Hi all! New Guy here, Low Buck Comp build, E/ED

[MICROMACHINE72]

First want to say thanks for a great site!! Just thought I'd start my first post with a picture of our current project at hand. Its an old "late 80's" C/M 215" RED that originally ran C/ED with a SBC and glide back in the day. It was last bracket raced with a SBC and still has current 7.50 sportsman certs. My ignorant attempt is to go comp racing for under 10k. Just went through all the chassis updates, and motors are in progress. We are going to attempt to run E/ED with it. We are building a six in a row, 240" Ford inline with a glide, Stock production head, and 2-660 carbs. Hoping for 400hp out of the first effort engine and try to crack at least the 8.80 Index at 1500lbs. If anyone is interested I'll keep ya posted! -Mark

[Marty Knox]

Welcome! It's good to see someone else building a six - even if it is a Ford.

[Joe Toller]

Looks good, and I'm a big 6 cylinder fan...keep us posted!!!

[Dion Hildebrandt]

Looking forward to updates on this, I love comp!

[Ed Fernandez]

I never thought you could use the words "low budget" and NHRA Comp Elim" in the same sentence.Good luck from a former 6 cylinder Stock Elim racer.

[MICROMACHINE72]

Trust me, I didn't either.. And until actually racing again, that will remain questionable, but I'm dumb enough to believe this may be possible.. I looked at every class in comp. Dragster & Altered classes very close, and being a V8 Chevy guy by nature. It was a tough question to figure. I have raced door cars and altereds in the past, before taking about 10 yrs. off form the sport. Now, nothing against the bracket and .90 racers but its just not my cup of tea. I'd honestly rather do something else if that's what I had to do. But that's just me.. Again, on a low budget, I looked at all the comp classes, and naturally any class you could run a door car was out, do to the great expense of what a good used roller would cost. Of course building a chassis from ground out was out, because that would cost twice the money.. Its the right way for a competitive build, but I'm not kidding myself to start on an optimum build that I will just run out of cash less than half way through, and never see my goal of racing again! Starting looking at altereds, but again, your subject in racing against half million dollar ex-pro-stocks, maybe even in your same class! So dragster decision it was! Now to pick the class.. I mulled over a C/ED, was my first choice, I love a 10k rpm small CID SBC!! But damn.. With the record near 6.90, and the index pretty much slammed, you would need I est. around 25K for a engine build. Thought about just doing an old school stock block 283 punched +125 for an old 301, some good alumn. 23deg heads, prob. a little over 500hp, yeah I would be racing, but the car would not even crack nowhere's near the index.. (I had some parts lying around, and through together last year just to get a feel for the car, see pic below) I knew we had to go (econo) even though nothing is really econo, but wanted to run a glide, so regular gas dragster classes were out. Looked at the V6 classes, Whoa!! Those engines cost more to build than a V8!! And the 4-banger classes.. well new millennium technology has taken that over that pretty good too.. I also wanted something on the slower side, let them run me down, and with E/ED inline 6, my chassis doesn't need no more than a sportsman tag. Low buck again. I picked E/ED because right now I feel the index is manageable. Just hope it stays that way until I get there! And its the last class where you still need to run stock production style cylinder head. (non-cross flow) After looking over every convievable 6-in-a-row core, I felt the 240 Ford, at a cool 4" bore-3" stroke, was by far the best choice than any other stock junk yard core- inline engines. So, fast forward to now, I have about 5k in the roller, complete with shorty glide. I'm halfway through the first engine, and have not spent 2k in it yet.. We shall see, If I can finish it and at least crack the index with the first engine, it will be under 10k spent, and maybe, just maybe be "econo" after all telling me there is no such thing anymore!

[nickh]

Interesting, yes we would like to follow along. Also have you visited www.insidecompracing.com there is a ton of Comp racers that will do anything they can to help. I love all the comp classes, along with all the .90, stk, superstock, etc...

If there is anything any of us can do to help let us know. There are some folks over there running in some of the econo classes with 5 cylinder trailblazer motors, Glen Treadwell is one that comes to mind

[jims5600]

Another member that would like to follow your journey. It will be nice to see how the project runs. Best of luck.

[Charlie A]

[Andrew Hill]

This is really cool! Stuff like this is why Comp Eliminator is my favorite class. There are just so many different interesting engine combinations out there that no one besides a comp racer would think to run. I hope you're successful with your goals, keep us posted (with lots of pictures)!

Where will you be racing the car?