Up next on the build agenda is to fill the block, yes that’s correct fill the block, and yes this is a street rod!

(This is a cutaway picture of a short filled 454 Chevy for circle track use)

Lets first start by looking at how HP is made; there are two good ways to make lots of power.

(1)   You can buy lots of very expensive light weight parts, machine everything to exacting standards, and spin the whole thing at an incredibly high RPM

NOTE:
This technique requires that all these expensive parts be replaced often or else risk catastrophic failure.

 

(2)   You can create an environment where your producing very high torque numbers at a lower RPM

To break it down to simplicity horse power is an equation of torque times RPM. So your either turning it up fast or making torque, or both!

The later is exactly what we are doing with this build. Now let’s take a look at the limiting factors involved in this process because there is a limit factor and it involves the cylinders themselves.

At the point where you are developing enough torque that the cylinder walls distort to the point where compression is lost, this is the limit! Your limit of torque creation. There is a way to drastically reduce this distortion however and that would be to short fill the block. The block on the 392 hemi has 6 ½ “ of the cylinder in water and we have filled the bottom 3 ½ “ with RokBlock filler a technique that’s been around circle track for years.

(This picture is of are 392 being filled with RokBlock)

The only draw back to short filling a block is heat! This is one aspect you must carefully look at when considering this option. The cooling system needs to be beefed up just a little I.E. high flow water pump and big radiator but the real concern is the oiling system.

Science tells us that the surface area to water volume is still relative so the water temp won’t change that much but the newly created, none cooled, oil surface is increased so the oil temp will skyrocket if not kept in check and due to contrary belief just adding a bigger oil pan or adding more oil volume will not help at all. Oil is a great conductor of heat so increasing the volume just means it will takes a few more minutes to over heat.

There will be more on how we are keeping it all cool in the next segment of are block prep so stay tuned and if you have any questions or comments please feel free to ask.