The Chevy 6 With a V/8 Head Punch!

Around 73 or 74 my brother and I did a Chevy 292--4 in bore JE forged pistons Crane roller cam and Boss 302 ford heads and Olds-Hilborn injection, and Vertex mag. That was the road to horsepower. I put the engine back together 3 yrs ago and got it running and I,m glad I did as my brother passed away 2 yrs ago but he got to hear it run, and this brought back many pleasant memories. Late 50s,60s and early 70s, sure were fun years.

 

Furnace brazed iron heads were a common (well, maybe not common, but well-known in the racing fraternity, it was high end, exotic, high $$ stuff, even by racing standards.) part of the MP Comp and Pro Stock scene of the seventies. They were NOT welded up inside a furnace, the head would be heated to a high temperature inside a furnace, removed from the furnace, wrapped in an asbestos blanket that left the area to be welded on exposed, worked, then as it started to lose temp, returned to the furnace, re-heated and so on. I can dig up photos, and saw furnace brazed heads in person back in the seventies, when I was at Bob Crosbies shop. Booth-Arons and Maskin & Kanners ran AMC heads in pro-stock that had been sliced horizontally and welded back together. Bruce Sizemore used six cylinder ford heads that were made from sliced up 351 cleveland heads, also furnace braced. The method was also used in the exhaust ports of iron BB chevy heads for Pro-Stock and comp motors at the time. The process fell out of use with the advent of aftermarket aluminum heads in the early '80s. It is tricky, high $$, and takes many hours of HIGHLY skilled labour.

 

here are a couple of 6 racer's from 1974, although not with the v 8 head. I seem to remember a couple of cars running at Cayuga with the welded v8 heads back then,

 

Great topic guys and yes many yrs ago they were all cast iron heads Now they are useing the alum heads.And i am sure the alum heads offer a little more power over the cast iron heads.
I would love to see more if you guys have them.

 

one of them four in your post isn't a 292 Chevy ....Gotta be one of them GMC types

 

nice to see their vega survived!

 

more....

 

I remember reading an article in Hot Rod about an early OHV Ford six cylinder head that was modified by milling off the cast in manifolds and replacing them with a plate that was furnace brazed in place. It was a fast little sucker.

 

Hey biscaynes......great pictures.......are these your personal pic's?

 

no, got them awhile ago from this thread....

http://www.colesy-juniorstockforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=225

 

i saw V8 heads welded together back in the late 60's at thunder valley Marion S.D. also watched a guy weld engine blocks in a furnace somewhere around Ames Iowa 15 years ago

 

I saw the Anglia at Green Valley in the late 60's,, had cast iron heads welded together. I remember my buddy at the time said it was out of Canada. Quite impressive.

 

There was a machine shop in Beaumont Texas ,Williams Machine Shop owned by Stanley Williams sr. that did at least 3 pair of the v-8 heads welded together for a 6 cylinder. At the same time that he was doing the set for John Bankstons dirt car he was building a front axle for my t-bucket.I would go by at 5;30 in the morning before I went to work to work to make sure he was sober and he would work on my axle.

 

Interesting fuel pump on that motor.Run off the cams dist. gear.hum

 

Sounds like there should be some more of these type of six's heads around!

 

I grew up near dearborn michigan ford used to donate (stuff) to
my high school auto shop
we had a experimental 351 cleveland engine that was chopped down to a V4
and the block and heads were (welded back together)
it was on a test stand and used as a (teaching ) aid

it was pretty bizar with its sheet metal intake and 4 barrel carb

wish I had pics of it and dont know what ever happened to it
the teachers kept talking about putting the engine in a pinto
and using it at the High School drags

 

They're cool, for sure, but 'they eat V8's' makes no sense. Unless the V8 happens to be one that is much milder to start with.

 

So cool. I would love to hear what it sounds like

 

I think you are missing the point of building a hot rod that is unique and an extension of your personmality. Anyone with a fluffy bank account can buy a prebuilt '32 painted red and a 350/350 combo and trailer it to the runs to power park on the grass, but I'll spend more time in the parking lot looking at some unusual modifaction someone made to a car that makes sense to me and try and adapt it to my own vehicles.

 

Like I said, they're cool. And yes, I would much rather look at one than a small block 350/350 setup. I just don't buy into the myth that a 6 cylinder with a fancy head on it is somehow going to beat a V8 in a similar state of tune.

 

most where built because of class restrictions and to take advantage of loop hole in the rules, i was told that you have to read between the lines and take advantage of everything that will give you an edge. that is why rule books get thicker every year!

 

About the furnace welding or brazing. Have seen cracked cast heads and blocks repaired by welding, after the casting was heated. A hot iron casting is less likely to warp from heat stress as the whole thing is more or less the same temp.

To weld a head they would have a couple of gas burners like off a gas stove. Above them a steel rack with the head sitting on it. Then build a wall around it with fire bricks and roof it over with more fire bricks. The bricks to keep the heat in.

Slowly heat up the casting with the gas burners. When it is up to even temp move aside some of the fire bricks to get at it, do your welding, put the fire bricks back and let it cool down slowly.

Doing it this way reduces the chance of cracking and warping.

 

There is nothing magic about 8 cylinders. If both engines are of equal displacement, and built to the same level of technology it would be a close race.

 

Here are some inlines that crank out over 3 hp per cubic inch and all get to the finish line first a lot of the time.
Normbc9

 

Here this is a 64ss chevyII 250 & a mustang 5.0 http://t6racing.org/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/smokenmousenite.wmv

and L6 250 & a sb 350 http://t6racing.org/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/L6vsV8.wmv

Fun WOW

 

Shit. That is incredible...


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NORMbc9
Are the last 2 pictures 4200 GMs?
Ron