Airflow over engine - Max49, this is for you

[Ron & Dee]

Max,

I have been over 285 from the lower end up to Fair Play. I might have been on up 285 to Denver but my memory slips me

I didn't remember anything too difficult, but remember I don't tow. I don't go a fast as I could up mountains, but the MH seems to have plenty of speed and power if I wanted to put the pedal to the metal

Thanks,

Ron

[max49]

I don't go wide open any more with the new engine, I try to stay no higher than 4000RPM and that's about 30 MPH in low gear, because it can't pull the next gear.
My 4 speed must be a littel disadvantaged with the wide gaps between gears.
@ 4000 RPM, my first gear is good to about 30 MPH and 2nd gear is good to about 55 MPH. With the wide gap in ratios I often find 2nd is too high to pull and 1st I could hit the rev limiter easy if I would let it. I call that 'between gears'. I think 3rd could probably go 90 and OD 125 MPH if it wasnt for the 80 MPH speed limiter. Not the best gearing for a heavy vehicle.
I'd like to have a 5 or 6 speed ; but I'd like to have a DP too. For now, I gotta love the one I'm with, it's tough sometimes.

[dieselclacker]

At the end of the day I'm agreeing with you. Let's all just trade for rear engine coaches with an engine which was designed for moving heavy loads. The only thing between my doing this is money and my wife

Joeg
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Those are two pretty darn good reasons Joe! I have the same problem.


Dieselclacker

[pkmesser]

Maybe Oemy could enlighten us on the solid core wires for the 8.1. Perhaps they are shielded like coax, however if that is the case, and the shielding is grounded, if the insulation between the core and shielding failed due to heat, the wire would ground out.

Max, looking at your photo's, my W22 is totally open where your's has the metal shields. I did have #4 wire fail, but I think the damage occurred before I took delivery, maybe sitting idleing way too long in the heat? Now, not as much as you, but I have pulled a number of 10K passes. If you get another wire failure, with what you have done, a cheap trial would be to pull those shields and see what then happens.

[Joe Gilbert]

I can tell you that my Corvette wires, the new ones which did not work with the MSD ignition, had full braded metal covers yet the wires still were a problem. If you know your Corvettes, these wires were stock and perhaps still are. So! it takes more than a shield to make plug wires work. It just may be that any plug wire does work as the length of each wire is very short on our engines.

JoeG

[pkmesser]

Joe, I take it that the MSD ignition was an add on? And that it did not work with the factory wires?

[Joe Gilbert]

Yes I added the MSD ignition. The Corvette (which I purchased new, just to date myself) has a solid state ignition however; the MSD unit delivers so much more energy to the plugs. The end result is that it runs perfect all the time whereas with the OEM ignition it would only run perfect with brand new plugs. When I added the MSD I replaced the plug wires with new OEM (shielded) wires. During this process I found out the necessity of the special wires MSD clearly said were required.

The Corvette is also a "big block" (1966 427) so you can see that I go back a long ways with GM big blocks.

JoeG

[FrankO]

So Joe were you at the Corvette show in Frisco a couple of weeks ago? Great show with some 200 Corvettes.
Frank O.

[speed racer]

The best plug wires are the spiral wound ones like MSD sells. There are other companys that make them also. They have a wire wound around a carbon filiment core that carries the higher currant and multispark discharge without causing RF interferance that interfears with the controll box or raideos.

[Duner]

Originally Posted by pkmesser

........On the headers, when I put the Banks system on the 460 we had, I believe it helped the heat, the doghouse on that MH was not insulated very well, it it got really hot, after the Banks was in place, there was a noticeable difference. If you have not looked into that yet, for the high weight condtions, you will get the most improvement in performance with long tube headers. They probably also do the best on extracting heat. (long tube for torque, short tube for horsepower gains is the general rule). On those Banks, for the 460, the collector was almost all the way at the back of the tranny.

Yes, pk has got a good point here.

The Banks headers on my 1999 V10 made a huge difference on the cooling. My 34 ft Chieftain did fine until I bought a 24 ft enclosed trailer for m buggy and the additional 4500 lbs had the fan clutch kicking in almost on any grade. With the Banks I could get nearly over the top of 20 mile long Cajon Pass before the "power sucking" fan engaged.

I think the tuned headers help pull the hot exhaust gas out instead of heating up the cast iron manifold which transfers the heat back into the engine block.

[Joe Gilbert]

No FrankO, I was not at the Corvette show. I'm presently in my summer home in NH. I don't drive the Corvette a lot but it is fun once in awhile. It has big power and is a hoot to drive.

JoeG