December 13, 2016:
Over the years I’ve had a great sense of satisfaction building and designing our engines, maintaining the old Doug-Nash 5-speed, and setting up our own rear gears. Of course I’ve relied on machine shops to do the necessary machine work, but the engines were designed and assembled by us and we learned from our failures and successes.
The one exception was the 406 in the Chevelle. It was cost effective to purchase a short-block assembly with a Dart Little M block, Callies crank, Manley steel rods and Wiseco pistons. To have purchased the individual pieces and paid for the machine work and balance was not cost effective. But with that said we had great input on the build including what main journal diameter we wanted, compression ratio, etc. We also selected the heads, camshaft grind and put the engine together less the short-block assembly and have rebuilt it once ourselves.
Sadly, in my opinion, the trend today even in bracket racing is having your car completely built by someone else, purchase complete engines from an engine builder, etc. The other trend is to replace your ride every few years and go to a bigger engine. Certainly there have been many who have had great success with this type of program but I fail to understand where the personal satisfaction comes from?
Many of the very best racers in Modified Production were those who built their own engines, serviced their transmission, clutch & rear end, and worked hard to improve their chassis. Sadly we are like dinosaurs, creatures of the past.
Roger
Edwards & Young Tech Tips
Edwards & Young 331 in our ’57
Assembled 350 short-block currently in our ’57 with Wiseco pistons. Ring package: .043/.043/3mm low tension oil rings
Coated Wiseco pistons in our 350
406 valve train, 1.6 rockers on exhausts, 1.5 rockers on intakes. New roller lifters
Building our own engines and building everything in the 57 has always been a source of pride with us.
We’ve learned a lot over the years. Can’t remember how many ring combinations we’ve tried over the years including the Manley single-ring piston which was a flop in our last 292. Different cam grinds, bearing clearances, rod side clearance to lubricate the cylinder walls at high RPMs.
It has been challenging but rewarding!
I’ve been catching up on some reading this off season, and there appears to be a concerted effort by some noted writers to send Pro Stock to the trash heap because “it is too boring.”
Let me see, you got rid of Modified Eliminator, Pro-Stock Truck and now want to send Pro Stock, Motorcycle and Comp Eliminator to the NHRA archives which leaves what?
So, you bring in Pro Mod which often end up on their lids and you expect NHRA to stay with a live broadcast? I wish you well with that! NASCAR has tried that with making all the cars run virtually the same which raised the number of wrecks per race. It worked for awhile but now they’re losing asses in the seats.
Could it just be the demographics have just been changing? That there are less and less youngsters interested in motorsports? Frankly I still like Pro Stock despite the rule changes last season to fuel injection. How about lowing the admission costs for National & Divisional events before making wholesale changes with the HOPE of keeping a dying sport alive!
There are fewer and fewer 20 something kids working on their cars. With the emissions rules and new cars you can’t build much of a hot rod today. Also many of them care more about video games and cell phones than anything else. This has had a major impact of younger people getting involved in racing. Most only do it if mom dad or grandma or grandpa pay for it. Just my thoughts…..