Am I that good, or just that lucky???

[Marv D]

<font face="Arial,Verdana" size="2">. If you spend money on a 4340 anything and dont rev it to 9000 rpm, hit it with a 500 horse shot of nitrous, or 25 pounds of boost, you just wasted a TON of money. </font>

Ohhhh your going to get a lot of argument on that one. It is HARD to hurt a 4340 crank. The service life of a quality product even at 6800 makes it WELL worth the investiment IMO. I won't argue that there is a LOT of 'monkey see monkey do' in this hobby and that keeps the aftermarket a multi-billion dollar industry.
I've beat on GM parts and high dollar aftermarket assemblies. I can tell you when something 'does' break (and in racing something is eventually going to give) the residual damage to other components is minimized when things stay together. Things stay together when the material is strong enough to retain it's shape even tho the forces are trying to rip it to shreads.

 

[Mwilson]

Only good thing about cheap stuff is if you get 6 mos or 3 years who cares you can build another for nothing almost and your back on the road

 

[Damon]

Hey, if you've been lucky with reworked stock stuff then I must be, too. Most of the small blocks I build are for modest street performance and I haven't blown too many of them up (and I usually found the cause of the faiure was NOT the parts or assembly but some other stupid thing I had done or failed to do). I like to build real world daily-drivable N/A small blocks that can run a solid 12 from any stoplight in the country at the drop of a hat- no race prep.

Even adding nitrous on top of that is not that big a deal with cheap (but properly prepped and assembled) parts. Don't run lean, don't get greedy with spark advance and they usually live a long, powerful life.

Boost is more problematic for me, now that I'm playing with it a little. Different ground rules which I'm learning one mistake at a time. Eventually I'll figure it out and then I'll be able to build some VERY streetable, docile small blocks that can rip your head off for not much money.


[This message has been edited by Damon (edited December 26, 2004).]

 

[ZS10]

<font face="Arial,Verdana" size="2">Originally posted by Damon:
Different ground rules which I'm learning one mistake at a time. Eventually I'll figure it out and then I'll be able to build some VERY streetable, docile small blocks that can rip your head off for not much money.
</font>

Thats what I say about my 427...except for the "not much money" part. lol
Again, stock crank, (indexed and all that

), stock resized rods, and stock type valve gear.

392 Hemi lost its bottom end after a 7K clutch dump.

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73RS/LT/427

 

[Mwilson]

Hey i do run good valvesprings! that mistake cost me twice i love 4 speeds but my car would spend more time down if i had one look like that one up there! My motor is cheap but i drive it accordingly, probrably wouldn't last 5 laps at a dirt track or one squirt of N2O!

[This message has been edited by Mwilson (edited December 26, 2004).]