Stage 1 "TRACK ELIMINATOR" heads

Anybody have any info on when the Stage 1 "TRACK ELIMINATOR" heads will be available to the general public?

Rob.

 

They are ready now. Machined castings can be shipped within a few days. Fully assembled within a week. Ported and assembled within two weeks. We are now offering our quickest turnaround time for heads, ever!

Dave

 

Dave,
Price on machined castings?

Rob

 

$1495 for machined castings, $2550 for assemblies

Dave

 

TE ehads

Are TE heads different than SE heads only in the intake ports? SE heads (correct me if I am wrong) will work with all my current parts. Will TE heads only need a high port intake, but work with everything else?
Thanx all.

 

You would be correct! :TU:

 

Got me a set thanks to Jim at Tri-Shield and Jim is doing them up as we speak. We are shooting for early spring and my goal is 750 HP and looking to get my 3000 pound GS into the 9.25 range along with the help of Steve Reynolds of SRE and Rob Chilenski of Stage 1 auto. We're going to show these heads work extremely well on the dyno and on the track. I will be posting the details once we start getting the engine together:Brow:

They are tall ports on the intake and you can still use the same roller rockers and headers as with the Stage 1 SE Heads, except the TE Heads flow much better.

Now I have to bust on Mike at TA for those 2 1/8" primary tube Stage 1 Headers, I believe they are available or soon to be.

The shots below are of my heads compared to the Stage 1 SE heads, JW e-mailed them over. The TE heads are the top set (tall port)and the SE heads are the bottom set.
-Rick Martinez

 

heads

I realize that in theory the high ports work and i also know alot of people claim they make 800 or more horsepower, but there ets at the track dont add up.800 hp in a 4000 lbs gs will run 9.80s all day long .I havent seen any high ports run any better than the standard ports.I know they will flow better on the bench, but they dont seem to run any better.From what i have seen,all the fast guys are running standard port heads wether it be stage1 or 2.I always hear guys making claims of 750 hp and so on but dyno means nothing.750 honest hp will push a3800 lb gs in the low 10s high nines. .I really hope you guys can get the heads to work good at the track and not just on the bench and dyno.Good luck, and i look forward to seeing the results. :TU:

 

Re: heads

Have to agree to a certain point there. I was running the steel Stage 1 heads 9.80's at 135 mph in a 3200 pound car. Never had the engine dynoed but the et numbers tell it all. I did have the rest of the car set up, though a better convertor and suspension could have netted me maybe another 10th.

The proof no doubt will be on the track. One HUGE factor is the rest of the combo. An 800 HP dynoed engiine in a 3500 pound car will do squat at the track if the convertor, gears and suspension is not set up correctly. Unfortunately the only real way on doing this is track time testing. As we have read about Jim Weise, Mike Garrison and Doug Hecker have been doing. Trial and error. The engine is set up but now it's onward to the rest of the car. More HP doesn't generally mean a quicker car, it just moves you onward on completing the combo. Once the entire car is working as one, then you will be able to enjoy the fruits of the hard work, not to mention all the cash spent. But hell thats drag racing.

Rick Martinez

 

engine

I agree 100 percent Rick.I was just stating that dynos arent very accurate when comparing horsepower.(one to another).You mention Mike garison.He said his engine dynoed at around 830 i believe, but his et and mph arent close to 830.J hass ran 999 in good weather and his car weighed around 3800 lbs.I believe this was his engine.I would say that the engine is close to 740 to 750 on the power speed calculater.Dynos really throw people off.I believe the best place to test is the track, and i know you are alway at the track , and i know you will reach your goal.Good luck :TU:

 

Re: engine

Well runem(sorry didn't get your name there),

Not real sure about using Garrisons motor as an example here. Sure Jim H. may have gone 9.99 I don't know. But you yourself said the motor did that in a 3800 lb car. OK.....well toss another couple hundred on top of that, and street tires, and full exhaust, and interior, and stock type suspension, and you have Mikes car. That 9.99 would make about a 10.19(or there abouts) in good weather(according to you)with just the 200 lbs. Mike went 10.18(I think it was) in bad weather. The motor dynoed like 825 (as I recall) AFTER Mike had to have it rebuilt ! Something about a bearings as I recall, in fact I was there when they went south, in any case.......

Those power speed calculators are WAY off "in my opinion". Unless my stg. 1 is really only making the 300 some odd hp that my moroso calculator says it. And I'm only running 11.50 @ 119. I have run a superflow dyno myself several times and I will bet anything you wanna bet on it's accuracy being closer than some power speed calculator.


later...............................

 

Tools in the box..

Flow Benches and Dyno's are just tools, just like my torque wrenches and dial bore gauges.

If you want to look at real world performance from a dyno number, you look at the raw, uncorrected numbers.

Not everyone races at sea level.

I have never even seen a barometer over 30.2.... not around here.

So, if we look at the raw numbers that the dyno produced, and compare that with the cars performance, you can see that the dyno, in our case, is pretty much right on, or maybe a little conservative.

George made 804 HP, 727 torque.. corrected.

Raw numbers were 740 HP, and 690 or so torque.

3170 lbs tube chassis GS, has run 9.36 at 142, with an adjusted altitude of 2700 feet.

It will run 1.27 60' times.. and the car will go a bunch faster.. it has only made 15 passes down the strip, since it was built.

In a motor like George's, the dyno is VERY important. Any way you slice it, an 800 hp Buick is a dicy deal. Everything has to be perfect, or you will be taking it back out of the car.

The dyno not only allows for a near "perfect" tune up, but it proves the motor, durability wise.


Yes, the racetrack is the ultimate equalizer.. as long as it's the same track, and your comparing cars on the same day, under the same ambient, and track conditions. I have seen plenty of "9.50" cars run 9.90's..

And trust me.. the tall port head will outrun anything you can do with the standard ports. 350+ cfm makes power, and the only motors to ever produce that kind of power had this port in the heads. Either produced by TA and then ported and flowed, or welded and ported from a standard port.

I will take a good dyno session to prove a motor like this, and get a tune up, any day, instead of wearing the motor and car out at the track. Remember a 7 second dyno pull can tell me everything I need to know about a motor. A full dyno session will produce about as much wear and tear as 2 passes down the track.

And if something goes really wrong, say the oil pressure drops off, or the power numbers drop off, you have the controlled conditions of the dyno to see this immediately, and can prevent catastrophic damage to a very expensive engine.

The other advantage to dyno tuning is that when a new combo does not run up to the "dream wheel" specs, you can factor the motor out of the combo discussions.

Case in point:

George's car ran a string of 9.50's at as slow as 135... way too slow for what the dyno said.

so did I start fussing with jets and timing... Heck no.. I KNEW that stuff was on the nuts. That's the value of dyno tuning.

We traced down some "leads" from simple things like hard starting, and determined that his brand new battery would take a good surface charge, and appear to be fully charged, but as soon as the draws of the fuel, water pump, and ignition system were put on it, the battery would drop well below 12 volts, due to an undercharged condition. And of course, an alternator charging a battery will not produce voltage.. You get voltage when you have a fully charged battery.

So.. I did nothing more than fully charge the battery, and the car, without every having a float bowl off the car, went from the 9.50's to the 9.30's.. in worst air than it had been in at times.

And , heaven forbid, if you have a mechanical issue, you have to take the whole dang thing apart again, to get back into the motor.

Now, I ask you.. how many times do you want to take the motor out of this car?

I have not even so much as had a valve cover off it, since the last time it came off the dyno.. but plenty of work happened with the motor, long before it ever saw the car.

JW

 

A dyno is a good tool to help figure out the engine. You don't race flow benches or dynoes, but they are a very important part in building a good car. As Jim stated, after the dyno you can start working on the driveline components to realize full potential of the package. I do agree that there are several cars out there that don't perform up to potential, but the owners also know this and seem to be working to find the problems. One thing that has not been mentioned is the variation from one dyno to another, if the correction input is wrong you will think you have way more power than you do. The dyno needs to calibrated and function properly to get useful results. Even if the numbers are wrong you can still learn from the experience, you will still know what the engine likes for jetting and timing. MPH is always the true judge of HP being used, you can produce it without using it. I had a quick dyno session done on my engine that was only 4 pulls with a best of 542 hp, my 68 weighs 3100lbs with me in it ran a best of 10.05 @ 130 I am very happy with the final result. I don't have the power speed calculator but would like to see what it says my motor is making. There has been some tuning done since the dyno and I would guess the dyno would say 560+ but under 580.

 

Hey Dennis,

Here is a site that will calculate the HP for you when you input a few peices of data. Input what your car was running at Norwalk and then input what your car was running at Cecil.

http://www.speedworldmotorplex.com/calc.htm

Take Care

 

Case in point on the dream wheels..

follow the link, and put in 3170 and 142...

... then put in 3170 and 9.36..

No, go read my post again, and see what that car really has for power.

... 900 HP would take a shot of N20...

Guys.. careful on spreading "the gospel" on what your car has for HP, unless it has been strapped to a dyno.

And yes.. input data, and machine calibration must be correct.

"Garbage in - Garbage out" certainly applies here.

JW

 

Good point Jim......."Dyno is just a tool"

My motor has never been Dynoed but I am happy with the hand full of 9.6x timeslips I have.......Money I was too cheap to spend on Dyno time will go towards making the car faster.

I've seen 650 HP motors go in the 9's and 800+ HP motors that couldn't get out on their own way.......

Dyno #'s may impress at the car show,But forget them at the Racetrack.

TE heads look good....Now they just need a provision for a REAL set of rocker arms for a roller cam set-up:TU:

 

Thanks for the link John. I agree with Jim on the et conversion. The mph conversion is within reason but still high.

 

Jim,


The numbes on the link I gave did seem a bit high. On the Moroso slide rule here are the results which I know is just a tool.

3170 @ 142 mph takes 690 hp at the rear wheels.

3170 @ 9.36 et takes 720 hp at the rear wheels.

When I bought this thing a few years back I called Moroso ask then how do you actually use this thing. They said you take the rear wheel HP numbers and add 10% for really light cars and at 15 to 18% for really heavy cars. OK....... below are the results.


690 hp + 15% = 793.5 HP

720 hp + 15% = 828 HP

I would say these numbers and very much in line with your engine dyno numbers. Again... this slide rule is nothing more than a tool. Now..... if the above numbers were for my car I would be asking myself why is there such a difference in HP for ET and MPH? Is the ET better because your using a 3 speed??? Is the MPH down because your using a 3 speed? I dont know.... I just say dont throw out the "Dream Wheel" numbers. They can be used as a tool also.


Dynos?

I ask this question to everyone out there because I have never had an engine on the dyno. To me a dyno is a tool to help sort out an engine combination. How much does a day of dyno time usually cost?

Machine shops have been building Buick engines for years now. NO ONE out there has reinvented the wheel with these engines. We all know to run our timing from 32 to 35. We all know that a 464 engine will like a 1050 dominator with 89 to 92 jets. Maybe a 494 or larger will like an 1150.

Therefore what is the BIG advantage of putting an engine on the dyno other than to get a number from a dyno operator who ALWAYS claims they have a CONSERVATIVE dyno. I have never heard anyone say ..... Well the numbers from my dyno are usually a bit HIGH.

Yes I agree that its better to break an engine in the dyno. But for me thats a lot of $$$ when I can put the engine in my car in 3 hrs and then may not even have to take it back out.

Has anyone out there put an engine on the dyno and FOUND 50 additional HP? What is the max HP increase found when dyno tuning?

Back to the "Dream Wheel" calculations for my car.

2800 lbs at 149.95 mph = 725 hp RWHP + 13% = 819 hp
2800 lbs at 8.97 et = 730 hp RWHP + 13 % = 824 hp

Now... I know my engine dynoed (before I purchased it) at 800 hp with 730 tq. I went through the cylinder heads and did additional porting. Did I gain a few HP... Yes.... Am I comfortable telling people that my engine makes 820 hp. Yes... I am and I saved myself the $500 to $600 bucks. Do I need to dyno this combo again to find an additional 10 hp or do I just change my shoe polish the next round?

Someone please tell me why I would need dyno time.

By the way..... To whoever reads this post it was not written with any sarcasm. I would really like for someone to explain to me why I would need to spend the time and $$ on a dyno session. I am not against spending hard earned $$$ if there is a benefit. Anyone who knows me well enough knows that I will spend the $$$ if it makes sense.

Thanks.

 

FWIW...

I have found the Moroso sliderule to be very accurate for me. It's always been within 10-15 hp, maybe closer, and 1 tenth on every car i've owned and raced... and that's been quite a few.

J

 

John,

Just an opinion here.

I'm no expert on the race engine building. But like you said,I too listen and learn from what others have done when building a Buick engine, I find myself a good student. Their ideas can place me in a ball park area of my goals. So I guess we can also say this board is like a learning tool. We get to pick each others' brains.

As with the dyno, I have never had one done, and I know it can be costly. But what I try to look at is time. My time. For me to build a fresh engine not knowing where to have the convertor stalled at, what RPM's it makes its max power and torque, what gears might work etc. I would have to make a few trips to the track. For me even with an open trailer I'm looking at 2 bills (gas, & race gas, tolls, food, track fees. etc) for each trip. Plus my time burning weekends and unlike my instigating buddy Doug:grin: Which by the way is at Atco Raceway gunning for those 8's as I'm typing this response.

I have what most other guys like yourself have....a wife, kids, family, house etc. I'm not complaining there, I am extremely happy with my family life. So in the long run "time" becomes upmost important. Factor those with the track expenses and I would figure full day at the dyno would be a better deal. Only if you bring all your extra testing parts. etc. and do some tuning also so to maximize your time spent. And I am aware that the dyno is not the "holy grail" that even after a dyno session you may still have to spend time at the track, but I feel it is an important tool and puts you closer to your goal in a shorter period of "time", and "time" as we all know is money.

I agree with the real world of the track that the dyno will not compare, but as a tool if done correctly will save you in the long run, not to mention aggravation. and "time".

Rick