by admin | Jul 31, 2013 | News |
By Archie Bosman When installing a transmission, the first challenge is engaging the splines of the input shaft in the clutch disc and sliding it home into the pilot bearing without causing damage. But the complications are amplified when you have to mate the transmission with two clutch discs and the pilot bearing. Plastic alignment tools are inexact in their dimensions, which add to the problem. However, if using a plastic alignment tool ensure it slides easily in the splines as well as in the pilot bearing as you tighten the clutch cover assembly to the flywheel—always using a crisscross pattern. If the alignment tool is tight, the transmission input shaft will be tighter! Useful alternatives to plastic tools are Ram’s new steel alignment tools. Simple, inexpensive and convenient, they are precision-machined to fit the splines and pilot. More appealing still, they feature an open-ended design with a shank that is smaller in diameter than the splines, allowing you to load clutch parts onto the tool when it’s already engaged in the pilot bearing in the crankshaft. In other words this device allows you the convenience of installing the flywheel on the engine, slipping the alignment tool into the pilot bearing and sliding the discs onto the tool one at a time with the floater plate sandwiched between. For further information contact: RAM Automotive Company 201 Business Park Blvd. Columbia, SC 29203 Telephone (803) 788-6034...
by admin | Jul 31, 2013 | News |
By Freddie Heaney Captured here by photographer Dennis Gray, 1978 world F1 champion Mario Andretti studies tire temperatures and other data after qualifying for that year’s Long Beach Grand Prix. Driving the Cosworth-Ford powered Lotus 79, the first F1 race car to take full advantage of ground effect aerodynamics, Mario and his team mate, Ronnie Petersen, enjoyed a decisive advantage, claiming first and second in the 1978 Driver’s championship and easily delivering Lotus the Constructors championship. During the season Mario recorded 8 pole positions, 6 victories, and 7 podium finishes. The racing photographer Dennis Gray, a venerable master of US motoring photography who captured Mario Andretti in the cockpit of the Lotus 79, was attending last month’s Mont-Tremblant Historics event. Gray was in his element: feet well-planted, swiveling around through 140 degrees to focus on the approaching race cars, left arm extended holding a 70-200mm F2.8 Nikon lens, the old master followed through the motion: click, click, click. “What are you tracking Dennis—the driver’s face?” “No,” came the brief rebuke, “his eyes!” For many, Gray remains the definitive authority in debates about photography—the court of last appeal. Now in his sixties and with a lifetime behind the lens at the racing circuits, happily he shows no signs of slowing. And there’s news, good news. Next year, 2014, he and his firm, F8 Motorsports Photography Workshops, return to the circuits not alone but with students. Aspirations to become a better photographer? Gray, who runs F8 Motorsports Photography Workshops, teaches exacting standards in motor sports photography and in 2014, should you have a desire to refine your picture-taking techniques, you can...
by admin | Jul 31, 2013 | News |
Tampa Florida: Muscle Mustangs & Fast Fords magazine is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. And to help celebrate a quarter century of innovation in Ford power, it is building an over-the-top project, dubbed “Hypersilver” to be unveiled at the 2013 SEMA show. Featuring styling cues from the past two and a half decades, and a few that have yet to be seen, Hypersilver will be the most extreme Fox-body project car the magazine has ever undertaken. At the heart of Hypersilver will be a 427cu in P-38 engine from Jon Kaase Racing Engines. Expected to make over 600 horsepower, the Windsor-based engine will feature a JKRE cross-ram intake with their acclaimed canted valve P-38 cylinder heads on a Ford Racing Boss block. For more information, go to www.musclemustangfastfords.com or pick up a copy of Muscle Mustangs & Fast Fords at your favorite...
by moore1 | Jul 30, 2013 | News |
If there are six centrifugal supercharger manufacturers each supplying 15 to 20 kits per week and as many turbocharger makers doing similarly, you could conclude conservatively they are producing around 750 kits per month. If you further assume that many of the buyers of those kits might be persuaded to invest $650 in a premium carburetor and avoid the high cost of converting to fuel injection—not to mention their apprehensiveness for laptop tuning—the number grows. For these cherished disciples Demon re-introduced three new Blow-through models. By Fergus Ogilvy Dawsonville, GA: For turbocharged and centrifugal supercharged applications using a bonnet, Demon has now offers three Mighty Demon Blow-through carburetors. Operating with up to 18psi of boost they are available in 650, 750, and 850cfm. To increase the vacuum signal to the carburetor under boost and to enrich the calibration, they are equipped with annular boost venturii, large screw-in power-valve channel restrictors in the metering blocks, and 0.130in needle-and-seat valves in the fuel bowls. The bowls also contain non-collapsible solid nitrophyl floats, unlike their brass counterparts. Air bleeds are appropriately sized. These new calibrations are said to hold a flat fuel curve. Even at higher rpm the main circuits sustain constant BSFC (Brake Specific Fuel Consumption) values and air-fuel ratios. The idle circuits, which often carry the responsibility for part-throttle cruising, demonstrate fine non-boosted drivability. On the bottom side of the base plate, machined, right-angle channels are visible. These introduce a source of boost pressure to four machined grooves on the throttle shafts. This innovation seals the shafts and prevents pressure escaping from the carburetor. For security, screw-in vacuum fittings replace...
by moore1 | Jul 26, 2013 | News |
By Archie Bosman Plan to attend this lively Q&A Session where four top engine builders covering the circle track, sprint car, dirt late model and drag racing segments will field questions from an audience of attendees. Scheduled for 8:00 – 9:00 a.m., Friday, December 13, 2013, at the Indiana Convention Center, Meeting Room 231-232 panelists include Keith Dorton (Automotive Specialists); Jon Kaase (Jon Kaase Racing Engines); Vic Hill (Vic Hill Race Engines); and Ron Shaver (Shaver Racing Engines). Theater-style seating for 200 will be available for this rare event and topics will cover “how to run a successful race engine business”, “tips of the trade”, and more. More importantly, questions can be submitted prior to the event via social media and email – look for news from the staff at PRI magazine. Kaase’s Background Jon Kaase earned a degree in mechanical engineering, created race engines that won a dozen Pro Stock championships, succeeded in winning the Engine Masters Challenge four times, and has presided over the company that bears his name for almost 34 years. Kaase, 60, started competing in drag racing while still at high school. He moved to Atlanta, Georgia at the beginning of 1977 to work for Dyno Don Nicholson and by year end celebrated the move by claiming the NHRA Pro Stock title. In November 1979 in Norcross, Georgia, he formed his own company, Jon Kaase Racing Engines. Later in 1998 he designed a purpose-built shop and moved his business to Winder, Georgia, from where the company operates today. Around 2007, the firm expanded its operations into the hot rod market when they introduced the...
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