Intake & Cam Swap

Hey, this time we're gonna get back to the basics with an intake and carb swap.

So you stick around

today on horsepower TV.

It's back to horsepower basics as we show you an easy way to bolt on more horsepower with a performance intake and an 850 CFM car.

We'll put our budget Honda on the bottle Nitro. That is, it's the cheapest T

or horsepower you can get and we'll prove it on the

dyno

cha

plus it's your celebration time in Tennessee as we take you to the largest gathering of America's favorite mid size muscle machines.

Well, that's what these cars are made to do

is to get out and run a little bit.

Gotta see how it goes.

So, hang on for horsepower TV.

Hey, welcome to the horsepower shop. Hey, what is this another Chevelle? When are we gonna work on a Ford around here? Well, just hold on to your horses or your mustangs there. Blue oval boy. Now, what we've got here is my 69 S S3 96 convertible and for the most part it's unmolested.

But guess what, all that is gonna change today. Well, before I change my mind. Better get this thing on the dyno Jet. I guess we need to see what kind of baseline this uh stock 396 lays down.

We get involved in some fairly complex projects here in the shop. But you know, every once in a while it's not a bad idea to go back to the basics. Now, for a lot of you guys changing out the intake track on your engine is one of your very first horsepower hop ups. It can be one of the most effective hop ups in terms of bang for buck,

getting rid of the old cast iron manifold, there will lose you some weight and gain horse power. Plus you'll impress your buddies with your brand new aluminum intake.

Well, what's the verdict there? Judge uh 222.9 horsepower. Well, let's call it 223. Not bad. Not too bad for a 325 horse 396. It's got over 90,000 miles on it, but uh

always room for improvement right there. Bow tie bubba. Well, you bet they blue oval breath

now to help our rat motor breathe just a little bit easier. We're gonna bolt up this Edelbrock performer RPM

intake. That's a dual plane design for Chris throttle response and plenty of top end power plus it's engineered to work best from 1500 to 6500 RPM. Now, that's gonna make it a great choice for the street and the occasional blast down the quarter mile.

Of course, we ordered ours with this dual carb flange pattern. So we'll have the option of running either a spread board or a square flange carb. Hey, speaking of carbs, we're gonna top that intake with this performer RPM Q jet that flows 850 CFM. Now, you guys with long duration cam shafts will be glad to know that Edelbrock has modified the transition circuits for a richer idle. Now, this thing features a side fuel inlet so you can keep your stock fuel lines and an electric choke for a quicker warm up and smoother operation.

Now, I've already disconnected the battery and just finished draining the radiator.

You know,

I've always liked those quadrajet carburetors, the small primaries give you great throttle response in those huge secondaries.

They feed the motor plenty of fuel when you're legging it.

Now, if we can just get this air cleaner off here

and disconnect the leakage right here at the carb,

then we can remove the distributor cap and wires,

the heater hoses

alternator bracket

and fuel lines

before we can remove the distributor, we need to mark its location so that we can index it properly once our new intakes installed.

Now, the rotors pointing straight back to the firewall. So

we'll make a mark right here,

then remove this vacuum line

and turned the advance can,

so you can get to this clamp at the base of the distributor and loosen it.

Then after moving this coil wire,

turn the rotor counterclockwise and pull up the distributor. At the same time,

we want to remove the stock intake and car together as a unit. But before we can do that, we first need to remove the valve covers to give us clearance right here around these manifold ears.

Then we can remove the thermostat housing,

then remove all the intake manifold bolts.

After years being bolted down, these intake manifolds can really be stuck in place. So don't be afraid to insert a screwdriver right down here in the front

and gently pry it up to break the seal

things a little heavy. Huh?

You can say that again.

Well, now we need to get rid of the old gasket material and I cut a piece out of a box. Our intake manifold came in

tuck down here in the Lifter Valley.

There we go.

Now we're gonna stuff some paper towels in these ports

to keep the crud out of the engine.

It's good to start with a scraper like this to get rid of most of the material.

Then we'll use this gasket removal tool that uses a scotch bright material to give a nice smooth finish.

We're ready now to lay in our ultra seals from Mr gasket. Now they're made from a rubber fiber material with these built in silicone beads right here to help improve ceiling.

Hey, good job there Ford guy. Thanks. For noticing. Now, I like to seal up the ends of the intakes by laying a bead of silicone along each one of these end rails here plus a dab between each one of the ports just to hold the gaskets in place

with the intake in place. Time to snug down the boats working from the center out. Of course. Well, while we keep working, you keep watching.

That's right. Now, we're gonna be back to finish up our intake swap right after this short break.

How much new power can we get by bottle feeding our four banger Honda, we'll know later in the show during phase three of our budget build up.

Then it's a Chevelle lover's dream come true in Tennessee. They're gleaming and gorgeous at the show site

and nostalgic next, snapping fun at the strip.

Hi. Welcome back to the horsepower shop and our carbon intake swab on Chuck 69

Chevelle.

During the break, we reinstalled the distributor. The valve covers the fuel and vacuum lines and all the brackets. So now after I wrote down this new car,

we'll be ready to reconnect the throttle linkage.

There we go

next. We need to wire the choke

to a 12 volt source that's hot only when the key is on.

Now, I've just reinstalled the distributor cap and wires so we can go ahead and top off the radiator and reconnect the battery.

Once that's done, we'll fire the engine up, check it for leaks and set the timing.

We're going to go ahead and set our timing at the factory spec, which is 12 degrees.

Well, how do we do that partner? How about 246 horsepower? That's 23 over our baseline now. Oh, man,

that's great. Especially when you consider that. Well, this is a basic bolt on that you can do in your own driveway in an afternoon. Right. And depending on driving location, expect to spend from 3 to $500

they all read it. We need to swap out those rusty old manifolds for some headers. And what about a new exhaust system, man? We partner, calm down. Now you get a little ahead of yourself. After all, we've got to get back to work on our budget Honda build up over there.

All right up off the hood. Hey, that's a good idea. Now, to bring you up to date on this project, we picked up this 94 Honda Civic for $3500 out of our total budget of 85.

Then after adding a new intake

header and free flowing exhaust system,

we made 10 more horsepower than the stock. 87

later, we installed an MS D ignition which left us with 3700 bucks to spend

today. We're gonna spend a little more money by adding nitrous to our Civic, probably the most horsepower you can make for the money

and I want you to meet our guest gearhead this time, Matt Patrick who not only races Hondas, he designs performance parts for them to help you get down the track quicker. Well, what do you got here? Well, g we have, we have here is a XX dry nitrous system,

a dry nitrous system injects just nitrous in the inlet track of the engine. Whereas a wet nitrous system injects fuel and nitrous into the engine. Ok. Without having to worry about the fuel line. This should be pretty simple, should be very simple to install this Nitrous system has what's called a Nitrous management unit inside. This is the solenoid, the fuel control circuit as well as the TPS activation circuit.

But of course, course, this kit also includes everything else you need to install it,

the bottle brackets the 16 ft feed line as well as the 10 pound nitrous.

Ok. It looks like it's all here and with any project like this, the first thing to do is to figure out where everything is gonna fit. And well, one thing I noticed this feed line from the unit to the nozzle is only a couple of feet long. They've gotta be close together. Absolutely. Let's check it out. And while we do, you check this out, we'll be right back.

Ok.

Mama said the only way she's gonna let me go down that track is she went with me. Otherwise she's gonna break my dinner plate.

Don't worry, Papa. There's plenty of room in these classic muscle cars later at the show celebration.

All right. Welcome back to the shop as we get ready to put our budget Honda on the bottle.

Well, as you can see here, Matt's found a great spot for that management unit on the firewall. Plenty close to. We, we

add a nitrous nozzle here on the intake tube.

Absolutely. And as soon as I finish securing this, we'll go right on it.

First mark the location for the nozzle,

remove the tube

drill a hole with a quarter inch bit,

then

use the tap included with the kit to thread the hole.

Finally, we're ready to install the nitrous nozzle.

All right, this tube is ready to go back in the car.

We're starting out with the 55 horsepower jetting,

but

this nitrous system is adjustable from 55 to 75 horsepower.

Well, next we can connect our fuel control hoses. One goes from the management unit here

to this fuel pressure regulator.

The second one

from this vacuum port here on the manifold

back to the unit. Now for fuel, we'll also go with the 55 horse jet.

Hey, guys, let me show how easy this wiring is.

There's a black wire for ground,

a white wire for the throttle position sensor

and a red wire for the arming switch. Now, we're gonna go ahead over here

and put our arming switch in this pop out panel.

This will allow for easy access for our wiring.

Well, looks like it's gonna be up to me to give the show a little bit of XX appeal and

I'm gonna do that with this 10 pound bottle of juice that will mount back here in the trunk. Now, I've already got the brackets on the bottle here. So

now we'll find a suitable location to mount it.

You know, this looks pretty good

right here.

Yeah, I think that'll do

now. We'll just mark the holes

so we can drill them

and then bolt everything down.

Next, run the feed line from the bottle to the engine compartment.

Now, before we hook up the main nitrous line to the management unit, it's important. We make sure there's no trash in it. We're gonna go ahead and purge it. Good idea, Matt. Hey, crack that bottle truck.

Like we're good to go. Once you get that hooked up, you do the honors on the

dyno J.

All right,

man. Would you look at this 100 30 horsepower? That's 33 more than we made last time. And that was our smallest jetting. Yeah, pretty cool. And we only tapped our budget for about 525. Well, stay tuned. We'll take you to Chuck's version of Muscle car. Heaven next, thanks a lot, man. Thank you.

I tell you what. Uh let's head to the racetrack, what he said. I'm ready.

We'll all head to the annual celebration of

Shy

Chell Muscle Machines next on the show.

Horsepower happenings is brought to you by Wyotech. The nation's premier technical training school.

Hey, can you guys tell me where the Mustangs are around here?

You gotta be kidding. The mustangs.

Uh I think they're in the neighborhood garage that's down the roadways.

You won't find that here.

Well, even the most die hard mustang guy must admit there's something magic about this mid size muscle machine with the Chevy bow tie

gone for 30 years, but not forgotten, at least by members of the American Chevelle enthusiast society or Aces for short.

They have their national gathering every year in Nashville called a Chevelle Abra.

And the leader of this pact is none other than my horsepower sidekick himself.

I can tell you this is one of the best collections of Mustang. I mean, uh Chevelles I've ever seen.

Seriously. Where did they come from? Well, we've got members that come from all over the country. We've had them come in. We got two that drove in from California.

We've got them driven in from Florida, New York, Michigan, Minnesota, South Dakota 27 States of the Union, man. Yes, sir. And drive in. I, I like to hear that. Yes, sir. They're all driven in.

Hey, we've got a gorgeous collection of Chevelles with big blocks, small block. We've got El Caminos and I'll tell you what, they're even a couple of special ones. I wanna show you later on. Let's go look at them now.

Hey, well, you know how I like my groceries and how I like my grocery getters even better. Well, check this one out.

Yeah. The guy that owns this drove it all the way in from Marietta California. No, uh, he drove this thing and drove it

in.

Check it out. Fuel injected 5024 wheel disc brakes. I love that blue paint job. And how about those subtle flames?

The stars of this year's event are the rare Tuer and Coco

Chevelles. Now, this car here is a 68 Chevelle built by Dick Harrell Performance and it's one of only five that were built.

And this thing is totally original. It's a one owner car

11,000 original miles on this thing. And it's the only one that was built with a twofour barrel set up. Now, this is a stock

425 horse 427 but with the 24 barrels and the headers on it, it's making a whole lot more power than that.

That's beautiful.

And you got the Yanko.

Yeah. Now the, the Butternut Yellow Yanko is owned by the original owner, believe it or not. He's headed off

these years and he's driven it. It's still driven today. He enjoys it

and, uh,

unrestored.

Well, now over here we've got the later model challe

70 to 70 twos and these are our biggest classes over here. I can see that. I'll tell you one thing. Your aces guys apparently watch our show.

This guy here is bolted on everything I think we have this year. I believe you're right.

Among the 400 so gorgeous cars here are examples from every year of production, from bone stock to heavily modified.

It is the first car I ever owned.

Um, we put 400,000 miles on it and then parked the car,

figured we'd spend some money on it.

I just love Chevelle. I guess

I put the 350 tags on the fender and put the big motor between the fenders and go have some fun.

I bet you do have a lot of fun. It, fool a lot of people, huh? Yeah, this car surprised a lot of people.

You wouldn't beat up on Fords with this thing. Would you?

Uh, probably every chance I get,

hey, look here, I found Joe's brother.

Look over there.

Hey,

see the d, see the similarity,

see the similarity. Look

there, he is

a chave.

Abbra is all about serious bench racing.

Finding the right missing parts for that restro project.

And for this Tennessee couple an annual wedding anniversary and you both have

68 challe.

He's got a big block. I got a small

block.

Yeah.

How does that work out?

Well,

better than him having a big block than me.

I gotta have your foot

with this. No kidding is Chuck Hanson's younger brother? Al?

A lot better looking more intelligent was Chuck adopted maybe

we actually have papers on his adoption. Yes, it is true.

I figured

now that we've got that settled, you might be asking why would anyone take a classic show quality Chevelle and punish it on the drag strip.

Uh, that's what they were made for us to,

I hide

them and have fun. Mama said the only way she's gonna let me go down that track if she went with me, otherwise she's gonna break my dinner plate.

Ok. No one's gonna break any ET records. But when it comes to having fun with America's favorite mid size muscle car,

my TV partner knows how to put on a party.

Horsepower TV

S hot parts. A close up. Look at the latest in high performance hardware,

Flowmaster Delta flow mufflers are known for their sound canceling horsepower enhancing technology. And well, now they've gone for sport compact as well. Of course, they use the same welded steel case for long life and you're gonna get that unique sound that really states your case on the street.

Now, to get one of these, you're gonna have to dish out about 80 bucks.

Hey, I ain't feeding you a line when I tell you these flexible hoses from classic tube are designed to fit just about anything on the road. Now, they're built with stainless steel, they can handle just about any type of fluid and well, they're made to last for the long haul. Now, prices vary according to your application. Well, I'm very impressed with next week's show. So why don't you check this out,

Chuck and I kick off a brand new season of horsepower TV by taking a 30 year old grocery getter into the new age. With the latest in EF I technology.

We'll install a new computer to run the system

and a fuel delivery upgrade to give it power.

We'll also take you to a, one of a kind car show in Tennessee where a big hearted hot roder carries on a mission of helping Children with big blocks burnouts and cars for kids. There's nobody come and hit me.

If it's coming to hit me, it wouldn't be two people here

but they all coming to help the kids

for information about the products used in today's show and more. Check us out online at Horsepower tv.com

Horsepower TV is an RTM production.