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Topics - Steve Wood

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16
General Buick Tech / Camshaft shift points
« on: July 22 2021, 08:40:41 PM »
My friend, Ed Baker, made a statement the other day that shocked me.  He advocated shifting at 5000 rpm on a 206 deg cam because it was a small cam with a relatively low power band.  This did not jibe at all with my memories :)  Yeah, yeah, I know my memories are best of the early 1950's, but...

The factory cam was around 194-196 degs.  This means that the 206 cam has about ten more degrees of duration and according to Harvey Cranes notes from his day, ten degrees at 0.050" moves the powerband up about 500 rpm.  I looked up a few 206 deg cams and the rated powerband was 4800-5200 rpm depending upon which cam which makes sense, I think, as Buick rated the hp on the intercooled factory Buicks was around 4400 rpm as I recall.  Not sure what good factory specs are but I don't have any dyno runs from those days on stock cars.

On NA cars we always went past the top of the powerband so when shifted, the cars stayed in the peak area.  Personally, I don't think that means a lot on a FA engine as the situation is far more complicated by the addition of boost.

I remember that we always tried to shift well above 5k with a stock cam and improved valve springs.  I asked Steve Y what he shifted his Black car at as it has the factory cam.  He shifted at 5600 rpm and it ran a 10.4 the week after he sold it with a new, bigger turbo on it.  I think he had a Craig 62 on it when he sold it and ran a couple of tenths slower.  He did not recall the precise springs that he put on it but said it was one of the usual sets that people used back in the day which probably meant the old Chevy LT1 springs off the 350.  That was the go to spring in the early days.

Brad always mentioned that he ran a factory cam with some Pioneer springs that was even stronger than the LT1 spring.  I would like to say it was 125 psi closed.  He mentioned it here and provided the part numbers.  He was shifting in the same range.

Now, why do we want to go higher than 5000 on the shift points?  The most obvious reason is that we have a better gearing advantage in first and second and the car accelerates faster in those gears due to this advantage.  If one takes a piece of graph paper and projects the acceleration rate from 5000 up to say 5500 in low gear, and then picks up the acceleration rate in second and takes off from the 5500 extension point, one will be up several mph when it goes into third which can be very beneficial on a 11 sec car to enable it to dip further down in the time band.

If the car has an improved cam duration of only ten degrees in it, and the powerband moves up 500 rpm, then it seems logical to take use of this and extend the the shift point a bit more assuming one has good valve springs that match the cam.

Now, as I said, FA cars are not quite the same as naturally aspirated.  The turbo keeps pushing air thru the port and into the chamber where a na car might be falling off.  Of course, this assumes the turbo can supply the volume at the higher rpm without falling out of it's efficiency zone and heating up the air so it becomes less dense than before and it becomes a no win situation.  I suspect that when we see a car that starts showing less boost at higher rpm, this is what we see.  A turbo that cannot keep up any more.

This is probably why the 6262 or 6265 is so popular on fast street cars.  It handles higher volumes without moving out of the efficiency zone at 5500-6000.

Another associated problem with FA engines is that boost tries to keep the intake valve from closing and this seems to be more obvious in higher gears where the acceleration curve is flatter than would have been guessed.  This was really bad with factory springs and even the Comp 980's seem to get weaker pretty fast.

Now, if one wants to go say mid elevens on a 28" tire, he will need to be pulling somewhere around 5500 rpm which is about 118-119 mph in third gear.  That is simple math.  Moving the shift point up in first and second helps get a running start on the situation.

My GN has a 210 deg roller cam.  I think those were rated around 5500 as to powerband.  My experience that it is accelerating as fast at 6000 rpm as it was at 5500 as per the acceleration curve.  It is still accelerating as quickly at 6200 when things go bang when the valves lose control.  I used to shift at 5800 trying to avoid that problem.  I try harder now after installing a new set of heads.  :D

18
IHADAV8 Playground / Covid 19 in Texas
« on: April 14 2021, 10:29:04 AM »
five weeks ago, the governor of Texas removed all the restrictions in the State with regard to Covid mandates and left it up to individuals and local authorities.  The media went wild and predicted a horrible future for the people and called the governor all sorts of names (he's a republican)

Then Spring Break came along and the inevitable partying took place and this added to the condemnation. Here are the latest numbers as per the New York Times.  A new variant may hit that kills us all but at the moment, we can see that the experts are no smarter than than anyone else when it comes to predictions.  Yes, Nostradamus was spot on like always...

19
IHADAV8 Playground / Picture of Grand National Moon shot photoshop?
« on: March 14 2021, 11:38:28 AM »
Any one remember the old photoshopped Grand National rocket launch?  I used to have a copy I downloaded but cannot find it anymore.  Looking for a copy for wall paper

20
General Buick Tech / New Alky Kit
« on: March 08 2021, 11:59:02 PM »
The alky set up in my GN has been moribund for a long time.  I have cobbled it several times until it refused to be resuscitated anymore and there is not much need to have one that might not spray anyway.

I ordered a new kit from Julio and a new panel to put the controller behind from Mark at Buickgn.  I installed one a few years ago in the T.  I am getting to the point that I hate to undertake anything but I guess I have at least one more alky set up in me LOL

I should be out there finishing up Taylor's wagon for him to get it out of the shop but I figure it is good for him to do the bulk of the work while I tell him what he should have done  :icon_lol: :icon_lol: :icon_lol:

21
General Buick Tech / Happy Birthday, David!
« on: January 16 2021, 01:39:45 PM »
How is the car coming?  Gonna be time soon to put your annual 50k's on it! :cheers: :cheers: :cheers:

22
General Buick Tech / Hey, Scoob!!
« on: October 15 2020, 10:53:32 PM »
Shimey is looking for a TV cable for his new project.  I thought maybe William might have one but he cannot find it.

Do you, Dan, or one of the other guys up there have one from an old transmission?

23
General Auto Tech / Motor Trend network
« on: September 12 2020, 09:39:30 PM »
I really enjoy some of the shows on the MT channel.  They have a million different series and some are really interesting to me while others are not.

I really like Engine Masters, Hot Rod Garage, Road Kill Garage and a few more like Garage Squad.  Engine Masters has some really good shows where they test various combinations of things and it is strange how often the results are nothing what you are led to believe by the magazines :D  I guess having no advertisers to please (other than Amsoil's name on the screen) can lead to honesty without having to promote brands per se.

Steve Dulcich is one of my favorite guys and he is on Engine Masters and Road Kill Garage. 

Whether one is a ricer, hot rodder, truck guy, drifter, fabricator, or whatever, there are shows for you.  :cheers:

24
General Auto Tech / Mopar swap
« on: September 10 2020, 10:45:31 PM »
my son brought his '72 Plymouth Satellite wagon up the week end that started all the quarantine rigmarole here back in March.  We pulled the 150 hp 318/transmission out of it.  He made a trip up a couple of months ago and we installed time serts into all the exhaust manifolds on the 440 that were either stripped, or semi stripped as they go thru into the water jacked. That was a bit of a pain in the neck but we gotta her dun as they say.  We also installed new valve springs and seals.  I have a 440 that has been sitting in the shop for years since I pulled it out of the Challenger and dropped the 526 in it.

I hope the damn thing is still okay.  It does not seem to be rusted up.  I am not sure about the Torqueflite 727 that goes on the back of it but, again, it was working when it came out.

He came up again last week end and we dropped engine and tranny in, rebuilt the steering coupler and reconnected the steering box that I got resealed in hopes of fixing a power steering leak.

Now, I have to get under the car and pray that all the bits and pieces that I bought will allow me to figure out how to get a column shifter to work with a 727 as it was not an option.

Then I will rewire it using a GM HEI ignition module and a Crane/FAST E type coil.  I will power the module directly from the battery via a relay that is triggered by the ignition switch wires that originally went to a cursed ballast resistor.  The Mopar box is in the trash.

He bought a serpentine two belt system that hopefully he can figure out how to install LOL   It cost the same as trying to find all the correct factory pulleys in the correct combination.  The brackets and stuff that came off the 440 moved over to the 526 so I had nothing there.

The headers were not too bad of a pain.  The driver's side was tedious because it had to pushed up into place but not bolted down until the starter (driver's side) was then inserted and bolted down and then the headers got installed and the engine finished lowering into place.

Once I get the column shift working (hopefully), then I will install a cable set up for the TV valve that will work with a Holley.

It was a hot week end but I mainly handed him wrenches, told him what he was doing wrong, warned him about his attitude, and/or laid under the car and steered the tail shaft.

I need to measure the driveshaft and get a new one made that will probably be about 5" shorter as best I can figure from looking at specs, but I would not yet bet on it until it gets measured.


25
IHADAV8 Playground / Happy birthday, Mark
« on: April 22 2020, 02:30:52 PM »
Happy birthday, Mark! Go out and work on the Buick!

26
IHADAV8 Playground / Forzfed!!!!!!! Where the heck are you?
« on: January 29 2020, 09:59:04 AM »
Are you standing on top of a 13 m ladder under that radiant heater trying to feel the heat?  C'mon in here and we will loan you a coat and a 12 pack of Keystone lager!

27
IHADAV8 Playground / Happy Birthday, David!
« on: January 16 2020, 10:28:41 AM »
Happy Birthday to  my favorite Canadian painter!  Time for you to get your own TV show on the DIY channel!

28
General Buick Tech / Earl Brown!!! Link to your oil cover mods
« on: December 19 2019, 10:50:37 PM »
I think I asked you once before if you have a link to your suggested timing cover mods.


I would like to add it to my [size=78%]http://www.vortexbuicks-etc.com/howto.htm[/size]  page under Earl Brown Racing timing cover mods

29
Jeremy spent the week end unplugging my VortexBuicks site from my current hosting company and installing it on Mark's server.


Mark, I really appreciate your generosity!!  If I can help pay some of your server costs, I will be all too happy to do so.


Jeremy, I know you had better things to do this week end and I appreciate all the efforts you put into unraveling the DNS, getting the domain moved, and getting the site up and running on Mark's server.  I owe you more than one for all the effort you have put into helping me over the past year when I had problems getting things to work!  Not to mention all your efforts on the Board to provide all of us with a better experience.


 :cheers: :cheers: :cheers:

30
IHADAV8 Playground / Earl Brown Racing
« on: November 30 2019, 10:32:50 AM »
I ordered a set of brake hoses from Earl on Ebay.  I noticed that he has a 100% rating.  Between Jimmy Hoffa or whatever name Paulie is using these days, and Ibby?, I would have thought he would have had more like a 99.9%  :icon_lol: :icon_lol: :icon_lol: :rock:

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