500 into Buick 8/40 Special

[Deano]

Hi Everyone.  I've enjoyed reading about all the projects, problems and combinations on this site.  This is my first post here.  I'm based in New Zealand and am building a 1947 Buick Special up with a 500 Caddy, 400 trans and 9 inch diff. 

I noted in the background of one of the Nashillac project pics what looks like a 1942/1946 Buick with the same shape as mine.  Can anyone tell me whether this is getting the 500 Caddy treatment?  Any information would be appreciated.

At this stage I am only collecting parts but will begin work in earnest as soon as I've finished painting the house.  Got to have a dry roof over the project.

Cheers.

Dean.

[sMiles]

Good Morning Dean,
                             Your Buick is, I believe, the same body frame as my '47 Olds 76 series sedan.   There seems to be detail differences, the grill area of course, as well as the front fender extensions onto the front door. 

I have recently completed a 500/400 install .  However, my front clip is from a WS6 TransAm, so,  the clearence issues will be somewhat different.

I think you will find the engine /trans can be moved back a good distance since the distributor is front located on the Cad.  I used a short tail 400 located just forward of the X frame in the center of the car, a 3.5" diameter driveshaft,  the TransAm 10 bolt is adapted to the stock truck arm style suspension using the coil springs with the added WS6 sway bars and double adjustable shocks.

I did find it necessary to move the steering at the firewall toward the outside to gain header clearence .

Welcome to the board.  There is a wealth of knowledge here,  a good archive of info on the search feature,  in other words,  your in the right place.

Keep us posted as you go ..

Miles
.

[~JM~]

Welcome to the board Dean. I hope you find it to be worthy of your time.

The board member that is building project "Nashillac" is Marty, the owner of MTS. http://caddy500.com/index.php?topic=18.0
If you decide to build a Cadillac 472/500/425 engine. Sooner or later, you will most likely end up contacting him.

Good luck & please keep us posted.
~JM~

[MTS Marty]

Looks like a fun project.
That vehicle in the background is a 40 Plymouth. What fooled you is it has 41 Buick tail lights 
It's a "cookie cutter" build    SBC   700R

[Deano]

Thanks for your replies.  It was our weekend here and decided to get some miles on the bike as it hasn't been out in a while.  The bike was my last project.  A turbocharged 1300cc Suzuki Hayabusa putting out 260hp and 154ft/lbs at the rear wheel.

Thanks Marty.  Yes the tail lights are what fooled me.  Love Nashillac and the motor configuration.

Miles.  Nice to see another build like mine.  If you've got any pictures I would be keen to see them.  I intend to fit the front end from an XJ6 Jaguar as they are common here, cheap and very popular on these type of conversions.  At the moment the 400 trans I got with the engine is a long tail but if it makes the conversion easier and allows me to move the engine further back then I will consider modifying it to a short tail.  The more weight over the back end, the better with that kind of torque.

JM.  I've been eyeballing the MTS catalogue and intend to save some money this year so that I can do a bulk buy towards the end of the year.  I've got a friend running a bike at Bonneville who may be able to bring the parts back in his container which would be a great help.  At this stage just looking at a reasonably mild build with ported cast heads and the other necessary parts to produce a street friendly combination.  Don't want to go too wild as gas costs a fortune here at $9.50 USD/gallon and I want to drive this car often. 

Cheers.

Dean.

[~JM~]

How about some pics & details on your bike? 

[Deano]

The bike is a 2005 Hayabusa.  I bought it new and started modifying it in 2006.  I bought a turbo kit from Velocity Racing but that turned out to be a bit of a lemon so we have replaced or modified "everything" that came with the kit.

We're running a Garrett T28/60 through an MCXpress air to air intercooler to a custom made plenum.  Uprated the injectors from 260cc to 550cc RC injectors controlled by a PowerMod piggyback ECU.  Factory fuel rail replaced with 1/2 inch ID billet aluminium control by a 1:1 fuel pressure regulator.  50mm Tial blow off valve.  Exhaust is custom made 2 1/2 inch running to a Micron race muffler.  Headers are home made mild steel and ceramic coated.  The original stainless headers couldn't handle the heat and vibration and kept cracking.

We replaced the pistons with JE turbo pistons only because we melted the originals because we didn't know better and the JE pistons were cheaper.  Just running a 2mm base plate to reduce compression to about 9:1.  Fitted heavy duty clutch springs and the rest is pretty much factory.

I run 10lbs boost on the street with 95 to 98 octane fuel and up to 18lbs on C16 for drag racing and speed runs.  Don't like to run C16 too often because it costs $182USD for a small drum and doesn't even fill the fuel tank.

The bike is fairly stealth with only the air filter being the visible.  The rest is hideen by the body work.

I've been measured at 199mph but the bike looses boost at speed because the body work is drawing air away from the turbo at speed.  I'm going to modify the body work to force feed the turbo which should give me full boost and better speeds.

Here's a YouTube link to one of my runs.

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=gavinlegge#p/u/29/xwna3UeFVZ8

As you can see, the road isn't very wide but it is a closed public road sanctioned event and it's about as good as it gets over here.

Got my calcs wrong before.  Pump gas is about $4.60 USD/gallon here.