A few days ago I bought a used 389 from a roached out 61 Pontiac parts car. It was gonna need everything but the seller is a buddy of mine. Some years ago I sold him my 60 Pontiac 389 that I'd built for my 56 safari. The safari sold to a restorer and he had no use for the 389. In a distress sale, I sold it to my buddy, Dar, for his 56 Poncho 2 door sedan but it also sold to a restorer for totally stupid money. The trusty 389 had no-body! Yesterday, he called with a radically low price on it. It's still bolted on the engine stand and has yet to be fired since I built it. It all new. Bored 0.030 for a total of 394.69 cubes with high-silicon hyperutectic flat tops with 10.53 compression ratio. I put in a killer ram-air III cam. The Pontiac freaks know it as the 041 cam...the last 3 numbers of the part number and it a hairy mo-fo at 308-320 advertised duration and .470 lift. I put a melling hi volume pump in it with a double roller timing gear. My machine guy did a 3 angle valve job on it and I used a set of Rhoades lifters in it to help tone down the cam at low rpms. There still should be enough duration to lower cylinder pressure at the low end to help with detonation problems. I still see a diet of 92 octane gas in it's future. I sold this engine for a lot less than I put in it and I'm buying back for the same money plus he's throwing in a stick bellhousing with it....now I need a flywheel. This saves me from building another one and there's no way I could do it for what I did in January of 2000... This little jewel should work just fine with my sooper T-10 and 3.23 posi 57 Poncho rear end..... I couldn't be happier...shit's comin together!
Those Motors are great!!! What a sound and you can earn extra money pulling stumps out of the ground for people in your spare time with the torque. I had one for my 54 poncho but I think I am going to use my '56 motor. I know my 62 GP with its stock motor pull like no other. Good luck with it! Larry
Nice score on your old 389 Rocky. The RAIII manual-trans cam was the 744 with 301/303 duration and .407" lift w/1.5 rockers. Auto-trans RAIII cars used the milder 068 cam (288/302 .407") that was also used in 389 GTO Tri-Power engines among others. The 041 cam was first used in the '68 RAII 400 with 1.5 rockers for the .470" lift, after that in '69 -'70 RAIV 400 engines with 1.65 rockers for .517" lift. Both the RAII an RAIV engines each used their own very unique round-port (exhaust) heads. The 041 is a super-nice factory cam that sounds pretty hairy and rips your head off between 4000 and 6000 RPM. Wise choice on the Rhoads lifters, without 'em you'd probably need a lower gear like the 3.90 or 4.33 gears that the RAII/RAIV cars came with. Be sure to keep an eye on those pressed-in rocker studs if your 389 still has 'em. Just another Pontiac freak checkin' in. ----- Bart -----
Draggin GTO....the Rhoades lifters are almost essential for street operation. I did a lotta research before I bought anything for this motor. Jim Hand has a lotta draqstrip testing and experience with this setup and he's tried many other cams in his 455 with stall converters, different length header tubes. different ratio rockers, different manufacturer's lifters, including OEM and even several custom ground cams. [runs low 12's with his 455, automatic and 041 cam, Rhoades lifters with 1.65 rockers in a heavy 71 Tempest wagon] I used his experience to pick out my parts and am looking forward to having a streetable, quick engine..... And if I have problems with the rocker studs pulling out, I'm gonna start saving for a pair of Edelbrock aluminum heads. They're drilled for the later [65 up] intake manifold which gives me more options for a more efficient intake design and they have screw-in studs. I don't think too highly of drilling and pinning the studs to their bosses like they usta do "back in the day". I wanna keep all the metal I can in the boss..plus, I've heard of the staking pins breaking off under enough valve spring pressure and the stud pulls up anyway.....we'll see.
Rocky, Jim Hand made some changes to the wagon since the low-12s days. Built a fresh 473 stroker short-block and replaced the stock '71 96cc heads with some '70 87cc ported heads and a Wolverine cam with a few more degrees of duration. Also replaced the stock iron intake/Qjet with a Performer RPM/830 Holley. The heavy wagon ran 11.30s for a while, but he then de-tuned it by putting the iron intake/Q-jet/RAIVcam/Rhoads lifter combo back in. Still runs 11.70-11.80, recently swapped the 3.55 gears for 3.31s and lost nothing in ET. Glad to see you found and followed all the good info from Mr. Hand, pretty much priceless. Jim Hand 473 build-up Jim Hand articles all Pontiac performance freaks should read. Rocky, did you ever see the 455-powered '41 built by Dave McGarry from Ventura CA in High Performance Pontiac magazine?
The 389 in my '60 was probably my favorite engine out of the few that I've owned. Man, that thing moved out RAL nice!
I've owned four GTO's over the years. May fave being a '65 Post car with maroon outside and Parchment inside. Four speed with air...weird car. Had a 389 and 3:23 rear. That thing would fly! My next motor WILL be a Poncho! Spike
Rocky. The alu heads are a big hit in the wallet, but the flow #s can't be beat with even the best ported iron RAs. Mastercard bought mine and I'm still payin em off, but I don't care. Every time I drop the hammer, it's WELL worth it. So...you gonna have it ready for the Drags...?? All this fast Pontiac talk is gettin me stiff... -Abone.
Rocky, sounds like a great deal. Too bad he didn't throw in a snow shovel! (See Rocky's "This is STUPID" post)
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