FlatCad Racing's Quest for 200 MPH-a Cadillac Flathead Story!

WZ JUNK does some cool stuff with fiberglass!

He's been working on the aero mods for us. Here are the fender mod mockups, and the plug he just finished for the air inlet!

 

Here an update on the block. I sent the block to Valley Balancing ( Kenny Boyds shop ) for mag and pressure testing and all is good then I set it up on our CNC. and alined the main bores up to check all surfaces, We found out that we are in line on the main bore within in .0015,, main cap mounting surfaces are within .001 to the main bore and the pan rail to mains within .003. It looks like we have a good sound 200 mph block. Now we will be redesigning the main girdle knowing we have a great block still.

 

That's good to hear Will be interesting to see the new girdle.

Kjell

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Taildragger&fenderless

 

Well folks progress is happenin on the flatcad. No more door hinges or handles sticking out slowing this thing down and here are a couple pics of progress i have a bit more work to do but the hinges are installed and the the doors open shut and hopefully if all goes well this evening the custom push button handles will be installed later tonight stay tuned big progress is right around the corner.

Sent from my DROID device using the TJJ mobile app

 

Randy, nice work as always!


From WZ JUNK:

I am making progress but it is slow. See attached picture. I have had various little problems that had to be solved. The plug for the air intake is done and I made an indexing rotisserie so that I could rotate and hold the plug while I apply the gel coat and then lay up the fiberglass. I will leave it on the plug for a few days before I remove the plug. We should have a part for a trial fit next week.

I'm digging these aero mods!

 

This is gonna be awsoooome come next year!!!

 

Design Work - Crankshaft Girdle and Main Caps - Version 2:

Buddy, Don and I have been chatting about making some updates to the crankshaft girdle - to make it even stronger. I've made major updates to the middle cap (to a splayed design) and widened the front as well. Also, there will be big dowel pins between the tops of the caps and into the bottom of the girdle and there will be cap alignment dowel pins put into the block to ensure that nothing can move. In addition, the caps will now have big 1/2 NF bolts to torque them to the girdle - we only had a 'crush fit' in the last design. All of this is to make things stronger and even more rigid.

I do not believe that we experienced any 'cap walk' with the previous design, but we're going to push it harder next year and we decided to add as much lower end strength as we can muster.

Here are some pictures of the new design . . . now Don gets to 'make some chips' and whack some new caps out of steel.

 

Looking good Dale! Just corious, will the new front cap be press-fit?


Kjell

...............................
Taildragger&fenderless

 

Hi Kjell

Yes I will be fitting it for a press fit , and also looking closely to see if I can cross bolt the front main

 

I've been working with Cometic to get custom gaskets for The FlatCad, as I really dislike the copper gaskets.

We received the prototypes- They need a little refining, but this should help us out!

 

Those guys at Cometic are good. They have built custom head gaskets for some of my oddball engines.

 

Hope the Cometic gaskets will hold the pressure Buddy!

Might be a stupid idea, but how about connecting the front main to the timingplate? Similar to the rear, but now the lower-end will connect to the top-end!?
Forgive me, I ask to learn.

Your no.1 supporter in Norway!

..................................
Taildragger&fenderless

 

You guys do such top-notch work, I hate to make a suggestion.

During the tear down, it was mentioned that the front main showed signs of wear, probably caused by the blower drive.
I know there's an additional support plate in front of the pully.
But there may be a little room for more support by changing the 6 round bars to a single plate on each side.

From an earlier picture
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=1705733&d=1343998280

 

Kjell, Dale has mentioned several times that he'd like to tie the top and bottom of the engine together. This is something we are looking at hard!

Thom, I've been following your upholstery thread!

Those 6 round bars, bolted at both ends are a concern I broached. When you watch the video of the engine under load, you can see some movement there.

We will be addressing the issue!

 

Cool, I missed that.
It's just another learning experience in my quest for 100%

Who ever has the front plate could check for inprints from the bars, see if the belt was pulling up on 'em.

Keep up the good work guys!

 

38 FLATTIE could you shed some light on what you mean by "We added material around the short side radius"? In the flathead singles I run in the USLMRA we epoxy smooth a nice radius between the valve stem and the cylinder wall side to valve opening to stop swirling in the runner. We are spinning 6000 -9000 rpm.
Tom

 

This is too cool, love it. Keep up the good work, you can do 200+ MPH, I have faith.

 

Well a bit more aero progress wzjunk come by and we fitted the inner part of the hood scoop took a bunch of measuements and developed a plan of attack here are a few pics

Sent from my DROID device using the TJJ mobile app

 

Looks real good, Randy! I'll see you and John K on Tuesday!

Tom,

The top of the port has a sharp radius. We were trying to figure out how to get more flow.

We took a thin wire, and put a small ball of clay on the end of the wire. We then inserted the wire and clay into the port, while we were flowing it. On a perfectly ported port, the flow should gecrease. However, when the clay got in the area where the arrows are, flow and velocity increased!

This told us the ports were too big. We then took small amounts of clay, and molded it to the ports in these areas, 'straightening' out the top side radius. This increased both the velocity and flow. See the arrows in the pics- these are the areas we added clay too.

I hope this helps. If you need more info, PM me your phone number and I'll call you.

 

Buddy, You are sure doing some interesting mods to your flathead Caddy. That is one wild Flattie V-8 ! Would love to hear it run at El Mirage some time. I am in Adelanto and is short run to get to the lake bed.

Dave

 

Dave, we'll be at El Mirage in May. Please come join us!

 

I love what you guys are doing and I love this thread.Just letting you guys know I have a Edmunds 2x2 manifold for a flat Cad that I would like to sell.I haven't advertised it but I thought there would maybe be some interest here.I want a flatcad T shirt .

 

Ok Here we go !!! The machining on the block is complete and I will be machining the new bearing caps next. We machined a wider surface to fit the new main caps, the new caps will have a wider base and added dowel pin holes for stability . On the front main we machined the block at the pan rail the same width as the bottom mounting surface for a good tap fit top and bottom



here is with the dowel pin holes

rear main

now the center cap --- the design will consist of cutting 2 notches at the pan rail to fit the ears on the full width center cap and to sandwich them between the girdle and block along with doweling in the block and to the girdle. see rough sketch




now off to make the new mains

 

As always your work looks amazing Pops............

 

Great looking work Don . . . you are the man of many chips!

 

Looking good guys! Learned something today too!
Would you consider giving the Flatcad the stronger stuff for next year CH3OH ??

K

..............................
Taildraggerfenderless

 

Kjell, like in CH3OH and 10-15% CH3NO2???

Patience, Grasshopper, patience!

Don, fantastic work, as always!

Woo-Hoo! Got home today, and look what showed up!

 

NICE!!:d

 

I've been crunching numbers, to see where we need to be HP wise, to get to 200 MPH- the results ain't pretty!

Based on last years numbers, we'll need between 800-900 HP. Unfortunately, we will not get there on gas! So, we'll need to switch to a fuel class, and maybe even add a little nitro!

The HP numbers don't reflect any aero changes we make, so 750-800 HP may suffice- Still, we won't get there on gas.

Hell, the engine MAY not survive the dyno at that HP level. I want to take the chance, though! We knew going in 200 was a stretch, so if we don't take a few chances, 200 mph will NEVER happen!

We need to change to modified class, instead of Vintage- 200 mph in XXO/BFCC is a red hat. In Vintage XXO/BVFCC, we would have to average 209.986 mph.

The good thing is, fuel is easier to get an engine to survive on. In addition, we can add engine management- a crank trigger, boost referenced MSD box, and an electronic ignition. Dale, I want to add the crank trigger when we reassemble the engine.

We'll still run our vintage classes. When we go to the dyno, we'll setup the engine for both tunes. We'll probably make a little less HP on gas this year, as the cam will be ground for fuel. Still, we left the records where we can easily bump them.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

 

This is gona be interesting Buddy
Started Christmas to grabbing a beer and watching the
World's fastest Idian.
Have a couple of wishes to Santa;
1.May everyone in my family have a good health.
2. Finding the money to go to my family in the US.
Experiencing Bonneville Speed ​​Week 2013, and meet the Flatcad gang.!

Merry xmas to everyone

Kjell

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Taildragger&fenderless