Little engines that can

[VintageMusclecar]

OK. I'll try to put this in perspective w/o typing a novel.

My friend's Mustang is nowhere NEAR maxed-out, it's just well-sorted out for the parts on the car now. It does (/did) NOT have a super-tricked out trans, just rebuilt with a few parts added for reliability (but he still managed to break it). It did NOT have a trick clutch in it, just a Ford Motorsports "street/strip" unit. It does NOT have trick shocks & struts on it, just mid-level components. The engine is an 80K+ mile UNTOUCHED OEM roller 5.0 short block--stock rings, bearings, never been apart. It had a B303 cam in it with OEM lifters, a pair of mildly re-worked 351W heads, a Weiand dual plane and a 750 Holley. Headers were street 1 5/8" units with 2 1/2" pipes and a pair of Flowmasters. All fluids are ran full at all times and all are garden variety--no trick racing oils or anything like that.

It runs like it does because he's made hundreds of passes and refined everything as far as he could. He nailed down tire pressures, launch RPM, shift points, timing, jetting, etc. Speaking of shift points, he only shifts this thing at just over 6K.

Using Stan Weiss' calculator calculator and plugging in 3000 lbs and an 11.8 ET shows 360.88 HP required, pretty much spot-on for this car taking into account the typical 20% drivetrain loss from flywheel to wheel HP with a manual transmission.

Were you to leave his engine untouched and add a full race trans & clutch, high end shocks & struts, radial tires, zero friction suspension components, etc. the car would be at least .3-.5 quicker than it was. There's mid 11's with 300 RWHP at ~3000 lbs. The calculator says it would take 390 HP to do that, but we already know it's within reach w/o touching the engine.

Consider the Chevelle. As stated in the article, it runs right at the national record so we know it's scienced out. Minimum weight for L Stock Automatic is 3072 + 170 lbs for the driver, which is 3242 lbs. Again, I'd bet my bottom dollar that car has every trick in the book in it--lightweight low friction trans, high-$$ converter, suspension has been perfected, etc. With modifications like these, it's not uncommon at all for a Stock or Super Stock car to ET well below what HP/ET calculators predict.

Again using Stan Weiss' calculator and plugging in 3242 lbs and 11.6 ET shows a requirement of 410 HP. Since the car's scienced out, we already know it really doesn't take that much power to run that number.

Set on "kill" (water-thin oil, probably only 2-3 quarts in the pan, engine ice cold, etc.) I'm sure the 283 probably doesn't miss 400 HP by much, which again falls right in line with the numbers.

JMO of course. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/smile.gif[/img]

*edit* John typed his response while I was still working on mine. As usual, he's spot-on.