Problem #2: The head was now on and I installed about the half the ARP 12-point nuts on the studs and snugged them down so the head couldn’t move, as I wanted to check for pushrod length. I installed adjustable “checking” pushrods on the intake and exhaust roller lifters and dropped the rocker arm shaft and rockers into place. UH-OH!! The pushrods wouldn’t even touch the rocker arm adjusters! Seems when the heads were machined at Edelbrock the pushrod openings in the heads were at the wrong angle and in the wrong place. The heads needed a lot of material milled out and some careful grinding around the intake port for pushrods to fit.
Problem #3: I spent six hours milling, grinding, trial fitting, milling some more, grinding some more, and checking clearances again and again. To get the intake pushrod to clear the intake port (this is after we ground through a port and had to use JB Weld and a soda can to patch that up!) I had to use offset intake roller lifters to get enough clearance. The lifters are about $500 a set and if you already bought a set of regular lifters you wasted half your money unless you like spare parts sitting around. Finally, I thought I had it. To say I was disappointed in the Edelbrock Victor 440 was an understatement at this point. Billed as bolt-on performance I would say they missed a couple steps in engineering to make these errors. I do not see how they could have ever had a set of these on a mocked up engine and not been aware of the severity of this problem.
I have to end this tech story for this month but before I do I want to make something very clear. I was in contact with Edelbrock several times about these problems. I got some
vague replies at first but when other racers called and they figured out they have real problem with the Victor 440 head, Edelbrock acted.
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Edelbrock now has a special link on their website for the Victor 440, they invite customers to call their technical staff, and they have redesigned and rewritten the instruction andinstallation sheets for the Victor 440 head. They are making a good effort to help their customers, I will credit them with that. I just have to shake my head, though, on how something like this got out without being checked first.
There is at least one great thing about the Victors: With Modern Cylinder Head porting and prep THEY MAKE POWER! Our first ¼ mile runs were 7.92. 7.93, 7.93 all at 170 mph. That is faster than my first 540 that made 840 hp on the dyno!
How strong is this engine? I am not sure, but I would guess it is making close to 800-840 horsepower at 6800 rpm. We are only running 31 degrees of timing, the injection is in the “protection mode” and is dead fat past the 1/8th mile. We are launching at only 4200 rpm instead of the normal 5200. I think there is easily a tenth in the car yet and I will find out when I try to qualify for the Quick 32 at the “Monster-Mopar” race in St. Louis on Sept 8-9.
Watch the “Back-2-Basics III” update in a couple weeks here in Mopar Max. I am going to try to get a new tech article in every two weeks for a month or so to get you up to date on our progress.
