Messages

31

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 25, 2012, 03:51:22 PM »

Hi Jon,

If that's the test I remember with Cantwell there, they were testing the full car exhaust systems, not just the "Open Headers" that TRACO normally used on the dyno.

32

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 24, 2012, 02:45:39 PM »

Yep, 40 years is too long to remember HP stats, at least for me. The only thing I'm sure of is that the AMC engines put out a little more than the Chevys.

TRACO preferred the "Red Line" at 7200 I believe, but 7800 was more to most drivers liking.

I remember we worked on (rebuilt) a couple of 302 Fords and they were fairly comparable to the AMC's.

The Offys were spectacular on the dyno, separated by the cam cover, the exhaust was white hot and the intake frosting up so quickly that you could see the build up over a few seconds time frame. It was difficult with that old "Water Brake" dyno, as weights had to be added to the scale, a guessing game at first, and the Offys put out so much power that the water would steam off in the condenser faster than it was being replenished. Close to 1,000 HP at 10,000 RPM, using Nitro-Methane. It was scary being close by when running high RPM (for me anyway).

Pigpen

33

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 24, 2012, 01:48:04 AM »

Hi Robert,

I'm sorry but it's been way too long for me to remember the torque curves for TRACO's T/A engines (or any for that matter), but 475-490 HP was a good number for the Chevys, on TRACO's dyno. We did occasionally rebuild engines originally built by some of the competition, and their Dyno HP was no better than ours, usually a little worse, some quite a bit worse. The AMC T/A engines were a little better, around 510-520 on the Dyno.

I know that some would question it, but TRACO engines were built the same for all customers. The only exceptions were special items that some customer got hold of, but all in all, Penske's engines from TRACO were duplicates of his competitors, those built by TRACO.

Penske did have some "pull" with the Chevy factory for Aluminum blocks and heads, not for T/A racing.

For the T/A series, Penske ran 2 cars, each with 3 engines; 1 in the car, 1 on the truck as backup and 1 being rebuilt at the shop, this was the same for both Camero and Javlin.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I don't personally have any photos, looking back now I wish I had, but I was young and dumb, with never a thought of the faaaaaaar future when I might actually enjoy reminiscing.

Pigpen

34

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 22, 2012, 02:55:13 AM »

Hi Jon,

Correct, TRACO did not supply any headers.

One of the Headman Headers group (again at a loss for a name) spent many hours with us on the dyno designing the 4-2-1 headers.

The final product was a large improvement over other systems at that time. Mid range torque was up 20+% without affecting the high end.

TRACO did not officially recommend anyones header systems (that I was aware of).

Pigpen

35

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 19, 2012, 08:57:19 PM »

Jon & Robert,

Isky did supply some components to TRACO and those rocker clips were probably from him.

I did remember the spring company which produced all of our valve and other springs - Century Spring Co.

Pigpen

36

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 19, 2012, 12:19:15 PM »

Hi Jon,

I believe those were made by the same company that made our valve springs and I'm sorry but I don't remember their name.

We had a lot of problems with the original Chevy rocker arm design and applied a number of modifications to make them work, which are mentioned in articles here on the CRG forum. Roller rockers were the longterm solution.

Pigpen

37

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 18, 2012, 08:30:33 PM »

Hi Jon,

It was machined from either 1/4 or 3/8 inch thick stock (1/4 is sufficient), I think Narin (next door) machined them for us, it's just 5k or 6k Aluminum alloy round stock with holes, I can't remember if it had a register on the center rear, I don't think so.

The lower pulley was a factory part, welded I think, the vibrations would crack the metal around the mounting holes and then break apart the welds.

I don't have any TRACO items, I live with 3 women, my wife, a daughter and my 92 year old mother, you can only imagine what my garage is full of - LoL.

The pulley reinforcer is not critical at all, just a method to keep the thin metal pulley assy from vibrating or warping, I suspect that large diameter / thick fender washers under the bolts might work, or simply someones aftermarket pulley. Be sure whatever you use is round or equally balanced for rotation.

Today we have excellent Loctight products, back then they were just starting up their business, so most of the bolts on TRACO engines were cross drilled and wire wrapped, talk about time consuming.

Pigpen

38

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 18, 2012, 11:55:57 AM »

Hi Robert,

The lower pulley had a bad habit of warping under load from the belt, so that (as you found) Pulley Support Plate was added.

Before Chevy came out with the Stainless stamped head gaskets, some of the engines used studs for the heads, mainly those for long duration track races. After the Stainless stamped gaskets, all engines used bolts. Properly installed with Aluminum particle paint, those Stainless gaskets required a lot of prying to get the heads off after the bolts were out and all head gasket failures ceased. All heads were "Hot Torqued" after a Dyno warm up.

Studs were used on all the Chevy small block mains.

Pigpen

39

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 18, 2012, 01:28:05 AM »

Hi Chad,

Re: TRACO castings...

I'm sorry, I don't remember exactly who produced the cast Aluminum remote oil filter parts, that was set up before I started work there, but I think that it may have been the shop that produced the AMC 2x4-BRL mainfold for us, Don Narin's Speedway Patterns, that's just a guess.

Pigpen

40

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 18, 2012, 01:15:36 AM »

Hi all,

I'm getting the impression from some of the questions here on this forum and some other forums (especially AMC forums), that many people are not aware of TRACO's involvement with the Chevy and AMC factories. TRACO received a number of "gifts" from both factories, in return for testing and modification if necessary. Other racing groups and shops were also "gifted" in return for the same.

We received a couple of the first all Aluminum 427 Chevy blocks and heads, no cylinder linings, they used a special coating on the outside of the pistons, special rings and the cylinders were specially honed to leave the Silicon nodules from the special alloy, on the surface. The heads were fitted with Stelite valve seats which required an orbital valve seat grinder, and required a special coating in the water jackets to hold some heat in (kinda overused special there, but they really were).

A lot of people in the industry knew about the Aluminum Rat engines, but only a few knew about the Aluminum small blocks. The factory trusted TRACO to test things properly and supply all information back to them.

Trick rods, cranks, heads, cams and more, we performed a lot of side jobs for the factories. Picture an all aluminum 350 CID with a Flat Crank (180 Deg Opposed) and EFI mounted right above the intake valves.

The first group of AMC heads which had their cores "scratched" to permit larger valves, were accidentally ran through the factory assembly line before being caught, so there were 50 or so AMC stock engines with very expensive heads running around.

TRACO made a number of suggestions which the factories acted on, especially rod and crank treatment modifications, which led to significant reliability improvements.

I don't remember which Trans Am race it was after (or even which year), but when Penske's Cameros and Donahue won the majority of races one season, even though the Ford factory had pulled out all the stops and spared no expense, top drivers and dozens of spare engines each race... We were working the next day at the shop when a long limo pulled up in the alley out back, a young well dressed gentleman stepped up and over the chain which was draped across the large doorway at the rear, seriously pissing off Jim who was standing close by, as there was a "NO ADMITTANCE" sign attached to the chain, he walked up the shop isle like he owned the place and stated "I'm Edsel Ford II and I'm here to see just who managed to beat my Mustangs" (Edit: Oops, got his name wrong). Jim and Frank both had the biggest grins on their faces that I'd ever seen - LoL.

So TRACO was a privately owned and operated business, but the inside circle of the racing industry back then was very tight, there was a lot of shared "back scratching" going on behind the scenes.

Pigpen

41

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 17, 2012, 11:59:24 PM »

Hi klvn8r,

OG69Z messaged me about that manifold and I answered him with it's history, I mentioned that you asked about it also and asked him to post my answer here if he would, to save me writing it all again, as I didn't save a copy in my outbox, you know how us forum newbs are, takes 50 posts to figure things out - LoL.

The short answer is that it was cast to TRACO specs by an outside source, the design was predicated on what we learned testing and modifying a Chevy 2x4-BRL in-line factory prototype manifold.

Pigpen

42

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 17, 2012, 05:47:48 PM »

Hi Jon,

It depended on the manifold's use. Just about all of the manifolds were port matched, there was one Edelbrock design, the "Torquer" which was purposefully not port matched, it was used on some street design engines.

The Weber and FI manifolds were polished as well, but tests showed that polishing manifolds where the carb was the restrictor, was useless. The runners were cleaned up some but not polished.

For single 4-BL carbs, the size of the plenum under the carb is more important than polished runners. I don't remember the numbers, but plenum size versus runner length helps determine the engines torque curve, also the area around the top of the carb is very important. Most TRACO 4-BL carbs had the "Choke Horn" machined off to increase the space / area for air intake.

Usually the manifolds were sent out for work, but I do remember a couple were done in house, perhaps just a rush thing.

Pigpen

43

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 16, 2012, 02:55:27 AM »

Not all Chevy dampeners were designed as well. We built two 454 CID engines for a 40 foot "cigarette" boat Penske entered in a race out of Marina Del Rey, CA. Lots of torque to the props. About 30 mins into the race, the dampener on one engine exploded, luckily no one got hurt. The 454 CID dampener is not equally thick around its diameter, it's used as part of the balance weight for the crankshaft. Even though Edelbrock had balanced it mounted to the crankshaft, it couldn't withstand the harmonics. From then on TRACO stayed away from 454 Chevys.

44

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 15, 2012, 03:54:55 PM »

Hi Chad,

That's one job none of us could ever forget - LoL.

After a quick lathe job to clean up and make the outer surface round, the dampeners were mounted on a turntable on a Bridgeport vertical mill. A tool was ground and used like a shaping tool to cut each line, one at a time, simply puling the handle to bring the spindle down (not rotating), the mill was not on. It could have been done on a drill press stand as well, but the mill had easy to adjust stops, adjusted for line length.

When finished, the dampeners were held in a vise and hand stamped, hand sanded, cleaned, painted and hand rubbed with paint sticks.

A very time consuming job, but the result really looked great / professional and was a sort of TRACO trademark.

We all did them, as with just about all the required jobs, everyone shared the load. I remember having a sore arm for a day after cutting a group of 10 or so dampeners.

Pigpen

45

Trans-Am Camaros / Re: TRACO Fans

« on: May 14, 2012, 01:40:40 AM »

Hi Bruce,

I remember that we started using the angle plug heads after they were available for some time. I mainly remember them used on the IROC engines, I think because they tested better at lower compression ratios, but I wasn't directly involved in any such tests.

The IROC engines were somewhat de-tuned from their normal TRACO CID equivalent, the whole concept was to test the drivers on as equal a basis as possible, so each engine was tuned to a pre-specified power output all were as close to the same as we could produce them.

I also remember Jim and Frank complaining some about the deal they had made concerning the IROC engines, not a lot of profit (if any), mainly just kept up a steady cash flow for the shop, but as was the TRACO way, those engines were treated exactly the same as all TRACO engines, no corners cut, always the best possible workmanship.

Different subject - Reading through some of the articles posted here about TRACO parts and assembly procedures, I didn't find one very important item; The factory crank shafts were very good, but after about 1967 all TRACO cranks had the bearing journals highly polished and flash hard Chromed, about a 0.0002 inch coating. That made a big difference in bearing life.

Pigpen