Re: Early V8 Dyno Work
In my case I never had a dyno to go to in the area we were running. I learned by what worked, I took suggestions from the more experienced racers, if and when they would share. I was lucky that I had a good friend and engine builder that allso built Danbury engines for others. He was from Upstate NY and ran several short tracks there. Mostly dirt. We;re talking late 50's early 60's. Yes I ran a 404 radius lifter cam, it didn't work for me or the car/driver chassis setup. We never found out why. Later i discovered that quite a few cars ran this cam for awhile but switched to other grinds, mostly the 400 jr.
After a few years of learning you find that some guys give you misleading information for their own benefit. When we changed drivers for the last time, we discovered that changing cams was not our problem, and all the horse power in the world won't help a poor handling car or an inept driver.
The best thing that ever happened to our car was the addition of Bob Counio to out team. He was a young engineer that worked for the bullard co as I did . One day I took him out to lunch and dropped of some parts an the garage where our car was. It was the first time he saw a stockcar up close. He turned out to be one of the best chassis man in NASCAR, even won the olympics BOB sled Gold for America for the first time. Just think, if I didn't take him to lunch, we'd never win the gold medal
When Danbury left Flatheads I left racing. but I never left Flatheads. I have one more story of a race bete\wen the 258 vs the 284. Later.
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