Finally got the car out to the Street Legal runs last weekend, got out fairly late so I only managed three runs for the whole night.

Car is an '86 plain-Jane Firebird (originally 2.8 MPI V6) now with a 0.060-over 283, Edelbrock Perf RPM heads, Perf intake, Comp 268H, headers & 2.5" cat back. Using original wide-ratio 5-speed from behind the V6 and the 3.42 open rear gears.

Ran two 14.5s at 97 Mph, and a best of 14.34 at 95 Mph. This is at 2200 feet elevation, humidity about 60% and 75 degrees F.

Granted the transmission is not going to last long at the drags, even slipping the clutch as I was, but the short 1st and 2nd ratios really work with the torqueless 283.

The aluminum heads are coming off and some reworked 601 castings going on to raise the compression and improve driveability. I'm hoping to keep it in the mid-14s after the swap. I'll post the times once it runs the 1/4.

 

wow, thats a fast v6, great job. :hail:

 

It isn't. A 283 is a very small V8.

I'm wondering why you bothered building such a small engine? It costs the same to build a 350.

 

Those are pretty decent times for a 283. How does that cam sound in that motor. I guessing fairly lumpy. What rpm are you taking it up to? What carb are you running?

 

The 283 went in because I had one handy and I could transfer the heads etc to another small block if I wanted to go faster. The idea was to keep it around 300 cubes so the trans and diff would survive, the trans especially won't deal with a pile of torque (4.03 1st gear!).

Carb is a 600 cfm Edelbrock. It does sound quite lumpy with the 268H camshaft, it's quite hot for a small, low-compression motor. I've been shifting it at 6500, but wound it out to 6900 in 3rd on the quickest pass because the shift to 4th is close to the finish line.

I've got a core 350 on the stand but no manual transmission worthy of it's torque.