It's a buick web site, but that particular post is about the 425 in my '79 Caddy SDV. Buick, Caddy, and Olds 425's are completely different animals. BTW, I'v still got that '79 all these years later, and I'm knocking around the idea of droping a diesel engine out of an old truck into it, as per the line in my signature.
That is too cool. I bet you will have changed at leasst one of their minds on how bad ass a V8 is compared to the little Honda motors. With this being said I can not wait to put that 425 in my little Model A truck. I plan to make lake style headers for it will this create any problems perfomance wise or will it better it ? Just curious because of all the smog shit that it may have. I am getting ready to strip all the junk off of it.
Waste Veggie Oil, www.frybrid.com www.greasecar.com http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/cfrm/f/898605551 www.oilburners.net Bio-diesel is manufactured from veggie oil, or you can modify the diesel engine to burn the veg oil without changing it into bio-d. Restaurants throw the stuff away in massive quantities, and usually have to pay to have it removed. I'v got 130,000 miles on WVO, and I burn it in a commercial truck. I saved enough money last year to pay cash for a $55k RV.
No problems. The 425 responds quite well to all the tuning tricks. Strip the motor down of all it's power acessories and emissions crap. You may need to plug up the AIR passages. Re-bop the carb,,, it will need to be re-jetted for the reduced exhaust back pressure anyway. Re-curve the dizzy, Here is a fantastic write up on how to. Since the Buick and Caddy are both made for torque, the numbers should translate very well. IMHO, it would be worthwhile to pull the heads, re-grind the valves, and definately replace the valve springs. If it's in the budget, swap the cam [or regrind it] to something in the 272-276* range. 112* centerline will help keep cylinder pressure and maintain good vacuum. PAY ATTENTION to the tranny!!! T-400's are dirt cheap to re-bop. $130 for all the parts INCLUDING a shift kit. The above cam will "do it's magic" from 1800/2000 up to 5000 rpm's, so a saturday night special "el-cheapo" torque converter with a 2000 stall is in order. It might also be worthwhile to hit the boneyards, and find a valve body from a 455 powered Olds or Buick. The small passage caddy valve body will short shift you [4000 rpm] every time. That combo should be good for an honest to goodness 375 hp and 450 ft/lbs, and if you can do the work yourself, maybe $600. [Ha! Try doing THAT with a SBC.... Try even buying a core BBC for that kind of scratch!!!] With all that torque down low, you wont need a lot of gear to make it scoot.
No, not bio-diesel, Waste Veggie Oil. I have modified the engine to burn the oil directly instead of converting it to bio.
I'm running a 60 over 500 in my 32 hiboy. Backed by a Richmond 5 sp (real hotrods have three pedals) 3.90 limited slip Ford 9" Running very tall truck sized rear tires. With shaft rocker conversion and a Edelbrock manifold and Demon carb there is no need to spin the engine more than 5K. And yes it will boil the tires if you let it but isnt that the reason you build a hot rod so you can go through a intersection sideways boiling the hides when the need strikes? No hood sides allows for a cool engine compartment and show off the beast.
Short answer: Yes, it really is as simple as that. Long answer: The devil is in the details... There are at least 2 dozen other factors that must be consideder when burning VO. For example, you must use 2 fuel tanks. One for diesel fuel, and the other for VO. The engine must be started and stoped on diesel. Starting a cold diesel on VO will,,, let me stress will, destroy it in short order. The first link I gave, www.frybrid.com has a wealth of information. If you would seriously like to give this a shot, read, read, READ all you can. 95% of your questions have been asked before, and the answers are there for you.
Thanks for the info guys its been very helpful. been looking around and obviously the valvetrain and the conrods need to be changed, Any idea's regarding which valvetrain kit is best ??? I think i will need 500 ish bhp to get what i want, Car will be as light as its possible. Founds these conrods http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Cadi...emQQcategoryZ33623QQihZ014QQitemZ330204718475 at a reasonable price, Opinions ???
Chat up Chris at http://www.cad500parts.com - he'll tell you all you need to know, whether you buy some parts from him or not - he rocks! ~Jason
MTS sells a flywheel to do the manual tranny thing.I had a caddy 500 in my 1994 GMC 1 ton truck with an NV 4500 5 speed behind it,used a 3/8 inch thick adapter between the tranny and the motor.It now has a cummins diesel in it. 3 of my cars are caddy 500/472 powered ,I just lurv the power these engines produce.The one in my A sedan has pushed the car to 163 MPH at Bonneville and the motor is a mild build,just balanced with a cam and some larger valves and 10:1 pistons.My 56 caddy has a stock 500 in it and the 70 coop has a 472.
Do yourself a favor and search the forums about the big Cadillac. There are lots of urban myths about this engine family, but lots of facts on these two forums. The vendors are well represented on both sites. http://http://www.cowboyseven.us/forum/index.php http://www.caddy500.com/
<TABLE id=HB_Mail_Container height="100%" cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0 UNSELECTABLE="on"><TBODY><TR height="100%" UNSELECTABLE="on" width="100%"><TD id=HB_Focus_Element vAlign=top width="100%" background="" height=250 UNSELECTABLE="off">I am running a 472 Cad big block in my Buick, it's bored and stroked to a 518 and has an Edelbrock intake and carb. We put Sanderson block huggers on it and now it really breathes. I have had this car up to 140mph on the freeway and it just hugs the ground. You need to know that the valve train needs work it's the weakest link. but if you let one of these big mothas breathe it will light you fire. Rags </TD></TR><TR UNSELECTABLE="on" hb_tag="1"><TD style="FONT-SIZE: 1pt" height=1 UNSELECTABLE="on"> </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
Most already know I run a 73 Eldo (506) in my 51 Cad more-dor body. Definately use the www.cadillacpower.com site mentioned above. There you will find the best & most knowledge bunch of csobs on the web when it comes to the BIG INCH Caddy. I won't recommend any vendor as 'most' all on that board are aces. Good Luck, & welcome to the world of INSANE POWER Al
WOW!!!!! I would have KILLED to have that kind of price and availability when I built my motor. Obviously people have "discovered" this engine, and the scene has changed quite a bit since then. While these rods would fit the bill nicely, I would suggest you do your homework first because I'm not aware of any "off the shelf" forged pistons available..... It may be more adventageous to [for example] use Olds rods and BBC pistons,,, or Mopar rods and Ford pistons, [etc, etc] to arrive at the combination you want at a price you can live with......... JMHO, and I could be wrong.
You can make it fit. Tonight I will measure the 425 in my garage, I think it is the same dimensions. I may be wrong but if it will help I will get these tonight around 9:30 pm ok.
When I had the caddy 500(stock) in the truck(1 tonne crewcab) it was a lot of fun fast of the line and pull a trailer with a big car on it effortlessly ,compared to the stock cummins motor the caddy would walk all over it.The only problem with the caddy motor was the fuel mileage with the 4:10 gears in the truck,I was getting about 9-10mpg.The cummins will get 16-18mpg.With different gears the caddy could get near the cummins mpg.
Cheap tip! My 472 had small chamber heads and dished pistons. My 500 had large chamber heads and flat tops. I put the small chamber heads on the flat top pistons for a compression boost. Worked great.
I second the comment about the overwhelming amount of heat these big block Caddys give off. A friend has a 500 in his '56 Cadillac (FireMaker) and we drive the hell out of it. We have a 500hp one coming from Potter Performance soon. When we redid the car last year we throw a little higher stall converter in it, and it really picked up the launch. We were catching some of the muscle car guys off guard at the lights out on Woodward Ave. big on torque, but short on rpms.