Try flashing the converter. Don't preload it. Load the chassis so the front comes up and hold it up with the brakes. Let the engine go back to idle while still holding the front up. Hit the gas and release the brake at the same time. If you time it right it will get the converter to flash to a higher RPM at launch and it will have the front of the car already up. You also may want play around with the timing curve. Adjust the initial timing until you find the best 60 ft. Then adjust the max timing until you find the best mph. Then recurve the distributor so you can run the best initial and have the best max timing.
Very good advice. I actually lock out the mechanical advance when I am testing for the best initial advance. I also use manifold vacuum on the vacuum advance. I find the engine more responsive on manifold vacuum. I have an organizer bin full of HEI center plates and advance weights. I also have one filled with Q-Jet calibration bits. The best curve I have found was a 353 center and 053 weights. With the mid weight springs from a Moroso curve kit, the advance starts at 1,500 rpm and it delivers 15° @ 3,600 with about 10° @ 2,200 rpm. Most of my cammed small blocks with a decently fast burning head like 14-18° initial and 30-34° total. The 305/081 combo I had like 34°. The 305/601 combo liked 32°. I also had a stock 1985 LB9 416 head 305 that I converted to carb, basically a L69 that liked 37°. This was some of the HEI and Q-Jet stuff I was playing with a couple of years ago. www.thirdgen.org/forums/carburetors/775566-850cfm-m4me-q-jet.html
Bud no offence but you have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to loading the chassis ,what does that even mean hold up the front end with the brakes that is impossible?? Loading the chassis is done when the car is on the line and your literally foot braking while on the throttle and the chassis is loaded ,how you think you let off the throttle and the brakes keep the front end up and chassis loaded is just amazing . Also you are talking about a issue he does not have ,traction issues that is where you would have to do some chassis tuning ,shocks ,springs ,anti roll bar.,,4 link ,etc . Nothing you said will do anything but make you look like a tool on the starting line. Flashing the converter is literally just mashing the throttle off idle ,does not make a converter stall out any higher
Subscribed: the cleaning of the heads in the backyard did it for me and it's an sbc👍🏿👍🏿👍🏿 Edit: everyone don't have the big machinery to do what you do and you do it right with what you have.........super major props, excellent 👌🏿
The only things I see that aren't common garage hand tools are the pneumatics, the carbide bits and the valve spring compressor. If you have a cordless drill could switch to that for the grinding, just probably going to have to recharge batteries a lot. Seen some valve spring compressors on the jungle site for less than $30.
Very impressed with even the first 0-60s runs of 7.7s with a 305 👍🏻 enjoying this series alot and the 0-60 in now 6.0s .. wow ! Excited to see what the weight savings give it.
from my exp with the 081 heads they are low end torquey heads but are out of power in the low 5 grand area, the 601s will make a bit more higher end power but seem weaker off throttle,really what you gain down low you lose top end, always a gamble but with the 081s being a 58cc and the 601 being 54cc that changed your comp ratio ever so slightly,unless you made up the dif with a thinner head gasket to keep everything within the same playing field,great back to back video tho showing both, i was shocked that the 081s done slightly better, but i would credit that to all the extra work that you done with porting them and everything, because stock to stock the 601s would out do the 081s been there a couple times myself with running them on 327s and 350s :) great video tho!
Awesome job. I didn't think it was going to make that much of a difference. Lol, I guess I'm always skeptical and you always prove me wrong and actually go faster.
I had a 305 in a 84 trans am was .40 over I ran old set of brownfield heads 49cc chamber with unknown crane cam with 5 speed went pretty good for what it was .
Hell of an improvement, similar weather conditions? Who taught you how to do the cylinder head work? Self taught? Or went to a tech school? I've never been brave enough to grind on cylinder heads.
Most people are worried about messing up valve journals and valleys but the main part to concentrate on is face smoothing. Less drag on airflow equals more CFM.
This is so awesome!! I had a Monte Carlo SS project in the late 90’s and I literally went through the very same process you’re going through except I had a turbo 400 trans with a 10” stall, same 4.10 gears with Hoosiers. I got rid of the 305 for a 327/350 hp motor that a friend was selling and when I finally took it to the track she went mid 13’s. Hope to see more of your project!!
I had a 230hp 5.0 TPI with 5-speed and G92 package that ran 14.7 stock and after SLP exhaust and SLP runners, 24lb LT1 injectors, underdrive pulleys, MSD ignition, Hypertech Cool Fan Switch and chip it managed 13.6 with factory heads and cam.
Damn, more than a whole second 0-60 and 0.75 in the quarter. That's a JUICY improvement my man. I'm gonna repeat one of the other things I said and agree with bovine down below; Try flashing the converter off idle instead of preloading it. :)
Looks like decent port work considering it was freehand, problem isn't the heads it the displacement, that thing needs a 383 swap if you even want to ever see 12's...
Years ago I swapped out my 305 (081 heads) in my 87 Camaro with a set of 520 heads out of a wrecked 2000 mini van. All I did was add 1.6 roller rockers. The most my LG9 ever dynoed was 217 whp @ 5200 with a 700r4 3.08 gears 2400 stall solid low 14s @102-103 mph that's with 1.96 valves and minor porting .With the newer 520 head scar put down 235 whp @5400 ran the 1/4 mid to high 13s @105-106mph. Everything was run with shorty headers, 625 cfm Carb. Only difference was getting a vortec style intake. I cant remember the cam but it was a wimpy.450-.450 Even with the smaller valves the 520 heads outflow the LG9. Ive since had a set of modified 520 with 1.94/1.55 valves milled down .020 with minor porting 235-240 cfm on build they been sitting in plastic the last 10-12 years as I went to the dark side and Mustangs. My first 4 cars were 89/87 Camaros & 91/92 Firebirds, All were 305s . Ive ran all style gm heads 305/350 gm heads the 520 head flowed the best required no milling, Even the older style heads ported will struggle to match the 059/520 heads even with their smaller valves. I picked up 3-4 mph and .3-.5 seconds by going from mild ported l81 with 1.96 valves to 520 junkyard heads with smaller valves, Mild ported 520 heads with bigger valves probably would of put me close to 250 whp . Awesome video brings back memories of my 20s haha
I vote that if you end up hurting the 305, you find a 307 chevy to drop in the car. Just to make the folks saying you need a 350 mad lol. While it maintains a similar displacement, you open the bore by .140 of an inch basically. So while a 2.02 valve still won't fit, a 1.94 will flow better because you are unshrouding it some.
A full second wacked off the 0-60 is a huge gain, I love that your building a 305 it gets pretty tiring seeing the same ls swap this 383 stroker that. With the small displacement you have some higher rpm potential which will help a ton with the wide ratios of the 4 speed, I don’t know what cam you have but I’d love to see you throw something in the range of 230 degrees on the intake with a 107 lsa and spin that sucker out too the moon!
Nice vid! 2 things 'tho. #1) Did you get a 3 angle valve job on the heads?? That's critical for flow. It didn't look like you did. If not, I highly recommend that you do. #2) why would you build the motor in the engine bay like that? It's a Million times easier and a fair bit faster to pull the motor, build it on the stand, and then reinstall. Not to mention a Million+ times better for your back. Cool car. 3rd gens rock, I had a blast with mine.
These motors get a bad rap and I understand why. But I had a TBI L03 in a Chevy Van and I was more than thrilled with it. It moved that van around without any effort and I never had an issue when I used it to tow anything. Being that is was a van I wasn't worried too much about fuel mileage although I used to get around 400km out of 83 litres. Couldn't tell you if that was good mpg's or not though.
I like what your doing, I’d see if you could add some compression, those 305’s were terrible. Maybe some pistons, or deck the heads and maybe go to go a thinner head gasket. You really want to be at 10:1 or better.
I thought I saw a Shorts video of your car with a bigger cam swap? (480 lift) if so, is the comparison video in the works? Would love to see that. Thanks
400ci SBC Crank? As always, love the content and nice to see the results, a lot of time gained for head swapping. I kinda feel like the car should be in the low 13s like the Firehawk by now, should be making close to the same power right? Is the "test track" uphill? Just curious as I too have a 305ci Camaro and I'm hoping to build it to the Firehawk performance level.
@TexHasselhoff small cam 443/465 lift and needs a little carb running for a better 60ft if get more time this week I’ll see if I can break into the 13 sec range with some carb work and a little weight reduction. 3520lbs with me in car with 1/4 tank of gas.
@@KrikkebobbyracingchannelYeah, the Firehawks 0-60 is 4.6 so the launch must be part of the issue, I know it's kinda apples to oranges but, it's the goal I have for my car. As for weight reduction, I've been doing some research on that too. So far, I've found that the stock hood and the doors are roughly 80 pounds each, I've heard you can lose some weight by replacing the rubber bumpers with tube frame bumpers underneath the fiberglass. Also, Lithium motorcycle batteries are less than 5 pounds so that's an easy 30+ pound weight savings and if you want you can unbolt the alternator for the races. Also I hear the later "Vortec Engine Starters" are much smaller and lighter than the starters that came with our cars from the factory. Sorry for the info bomb, just trying to be helpful. ;-)
@@TexHasselhoff The Vortec starter only works with a 168 tooth flexplate or flywheel. The 3rd gens came with a smaller 153btooth. The LT1 Camaros and Corvettes used a mini starter for a 153 tooth.
I can't stand these people who don't give engine specs and leave the despcription blank. What cam? It nakes a difference on a 305, to much duration and they have a hard time getting started. Please post your cam specs and compression ratio. It will make your video go from "look what I did, Mommy" to being a solid informative tech video. BTW, I took my 416s off in 1998 and then my 081s off in 2002- I have never looked back since upgrading to the 305 Vortecs. High lift with mild duration or it will never be fun stop light to stop light. 305s are right on the teater totter of having enough power for a strong launch unlike the 350 that can afford to loose some bottom end in exchange for top end.
I have put cam specs in previous videos in this video it is 443/465 lift , 214 duration @.50 ,with 1.6 rockers. Compression my guess is 9:1 or less. Appreciate the feed back thanks.
The fleet engines are the cheap performance engines if you can’t afford the holy grail of SBC engines such as the 350- 400 and the LS V8 engines are better but make sure you can get a affordable price on those engines
Like a 225 with then a lil suspension tweeking may leave like it has better gearing and then smaller tires would help all the way threw and or would appear more stock if n the back tire wasn't as obvious 😊
Plans to keep it a 305 sbc tell car breaks into 10sec range. Waste of time and money yes lol. but why be like everyone else I already have fast stuff this car is pretty much a budget build fun learning project for old lady’s first race car. This is the most fun iv had in awhile with a car. fast is fun to but fast also means more money and maintenance and wear and tear on car which takes a lot of the fun out of it. Just hope everyone enjoys the long journey of baby steps as the car slowly gets faster and faster and use what they can to make there own car faster.
Sorry to say but the 305 is still a dog. I’ve been there. Remember the old saying “ there’s no replacement for displacement “ Finish it with a nice mid rpm cam and call it a day, or drop a 350/383 crate motor and beefier trans in it, maybe a better rear too. Good luck
Nice job, keep up the good work, you will get to 13s. Having built numerous 305s in the past 20 years I have some info, actually loads of it running the different GM heada that work well on the 305s small bore. The 081s are decent heads. With the same port work the 416s, 601s and 081s flow nearly identically. The 601s have the smallest chamber and it is twisted like a fuelie head. The 601s are thus closed chamber. The 081s and 416s have a straight chamber and thus are an open chamber design. The 601s have the best combustion chamber design of the 3 but need to be smoothed out a bit to unshroud the valves. The 059/520 305 Vortecs can exceed all 3 in power production and the intake ports flow as well as a modestly ported 416, 081 or 601 without touching them. My 059s flowed 218 @ 0.500 off the junkyard L30, dirty carbon covered valves and all. All 4 of those heads have a similarly flowing exhaust port and some port work pretty much never hurts a SBC exhaust port. The final head I have run on a 305 is the 113 aluminum casting off the ZZ4. I actually like the 113 head the most out of the stock GM heads that are appropriate for a 305. The 113s can flow close 260 cfm without going too crazy on port size and they can easily be milled to ~54cc from 58. The 113s also have a 1.94 valve which helps the flow. I went through some old reciepts I had filed away and Precision Engine Parts in Nevada makes an undercut stem and back cut 1.84" stainless valve for the 305. P3091JF. The valves were worth 12 cfm @ 0.450 lift on the 601s I did some cleanup work and mild porting on. They were the first set of heads I ever put a carbide too. I used the 601 porting templetes that were on TGO years ago. I printed them to scale and translated them to a thin, rigid plastic that I was then able to accurately gauge my process with. The heads flowed 212 cfm with stock valves and 224 cfm with the undercut stem valves. I later found filling the voids under the intake rocker studs with epoxy and smoothing that turbulent airflow out was worth another 6 cfm by itself. My stock exhaust valves were trashed after running 150K miles in a fullsize van under load. I used their 1.50" exhaust valves, P2323J that had the same undercut stems. Another benefit of those valves is the chamber side of the valves is flat as opposed to the dish in the stock valves. The dished area of the stock valves is 2-3cc more chamber volume.
Great insight, it would be mighty interesting to put fast burn heads on a dome piston, good rods, and a "slightly tweaked" version of the Duntov 30-30 (little more aggressive ramps) in a 305. 🤔 This car should run better than it did with 601's. My father spun off a 16.10 with an '83 G20 conversion van with a 700r4, 3.08 gears with nothing more than a Crane cam, recalibrated Quadrajet, and exhaust back in 1990. Might sound slow, but that was a dressed 5,000 lb van. I KNOW the potential is there, and no one will ever tell me different. Although to play devil's advocate, the 601 heads leave the foundry very rough cast. There's a guy that goes by "Jeff Swisher" on NastyZ28 who swears by them with videos to back up his claims. His engines pull well beyond 7k. I'm simply dumbfounded to see the 081's impact the car that heavily. That's a tremendous drop.
@@CSXT8250 I would say it is the porting that really helped the 081s. Stock for stock they are on a fairly level playing field with the 416s and 601s. Your build idea is not all that different than my close friend David Kauffungs Engine Masters entry. His had dished pistons though. He returned the next year and made something like 460 hp with a bigger cam, different rocker ratio and some other improvements but Engine Masters disqualified his runs over an oil pan. Engine masters went after the guys using more stock based parts because their sponsers wanted more of their aftermarket stuff used and made rule changes to that effect. His first year entry made close to 400 hp with a SBE 305 that had something over 200K on it before he freshened it up, fast burn heads, mild solid flat tappet cam and a Q-Jet. I know the vans ran stronger than their numbers would suggest. Mine was 5,300 lbs with me in the driver seat and I was 220 lbs at the time. It cut a decent 60' time even with a 3.08 open rear. I had P275/60R15s on it and later P295/50R15s. I tried an Edelbrock 1405 on it, but it had a 25-30 ft/lbs loss at ~1,500 rpm compared to a correctly setup Q-Jet. The torque loss was from the secondaries opening too soon on the 1405 creating a lean bog. Q-Jet went back on it. The performer rpm spreadbore manifold added about 30 hp compared to the stock aluminum Q-Jet manifold on that old 305 G20. The thorley tri-ys had their collectors nearly even with the 700r4s crossmember. Very good for torque production with a X-pipe added into the factory catless dual exhaust. I also had the Crane 274H06 cam in mine, it was a stump puller in the 305 and carried power well up to 5,500 rpm.
@@CSXT8250 I wonder if the weather where he is cooled off 30-40F between when he ran the car with the 601s vs when he ran with the 081s. That would partially explain the huge jump. Other curiousity would be valve springs. I have not watched the cam swap video, but if it had the weak stock springs on the 601 it may have been running into valvetrain stability issues, lifter toss and pump up.
@@chrisreynolds6520 That is very well possible. Not sure how those 601's were ported either. They need most of the help on the intake side. From my gathering of Intel one of the keys to making the 601's great is raising the roof of the exhaust port and staying off the floor. Even though 601s already have a terrific exhaust side as they are. They like a lot of cam in the higher displacement small blocks. Jeff Swisher has done dozens of 601s and come to the conclusion that there was no gain by going to 1.94s, there is one small portion of the intake side to unshroud of the chamber that gains 400 rpm further in the powerband. Very small amount, not as drastic as someone would be led to believe. How does a 7400 rpm shift point sound with a 270 magnum comp cam in a 355? Yeah man, he knows his shit. The 081's.. Never held a set, so I can't say one way or the other. Very curious and will look for a set. Are these "lightweight" castings? My friend had 081's on his '89 LB9 IROC. Off idle torque was incredible. Nothing upstairs past 4500. My old L69 '84 Z would have walked away past 2nd gear. Both had 3.73 gears and 5 speeds. I speculate the swirl ports would have been a natural with tuned port.
@@CSXT8250 I owned a 1991 Camaro 305 TPI G92 5spd dual cat exhaust 3.45 9-bolt geared car 15 years ago. It ran 13.90s @ 101 mph stock out of the box. Some bolt ons had it running 13.20s.
I would’ve recommended watching some quality porting videos prior to the head install. The floors and the pushrod pinch are the last two places you should grind on. Love to see the before and after!
Agree, missed the good parts that give gains.Problem with a beginner DIY guy watching vids is they dont know most of them are blind leading the blind ,
I see youre using speedway motors head gasket. Basicall the only true 305 head gasket around. A felpro steel shim would still yeild a slightly higher compression ratio fyi. Great build i like seeing the inprovements!
Those 081 heads are really good on a 305. LB9 made 220hp stock; 50 more than an L03. I like it that you swapped the heads, but not the cam (yet). It shy what those heads are worth. It'd be interesting to see the improvement you get with a cam swap. Vortec heads would be more desirable than the 081s, but with 64cc combustion chambers vs the 081s 58cc chambers, you have to shave them .45, which means you'll have to shave the intake and it screws with the valve train geometry. The combustion chamber on the 350 Vortecs is also sized for a 4" bore, so there's some shrouding. You might want to look into the 059 Vortec heads. While they don't have the amazing heart-shaped combustion chamber of the 350 vortec heads, they have the same 58cc combustion chamber as a 305 and they have the same size combustion chamber as a 305, so no shrouding. They also flow more air than any other 305 head.
Good stuff. I'm thinking about going through a 305 and stroking it out to 334. Not as much for racing but more for good power with good fuel economy and reliability. Thanks for the video and info.
Had a 85' Z28 and a 86' TA with a stock 305 4 bbl (last year for TA) and remember getting over 30 mpg. Racked up a lot of miles on them and sold them running like new. Bullet proof engine.
That improvement is really commendable. Glad to see you still gettin shit done and progress made. I don't know that you'll get to 10's without some giggle gas or a spinny boy, but I'm interested nonetheless to see where this goes.
