[turbo69bird]

Originally Posted by jwood82d

That is cool to know. Dan was actually from Maine, so it made sense that the car was assembled in Framingham MA.

My father's also from Maine but moved to this area of NY in the mid 70's after college. Imagine making that 9+ hour trip today with 4.56 rear gears.

No highways yet back then It was all back roads . My RAIV bird was unloaded driven 2 hours to LVD in NY drag raced all day then Driven back to CT engine yanked and ( short block ) swapped in from
The RAII car went back to the track next morning for comparison testing . RAII engine had been blueprinted by merkel on Long Island at a pretty hefty cost . . ( there’s some discrepancy if the whole engine was initially changed or just short block still) but later it was just the short block I believe.
They didn’t want to pay for it to be re balanced and blue printed since it had little use 1/2 season and had the same 9792506 number on it. NHRA accepted it though the rule book says it’s not allowed they also had a special firebird 400 fan spacer that was longer ( I still have it) to place the fan in the same spot (so tech wouldn’t complain) but the engine back. It was exactly the same but 1 inch longer .so look
For stuff like that on your car. If the car was sent to a dealer not a privateer to be raced they were not exactly the same as regular cars .

[jwood82d]

It feels like it’s been a while since last update, so here’s more engine pics from today. Hydraulic camshaft is a Comp Cams custom grind from Butler. Need to measure for pushrods next and intake manifold going in is a dual plane Edelbrock Performer.