Straight 8 Power

J

jason drost

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I just got a 52' Roadmaster and I'm about to rebuild the motor and tranny. Does anyone know where I can get performance parts for the motor, mainly intake and exhaust parts? It's going to be my daily driver so I want a nice comprimise between power and economy.(leaning more towards power of course). Plus is the Dynaflow tranny worth rebuilding or would I be better off swapping trannies with an adapter? Thanks Jason
 
As far as straight eights go you have the biggest and best.

The intake on the '52 Roadmaster is a good high performance one for the engine. It is the only model which offered the 4 barrel carburator! I am not aware of any aftermarket ones.

There is some info in the Buicks.net shop about building the straight eight.

The transmission would be better replaced. Go to the links on this site and do a search for Bendtsen's . They will be able to help you. You will have to replace the entire power train to make it work.
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Thanks for your advise. It carries alot of weight with it. I just got done reading the article about building up a straight 8 off this site. It does alot for me, the only thing is I am going to up the compression ratio but the article advises to replace the pistons with higher performance pistons, any suggestions on where to find these? I do have Kanter catalog and I have EGG coming, I just not sure that they have what I'm looking for. Is there another engine that is more popular out there that might share the same size pistons to your knowlege?
 
Somebody else might have better sources, but I don't thing your going to find any "high performance" pistons.

I think raising the compression by planeing the head is fine, but I wouldn't go to the max of 1/8" unless I had a spare head sitting around. You will have to watch the valve train geometry.

I think any replacement pistons will be satisfactory. Even "hotrodded" it is not going to be very high compression or high reving. I would consider sending the cam away to be reground to a little higher performance. Cam grinding has come a long way in 50 years!

Keep us posted!!!
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Has anyone that has a 320 straight 8 tried to go with bigger valves? I thinking about it and I don't know if there is enough room to open up the ports and if there is how much and what other type of engine can I swap these valves for? I haven't been able to start on the engine yet, and I won't be able to for about 6 more months. I'm just trying to come up with a game plan so everything can go as smooth as possible. Thanks
 
Check out this guy's site. He's in Europe and has done interesting things with his Buick (see May '02 for engine work). His name is Jyrki. I plan on doing this to my 320 motor this summer. Let me know how you make out.

Bains

http://gamma.nic.fi/~marlin/Rmaster.htm
 
Best way I've heard to get any real HP increases out of these motors is to deck it to raise the compression ratio. Stock compression is pretty pathetic.

I've heard that BB Chevy valves will work in that engine with some slight mods. Not sure if that's true or not, so don't hold me to it. Might be worth looking into, though.

I know that the older Roadmasters had a factory compound dual carb manifold/exhaust set up. I've seen them on ebay go for anywhere around $200-$400 bucks. I'm not sure what exactly you would accomplish as far as CFM ratings were concerned. Those older compound set ups stack up two 2 barrel Strombergs, while the newer guys have the stock single Stromberg or Carter 4 barrels. I don't think you would gain much horsepower with the dual setup, but it would sure look cool as hell.

Also, I know that Edmunds made a dual intake manifold for the 320s. I'm not sure what the rules are on this message board about posting other web site addresses, so if you're interested, shoot me an email and I'll tell you where you can get them.

If you want a cruiser, keep the stock tranny in it. If you're looking for performance you're going to need to swap it out....right now before you do anything else. Expect to shell out the dough, though. All the adapters I've seen go for well over $500. Then you have to think about the driveshaft and rearend swap. It's quite the task. I've heard of some guys that have modified the bell housings on some Muncie trannys to bolt up to the 320s and have been able to keep the stock enclosed driveshaft and rearend. Other than cost, I don't see why you would want to do that over the later.

Good luck. Keep us posted.
 
BB Chevy valves are the only ones I know of that have long enough stems. BBC exhaust valves make nice intake valves for the 320 engine, plus you get rid that 5 cc cup on the original valve = more compression. BBC valve springs work, too. You can mill a lot out of the head (some 0.1") but I would prefer milling the deck.

Probably in the future, I will try to locate some standard connecting rods of another make, that would be about the same length and same journal size, then order custom pintons from companies like Ross or Wiseco.

I fabricated headers and I'm going to fabricate a new intake. I think the those two are the "achilles heel" of the original construction.
 
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