Camshaft Selection
“What camshaft should I use?” How many times have you been asked or heard that question uttered? Why is it so difficult to choose the “correct” camshaft for an engine build? What separates one camshaft design from the other? After all, isn’t it true that a camshaft opens and closes valves? Simple, right? Well let’s
Racing Rods – Engine Builders Have Options
Choosing a set of connecting rods is one of the critical steps in a performance engine build. The rods have to be strong enough to handle the anticipated speeds and loads, but also affordable for customers who have a limited budget. Most stock rods in late model engines can safely handle 400 to 500 horsepower.
Powerhouse Pinto Engine Makes 3.26 Ponies Per Cube
Doug “Burton” Brown of Fremont, WI, raced stock cars for more than 30 years before he got into land speed racing at Bonneville and other venues. In 2010, he set a record with a Datsun Z-car, and about a year later he found a Bonneville Streamliner on eBay and purchased the engine-less car for somewhere
Surfing Safari – How Today’s Wake Surfing Craze Can Be Killing Marine Engines
According to some experts, wake surfing has become one of America’s hottest sports. For those of you who are actively involved in building engines for pavement or off-road racing, marine motors may seem to be either an obstacle or an opportunity – and you would be right in both cases. Wake surfing is the practice
High Performance Engine Bearings
Building a high performance engine is always an adventure. You never know how much horsepower and torque an engine will make until it’s on the dyno. And you never know how well the engine will hold up until it is put to the test on the strip, race track, street or water. The bearings that
Understanding How To Tune Carburetors
An engine only runs as well as it is tuned. You can build a killer motor using all the best parts and machine and assemble everything with the utmost care, but if it’s a carbureted engine and the carburetor isn’t setup or tuned right your killer engine may never live up to its full potential.
The Daily Grind – Grinding valve seats with different abrasives
Grinding valve seats with abrasive stones has been aound about as long as the internal combustion engine. In the early days of grinding seats, there were only two abrasive materials to choose from – General Purpose and Finishing – because seats were mostly made of a single material, cast iron. Today, seats are made of
Exhaust(ing) Your Options
Here in the pages of Engine Builder magazine we have countless articles about choosing the right set of pistons, putting in the perfect crankshaft, selecting the best connecting rods and the list goes on and on for identifying what parts and products go into your engines. However, there is one item we seldom cover –
Round and Round – Valve Timing Events and the Order of Importance
If you’ll recall, in the January issue, we got into the nitty gritty details of what makes a camshaft the “right” camshaft. In this issue, we’ll continue the education. Cam class is back in session! Remember the camshaft makes one complete revolution (360°) while the crankshaft rotates twice (720°) for a complete engine cycle. Camshaft
High-Tech Tightening – Fasteners take their rightful place of importance
When you build your engines, you put measured thought into every component you use. From the intake system to the exhaust manifold, everything has its place and nothing is installed without careful consideration. But what about the fasteners? Some of the most critical components are held together with relatively low-cost fasteners including screws, nuts and
Engine Parts Cracks – How to Fix
One of the essential elements of engine building is making sure heads, blocks, main bearing caps, crankshafts, connecting rods, pistons, cams, timing gears, rocker arms, and flywheels are free from cracks. If you’re doing a complete engine build, checking the intake and exhaust manifolds for cracks is also a good idea – and that includes
You Better Think – How to Find Your Niche in a Competitive Market
It was Aretha Franklin who said, ‘You better think…’ many years ago, and while she wasn’t speaking about engine building, the statement still applies to the engine builder’s business. Too often in this industry, and in any business for that matter, the status quo or how things have always been done is the standard. In