo manifolds, there is no reason a streetable 9 second combination couldn't be put together. Look at Gessler's site; there are low 11 second v6 cars using the iron heads that flow, what, maybe 200 cfm on the intake? The V8 heads will go to 260 pretty easy, right? I can't for the life of me figure out why some of these guys haven't made the 231 to 350 swap with turbos. Same mounts, same bellhousing pattern, distributor in the right place... etc. Just a little custom manifolding and some special order bottom end parts. That being said, you're not going to build a streetable 550hp 350 as easily and cheaply as you can with a big block. Above that point, and with some real knowledge and experience (I don't think it's a trivial thing to build and tune something like a TT V8), I think the 350 with forced induction is going to be the new street HP winner. We just need some reasonably priced forged bottom end parts for them, and a good (EFI compatible) intake manifold! I would think the guys with the v6's would have done this by now, but I think they have had enough of the junk oiling system, and tend to go toward the Chevy motors when they want to see 1000+ hp, which is a shame.
Wow. I can feel the heat through the screen. This thread has gotten a long way off the original thought from Jim. I will put the question back to him. Jim how fast did you want this bracket racer to go? If you wanted a solid 12.5 second car than the 350 in that Regal should be fine. If you were hoping for an 10.5 second car than you might have picked the wrong engine with todays aftermarket support. My questions to the racing nuts are what is the 250lbs difference in the engines worth in trap speed?
The first thing that I want to say is the main reason I did my 350 Buick was because of Sonny Seals 350. He had a very fast 350. I had my engine built in 1994. I spent 5000.00 in parts and used up 3000.00 more in labor to have it built. That was a lot of money back then. I replaced every part in the engine or upgraded it to aftermarket parts. TA intake, Forged pistons, Ported heads, Larger valves, New crank, 73 Rods, MSD distributor, Holley carb, Roller Rockers, New Cam, SFI Flywheel, Lifters, Rings, Bearings, Torque convertor, and so on, Ran on dyno. I did it all. My parts came from TA Performance.. For all of this money spent I could have had a 600 hp 455 easily, and sometimes I wish I had. But there was that part of me that wanted to be different, like what Sonny Seal had done. One of my other main reasons was that the 455 with all of that horse would have used a lot more gas on the street than the 350 would have used. I loved to do a lot of street driving. Yes, the car is only a 13 second car, My best has been a 13.31. I have to have now over 500 passes down the track since I had it built in 1994. I have revved it to 6000 rpm every time, sometimes I hit 62-6400 rpm. I still run the same average times I ran then. I ran 13.61 at Norwalk last year. The durability has been great. I have ran Nitrous now the past 3 years on it and have ran a 11.81@ 114. I ran 11.90 last year at Norwalk without even trying. I had to ease it out of the hole. I am having a wheel hop problem that I need to correct. The power is there in the 350 Buick and I think it can be as fast as a 350 Chevy if we had some more good parts. (I think already is). You guys saying that the new Buick 455 is not a Buick you guys are nuts. If I bought one of those World Products 454 engines that are in the Summit Racing book and put it in my Buick Would You call it a World Products motor or would you call it a Chevy motor in my Buick? You would yell at me that I basically put in a Chevy motor and you would have forgotten all about that it is not a GM based motor just like you are claiming that the new Buick Block is not. Just because it was not built by GM does that not make it real? The Roush Mustang is still a Ford, The Corvette with a Alum motor is still a Chevy, the Mondello olds engine is still a Olds, The Cadillac motor from CMD is still a Caddy, and the Buick with a Alum 455 is still a Buick. They all have one thing in common, Aftermarket parts. Based on the originals. Like I said before, If you are going to make special parts for a 350 Buick they should be backed up with some kind of proof that they will work good in your car. I am sorry but we have a Turbo car with no dyno time or track time. We have a single plane intake that has dyno time and no track time. Not much info on how this is running in a street car. We have a 1000 hp 350 that makes it's debut and gets pulled off this site so nothing much there. There was one 350 Buick that did make 500 hp on the dyno but it never made it into a car and never went down the track. The only real proof that a 350 is good is that Mine has ran a 125 shot of nitrous and ran high 11's and you have Nick A. with his basically stock 350 running mid 12's with nitrous. Plus Sonny Seals. I also know that there are a few others. You 350 guys pissed off at what I said? Then get those cars to a rear wheel dyno or get it to the track and run off some numbers. Get a G-Teck or a Dyno Delicious for your Apple I phone and get some times. The sun is out in North Carolina. Go out of your residential roads and go to the highway if you can't get to the track. I can do it at 2am practically in downtown Akron on the interbelt. So don't tell me you can't get it done. If a Buick aftermarket block is not called a Buick block then what do we call it? You guys are really thinking way too much into this. Are the Edelbrock alum heads not called Buick heads and what about TA's Alum heads are they not called Buick heads? They are called Buick parts they just don't come from the factory that's all. To Jim I would say that you built a 350 engine and yes it did cost a lot and may not be as fast as a 455 but it will last a very long time. I think that your girls will be happy with it. Mine runs very consistant on the day that I am at the track. I would run a 50 shot of nitrous on it and it will keep that intake cool and you will run dead on times every time. It just wont Blow.:3gears:
I have raced the 350 Buick from 1984 till now and only lost one engine adn that was because i jest quit maintaining it . I just ran it untill it gave up. It was a 30 over and been honed till it was 40 over and no longer leagle at the time. I made a mistake of doing that because the legal limit is 75 over now ant it was a good running block. If you shift this motor at 5500 you can run it for years without any isues. Just make rounds over and over. Easy to drive off the line and easy to stage. It will be the perfect motor for the girls to race with no brakage , just go rounds. Dan
Thanks Dan, I know it will be a better car for the girls. I just got a little excited adding up how much I had spent in machine work and parts and knowing how much faster that money would have carried me with a 455, but I have one of those and if they get bored with the Regal or want to go fast I will put them in the 67 GS. I can't believe what I got going here but maybe it is good. I figured if I got 5 replies I would be doing good. Jim N
Okay, this one pissed me off. On 2 different engines, mild and built, the power figures with the single plane improved significantly. The intake allowed an engine that was fading off before 6000rpm to pull to 7400rpm, with the power still climbing. If turbos aren't proven for longevity, why the hell do you see them on virtually every long haul truck on the planet in the last decade? I have been running mine for years with no turbo problems, and I treat it poorly. As far as track proven, I'm the only 350 guy with a running turbo setup and am 2 1/2 hours from the nearest track, and am not able to bring the car out due to difficult times. What I can tell you is that it will nail 8psi (my wastegate peak) immediately off idle at full throttle and will continue that through 6000rpm very quickly. It makes the power, "track proven" will only come when I can get it down the track. Last but not least, this whole thread has gone to the toilet. I love both the big blocks, and the 350's. To compare a 350 without a power adder to a big block is dumb. The big block will always outperform the 350. A wild NA 350 would have a hard time keeping up with a mild 455. :blast: :blast: :blast: :spank: :spank: :spank:
no track times to back this up. time and time again i have seen chassis dynos show improvements only to show nothing at the track.. no engine dyno results either. I think it's great that you took the leap and made what others have not been willing to but numbers are just numbers until an actual useable improvement is shown. this may happen yet with your intake but so far it's all speculation. exactly.. once again no proven numbers or performance. I have zero doubt that it performs well compared to what you had before.. I personally dont think your log manifolds are capable of flowing enough to support the 700 hp a couple guys think they are going to make with your kit. horsepower is ALL about airflow. in order to make 700 hp you have to be able to get enough intake charge into the cylinders and then you HAVE to be able to flow that much exhaust out. if your turbo logs can't flow enough you back up the exhaust and intake charge in the engine , you can burn valves and cook things rapidly. a few blasts down the streets don't equal a proven combination in my opinion.
I wish you small block pioneers the best of luck. the 350 is a good engine and obviously can be made to run respectably. I hope to read some success stories soon.:beer
Okay, you roped me in for another round. The intake had dyno results in both cases. If dyno results aren't proof, then why do engine builders bother? Have you seen the Gale Banks turbo kits? They support over 1000hp out of a Chevy 350 with smaller logs than my kit has. Turbo builds do not have the same exhaust flow characteristics as NA, nitrous, or blower builds. Still, I respect your opinion about lack of flow and inability to support the power. That's fine, it's your opinion, based on a couple pics of the manifolds. However, it is no less foolish to argue something can't happen without proof of failure, then it is to argue it can, without proof of success. For what it's worth, the only time my car has been down the track, it couldn't run any better than 13's because it spun the tires through 1st and 2nd gear with about 7psi. That was with 18.5" street tires, and the wrong size turbos that had too much lag. It could barely muster 2.2 60' times strolling gently off the line to avoid tire spin. The tuneup was a mile off.
Jim - If you are going to build the bracket racer you should take a look at the Sticky under the Small Block Thread titled "Kenne-Bell 350 testing from 1984 " or something close to that. It goes through the progression from a stock car to a 12.40 second car that went through the traps at 114.2. http://www.v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=120004 This is one of the few documented cases that the 455 guys can not claim is BS. I doubt your regal will way in at 3500 lbs so you already have a head start.
We will prove you wrong, and Mark really does know what he is doing here! I am not sure why you are having such a hard time grasping the fact that we are going to make good power since Sonny went 11.06 NA with the EXACT heads I have and I plan to shove at least 14 PSI down them through my custom sheetmetal intake! And as far as people not thinking the 350 has ran fast NA... Did you also miss the 73 Century GS @ 3700 lbs by Roger Reed., built a mean Buick 350, made 480 hp, 420 ft/lbs torque, ran 11.65. I find that pretty respectable for 350 cubes, and iron heads. Simple NA combo that went fast in a heavy car. The Rod Margel engine that made 550+ hp was pretty tough BTW
Mark, What I don't understand is that there are some people out there that will say anything to anyone when they are sitting behind a keyboard. But face to face that same person would not be so rude. All I will say is that I have 100% confidence that if my manifolds do not flow well enough to support the system Mark will instantly rectify the issue. Try that with a ebay seller. Second, Mark is not stupid and he has done his homework and is in contact with some very smart buick builders on this forum that support everything he is doing. Third, Mark is a young guy that is helping to bring a lot of innovation to our beloved Tri-Shields. Fourth, and he is doing all of this on a shoe string budget, and trying to start a new buisiness in this economy. So forgive me when i say get of his a$$ for not making it to the track and support his efforts. And remember we are all on the same team. :rant:
And the funny thing is that Dan (stk3171) is running mid 11s with his NHRA Buick 350 car SEVERELY limited by things like: -Q jet -Stock intake -No head porting -Stock max lift on cam -Stock valve sizes -Stock dish pistons The good news is that even with all that he was able to get the compression up to around 11:1, use a 4.56 gear, and take advantage of what must have been a huge amount of trial and error for tuning to get inthe 11s NA. My point is that you Jim, can make your 350 run and surprise some people with that little 350!
and still likin' it ! yep - watched sonny run some nice numbers in columbus at '99 nats , saw the car in the pits later , walked over and talked with him for a minute and - hey wait a minute thats a 350 ! it clicked on the way home . del
The same engine builder that built Roger Reed's engine built mine. I had seen the dyno sheets of his when I had mine dynoed. The numbers are no bull. The 350's will get their due. How many of those 455 guys can't get to the track for one reason or another because of money or the track is too far away. I just have Nitrous and I can run with a 500 hp 455. Put that same nitrous kit on a 500 hp 455 and I think it might need some extra work done on it to keep it together. Sure it will put out 650 but will it stay together with nothing done to the block. Unfotunately the 455 will always put out more than the 350 no matter how you cut the pie. Everyone should be happy that it is a Buick 350 and not some other engine...Like a Chevy motor!
Has anybody looked at those Kenne-Bell tests on those 350's. He got some really good numbers from a 350 Buick. These tests were done before 1985 because I happen to have the Parts book from then. I just can't believe there has not been any Aluminum heads that were made by now. I wonder now what the specs are on the 5s cam. It ran pretty good with that cam. Maybe I should go look for a Carter 9800 800 cfm job. Looks like it ran good with that one too.:beer
