Best block for performance

[starliner62]

Is there a preferred block for boring to 304 cubic inches?
I want to build a pretty extreme engine for a future project and I don't know if some castings have thicker cylinder walls.
Thanks


Jamie McLeod
Hope Mills, NC

[StudeRich]

That question is really a toss up! Most Stude. people agree that the earlier 'Blocks, '55, '56, '57 seem to generally be a little thicker when they paid a bit more attention to core shift, and even the '51-'54 232 Blocks could be bored that much. You may still find just like the Granatelli's' at Paxton Prod. Division of Studebaker did, that some pass and some fail no matter what! [V]

The rear two Cylinders usually tend to be thin and the forward ones are sometimes very thick.
You could just take the best, the late '62-'64 and if it checks out too close to the water jacket in the rear, just do it, let it break through, bore it oversize and sleeve it in the needed Cyl's.

The best route would be to have it ultrasound tested first.

The downside to a '51 to early '62 Block would definitely be losing the far superior full-flow block, but if you race it and do not put many miles on it, longevity may not be your concern.


StudeRich at Studebakers Northwest -Ferndale,WA

[starliner62]

Thanks StudeRich. I have access to a sonic tester, so I will start checking blocks.
I see that I spelled preferred wrong in my post due to my fat fingers. How do I edit my post?

Jamie McLeod
Hope Mills, NC

[StudeRich]

You click on the paper with yellow pencil Icon on the post when you have it up and are logged in you have the option to edit or Trash can only your posts.

We also use the Reply with a quote Icon, the one with the red curved arrow, to copy some one's post when it may not be understood which post it is about, then you can delete the unnecessary parts that do not apply, like all their signature HTML language and photos which do not need repeating.
The Goggle toolbar that is an option on Mozilla Firefox has a great Spellchecker, but I always leave stuff out or mess up the wording and almost always end up editing it.[V]


StudeRich at Studebakers Northwest -Ferndale,WA

[Mike Van Veghten]

Rich is basically correct.

It's not so much core shift (they seemed to do a fairly good job of this), but it's the oil passages at the rear of the block that have thinned the rear cylinders for passage clearances.

Of the blocks I've tested, the non-full flow blocks are better around #7.
You want the thickest portion of the cylinder on the thrust side, that is...toward the "outside" of the engine.
Supercharged...no less than .190" thick
Non-supercharged, .150" at the thinnest area.

Note, when checking the blocks, the top 2.500" of the bore is the most important.
And check them in the 12, 3, 6, 9 o'clock positions with the 3 (or 6) toward the front of the block.

Another thing to concider, cylinder heads. You'll need good heads to fill that many inches!
Head over to the "Racing Studebaker" site for some good info about hot rodding a Stude engine.

Mike

[starliner62]

I have been working on Stude heads for a couple of years, and have access to a flow bench. I had thought about a pair of aluminium heads, but haven't heard too much about them. I'll probably stick with iron and a lot of bits and bits and bits. Makes you wish cast iron would cut as easily as aluminium.

Jamie McLeod
Hope Mills, NC

[PackardV8]

Hi, Mike

quote:
the thrust side, that is...toward the "outside" of the engine.

wouldn't that be toward the left side of the engine and thus only on the outside on the left bank?

Ted Harbit has probably measured and bored more Studebaker V8 blocks than anyone. Maybe Ted can refresh our memories as to exactly where the thinnest spots are. IIRC, he said it is only a problem on full-flow blocks and only in a couple of specific areas where the oil passage and the bore intersect. He has bored early blocks to very large diameters without problems.

IDEA! If Ted will rough out guidelines based upon his experiences, we can edit it for him and make it a permanent feature on the Tech Tip site here. This way, we won't cover this ground over and over again for the nth time.

thnx, jack vines

PackardV8

[sals54]

My question would be.. if you are going to build an extreme engine, then why do you need to bore it out to the max? Less bore and more boost would be a greater enhancement, wouldn't it?

sals54

[PlainBrownR2]

quote:
My question would be.. if you are going to build an extreme engine, then why do you need to bore it out to the max? Less bore and more boost would be a greater enhancement, wouldn't it?

Phoo, loaded question [)].......
We had answer somewhat for this back in Yahoo chat. One of the basic premises for boring was to unlock potential power in the block. These were verry verrry loose guidelines so I can assure you this isn't gospel. First thing was, it depends on what you wanna use it for. If you're going for torque the idea was to keep the bore somewhat smaller and the stroke larger. If you wanted the horsepower the idea was to make the bores larger and keep the stroke the same. If you wanted to multiply both well, bore and stroke to as far it was possible. In this case I have a similar idea, except instead of 304 I want to go to 299. I could go out to within a razor's edge of the water jackets, but, if something goes wrong with the block(the ever slight possibility it could) I'd like to have some metal left over that I could sleeve it with. A larger bore may be able to provide the potential for a larger bang, barring of course you can feed it.
Going back to the business in Yahoo, we had a number of guys that had the same idea. No need to do the engine work, just crank the turbo up as far as it would go(which from what I was told was a sign of a bad flow characteristic to the combustion chamber). Well the turbo could only do so much, before loosing the turbo, loosing an engine, or just plateau the power(which then required doing some work to the manifold, head, and/or block).
I know Mike is gonna probably chime in on this one, but remember this is part of a larger equation. Heads, cam, intake, flow, blower, internals, etc, all need to work together to get the best possible runner.


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