In this episode of Engine Masters presented by AMSOIL and sponsored by Mr. Gasket and Earl’s Vapor Guard
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MotorTranscript
00:00 This time we are going to hop up a Junkyard Jewel Mopar 360.
00:04 Dawson, do you think we can make 400 horsepower with this thing?
00:08 Oh yeah!
00:09 Let's do it!
00:25 Yeah, you're right.
00:35 That is the biggest piece of garbage you've ever seen on Engine Masters, which is presented
00:40 by AMSOIL and supported by Mr. Gasket and also Earl's.
00:45 But what you see as a completely clapped out Mopar 360 small block, I see as a guest star.
00:52 This thing came directly from the other show that Steve Dulcich and I do, which is called
00:57 Roadkill Garage.
00:58 It's only on Motor Trend On Demand.
01:00 And in a recent episode, we took a '75 or maybe '76 Dodge truck that had been rotting
01:05 in Dulcich's backyard, and it probably hadn't run in 20 years.
01:10 But we revived that engine and made it run and drive.
01:13 We hopped it up a little bit and we threw it in my Challenger.
01:20 But then, we're like, you know what?
01:22 We gots to know.
01:24 How much power will the 360 make?
01:26 And so Dulcich returned it to bone stock.
01:28 This thing is so worn out, you can't even believe it.
01:31 What we're going to do on this episode is run it stock and then start throwing some
01:35 speed parts at it to see how much power you can make with a junkyard jewel.
01:39 First up, throw it on the dyno and run it with Thermo Quad.
01:44 Will this thing even make 200 horsepower?
01:46 I don't think so.
01:47 When you've got a worn out old engine like this Mopar 360, you might think that the oil
01:51 doesn't matter at all.
01:52 But I'm here to tell you, it might matter more.
01:55 We chose Z-Rod 2050 motor oil.
01:58 It's a thick high viscosity formula that'll soak up and sop up some of the bearing clearances
02:02 and worn out rings.
02:04 It's also the high zinc formula.
02:07 This engine has a flat tappet cam.
02:09 It's probably on the edge of worn out as it is.
02:11 This might make it last long enough to make 400 horsepower with this old Mopar small block.
02:16 Let's see if I can get that as good as Fry Burger.
02:20 Oh!
02:21 Made a mess.
02:23 [SFX]
02:26 We're about to fire up our bone stock junkyard 360 for the first time and Dulcich swears
02:34 this is going to make, are you ready for this?
02:36 Again?
02:37 300 horsepower.
02:38 I'm secretly hoping for 300 but I think it'll make 260.
02:42 260 is your number?
02:44 Yeah.
02:45 That's a little more realistic I think.
02:46 You're thinking 260?
02:47 I'm thinking 260-ish.
02:48 I've seen the cylinders in this thing.
02:50 Yeah.
02:51 I know what the cam looks like.
02:53 I'm going to give it 245.
02:55 You're not considering it has 440 red stripe valve springs.
02:58 Oh, that's the key.
02:59 They're old and used from 1969, bud.
03:02 Yeah.
03:03 That's the only non-stock thing on this because we know we're going to be changing the cam
03:07 later and so Steve just set the thing up so it can take that cam shaft.
03:10 Plus it had the valve rotators originally which has a really short spring so they had
03:15 to be changed.
03:16 [SFX]
03:17 Look at the torque.
03:39 Your junk is junk.
03:41 Can you pull up the graph?
03:43 It's your motor though, Fryburger.
03:45 I know but we're about to fix it.
03:47 Yeah.
03:48 And by fix I mean barely make power.
03:50 Wow.
03:51 312 pound feet at 1900 RPM.
03:55 Might even call that 1800.
03:57 Wow.
03:58 And then it's all downhill from there.
04:00 207.9 horsepower.
04:03 Not 208.
04:04 207.9.
04:05 Give me the tenth.
04:06 No.
04:07 Come on.
04:08 Plus it's just that bad.
04:09 He's begging for tenths now.
04:11 You know when this thing was built a Corvette only made 190 rated net horsepower.
04:17 This really is the worst motor I've ever run.
04:19 This is depressing.
04:20 One of the worst.
04:21 Well let's go fix it.
04:24 Now our mission is to cheer up Uncle Steve.
04:26 It needs help.
04:27 We're going to throw a bunch of junk at it.
04:28 It's already got the Mallory distributor.
04:30 We're going to put in a cam and an RPM intake and a Holley on it.
04:34 Well those are all good parts so now we should be able to make a lot more power.
04:38 Like 250.
04:39 The cylinder boards are pretty worn out.
04:41 You know after we can just get rid of all that junk on top of a short block with eight
04:44 pistons in it we should be able to make some decent power.
04:46 That's the plan.
04:47 Okay.
04:48 Let's tear it up.
04:49 Yeah.
04:50 Yay for us.
04:51 200 horsepower from 360 cubic inches.
04:53 You know that takes a talent.
04:54 Not everybody can do that.
04:57 It was horrible.
04:58 So we're going to throw the entire toolbox at this engine.
05:01 Watch as we just raid the Summit catalog and hose it down with that Holley 750 double
05:06 pumper and Edelbrock RPM air gap dual plane intake manifold and Edelbrock aluminum heads.
05:13 Inside we're going to stuff in a Comp Cams hydraulic flat tap it.
05:16 It's what's called a single pattern cam.
05:19 That means it's got the same specs on the intake and on the exhaust lobes and that is
05:24 480 lift, 231 degrees of duration at 50, and 110 degree lobe separation angle.
05:30 The blow by on this thing is getting pretty brutal but it's still going to make more power.
05:35 Let's go find out exactly how much.
05:41 What's your level of like annoyance at your Mopar failure right now?
05:45 Oh, I don't know.
05:46 It could have a totally worn out and loose timing chain.
05:49 It has no compression.
05:50 It has no cam.
05:53 It really didn't have a chance to make horsepower the way it was.
05:57 Hot, hot, hot.
06:00 I don't know, Steve was calling this the worst engine that ever came through West Tech Performance
06:06 but I think he might be just pulling my chain a little bit.
06:10 You know, it wasn't that bad.
06:12 Right Steve-O?
06:13 If that's what you want to go with, okay.
06:15 You know, that's just buddy kind of talk, kidding each other around.
06:18 You know, really.
06:19 You know what this is really like?
06:21 This is like, check out my new girlfriend dude.
06:23 She's hot, right?
06:25 And she's not.
06:26 Yeah.
06:27 Some Risto guy would give me like 500 bucks for this.
06:35 Old engine like this, you often end up having to take the lifters out with a pair of channel
06:39 locks like this because they wear and they can get a ridge of metal around the edge that
06:44 keeps them from coming out of the hole and they get some varnish on them.
06:46 They're just junk.
06:48 You know how this is a special guest star from Roadkill Garage?
07:05 Yeah.
07:06 Well, it's continuing a long held tradition on Roadkill Garage.
07:09 What's that?
07:10 Well, I removed the world's smallest camshaft.
07:12 Yeah.
07:13 And look at that.
07:14 Oh, the cam bearing?
07:15 The cam bearing?
07:16 No!
07:17 It's been destroyed.
07:18 Look, that is cam bearing right there.
07:22 Oh man, what do you think caused that?
07:23 Look, every single one of them is wiped out that bad.
07:26 Look, there's a piece.
07:27 Oh wow, look at that one.
07:28 Yeah, there's a piece of the cam bearing sitting on that connecting rod.
07:32 On the bright side, we've proved on Roadkill Garage that you don't even...
07:34 It doesn't matter.
07:35 Yeah, you don't really need the cam bearings that much.
07:37 The ring ridge on these is so much, I mean, the cylinders are funnel shaped.
07:42 They've got at least 10 thousandths bore wear, which means the cylinders are like this,
07:46 which means the ring seal is junk.
07:48 And seriously, that cam bearing, I was willing to let go of the one on the Cleveland because
07:51 it was kind of okay.
07:53 That's all flaking the bearing material off.
07:54 This one is way beyond that level of butchery.
07:59 So yeah, I blame you.
08:01 My fault again.
08:02 I've got to be really gentle not to mar the cam bearings, right?
08:29 That is a $10 saddle on a $2 horse.
08:33 This is kind of like Roadkill, where we throw really good parts on really junky cars.
08:38 What we're installing here are the Edelbrock Performer RPM heads.
08:42 It's kind of like a street aluminum head.
08:44 It'll take 50 pounds off the nose of your car and give you a lot more flow than a stock
08:47 head.
08:51 Edelbrock Performer RPM air gap dual plane intake manifold.
09:00 Once again, way too good for this engine.
09:06 Damn, direct connection.
09:11 What does that mean?
09:12 Why does it say direct connection?
09:14 That's really, really good.
09:16 That should be some Chrysler history.
09:17 What is that?
09:18 That is Chrysler history.
09:19 Direct connection was the performance parts division of Chrysler company for a long time,
09:25 and then they dropped that name.
09:26 It was your direct connection to performance parts through the factory.
09:31 Yeah, we have to polish these now.
09:43 From here to here, pretty good.
09:45 We're all brand new.
09:47 From here to here, we're total garbage.
09:49 Yeah.
09:50 How's that going to average out?
09:52 That might average out to being okay.
09:54 But well, here's the thing I'm really hoping.
09:56 If it makes 400 horsepower, that will have doubled its power output for complete garbage.
10:02 That's the only thing that can save the situation and remove the humiliation of those cam bearings.
10:06 If it makes 400 horsepower, it'll be a total miracle.
10:09 It really will.
10:11 It might do it.
10:12 Well, let's figure it out.
10:14 We got this thing wrapped up with all these great parts, which includes now a 750 double
10:18 pumper Holley.
10:20 And even though we know that the guts of this engine are completely savaged and trash, I'm
10:25 going to use some break-in oil in it because I don't want to destroy that flat tab at cam
10:30 shaft.
10:31 And that's a actual serious problem these days is flattening a cam shaft.
10:35 If you're not using one of these break-in oils, high zinc, et cetera.
10:40 We've actually got the whole pan full of it now.
10:42 All that's left is to go fire this thing up.
10:45 Cross your fingers for 400 horsepower.
10:49 Look at all that flow by it.
11:07 It could be getting water in the oil.
11:17 It's just completely worn out.
11:18 Look at how much blow by is going out the valve cover.
11:21 I mean, look how nice the curve is though.
11:23 Yeah.
11:24 I think we're done.
11:26 Completely done.
11:27 Completely.
11:28 We haven't spun a rod bearing yet.
11:29 You guys are out of ideas already?
11:30 I just, I don't know.
11:32 Here's the good news and the bad news about this.
11:34 Let's start with the good news.
11:36 It made 140 more horsepower and 75 more pound feet of torque.
11:42 That's huge.
11:44 It made 386 pound feet of torque and 348 horsepower.
11:49 That's the bad news.
11:50 This thing should be making 30 more numbers than that on the horsepower range.
11:54 The torque is not too embarrassing, but the thing is it's just rolling over early.
11:58 It's smoking like a choo-choo train.
12:00 The bottom end of this motor is garbage.
12:02 What do you think would happen if we did like 125 shot of nitrous?
12:06 You have no ring left anyway.
12:09 There's a lesson here, which is I thought we would be able to sort of polish a turd
12:14 and instead the turd still stinks, right?
12:16 As I said earlier, it was the worst engine I'd ever seen.
12:19 And still is.
12:22 Let's pull this junk off the dyno and send it to the machine shop.
12:24 Give it 10 to one and some new rings.
12:26 I can rebuild it and make it better.
12:28 That's right.
12:29 Dude, what?
12:30 I thought we were friends.
12:31 What did I do?
12:32 How could you give me this wasted engine?
12:33 Oh man, it's actually not that bad.
12:34 What are you talking about?
12:35 Come on, it's 41 years old and it was probably junk 20 years ago.
12:36 So you're a glass half full on the 140 horsepower gain?
12:37 I think that was pretty good.
12:38 I'm a glass half empty on like what, three grand worth of speed parts and it still makes
12:39 350 horsepower.
12:40 You remember when I was a kid and I was like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to
12:41 be a lot faster than this."
12:42 I was like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
12:43 I was like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
12:44 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:10 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:17 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:21 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:22 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:23 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:24 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:25 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:26 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:27 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
13:51 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."
14:12 I'm like, "I'm going to make a car that's going to be a lot faster than this."