That magazine had a project car 305 Formula. Last I heard they had put a custom cam and World 305 Torquer heads on it, but they hadn't gotten the computer programed to run with the new stuff.

Does anybody have any leads on this story and what happened with the car?

Just to catch you up to speed, After installing the heads and cam on Blue Thunder, the shortblock immediately went south. During the first dyno pull, the motor would not rev past 4500 and on the second, the motor wouldn't rev past 3500 and shortly thereafter, oil pressure dropped and knocking ensued.

A 350 shortblock from Scoggin Dickey was dropped in and there were some tuning issues that left BT idling extremely lean and running extremely fat under wide open throttle.

The tuning issue has been somehwat remedied for now, but the health of the new motor is in question. Look for an update in GMHTP probably in the January, February or March issue. BT will return.

Steve

Coooool!

Thanks for the update!

Any idea why the 305 crapped out? I remember from the photos that the engine seemed clean inside so I figured the short block was in good shape.

We knew we were gambling a bit by installing new heads on the 170,000-mile shortblock. The motor was already showing 7 degrees of knock retard though we didn't detect any audible knock and the engine had made 230rwhp which we thought was excellent given the mileage. Adding new heads to an old motor sometimes puts added strain on worn parts such as bearings and piston rings, and we spun a connecting rod bearing and the rest looked like Rocky after 15 rounds with Apollo Creed.

The cylinder walls did look good. The bearings obviously didn't.

That's too bad Steve

Any word yet on whether you mag is going to cover our $400 set of heads you p and p yourself? A fair number of us are using them now and having too much fun not to share!

Email Rick Jensen.