Please Comment of Speed Secret # 2

[jim_howard_pdx]

Speed Secret # 2:

Again everyone. I am not purporting that this is the "best" speed secret you will ever hear. Or that this speed secret will even be important to your contribution to motorsports. I am simply offering up some pieces of information to serve as discussion points. To make us all think, reflect, and absorb some options to make us all faster and safer as we blister the roads and highways across the world.

Yesterday I wrote about squish and quench and wedge and flame propogation. My feeling is that you have to start from where HORSEPOWER is made. That would be the preignition and flame propogation in the combustion chamber of your engine. NO SINGLE ITEM IN YOUR HOTROD BAG OF TRICKS CAN OVERCOME SHORTCOMINGS IN THE BURN CYCLE.

Several of you saw my points and hinted at oppositing opinions that are abundant in the racing world. Like how things have changed between pop-up domed pistons, flat top pistons, or dished pistons. One person mentioned that modern combustion chambers are made to swirl the air fuel mixture as it enters and as it compresses. That the idea was to get a good homologous fuel charge so that the flame propogation would be smooth and steady as it ran from the spark kernal all the way to the pistons edge.

Really good stuff and all absolutely correct.

HOWEVER, you all need to sit back and realize that whatever you do to whatever engine you build, that it is the preignition and flame propogation that makes or breaks the horsepower your engine delivers. The quench and combustion chamber is where the game is won or lost. PERIOD END OF STORY.

If we keep quench tight, reduce the amount of wedge area to what is optimal to the best burn, then we make more horsepower. If we have jagged ragged pop up pistons that have ridges hills and valleys for the flame to cross, you will loose power. So what we did to run a 9 bracket was to take the pop up, make it a 0.10 fit to the wedge (after reducing the wedge volume, then make it all smooth as a babys butt retaining the stock combustion chamber cc volume to satisfy tech inspection. We used stock heads, stock rods and stock pistons and massaged them to make better burn.

I will share one last point to speed secret number one that I was really hoping one of you would jump on. Swirl. Modern engine builders use flat tops, and let the new heads make the swirl. Back in my day, I not only modified the domed piston to get my quench, but I modified the dome, to swirl the compressing fuel back into the sweet spot for the preignition.

No one grabbed that point. I was counting on YOU TO THINK THIS THROUGH AND POINT IT OUT. All NASCAR builders worth a damn are using piston shape to effect swirl to compressed quench. So if you ever get the chance to see a world record engine tech inspected BE THERE. YOU WILL LEARN ALOT FOR YOUR EFFORT.

So now as you read speed secret # 2 remember that I WANT YOUR COMMENTS. I want you to think the topic through and say "what about this", "what about that", and "what about the other thing"......

So here is speed secret # 2. A Z06 Corvette makes 400 hp. 315 to 330 of it makes it to the rear wheels. The Corvette is making 70 horsepower per liter. Why is it that most Honda VTech engines are making 100 horsepower per liter, and can cross the quarter mile faster than the Z06 with just a 1.8 to 2.2 liter engine?

That's quite a question for you to digest.

A Z06 Corvette does the quarter mile in 12.7 to 13.3 seconds. Pretty d a m n quick if that is what you are used to. But a buddies stock Honda CRX with a 1.8 liter FACTORY ORIGINAL Acura Integra R engine, a set of headers, 2.5 open pipe, no muffler and a stock honda 5 speed with racing clutch quarters in 12.4 seconds. No gimmicks. No engine work, No NOS, No trick intakes, No modified injectors, No custom computer, Nothing that did not come stock on that ol Integra. So why did that Honda beat up on the Z06?

I want your comments. PLEASE

Here is my speed secret #2. Reduce your parasitic horsepower loss, and you will improve your ET's. When we were racing in the 10's we had almost 600 flywheel horsepower and almost 700 ft lbs of torque from our trustworthy 428 super cobra jet engine. We started our campaign at a 10.2 bracket. Within two months the same engine the same transmission ran a 9.2. Tuning was the same, compression was the same, intake and exhaust was the same. We did add 4" to the tunnel ram, but that only got us .05 ET. Basically only one thing changed. We reduced the parasitic horsepower loss.

What did we do.....

Parasitic horsepower losses are the torque and horsepower lost transferring the rotational energy at the flexplate or flywheel to the bite on your tires.

We could not reduce the weight of the C-6 internals without lowering its torque capacity. So eliminating parasitic loss in the rotating pieces of the transmission was determined to be foolish. We could have shaved the drums, tried custom light weight alloy drums, but this is a quarter mile car. So what works for us at Bonneville, does not work at the drag strip.
So we moved on in our quest for better ETs.

The drive shaft. We decided on using a graphite drive shaft. I knew a company making graphite tubes for missle bodies and had them send us some units. We had to sign non disclosure agreements, and underwent an FBI security check before they would release the tubes. Then they would only send us the rejects. Man we never did see any imperfections. They used sonic and x-rays energy to check these. Remember a missle body accelerates to about MACH 4, so these have to be right on the mark.

My buddy at Rockwell supplied some epoxy (the stuff they use on the Space Shuttle). We glued the yoke ends to the graphite shaft on one end and balanced it with just the front yoke pressed on. Then we slathered silicone RTV on to a thin wall aluminum tube and pressed it into the graphite tube to provide laminate torsional energy strength. We were counting on the balancer to spin our epoxy and silicone into balance and it worked. Then we did the other end and balanced again. Now when a shop balances a drive shaft, ask then what rpm they balance at. Most shops balance at the RPM your engine turns at say 70 mph. We balanced ours at the highest RPM we could achieve. It really makes a difference.

We put the new driveshaft in and turned a 9.94 ET .26 et from a driveshaft? It is not just the weight that kills your horsepower. It is also the harmonics, vibration, and any imbalance. All those things translate to LOST power. Reduce the vibration and the harmonics and you gain horsepower. We used graphite not because it was lighter than aluminum. We could have used titanium and it would have been just as light as graphite. We chose graphite because it ABSORBS harmonic energy better than aluminum or titanium. The expanded foam material was to dampen the torsional energy stored by the silicone between the carbon and the aluminum. We had to show the tech guys the balance records to run the shaft at some brackets.

Next came the pumpkin. We wanted to use an aluminum Strange 3rd member to reduce weight. But the great guys at Hoopers rear end exchange told us it would be really hard on the wear patterns of the gears. Now having a gear wear out a little early was not our concern. Why did we stay nodular? Because if the case flexes and the gears run off line, then the missaligned gears scrub horsepower and inject harmonics and vibration back to the shaft and out to the axles. Do not sacrafice HORSPOWER for weight. Only lose weight if it improves ET's.

Still, our goal was to reduce the weight in the rotating assembly of the rear end. We refused to run smaller bearings to save weight, The gears had to be drag quality soft steel in order to take the launches (did you know drag gears are soft, and street gears are hardened????). At that point the differential was an open iron case with a mini spool. Worked ok at 10.8 but it was really heavy. So we chose an ultra lightweight aluminum spool designed for circle track racing. We used it oun our Bonneville cars. I cannot remember the grams, but this was about one third the weight of a posi unit, and one third less weight than a lightweight steel racing spool. We never broke the thing, so we were lucky. Luck is a subject for some other time.

Now we have axles. Everyone told us to run 35 spline forged axles. 31 was ok 35 was better. Ever weigh a 35 spline forged axle? Ever weigh a 31 spline forged axle?
We took a 28 spline forged axle before it was heat treated and turned it to make the outer circumference smooth and balanced. Then we drilled out the center section of the axle from the spool side only. We drilled in as far as our bits would allow us. We filled this cavity with our famous epoxy that had saturated random length fiberglass strands. We put the mixture into the hole and pressed it to 4 tons of pressure. When it dried we had the unit heat treated not by an oven but with some special equipment at Rockwell that hardens just the surface of the material. I think Currie Rear Ends uses one of these critters in their plant. Then we coated the surface of the smoothed 28 spline axle with an elastomeric covering used to absorb harmonics and provide just a smidgen of laminate strength to the weakened and lightened axle.

We did break a couple of these axles in testing, but never lost one at a race. No huge deal, we used disk brakes to retain the wheel to the axle. The spool and axles got the car to 9.39 ETs. Then we took the lightest rims we could find, lightened them more, and coated the interior surface with the same proprietary elastomer material. We ran MT crinkle wall slicks.

So a light weight drive shaft, light weight spool, lightened axles, and lightened rims and smaller LIGHTER slicks, turned a 10.2 car to a 9.2 car. You should have seen the difference in the dyno numbers. At 10.2 the rear wheel horsepower was 462. We lost 138 hp through the C-6, Steel drive shaft, heavy differential, heavy axles, and heavy rims. At 9.2 the rear wheel horsepower was 541. Just the reciprocating weight was reduced and we gained back 79 horsepower. Our top speed increased from 126 to 139. ET's went down to 9.2 - 9.3 with excellent consistency.

With NOS we had to run a light steel spool, and we highly modified the 35 spline axles, and used a stronger rim.

So there is my speed secret number two.

If you are at a wall and cannot get faster, get lighter with everything that delivers the crankshaft energy to the slicks. LIGHT IS RIGHT!

My buddies CRX shows 162 horsepower on the rear wheels and the engine shows 189 horsepower on the engine dyno. He loses just 27 horsepower. This is why that CRX can take a Z06. You might say NO ITS THE WEIGHT. But the CRX with autocross racing braces and cage weighs in at 2495 and then add my buddies weights 195 lbs. 15 pounds per horse. The Corvett is running 10 pounds per horse. So vehicle weight / horsepower is less determinate of ET's than power / parasitic loss.

Just to make everyone out there think even more, a 1.7 liter twin turbo RX7 is campaigning as we speak at the 9 second bracket. Do you still think what you were taught, more horsepower and less vehicle weight is really what makes low ET's. YES AND NO. It is a factor, but not the only factor, and it is not the determinant factor that will get you to the winners circle.

Think about it, challenge it, but by all means I WANT TO HEAR YOUR COMMENTS.
Then go home, and start lightening your reciprocating parts in your engine, your transmission, your drive shaft, your rear end, your rims, and your tires. You will be rewarded with faster times. Remember not to sacrafice safety for weight. When we tested NOS, the track tech would not let us race with the lightened rims. They had to be original NHRA approved rims and tires. SAFETY FIRST!

[5.0L_Of_Fury]

it must have taken you an hour to put into words and type all that knowladge...a true fanatic...I Salute You

[Dark_5.0]

I think your times for the Z06 are off by 3 or 4 tenths. The crx you described wouldnt break a mid 13 much less a 12 unless a butt load of weight reduction was done.

I totally agree with reducing the weight of recipricating parts but to knock a full second off of a 10 second car seems a little hard to believe.

JMO,

[ultraflo]

Originally posted by jim_howard_pdx
When we tested NOS, the track tech would not let us race with the lightened rims. They had to be original NHRA approved rims and tires. SAFETY FIRST!

I haven't taken the time to read through your entire post Jim, but I just caught this and had to say I got a good, hard laugh out of that statement alone...

I'll read the whole thing and comment later...

[jim_howard_pdx]

The centerlines were heavily machined. That and the fact that the track had a fatality the previous week probably accounted for his decision.

NHRA handbook said "any factory steel wheel, rivited or welded; any aftermarket wheel unmodified"

Our lightened wheels failed during NOS testing an FX racer. The passenger side wheel pretzeled. Lucky the car didn't go more than 120 feet or I would have been in the rail or guard wall. It was a deteriorating feeling from the steering wheel like having a rear flat tire. It was all I could do to keep the car straight.

That was no bloody fun.

[KillerStang]

damn that is some good stuff. ill have to check into some stuff. and doesnt some company make carbon driveshafts now? i swear i have seen them somewhere. and keep comeing with the speed secrets.

[jim_howard_pdx]

They do make carbon driveshafts now, but they didn't back then in the 70's. Carbon graphite was mostly military until the mid 80's and 90's. Man it makes great body panel material.

Denny's drive shaft service is really tops. I think that they prefer large tube, medium wall aluminum for drag racers. The graphite would not have taken our torque. We pressed in the aluminum shaft to meet the engineering requirements. Graphite is not good torsionally, and is was used first for Porsche 924's and 928's if my memory serves me....... Aluminum is much better for drag racing. So we combined the two.

Just when will they come out with titanium, light weight alloy, or composite type axles? That is where we all lose the most horsepower. That and the gears. They weigh a bunch too.

You have no idea how much horsepower the slicks suck up. They are heavy monsters. Problem is your times suffer without them.

There are good import street slicks out now. I wish I had these to play with back in the 70's. Light weight 15 inch VOLK rims at 14.6 lbs and a light weight import slicks might have worked to get even more horsepower to the ground. Going from 48 lbs of rotating mass to 31 lbs of rotating mass makes a big difference in parasitic power loss. You can see this clearly on a chassis dyno.

[srv1]

Originally posted by Dark_5.0
I think your times for the Z06 are off by 3 or 4 tenths. The crx you described wouldnt break a mid 13 much less a 12 unless a butt load of weight reduction was done.

I totally agree with reducing the weight of recipricating parts but to knock a full second off of a 10 second car seems a little hard to believe.

JMO,

i believe him totally. he is correct. harmonics play a big roll in automobiles. example, you want to build that 347 to hit 8 grand right? what do you do? high quality, less weight and balance it. therefore it will produce more power. try to run with one shoe size bigger on one foot and both shoes weighed the same. i bet you can run as fast as with them both the same size. balance, harmonics and lightness is correct. of course Jim doesnt realize he is lucky to get those materials and tools to do what he did. none of us can do what he did. well i should say the majority of us.

i always wanted to find the "free" horsepower, but it cost to much to do it!

Jim check your PM.

[Dark_5.0]

Originally posted by srv1
i believe him totally. he is correct. harmonics play a big roll in automobiles. example, you want to build that 347 to hit 8 grand right? what do you do? high quality, less weight and balance it. therefore it will produce more power. try to run with one shoe size bigger on one foot and both shoes weighed the same. i bet you can run as fast as with them both the same size. balance, harmonics and lightness is correct. of course Jim doesnt realize he is lucky to get those materials and tools to do what he did. none of us can do what he did. well i should say the majority of us.

i always wanted to find the "free" horsepower, but it cost to much to do it!

Jim check your PM.

I didnt say I dont believe him I said its hard to believe. I see what he is getting at the crx is front wheel drive and has less rotating mass so it gets more of its power to the ground than a Z06.

I know guys running 10.2's ........I see them dump another $3,000.00 into there car and only pick up a tenth or so. That is why I say it is hard to believe.

To clarify I believe him but just dont understand how it helped that much.

Later,

[srv1]

Originally posted by Dark_5.0
I didnt say I dont believe him I said its hard to believe. I see what he is getting at the crx is front wheel drive and has less rotating mass so it gets more of its power to the ground than a Z06.

I know guys running 10.2's ........I see them dump another $3,000.00 into there car and only pick up a tenth or so. That is why I say it is hard to believe.

To clarify I believe him but just dont understand how it helped that much.

Later,

i can tell you how it helped so much. let me give an example. driveshaft: if the weight is missing or you dropped it accidentally, what happens? it vibrates right? now try to do 130 in your Stang. you probably cant, cause of the driveshaft being off balance and it required more energy(cant think of the word!) to turn it.

huh, maybe i am wrong

i know what you said Dark. i understood you.

[Dark_5.0]

I see what you are saying. I guess I will monitor this thread and try to learn something

Later,

[jim_howard_pdx]

Dark 5.0, when I first met my buddy running the CRX he was racin his mom's new magnum 360 truck. Ran 14.1 quarter times. Not bad for a work truck with an attitude. He told me the CRX was chosen for autocrossing because it is simple to exceed 1.0 G. In fact he is doing like 1.15 G through the corners. He went with a full race cage, fully reiforced steel strut supports both front and back.

Then he is a typical 19 year old. So he has to have a thumper. His stereo can make your hearing fail in a matter of seconds. He said his sub boxes, amps, equalizers, wiring, and braces add about 200 lbs to the car.

He also liked the fact that his CRX has the lowest gears of the 5 types of Honda transmissions.

The R integra motor is nothing to sneeze at. It does 0-60 in 6 flat in a 2650 integra with higher gears. It does the quarter mile at 13.76 in the Integra body. So look what he did. He is running more gear, a full race header, wide open exhaust without CAT or Muffler. He has a mandrel bent tuned exhaust to produce maximum torque.

He runs a race clutch so he can rev and dump. The ultra light weight wheels and drag slicks weigh one third less than a typical setup you see on an American Musclecar.

His 12.4 times are ultra consistent. He is afraid to run NOS. I cannot blame him. True R engines are still a rarity in the United States. Most of the Integra R's in our town are fakes. His engine is a true R from Japan. It was raced in Japan, so it is possible that the team ran improved R cams, but they are still JDM (japanese domestic manufactured) pieces.

When you bump the cam in a 1.8 liter engine it goes from 190 to 196 or 200 to 205. Not like when we went 540 to 601 horsepower with just a cam and tunnel ram set up on the 428 scj.

This is a fun little car and it gets good gas mileage and goes around corners like nobodies business....

The engine is potent, and I dare FORD to show me any engine they have ever built that produces 100 horsepower per liter of displacement, can run a whole season without problems, and gets 25-30 miles per gallon driving home on the freeway........

Common FORD it is about time you put in some engineering to catch up to the performance world out there. HONDA has owned CART racing for three years in a row.

[jim_howard_pdx]

New Carbon Fiber Driveshafts are available from:

Advanced Composite Products & Technology
ACPT Inc
Dept MM 15602 Chemical Lane,
Huntington Beach CA 92649

714-895-5544
fax 714-895-7766

This information is from Mustang Monthly June 1995 issue. No article on the thing just the advertisement on page 84.

They claim it handles a higher rpm limit than metal shafts before experiencing harmonic whip. (that is why I used the aluminum inner shaft with silicon rtv as a dampner and with injected foam to absorb the harmonics.)

"off the shelf and custom lengths are available to meet a variety of racing and heavy duty needs."

My only warning is that we did the engineering on the driveshaft using a Rockwell computer. It showed catastrophic failure at 700 ft lbs of torque within 20 life hours of use. If you run one of these, it should probably be for a track car, not a quarter miler. Perhaps they will build a fiber aluminum composite for you like I built for myself. Fax them and ask.

[PKRWUD]

Less rotational mass, half the weight to move, and an engine that reaches and sustains higher rpms quicker.

I've been telling people about our Sprint car for over a year, but not too many seem to pick up on all of the significances, and how they could be applied to 1/4 mile racing.

We put out a conservative 725 hp n/a, in a 1200 pound vehicle, with driver. That's two horsepower for every 3 pounds of vehicle weight. Not many racecars can say that. We also run a direct drive to a Winters rear end, so there is no transmission, flywheel, or even a starter. The rear end weighs next to nothing. It has a one piece aluminum axle, and a final ratio of 6.86:1.

The engine works well by driving the water pump off the front of the crank, and the fuel pump and p/s pump off the back of the cam. It has no belts or pullies, no battery or alternator, and 5 radiator hoses (one going in the bottom of the engine, and four coming out of the top.

It's got a hillborn mechanical fuel injection system, with 4 dual throttle bodies.

Now, there are obviously some differences that wouldn't transfer from a paved 1/4 mile to a clay oval 1/4 mile, but there are many that would.

Why does the NHRA outlaw the rearends we use? They are very light, but very strong. Our driveshaft looks more like an axle. I used to race 1/4 mile, and I can't help but think about how many advantages there are to be learned from Sprints. It revs to 8k rpms faster than you could blink.

You would still need a transmission, but the advantages of lessening the rotaing mass are obvious! Try a driveline like ours, and I think you'd be very impressed. You might need a 2 speed for the 1/4, but it should work in the 1/8th.

Hmmmm. I need another project.



Good thread!

Take care,
ÅChris

[Old Guy with 87 GT]

mmm import tricks ,....heaven forbid

actually i can grasp the concept your going for using the import as an example .......a typical honda transmission is smaller with lighter weight rotating parts ,the drive axels are shorter then ours and smaller ,ther's no drive shaft and the wheels the import guy's use are genrally alot lighter ......aside from balance that actually gives them an advantage becouse of enertia

enertia=the tendancy for objects in motion to remain in motion .......just the same objects at rest tend to stay at rest ....it takes energy to spin an object and the heavier the object the more energy it takes to spin it ....so if you want on object to go from 0 rpms to 6,000 rpms it only makes sence that the lighter the object the less energy it takes to spin it

i think it's kinda interesting that you mention imports.....i have a curios mind so rather then bash the import guy's i tend to want to learn there tricks ,then aply them to bigger moters .....i have a few friends that own an import performance shop so i've had the chance to learn alot of there tricks and see actually how those little moters work .....ive snooped around many a torn down import moters ......us v8 guy's could build some awsome engines if we used some of the same technoligie on v8 moters

can you amagine a v8 v-tec moter.....he he

......for those who don't know a honda v-tec moter there actually pretty neat ....
......they have variable lift cam set ups , the valves are opened by a set of three rockers sliding along each cam opening two vavles per intake an two per ex...total of six rockers per cylinder....
.......each set of valves is opened by the outer rockers with one rocker in the middle of the two.....the one in the middle rides along alot bigger of a lob on the cam ,when the rpms rise the two outer rockers lock into the middle one so that all three follow the bigger lode in the cam ........it's like switching from a stock cam to an x cam every time the rpms reach a certian level
........another trick is the inake set up works with the change in lift ........there's two sets of intake runners ....shorter ones and longer ones ....as the moter goes to it's higher lift mode and higher rpms the shorter intake runners are opened to increase the velocity of the intake charge

so jim ....having seen one of the same acura moters you were talking about torn down ,it does shed some light when you talk about cylinder egronomics ........those moters have a pop up in the piston ( sorta looks like a hump) that fits up into the heads chamber .....it's shaped so it fits to a clearance just between the 4 valves ,with the spark plug in the center of the cylinder ........if you look at the way the ports ,and the piston are shaped it does seem like a pretty effecient set up ......the mitsubishi moters have almost the same type desighn without the variable lift cam set up

if the same tech was used in a v8 it'd be a pretty mean set up ,.......but since we are using only two valves ,theres a bit of difference in the swirl of air .....you would think that the ideal way to flow air into the cylinder on a two valve engine would be to kinda agle the porting torward the center so the air doesn't flow torward one side of the cilinder ........

now i'm kinda off topic ,...suolda posted that in the speed secret #1 topic

back to rotating mass ........on that note ....i kinda thought it was ironic that the guys using drag radials are competing with the guy's running slicks in the ford series racing ......if you watch them and look at times and mph ......it would seem the drag radial guy's pull alot harder at the top of the track and clock some pretty high mph's .....smaller harder tires =less rotating mass and less tire resistance ??.......mmm

this has been some interesting reading ,thanks for giving us your time and wisdom

[Old Guy with 87 GT]

i've been telling peaple about our sprint car for over a year and not to many of them seem to pick up on all the significances ,and how they could be apllied to1/4 racing

chris ....i've been listening ......sprint cars are prety popular around here and i have alot of respect for guy's that build them ....it's very competitive

ps. .....i'm planning on having a local sprint car engine builder do my short block work .....fellows supoosed to be pretty knowlegable and have pretty reasonable prices

[vetteeatr]

My god that is alot of insight and very well written. I swear i think half of yall are freaking nasa engineers

[RICKYRM125CC]

Man this is good stuff. I just replaced my stock flywheel with a fidanza aluminum and through out my old drive shaft for a ford racing drive shaft. This thing reves much quicker and should inprove my et"s.

[jim_howard_pdx]

Ricky,

How do your TF heads like the NOS? Any problems with head gasket sealing. And what gaskets are you using?

I really want to juice up my 358. My son has never been in a car that when you hit the NOS switch, the tires bark, and you are plastered into the back of your seat, stuck until you release the button. I miss that sensation.

[jim_howard_pdx]

Old Guy with an 87 GT wins a special prize, although this response belongs in the speed secret number one thread.

I was really counting on someone bringing up a 4 valve head. When you look at a new Acura Integra VTec II making 100 horsepower per liter, while getting over 30 miles per gallon, just what is going on? They are not packing in extra fuel or the gas mileage would crash and burn. So what is it?

It is the quench.

If you get a chance to see the heads on a Honda, you would see that the combustion chamber resembles a roof of a home. Instead of rising to a sharp point, they just transition into a smooth 1/2 inch ridge across the top of the chamber. This is the area where the precombustion takes place. Then the flame propogates down the sides of the roof line.

Measure the quench on this head, and you will find .06 to .08 quench across the entire piston. This is engineering dominance.

On my 358 I have a 57 cc wedge (after shaving the head), and I use a TRW forged 9/1 flat top utilizing a 13cc dish. I set this car up this way so I could run pump gas. But my quench area really stinks. Nothing like what I used on my 428 scj, on any of the hemi's I have built, or any of the 383's and 402 Chevy's I have raced. I figure I have close to 3 or 4 tenths of an inch space between the wedge and the dish.

On my honda VTec, there is a perfect .060 to .080 gap, direct from the factory. So this little 1.6 liter engine is as fast as a C code 289 in a 1966 Mustang. But it goes zero to 60 two seconds faster, and it gets 30 mpg around town and 42 miles per gallon at 60 mph. This is engineering dominance.

So guys, throw out those flat top pistons, and get to work with the dome pistons and the dye grinder.

By the way, my honda is 10.5 to 1 compression, and the LS 1.8 Acrura is 10.9 to 11.3 to 1 compression. So you get to make more horsepower, burn more efficient, use less fuel, AND get better volumetric efficiency without any detriments other than driving around in a rice burner.

While I do love my VTec on the street, when I build a racing honda or acura engine, the VTec gets deleted, because the engines are being run in the 5500 to 9500 rpm range anyway. No need to go between a stock lift and a race lift cam lobe when you are at a race track.

The VTec is for the street. When I hit 5500 rpm, the VTec swithes on and the feeling is alot like a turbo charger. You feel like you are being pushed from behind.

So next time you are around an acura dealership, ask them to test drive the new RSX Integra. 200 hp, 5 speeds and loads of fun. The car is especially well balanced, great brakes, and great handling.

Then call FORD and ask them why they cannot make an engine and a car with such qualities. The Focus is ok, I like it except for the styling, but it really falls short. The VR6 cylinder Jettas are the only thing close, and I like VWs about as much as I like a root canal.

Sorry, but I have broken so many VW parts racing, that I just will not build another one as long as I live.

I don't have these problems with Fords. They are built much tougher than most people could ever expect. They are safe, well made, and with the exception of profit over engineering, I think FORDs RULE.

First on Race Day.

Live it, breath it, and make the others brands beg for mercy.