I watch a lot of Motor Trend TV esp engine masters.They recently dyno a 383 chevy with a victor jr,tunnel ram and a cross ram.Tunnel ram and cross ram were within 7 hp of each other and no hole in hood. TR had carb spacers and carb were sideways.
I'm sorry but I'm having trouble understanding your wording. The vehicle on the TV was a 55 Chevy or you want to do this on a 55 Chevy you have? Also, would that be a Chevy car or truck?
Too bad they didn't do a base line pull with a 4 barrel. The fact that the crossram and tunnel ram were close isn't surprising. If you look at the peak HP and torque it's above normal useable street RPM, and typically under 4000 RPM it's not great. You will find many that say you can run those manifolds on the street without any issues. In fact 25 or 30 years ago I did. But neither was as quick over the entire RPM band as a single 4 barrel. Engine was a 301 SBC.
They did do a baseball with a single four barrel on a Victor Jr manifold this was all done on a dyno Sent from my SM-J737T using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Like mine - I didn't want to cut a big hole in the hood either. 53/54 Stude wagon hoods are hard to find..! Sideways carburetors, angled shims to set the carburetors level. The phenolic spacers are more for linkage clearance, than heat transfer mitigation. The primary throttle bores are on the outside and equidistant from all four runner openings, per side. The same thing with the secondaries, they sit equidistant from the runner openings, per plenum side. This is a highly modified "Renegade" manifold that is an aftermarket replacement for 80's Corvettes, Camaros, and Firebird Chevy crossram manifold. This has been cut up/cleaned up to bolt onto a Studebaker engine, with the aid of a set of spacer/adapter plates. Mike
Some vehicles you can fit a tunnel ram under the hood, I was getting a play by play of the shootout because I don't get motor trend tv, but it sounded very interesting. It's always fun to read the comments made by Ralf Nader types on these kind of posts "Sonny you're gonna kill your grandma with the extra carb on there" Here was a photo I was sent of the numbers and a photo of my intended plan for a regular old driver that'll see 6k rpm just like all my other cars.
I’ve seen comments on various forums about how some cross rams are “junk” and others are good. Not counting the Z28/Smokey Ram, which of the early aftermarket cross rams worked best? I keep reading that the Edelbrock version wasn’t the best performer, any experience or opinions? Sent from my iPad using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Bob It took many years for me to realize this but I think it had a lot to do with what was being "tested" by the magazine/s at the time, a kind of "manifold of the month" affair.
Bob - The Chevy Z/28 and the Offenhauser manifold were/are basically the same. Offy made three different tops for their manifold, while Chevy just had their dual-4. Except for a couple of fastener locations, the tops will interchange. The Smokie Ram was/is a terrible design. It has a "rib" just under the carburetor that's WAY too close to the carburetor for any real rpm power. I've seen a coupla tests by different people that said basically the same thing. The fuel bounces off of this "rib" (1-1/4" or 1-1/2" wide, full length of the plenum) and doesn't go smoothly into the runners. I've seen, but never really studied a Smokie Ram, and yeah, this rib is only an 1-3/8" or so away from the carburetor base, way...too close for smooth flow. I don't know what the "rib" is for, but it's in a bad location. Must be a reason that it came and went quickly, back in the day, without much hype or fanfare. Even the old M/T and similar Edelbrock manifolds that you need a crane to lift worked better than the Smokie Ram...unfortunately. Mike
I found a use for my SY1. Interesting discussion on an old HAMB thread about the SY1. https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/smoky-yunick-ram-intake.149990/
On the video it was determined that the intake doesn't work the way we think they does ,they did some jetting changes and they had o2 sensors in all 8 exhaust pipes and the results were amazing on which cylinders were affected.
Mike VV, I wholeheartedly disagree with you about the "Smokey Ram" manifold. I ran one on a limited sportsman dirt oval car back in the late 60s-early 70s. We were limited to 305 cid, flat tappet lifters, battery and points ignition, single 4 bbl carb and 10" tires. Switched back and forth several times between the the Smokey Ram and an aluminum Corvette 4 bbl manifold, using the same 800cfm double pumper mech. secondary Holley carb. With no changes other than the carb, I repeatedly found cars that I could simply drive by on the straights with the S R that I had to race hard to get by with the Vette manifold. This wasn't just some magazine BS it was 7000 rpm, mudslinging, fender rubbing, bumper banging, contact sport that gave me the username I have now.
Avoid any of them with no connecting plenum area or passage between the two carbs pads....like the Edelbrock XC-8 or the Weiand that looks just like it, with the carbs directly even with each other side by side but totally seperated from each other airflow-wise. Looks cool but doesn't perform well. Each carb acts ike it is on an uneven fire 4 cylinder due to cylinder firing layout on a V-8....carbs need to be small cfm and pretty heavily modified to compensate....killing the whole reason for using a ram which is big airflow and big cfm for power and long runner lengths for torque and ram effect filling. The factory Z cross ram and Offenhouser, the Mickey Thompson are a lot better. I had a good running Smokey Ram, but it was modified with the epoxied in dams from the instruction sheet, or copied from a magazine article, I don't remember where the exact info came from...but it worked well with a 1" spacer under the carb too. A friend has it on his 13:1 comp 355 now.
That’s what I read in other places, stay away from cross ram manifolds that don’t have a balance passage. Sent from my iPad using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Dirty - Well, that's your prerogative to disagree. You did what you did. The history of it is there. With fuel bouncing off of a big flat surface just isn't conducive to good flow. It's good ol 8th grade physics. I could never figure out why the designers did what they did back when it was new, and I was just a kid that remembered some of my science classes. And why would two magazines with different sets of people on different dyno's tell a different story than yours. And why with so little sales, you see them at swap meets all the time. I'd like to have one...not to use, just for the history of it. Just think, maybe...you could have gone even faster/quicker with a different design !? Plus, that was a big runner manifold for such a small engine. You just came across an odd combination that should...not...have worked...but did, because of the smaller engine, and lower rpm, than most drag race combinations. Mike
Smokey Yunick touches on this in his book. He basically begged Edelbrock to build a manifold for a VERY SPECIFIC application, then after Smokey performed well with said application, Edelbrock decided to market it to the public, with Smokey’s Garage phone number on the instruction sheet for tech support. So THAT is why that manifold exists, and why it didn’t stick around long. People were probably calling Smokey asking why the manifold wouldn’t work in their stock Impala with a power glide and 3.08 gears.... kinda like a lot of the questions we see on the H.A.M.B. all the time. Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
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