With horsepower seemingly growing on trees these days, picking a set of high-flow cylinder heads for your engine combination is the easy part. A mother load of rotating assemblies and aftermarket blocks means that building a big-cube short-block to take advantage of all that airflow isn't exactly difficult, either. With the top and bottom end of an engine build covered, the wild card in the horsepower equation often comes down to the camshaft. While it's true that manufacturers offer a diverse range of off-the-shelf camshafts for every conceivable combination, several important decisions must be made before you even narrow the field of part numbers down to a list of finalists.

It wasn't long ago that the majority of muscle cars were either built as Pro Street machines or simply restored back to factory specs. These days, the word pro has evolved into Pro Touring and rather than idling through car shows, these gems can be seen cruising the highways and terrorizing the tracks against most modern-day sports cars.

In the hot rod world engine swaps are a big part of what we do. It can be a small-block V-8 to replace a straight six-banger, a big-block in place of a small-block, or any number of "this for that" combinations. These days one of the more popular gyrations is to drop a modern EFI-fed, computer-controlled mill underhood, and the most popular choice is GM's line of LS engines. After all, what's not to love? Great street manners, lightweight aluminum goodness, killer gas mileage, and a rock-solid EFI system wrapped up in an arguably affordable package.

In the auto trans world, few transmissions can handle the type of power the TH400 can when it's upgraded from stock. Unlike the Powerglide, which is mainly a drag racing trans, the TH400 is a viable choice for both street cars and hard-core strip racers.

Last weekend, something hit me: I’ve never considered myself to be a car show buff who likes to sit idle by the sidelines talking shop. While there’s nothing wrong with that, given the option I’ve always preferred to go for a cruise with a group of people or wheel the ride at a performance driving event.

Great fit

It’s late August, the hottest month of the year and absolutely the worst time for anyone to get caught driving through Death Valley with their windows rolled down. So why in the last days of August 2012 was there a black ’69 Z/28 Camaro doing exactly just that? The official name was the Death Valley Challenge, and the concept was dreamt up by the folks at Classic Auto Air to introduce Restomod Air—its newest division geared toward the needs of the custom A/C system builder. A custom builder can best be defined as either the home DIY guy who’s fanatical about how clean and functional the work he produces is, or the high-end shop that caters to clients desiring a custom-built A/C system unlike any standard production unit. Unlike in the sense that not only does the air-conditioning system have a fully customized appearance, it puts out a heretofore unheard of amount of freezing cold air.

No one builds a hot rod to save gas, but downgrading to bare essentials and stiffing your roommate on rent will only get you so far before it’s time to park that 10-mpg big-block. Even when gas was still cheap several decades ago, Gear Vendors recognized these issues, and in response, engineered a bolt-on overdrive unit. These slick gizmos attach to the back of just about any transmission, and add an overdrive gear that can be actuated from inside the cabin with the flick of a switch. The really cool part, however, is the ratio-splitting ability offered by a Gear Vendors unit, which adds a host of underdrive ratios to the mix. This lets you keep the motor in the fat part of the powerband, which explains why Gear Vendors units have become very popular in hard-core racing applications. That’s no joke, as Gear Vendors overdrives have been popping up in 6- and 7-second drag cars in recent years. To learn more about everything these trick overdrive units have to offer, we called up Rick Johnson at Gear Vendors to solicit his expertise. Here’s what he had to say:

Last month we set about building a big-inch big-block. Not big as in 496 or even 540 inches, but more like 582 power-making cubes. In addition to making power based on pure displacement, we also wanted this big-block to rev well into the upper 6,000-rpm range without falling on its face. To make it even more challenging we added the caveats that it had to run on 91-octane, have a hydraulic valvetrain, decent street manners, and enough vacuum to run power brakes.

A few months ago the folks from 3M’s Commercial Graphics division came to our offices in Irvine, California, to show off some semipermanent coverings from their Scotchprint line—a personalized vehicle graphic material that comes in a variety of different colors and styles, including brushed aluminum and gold metallic. But what really caught our eye was their faux carbon-fiber material and how cool it looked on the hood of their rental car. Yes, it’s an imitation carbon-fiber film, and this stuff looks trick. Immediately we started dreaming up ways to use it (interior accents, body panel stripes, and/or hood/bumper coverings).

Back in the Day!

Hot rodders have got this airflow thing figured out. With today’s incredible selection of high-flow cylinder heads, even home-built small-blocks can embarrass Rat motors from just a few decades ago. Interestingly, that same universal knowledge doesn’t apply to suspension design, as many DIY engine-building studs are clueless when it comes to upgrading the cornering performance of their rides. What makes the situation even worse is that by putting two to three times more horsepower through a car than it was originally designed to take, any inherent handling deficiencies become exponentially worse. The good news is that there’s no shortage of quality aftermarket suspension components to help tame today’s wicked engine combinations. Even so, haphazardly bolting random suspension bits onto a car can yield a mismatched combination that not only rides terribly, but doesn’t optimize handling, either. To get down to the nitty-gritty of how to properly upgrade an old-school suspension, you first have to understand how they work and where their designs fall short. To make sense of it all, we engaged in a conversation with Brent VanDervort of Fatman Fabrications. His shop has been building cutting-edge suspension components for decades, and by combining that real-world experience with a mechanical engineering degree, he has a knack for explaining highly complicated topics in a way that everyone can understand.

Heavy Breathing

L92/Wagon Marriage

If you’re into building engines on a regular regimen, then you’ll appreciate Powerhouse Products’ universal cam bearing installation kit. Even if you only build a couple of engines between your street machine or your dedicated track ride, including your buddies’ powerplants, then you can bet this specialized tool will pay for itself rather quickly. This setup comes complete in an easy to store case and allows you to quickly change the cam bearings on any engine block.

When you last read about our road-gripping second-generation Camaro project, Bruce Monroe and his crew at A&E Motorsports out of Santa Fe Springs, California, were situating some of the final components we needed to fire it up, including an American Autowire kit and Auto Meter’s Digital Street Dash. In this installment, we show off a couple of Lokar’s products, including their Competition Series throttle pedal (PN XBAG-6149), which we found was a great upgrade for those with flimsy or missing stock pedals. Ever try to drive an old car with a loose pedal or missing pad? Take it from us; it’s incredibly annoying. After we put our heavy sole on Lokar’s grippy pedal and felt how smoothly it operates while goosing the throttle, we wondered why we are using a sloppy stock pedal on our other projects.

We can remember the days when a 454 big-block was considered, well, big. But today you can hit that displacement number with a small-block and save a ton of weight. So, if you’re going to go with a big-block you might as well start thinking, well, big. Of course, using a factory GM block stifles dreams of huge displacement, but luckily for us the aftermarket offers blocks capable of cubic inches once only available to the pros. And, in the world of stroker engines, it’s not much more expensive to build a block big rather than err on the small side. Besides, more displacement equates to more torque, and more torque is always a good time.

While our ’63 Nova hardtop project is being worked on at the body shop, we thought it would be a good time to start fitting some components that we will need for an upcoming V-8 conversion. In last month’s article “Master Blaster” on page 36, we mentioned that the radiator in our ’63 sprung a pinhole leak after getting it shot with soda at Cal Blast; not a bad leak, but enough to make us start looking for radiator options. The 50-year-old copper/brass, single-row radiator that the car came with was showing its age, and frankly, we were surprised it was even able to do its job when we were blasting down SoCal’s freeways. Plus, the corroded stocker would in no way cool the terrible behemoth of a small-block we plan on putting together for it.

What a great year it’s been for anyone who’s into hot rodding. The aftermarket is constantly working overtime to deliver the latest goods for your street machine and believe me, we’ve seen many of the end results of your endeavors and we’re quite impressed. And as much as we would enjoy seeing all your rides out 365 days of the year, a little downtime for the winter months is good—if nothing else to scribble down future thoughts and to plan out the following year’s changes to stay ahead of the pack. So whether you’re looking for basic bolt-ons to hop up your powerplant or everything from mild suspension upgrades to full chassis modifications, we can’t wait to see them back in action and on the road again! If you’re not sure what you’re looking for, fret not. This year’s Holiday Gift Guide will probably showcase something to get your adrenalin flowing. —Henry D.

There was a time when the dual-purpose car was the norm rather than the exception. Driving your hot Chevy to work all week and racing on weekends was a way of life for many hot rodders. As the competition got tougher at the racetrack many dual-purpose cars were forced to choose, street or strip. This brought about an onslaught of dedicated race cars. One of the defining reasons for the death of the dual-purpose car was the final drive gear. To be competitive at the track you need a low final gear, while driving to work you were wishing for a tall gear.

Not until recent years did Europeans figure out the benefits of cubic inches. During the ’60s, fabled brands like Ferrari piddled around with weenie-displacement V-12s no larger than a typical American straight-six. Even so, what they lacked in cubic inches they made up for in spades with exotic good looks. Popping the hood of Maranello’s finest revealed 12 Weber carburetors sitting atop a dozen polished throttle stacks. Aesthetics were just part of the equation, as the basic nature of having an individual throttle stack for each cylinder netted massive gains in low-rpm torque over a typical common-plenum intake manifold. Cars like the Shelby Cobra represented one of the first domestic applications of a Weber induction system, and since then hot rodders have been going gaga over eight-stack induction systems.

Back in the May ’12 issue, in a story called “Big Heat”, we showed off the assembly of a factory block-based 496ci short-block, featuring the skills of Bryce Mulvey of Dr. J’s Performance in Anaheim, California. The idea was to put together a durable, yet simple big-block that we can test various parts on in future issues—something that can take multiple dyno pulls without a hiccup. What we came up with was a stock big-block Chevy stuffed with a forged crank from Scat that featured a 4.250-inch stroke, forged H-beam rods also from Scat, and a set of high-compression domed slugs from JE Pistons. With around 13:1 compression smashing against Brodix STS Race-Rite BB-2 heads, we hoped to make around 700 hp on the engine dyno.

This month’s installment is going to be a two-pronged discussion. If you’re a regular reader, you know that the racing scene in Southern California is quite dismal. We have lost our only quarter-mile track in the Los Angeles area, Fontana AutoClub Dragway, and for a period of time we had also lost our eighth-mile track, Irwindale Dragway. With both tracks closed, the natives have been going crazy to peel out and do wheelies! Well, we’ve got one of our tracks back, as Irwindale reopened for business several weeks ago. This past weekend they were having a Summit E.T. series race to qualify for competition in the E.T. Finals. My son and I had joined Fontana’s team before the closure, but without a definite answer if they were going to reopen or field a team at all, we decided to go to Irwindale and join its team.

There is something about working on a project car that’s been taken down to bare metal that really motivates you to start thrashing to get it completed. Maybe it’s the peace of mind of having a blank slate to work with that flips a mental switch that makes you stay up wrenching until 3 a.m. on a work night; maybe it’s simply knowing that your carefully chosen paint scheme will be tied directly to the project without someone else’s terrible color choice from 1978 lurking underneath. However, motivation isn’t the most common reason why folks take their cars’ paint all the way off. Sometimes it’s what is “lurking underneath” that makes you want to tear off your project’s old skin to really assess what you’re working with.

Bolt-on Ease