Whipple Supercharger 383 Small Block Chevy Build - Whipple Stomp

BRODIX KC IK210 CYLINDER HEADS

1. Our trusty Speed-O-Motive 383 short-block contains four-bolt mains, a cast crank, forged rods, and Mahle pistons.
2. Camshaft of choice was a Comp 292XFI, which specs out at 0.584/0.579-inch lift, 242/248 degrees duration at 0.050, and a 113-degree lobe separation angle. Pro Magnum lifters, Magnum pushrods and Ultra Gold rocker arms completed the valvetrain.
3. Brodix's Wild Thing KC IK210 heads are fully CNC-ported and have great flow characteristics; they also come with a 75cc combustion chamber, which brought us in at a 10:1 compression ratio.
4. Whipple's tuner kit for carbureted small-blocks is based on a twin-screw compressor. Fit and finish is superior, and the setup delivered massive power gains across the board.
5. For our force-fed runs, we used a Holley Ultra HP 950 carb with 76/83 jets.

Brodix's Wild Thing KC IK210 heads receive the full CNC treatment, including a worked-over combustion chamber. The 75cc volume put us at a 10:1 compression. Whipple recommends 8.5:1 to 9:1 for this system, but a lot of people who have supercharging on the brain have 10:1 motors. High compression, Dustin agreed, leads to more low-rpm torque. These lungs worked very well in both naturally aspirated and force-inducted guises.

Once we'd peeled away the packing foam, this is what our new Whipple supercharger looked like. It's a complete setup-all we really had to do was install it, pick a belt that fit, and fill the compressor with oil. The whole process only took a couple of hours with our easily accessible, dyno-mounted engine.

The basis of the system is the screw compressor setup, which Whipple claims to be the most efficient setup available. It's hard to tell by looking at it, but the rotors don't actually touch each other or the housing that contains them. This simple fact greatly reduces operating temperatures-and noise. The typical supercharger whine is virtually nonexistent.

The system comes fitted with an air bypass system to reduce drag during all vacuum situations, which Dustin Whipple says includes "virtually all" idle and cruising situations. "The engine is trying to get as much air as possible in these situations," he told us. "But the supercharger becomes restrictive because the throttle blades are closed." The bypass equalizes pressure above and below the supercharger by reducing vacuum on the inlet side, allowing the engine to breathe. "It takes 3 hp to run," Dustin continued, "and you also get better emissions and lower temperatures."

In a separate box we found just about everything else we needed to install our supercharger: bolts, belts, a thermostat housing, a crank-pulley base adapter and crank pulley, and also a carb baseplate that works with both 4150 and Dominator-style carbs. The plate must be drilled to work with any given throttle linkage.

First part of the install was to remove the intake manifold from the rest of the supercharger assembly. We used the same Fel-Pro 1206 intake gaskets we had used for our naturally aspirated configuration and bolted it right into place with the included ARP hardware.

Although the heat buildup in a twin-screw supercharger is low compared to a roots-style system, we took the "everything helps" approach and ordered our system with Whipple's water-to-air intercooler, which is neatly sandwiched between the compressor and the intake manifold. This adds 1 1/2 inch to the height of the assembly and $800 to the tab. Whipple figures it's good for about a 10 percent power gain.