I did a little mocking up today just for fun.

I’ve lost track of your build. What is going to be the recipient of this fine engine?

!953 1/2 ton pickup. 292, 4-71 blower, 3 Roch 2 bbl, Electromotive direct fire engine management, Tremec tko 600 5 speed. Frankland quick change with Gleason Torson diff. Wilwood 12.88" disk 4/6 piston. The head on there is a full race head built by Gaerte Racing Engines and I have a blower manifold for it but I am getting a 12 port aluminum cross flow head as soon as next week. It will require some block work like additional head studs. They told me they have supported 2000 hp with this head. It's made by Ryan Falconer. You should check out his Bio, has had an interesting life and great to work with. He has the been there done that no big deal attitude
https://falconerengines.com/

Thanks

Mick,

What are those holes in the side of the valve cover that look like eyes and a grinning mouth, future locations of breathers?

Ray W

Yes for breathers. I didn't put them on yet. It can use a little more polishing. I probably won't be using this valve cover on this engine. I just wanted to see what it looked like. The new head I hope to get has it's own valve cover.

Dang I'm drooling....

What does the blower manifold look like?

I haven't had it made yet. Hogan is going to design and build it. I'll have ports put in it for meth or anything else crazier I want to do down the road. He has made manifolds for the Falconer heads before.
https://www.hogansracingmanifolds.c...9TUzBfnoF2tpKe2dgv5XPXlyWeRoCcX8QAvD_BwE

Do you know if he is going to make GMC heads?

Ed

He makes his own I6, V8 and V12 engines. I think they are all based on GM engines. The head I'm getting is one head off his V12 engine. Give him a call. He and his son Erik are great guys. His engines can reach 6 digits. Read his bio on his website, It's quite interesting. My complete head "kit" was $5700 plus shipping. I'm having mine delivered un-assembled so I can improve the aerodynamics by polishing the outside.

"The head on there is a full race head built by Gaerte Racing Engines"

Mick,

Is it a modified GM head or something created entirely from scratch? I ask because we're constantly told here that some GM heads have no performance potential. That kind of statement makes no sense because nothing is perfect and there is always room for improvement. Science and engineering are always moving forward and whatever is discovered today was unknown yesterday.

I'm a geologist and what I was taught in college in the 1960s is considered laughable today.

Ray W

The Siamese intake runners and ports on GM 6 cyl. engines do not lend well to increasing HP and torque, made for long life and torque. Some have put a Ford 300 6 cylinder head on a GM 6 for more power.

Wayne, etc., single port cylinder heads were a significant improvement to pre. 62 GM cyl. heads.

Ed

One of the problems with a replacement head for the GMC is that the bore pitch varies along the length of the block (like the 235 and many other older L6 engines - even the slant 6). Nothing with that chamber/cylinder location pattern exists TIKO.
Clever compromise is possible by averaging out the bore centers and adapting something close (2 X 3 cylinders o a V8 welded, etc.), but not always easy to prevent the chambers from overlapping the deck (but not always fatal), water circ, bolt locations.

The 12 port heads that I've seen (pictures) have really bad chamber designs, some with no chamber in the head (piston dome only), vertical valves, no quench. These were made obsolete in 1949 when GM introduced the 303 Oldsmobile and 331 Cadillac OHV engines.

Well I'm a physicist so not much changes, we just learn more. I apologize for not being very clear. The red head that's on the engine now was done by Gaerte. It's a stock head that has been ported and polished with big valves and roller rockers and so on. The one I'm getting that will require some block work is a custom casting made by Ryan Falconer Racing Engines. It's an aluminum 12 port cross flow head. I don't have the specs on it yet. I'm running solid roller rocker cam. I'll let you know the specs when I get them. Sorry for the confusion, thank you for your time.

The red head that's on the engine now was done by Gaerte. It's a stock head that has been ported and polished with big valves and roller rockers and so on.

Mick,

Because it's stated over and over by a very few people on this forum that the inline GM heads have no performance enhancement potential I've gotten interested in that subject. There is no perfect product that I've ever heard about in 75+ years of life so the "Porting those heads is a waste of time" rap does not have the ring of truth to me. Do you know of any articles that describe modifications to those heads and before and after tests.

I once had the honor of meeting Harvey Crane at a Southern California Timing Association meet at El Mirage dry lake on the Mojave Desert of Southern California. He was there with a Buick straight 8 powered car and he told me how much potential he found in improving that head. Presumably the same potential exists in the Chevy/GMC also. I just have an academic interest in learning what there is to know on that subject.

I've also been to the Bonneville salt flats to spectate a few times. From that I learned that tiny improvements to engine power and vehicle aerodynamics result in new records being set on a regular basis. A good friend of mine campaigned a Ford flathead 4-banger from the 1928-34 era in a street roadster there. He broke a lot of parts along the way but inched his own record up year after year. 120 MPH isn't fast in absolute terms but doing it the way my friend Norm Adams did it can be appreciated by any antique car person.

https://www.gazettes.com/sports/fea...118769a-1160-11e3-b0f5-001a4bcf887a.html

Ray W

I don't know of any before and after articles about before and after but the physics are there. Some controversy exist as to the polishing part. It is possible that the gas molecules touching the casting are stationary and the molecules move against themselves. If that makes any sense. I used to live in Desert Hot Springs CA. We went to Lake Mirage quite often. I once dumped A Yamaha IT 490 there at 140 mph.

First let me say that I am in awe of what you are doing Mick. There is power to made with the GM L6 heads, a lot of machine work and porting. The point I believe a few member are trying to make is that your still putting it in an old truck. To get the power that these engine will make you need to reach the usable RPM levels, for most folks that will never happen. I am a fan of the 292, I have only built one but enjoyed learning all about that engine. It's true that it's a torque monster but with the right parts and some ingenuity it will make a great deal of power. The key to any real power is being able to make it breathe. There is a lot of information out there you just need to look.

P.S. I grew up around drag racing and such in the California central valley.

"The key to any real power is being able to make it breathe. There is a lot of information out there you just need to look."

Good morning Craig. Do you have links to any of that information?

Astonishing power levels are attainable from antique engines if one has a creative mind. The best example I can think of is the Poteet and Main Bonneville streamliner called "Flatfire". The goal was to run 300 MPH in a streamliner powered by a single Ford flathead V8 engine. Calculations indicated that 700 to 800 horsepower would be required to do that, approximately 10 times the original power output of that engine family.

Using the engine building skills of the legendary Richard (The name he actually uses was edited out) Landy the Poteet and Main team accomplished their goal, running 302+ MPH. So the takeaway seems to be that some serious horsepower lurks in those ancient engines if truly skilled engine builders prepare them. The naysayers appear to be ignoring what has been accomplished.

http://speeddemon.us/docs/HRDP-081000-DEMON.pdf

Ray W

There are sources for us novice builders, Langon's is a good start, check out 12bolt.com (some good articals). I followed a lot of the advice from Leo Santucci's book "Chevrolet Inline Six-Performance : Power Manual". A good machine shop is a must, your machinist should be familiar with in line 6's. I lucked out in that my machinist is also an NHRA record holder for 230 CID class (Jim had a 69' Camero named "Slow Motion" ) is a wealth of information on inlines.

Torque monster sounds nice, but torque (cylinder pressure) is pretty much a function of displacement and static compression ratio. There is no magic, no inherent benefit to L6 engines. A 292" anything (Ford, Chrysler, Pontiac; L6, V6, L8, V8) with similar cam timing and CR will have similar torque characteristics.
The somewhat greater low speed torque can be obtained from any engine by the following: 240 degree cam, early intake valve closing, 116 degree LSA and 8:1 CR. But doesn't that kill peak power? Yes, it does.