First 1,000+ Cu. In. V8 being built

  • Thread starter Thread starter Antonisbob
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Slashfan
I never said there was anything wrong with a tunnel ram. All I'm saying is you could probably make more power with a different design, since tunnel rams are notorious for robbing power at low RPMs but ok. End of discussion.
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You really need to understand what you are talking about. They rob power at low rpm, because they are designed to scream at high RPM. Torque doesn't matter at all in racing. Everything is dependent upon power. Power makes you faster. Period. Also, RPM makes you faster. You want to go fast, add power and rpm and you will be faster.

For reference, IHRA Pro Stock cars have been using similarly sized 'mountain motors' for a long time. The land of 600+ cubic inch n/a engines revving past 10,000rpm. Absurdity.

 
There's a tunnel ram in those pics? All I see are intake trumpets.

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I wonder how reliable this engine will be. Obviously, it's a high-revver, but the more displacement you use to make a certain amount of power, the less stress the engine will be under. 130 hp per liter is not unnaturally high for racing engines, some of which are tuned for 200 hp per liter.

Heck, there are some (barely) street legal engines pushing 150-160 bhp per liter... so just 130 bhp per liter... on detonation-squelching racing gas, no less... is not so stressful.
 
Honestly, I laughed when I read this. Very American style, absolutely insane. I just picture a redneck having this is a Nova saying "screw your Japanese scrap!". Realistically, this is pretty cool though. The ridiculousness of this engine makes it so interesting for me. What will it be put in? I've seen a '55 Chevy equipped with a Merlin V-12, so I'm sure some fanatic will find something to fit this into. I'm just excited what it will be. My opinion is an AMC Gremlin. The ridiculousness will fit.

Edit-Just read the article. This thing is a beast of an engine for sure. Full of aluminum parts, too. I'm curious as to the weight.
 
niky
Heck, there are some (barely) street legal engines pushing 150-160 bhp per liter.. so just 130 bhp per liter...
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Would you mind pointing me at one?

I'd love to see one. 👍
 
Denilson
Would you mind pointing me at one?

I'd love to see one. 👍
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Lots of RB26 motors pushing ridiculous amounts of power out of 2.6l, even more when bored to 2.8 or 3l. Also, the 3 liter 2JZ, a very popular engine tuned past 1000hp on a not-so-uncommon basis. Even more examples in the 700-800hp range.

Edit-nevermind, I completely overlooked the natural aspiration we're talking about here. I'll come back if I find an example.
 
Well, if you look at rotaries in the displacement Mazda categorizes them, even the stock renesis is nearly 200hp/liter. I've seen 13b's approaching 400hp/liter n/a, and heard of some at 500 and 600hp/liter. Stupid numbers.
 
Eunos_Cosmo
Well, if you look at rotaries in the displacement Mazda categorizes them, even the stock renesis is nearly 200hp/liter. I've seen 13b's approaching 400hp/liter n/a, and heard of some at 500 and 600hp/liter. Stupid numbers.
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Rotaries are king as far as I'm concerned with track motors.
 
Denilson
Would you mind pointing me at one?

I'd love to see one. 👍
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The T1 Caparo for one, and whatever is in the Radical. Honda is at 130 bhp per liter with the Mugen RR (concept only). Granted, these are small engines, but that's still power.

More recently, the Hartley V8 puts out 500 horses from 3 liters. Early development dynos in the DP1 showed about 430 to the wheels (about 470 crank... and the DP1 is all-wheel drive). They claim 500 bhp in the Ariel Atom. Completely street legal. Set a lap record on the TG Test Track, and a Palatov DP1 with the 2.8 liter variant won the unlimited class at Pikes Peak this year.

That's quite a feat for a naturally aspirated motor. He reckons he was missing some 100 hp at the peak! But given the DP1 weighs almost nothing, that wasn't such a big problem.

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Aside from possibly eating transmissions, I don't think this drag motor will be unduly stressed... as long as the crank can take all the torque.
 
Thanks Niky! 👍

As I expected, race cars with turn indicators and threaded tires.. ;)

Stressful or not, what you pointed me towards are good examples. 👍
But I'd love to see the durability of those engines..

There's a reason why Ferraris with more than 3000 miles are practically impossible to sell.
So yeah, 130 bhp/liter are'nt as stressful as a 165 bhp / liter Ariel Atom engine.

Motorcycles also produce those kind of numbers, or even up to 200 bhp / liter. But then again, not many motorcycles last 5-6000 miles either (high end sport bikes).

So what we're basically saying here is that, for non aspirated engines, 100 bhp/liter is good. It's a nice balance between race and durability. Ferrari are pushing it with 125 bhp/liter in the 458..
The 16.4 liter V8 in the OP are in the same league. Not that stressful given the fact that it's a race engine though.. Don't know if the Ferrari puts out 560 bhp with 92 fuel though..

The "cars" reaching up to 150-160 bhp / liter are practically race cars converted to road cars. And motorcycles ofc..
High revs in this segment is a must.

Rotary, turbo, supercharged engines aside. 👍
 
Hey, sportsbikes can last over 6000 miles. Just change the oil every few hundred and baby them all the time. :D

Durability is definitely questionable... and Hayabusa V8s typically have warranties measured in hours, not miles... but given drag motors don't typically do as many of those as circuit cars, I bet that motor (again, depending on how well the bottom end can withstand the torque) would last a season or two.

I'm not willing to eat my hat if it doesn't. It could just as easily explode spectacularly. :lol:
 
You also have to consider piston speed, something that doesn't scale. For instance, an S2000 engine makes far less power/liter than an F1 engine, so according to the stress=bh/l scalar relationship argument, the S2000 engine would be under far less stress (and realistically it is indeed) but the piston speeds in the F20C are actually higher than those of an F1 engine. This puts enormous strain on connected rods and pins. The E46 M3 also had crazy high piston speeds due to the long stroke and high revs.

This isn't any kind of slant against the F20C nor the S54 because they are utterly fantastic engines, but they are under a lot stress at high engine speeds.

I'm sure the V8 in the OP has an enormous stroke, which means the 10,000rpm is all the more impressive.

An aside: Even this 1000 cubic inch V8 has exhaust valves only slightly bigger than intake ports of a PP 13B. :)

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Which is really the entire advantage of the rotary... ridiculous air flow and velocity.
 
Actually, I didn't see that part.

Stroke of 5.875". Online calculators put out a piston speed that's twice that of high-strung a road-going motor. (9,700 ft-min at 10,000 rpm... or 49.7 m/s) Ouch.

I take it back. That thing might last a season, or might eat itself up banging off the limiter. That's insane. The 7,000 rpm street variant is still high-strung, but will likely last a lot longer.
 
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Longer travel in the same amount of time requires more speed, yes.

Question:
Imagine a 2 liter F1 V8 engine. Each cyliner is 1/4 liter, or 250 cc..
The 250cc chamber can be either "thick" and "short", or "long" and "thin" (Jeez, I need to work on my technical terms in english. LOL).
The longer stroke would require a faster stroke for it to rev equal to the other, right?
And therefore a higher strain, yes? Or are you saying the opposite.. Would be great to read some more about it. 👍

Either way, I think we're splitting hairs kind of with this discussion..

Can't we just agree that an existing 400ish bhp road car engine reving 8000 rpm put more strain on the engine compared to another existing 400ish bhp road car engine that revs 6000 rpm? Hence the general saying that more revs put more strain on it.

I do find this discussion very interesting though.. It's not that (I love to read posts by members with knowledge. 👍 ). It's just that once we're done evaluating on one thing, there's always the next technical discussion to take in to concideration.. :lol:
 
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niky
I take it back. That thing might last a season, or might eat itself up banging off the limiter. That's insane. The 7,000 rpm street variant is still high-strung, but will likely last a lot longer.
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MIGHT is the key word here. ;)

Our S/S (super stock) 4x4 pulling truck is twisting 12k and putting out 1,013 dyno'd HP. (Chevy small block - 408 c.i. naturally aspirated btw). We get ... are you ready for this one ?

We get 3 miles on this engine (300 to 350 ft. at a time on it). By then, it's wore out, the power starts dropping radically. Yes ... 3 miles and it's done.

This particular engine in the OP falls into the same category I'm afraid. Short life span.
 
1,000 cu. in. V8, awesome.

Even more displacement: The replacement for the replacement for displacement.
 
After windage, strengthening, frictional losses, and additional reciprocating mass is taken into effect, I have my doubts about 100 horsepower/liter.

But, uh...more power to them for trying.
 
Talking about how long it will last, anyone notice the race engine has no water jackets for strength ie no coolant going past the pistons to cool it, sure it would run on methanol (which runs at a much lower temp) but to have it running at even idle for 2 mins would risk severe heat damage. Not to sound like a hipster here but isnt the article a little old (sept 11), more impressive was the truck also featured in that issue of hot rod :sick:
 
Nicksfix
MIGHT is the key word here. ;)

Our S/S (super stock) 4x4 pulling truck is twisting 12k and putting out 1,013 dyno'd HP. (Chevy small block - 408 c.i. naturally aspirated btw). We get ... are you ready for this one ?

We get 3 miles on this engine (300 to 350 ft. at a time on it). By then, it's wore out, the power starts dropping radically. Yes ... 3 miles and it's done.

This particular engine in the OP falls into the same category I'm afraid. Short life span.
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Any videos of it? Is it a long-rod engine to facilitate 12,000rpm? Must sound unreal at that RPM.
 
Eunos_Cosmo
Any videos of it? Is it a long-rod engine to facilitate 12,000rpm? Must sound unreal at that RPM.
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I personally have no videos of it. Pretty sure my wife has a couple stored in her phone from this past season though.

rb26x
I'd like to hear or see it, too.
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Well, at least I can show it to you. Pictures, compliments of the wifey.
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Antonisbob
I 3rd that, but sadly can't find any video yet.
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I was unaware I had to supply a video :lol:. As mentioned, my wife has (I think, a couple stored in her phone). I don't have time to be videoing while at the track. There is to much going on for me to do this. If I had a You Tube account and knew how to make videos on there, I would gladly share them. There is however 1 video I have found on You Tube of it. This one is from '09. We were running a 410 C.I. engine at that time and twisting 11K - 1000 HP out of this particular engine. Since then we have dropped 2 C.I.'s and found a few more ponies, (damn inspectors, calling us too close to the displacement limitations and the hassles involved with them .... forget it, lets shed the cubes so we don't have to go through this anymore). The following video is an 11K RPM smallblock Chevy ..... Gitter Done. I'll see what I can do about getting a newer version up on this.

 
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