I'm ready to rebuild the firewall. I cut the flanges out today for the intercooler tubes to pass through the firewall. I'll turn them down on the lathe & weld them in place & shape the sheet metal around them.

Got the flanges turned this weekend.



I put a groove around the edge of the flange for the firewall sheet metal. Once I install the o-ring and get in place I'll check the new gap with a feeler gauge and make a soft gasket to seal the flange to the firewall



Engine side of the flange bored to size for the tubes.



Got everything mocked up. The flanges on the windshield will be added to the inlet side. I'll turn those once I get the V-band clamp. Should be here any day. The outlet side attaches to the carb bonnet with hose & clamp.

Made a little more progress. I put the ol' foam mock up engine in it to make sure I get the angles right before going too much further.

What's the mileage with that carb?

Very good. I've had it for a couple years now and have yet to use a drop.

That made me laugh !!!

Have you considered doing an injected variant instead of the blowthrough option ?

I don't know that much about either solution but I think you have more room for tuning and improvement with an injected setup, especially with a blower motor. Of course, it's lots more involved.

Injection would be cool but it's more $$$. And the carb will get me where I need to be HP wise, so I figured the extra expense wasn't worth it. They make some pretty exotic purpose built carbs for the pro charger these days.

I'm running this 427 with a 671 roots on it, 2 x 750 boost referenced carbs, the standard setup. I have it tweaked so it's pretty reliable for street use but will turn on when needed. I have been drooling over the idea of doing a ProCharger build for it tho, with injection, etc. I looked at stepping up to some Dart Pro 1 heads, a lumpier roller and prolly the F2 (go big or go home). Problem is this little street car isn't built (cage-wise) to do anything faster than 10.0 and I don't think I want to start chopping it up to go that fast. Ah well. The grass is always greener, huh ?

Mine will look something like this (but with a carb.)

Any idea what sort of HP you'll be making ?

Any reason not to go with the gear drive? Besides $$$ ? Seems like that is the hot ticket now.

I just like that blower belt whine I guess. But, I won't be buying the procharger for a while yet. (maybe next year) so I have time to change my mind.

H.P. will be in the 1,500 range. If I keep the weight around 3,000 Lbs. that should be about all it will handle with a mild steel chassis.

They still whine a ton with a gear drive, and reliability is vastly improved from what I've seen with the cars around here. Some of the guys used to put a new belt on every pass or two.

Thanks for the info. John. I'll have to look into that. I'll have to research what the initial $$$ difference is. If it's not a huge difference it sounds like it might be made up in less maintenance $$$. That would keep the Pro Charger head lower too. I'm not sure what my hood clearance is going to be that far forward, Although I do have the engine pretty low in the rails. After the firewall is built the next project will be mounting the front end (1 piece fiberglass). Then I'll be able to measure all that out.