[steve25]

Here’s the old yet still valid HO racing recommendations for camming and gearing a 350.

The gearing recommendations are probably even more valid today with the under 10 to 1 compression that needs to be run.

[Shiny]

What's a 524886 cam? Assuming it's Pontiac, where was it used?

[srmmmm]

Originally Posted by jhein

If for whatever reason(s), you have the motor out of the car and torn down to the short block, you're not too far away from a Butler 4.25 stroker kit. That gives you 400+ cid with a 4.25 stroke (more torque than a stock 400). That, plus a set of aluminum heads would kick a$$.. Obviously that means a full rebuild, but it would get you pretty much everything you want in a fresh motor that you can have confidence in.

I went the Butler 4.25" stroker kit route with my 350, Comp XE276HR cam with 1.5 roller rockers and 6X-4 heads. Torker-I intake (I know that some think it's a mushy choice, but there's sentiment attached) and 800cfm Quadrajet. CR calculated at 9.3 with Ross flat tops set at 0.0 on the deck. On the dyno, torque was 442 @ 4300 and HP 453 @ 5600. With the add-ons like ignition and Hedman headers, the build was about $9000. With the lighter piston weight of the 350, I think there's plenty of RPM capability to take advantage of the big valve head.

[steve25]

The 524886 was known as the number 6 hydro cam .
It was only used in 58 thru 62 motors and is a tad hotter then the 067 cam.

The 886 has 60 degrees of overlap while the 067 has 54.

[Masaki]

Originally Posted by srmmmm

I went the Butler 4.25" stroker kit route with my 350, Comp XE276HR cam with 1.5 roller rockers and 6X-4 heads. Torker-I intake (I know that some think it's a mushy choice, but there's sentiment attached) and 800cfm Quadrajet. CR calculated at 9.3 with Ross flat tops set at 0.0 on the deck. On the dyno, torque was 442 @ 4300 and HP 453 @ 5600. With the add-ons like ignition and Hedman headers, the build was about $9000. With the lighter piston weight of the 350, I think there's plenty of RPM capability to take advantage of the big valve head.

I’m looking to stroke my 350 with a 4.00 kit from butler. Is there a way I could contact you for info?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[srmmmm]

Originally Posted by Masaki

I’m looking to stroke my 350 with a 4.00 kit from butler. Is there a way I could contact you for info?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You should be able to message me through my member profile page.

[carbking]

I see no one commented either positively or negatively on my reduce the weight comment.

While lots of folks are concerned about power, one can easily pull a quarter of a second off a quarter mile time, and with some careful planning and purchases, more than 1/2 second while EVERYTHING else is left alone.

Easy reductions:

Aluminum wheels
Aluminum intake manifold

Less easy reductions:

Aluminum transmission case
Aluminum rear drums (in some cases)
Distributor housing (both CI and AL used)
Water pump housings same as above

And you can go overboard if you have a mind to do so (an AFB weighs less than a Q-Jet or Holley, and a TQ weighs even less).

Not going through everything, but I took almost 500 pounds off of a 1974 GTO. That is 8.6 percent of the shipping weight for the car.

Jon

[JLMounce]

Originally Posted by carbking

I see no one commented either positively or negatively on my reduce the weight comment.

While lots of folks are concerned about power, one can easily pull a quarter of a second off a quarter mile time, and with some careful planning and purchases, more than 1/2 second while EVERYTHING else is left alone.

Easy reductions:

Aluminum wheels
Aluminum intake manifold

Less easy reductions:

Aluminum transmission case
Aluminum rear drums (in some cases)
Distributor housing (both CI and AL used)
Water pump housings same as above

And you can go overboard if you have a mind to do so (an AFB weighs less than a Q-Jet or Holley, and a TQ weighs even less).

Not going through everything, but I took almost 500 pounds off of a 1974 GTO. That is 8.6 percent of the shipping weight for the car.

Jon

This is a very good point. There's even more areas that you can look at that will save weight without effecting quality of life with the car.

-Fiberglass/Carbon Fiber hood and trunk lid.
-Wilwood replacement calipers to replace the iron units
-Aluminum radiator
-Gear reduction mini-starter

Not all of these are cheap, but between those 4 items, there's an additional 50-75 lbs of weight off the vehicle without touching anything that would start to make the car suck to drive.

If the car has drums all around, I'd swap to 4 wheel 11" discs with the Wilwood d52/d154 calipers. More repeatable stopping power and much less unsprung weight on the car.

Headers are sometimes lighter than manifolds, but I didn't specifically include them because they can at some points start impacting quality of life via ground clearance and added noise.

[b-man]

Sure you can pay for some lightweight components, some cheap and some crazy expensive.

And you can strip out insulation, power accessories, comfort accessories like air conditioning and heating etc, etc, etc.

I stripped over 300 pounds out of my 1964 GTO 455 HO powered bracket car by removing seats, carpet and floor insulation, inner fenders, radio, heater, wiper assembly and such. Mostly to reduce drivetrain stress and breakage, less to improve performance because I was bracket racing not class racing.

I eventually put almost all of those things back when I was done racing the car.

Honestly when you’re starting a build and going to be down on cubic inches just to prove a point I just don’t see the point of that. Just build more power with a larger engine to begin with for pretty much the same money.

Buying a bunch of lightweight body parts and taking weight out of the car is much more expensive than just upping the cubes from 383 or 388 to 461 or 467.

On the street cubic inches are your friend. I’d rather have a lightly modified 455 than a heavily modified 350, less stress and lower RPMs required with more inches.

Back about 45 years ago one of my younger brothers friends had a very nice 1969 Charger with a 318. He did end up with a 440 in it, and eventually stripped several hundred pounds out of it by removing most of the interior, air conditioning, heating and whatever else. Took what was a decent cream color original paint job and primed it flat black.

It was a teenager’s hot rod and we really didn’t know that this car would be so valuable today. But even back then I had to just shake my head knowing he had essentially ruined what started out as a very nice car.

Just add cubic inches during the build, it’s free horsepower. Being a Pontiac there’s no big block or small block so almost all the same engine parts interchange between small and large cube engines, we should consider ourselves lucky that it’s easy to take advantage of more cubes in the same package.

[carbking]

B-Man - I will completely agree about the cost of building an ultra high performance 350 and a mildly modified 400 to get the same power. In my neck of the woods, 455's have been "son, haven't had one of those for years" for decades; while obviously the power potential is greater, not sure about the cost.

Much of my weight savings was because I NEEDED different parts, and the aluminum was not that much more:

Steel wheels were insufficient width for the tires I wanted
Desired wide ratio transmission
Using original RAIV intake with no crossover

I still have all inner fenders, insulation, seats, uphostery, etc.

When different parts are going to be used, why not lighter parts.

The problem I now have is the low first gear, the reduced weight, and the power is too much for the tires; I guess I went overboard

Jason - I looked unsuccessfully for years for someone with an English wheel to do hood and deck lid; is fiber even an option for a 1974 GTO?

Jon

[JLMounce]

Originally Posted by carbking

Jason - I looked unsuccessfully for years for someone with an English wheel to do hood and deck lid; is fiber even an option for a 1974 GTO?

Jon

Certain model years and platforms obviously have more or less of that stuff. Here's the VFN catalog for the 74 GTO. The hood is blah IMHO.

https://www.vfnfiberglass.com/73-74gto.htm

There's a ton of people these days that can custom create almost anything from glass or carbon. You pay for it though unfortunately.

[PAUL K]

We build Pontiac 350's occasionally. The builds are usually for older cars that still retain their original motor. We just built two recently. The one gentleman owned his Firebird since 1974 when he was in high school. He originally wanted us to restore the original two barrel. I talked him into doing a period correct build and we used headers, a vintage aluminum intake manifold and a Holley 600. The other guy wanted more power, but to run on 87 octane. We used a 4.25 stroke crank in that engine.

Both guys were happy with the results.

[tom s]

Franks Pontiac has 8 400 blocks and 5 455 blocks for sale on his site now.Not cheap but he does a great job describing what he sells.FWIW,Tom

[Derbs24]

Appreciate these 350 threads. As the owner of an original, survivor ‘68 350 2bbl Lemans, I like the subtle options while keeping it stock appearing. I have a drop in TH350 to replace the ST300. Also planning a 4bbl, 067/2800 cam, 60psi oil pump and a move to dual exhaust. Car runs so good now, that I don’t have the motivation to take it apart yet though…maybe someday. Thanks for all the 350 tips!