HOMEGROWN COPO #6 - Fire & An Engine - Yes a Fire Engine!

HOME Grown

COPO

RPM PROJECT CAR

by

Stan Smith

>> Our Project Camaro is too hot to handle...literally!

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B

ack in the January 2018 issue of RPM we reported that Project Homegrown COPO was making good progress with a full top quality body and paint complet-

april 2018 | RPM Magazine

ed and the chassis rolling.

The AFCO Big Gun X twin tube double adjustable rear shocks and Big Gun front struts were installed and various trim, lighting and interior pieces were sourced from a local dealer and

installed. From there, parts are continuing to be collected for all areas of the car and the Optic Armor windows and lightened factory doors have been installed and will be covered in an upcoming issue.

As promised, we are presenting the basic motor plan for our tribute COPO this issue. Also, an interesting twist in the life of the COPO happened a few weeks back and we wanted to share it with RPM readers.

1 While the shop wasn’t a total loss, the damage was extensive. Thanks to fast action, the Project Homegrown COPO wasn’t destroyed, but will require some repairs.

If you recall, we explained how the car was removed from the shop at Misener Motorsports to an undisclosed location so that work could proceed without the interruptions associated with having it at a 9-5 business. Also, there are some things project frontman Jay Misener wanted to keep out of the public eye and under wraps for RPM readers, which can be tough to do when everyone wants to know what’s under the cover.

The only challenge is that we didn’t plan on that undisclosed location catching fire!

Yes you heard right, despite a rough life during childhood being pushed around and banged up by a fork lift at a wrecking yard and

slated for the crusher before being rescued and destined for magazine stardom, our Camaro has experienced yet another major trauma.

It was smack dab in the middle of a serious fire. “If it wasn’t for the quick response of the fire department and the fact that they understood the value of the car and immediately put a cover over it and put the fire out around it, it would have been a lot worse, or maybe even burned to the ground,” explains Misener.

What caused the fire you ask? As it turns out, Misener received a boombox radio for Christmas from his wife and put it in the shop where the Camaro was sequestered to.

The radio, while still plugged in, was turned off when Misener left

the shop, however the fire dept said it somehow ignited and set the garage on fire.

There was quite a bit of damage to the shop and tools, however the Camaro escaped, somehow, with minimal damage. “We’ve got some bubbled paint and a few warped trim panels, our once perfect VFN Sunoco hood is our biggest worry, but otherwise nothing major was done to the car.”

So there is the drama for this installment, now let’s get on with discussing the HOMGROWN COPO (HGC) engine program.

First off, this is a basic outline of goals and the type of parts being considered, it’s not set in stone and is somewhat organic, so it can and will change slightly, but the meat of what is here will make up the initial

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RPM PROJECT CAR The once-pristine miles-deep paint was damaged by the heat, and the drivers side door and VFN Sunoco-style hood both took some considerable damage, too. While it is all repairable, it is a disappointing setback for sure.

HGC engine.

It has always been the plan to start the car up for the very first time with a nasty naturally aspirated LS in the area of 800 to 900HP and then once thoroughly run with lots of data collected, move into testing different power adders on it, which will require some change in internal parts once we get to adding boost. This particular engine plan is for that first NA mill.

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april 2018 | RPM Magazine

A word of advice, get your ducks in a row before you part with the cash for parts.

The best resources you have are the manufacturers and your engine builder/ machine shop, and hopefully you have chosen the right people for the job. Ask a lot of questions of both. Every manufacturer has sales and tech lines for you…and these people know their stuff, so use their expertise to help you choose the right parts

Here is a taster of the MAST Motorsports heads and intake that just arrived for Project Homegrown COPO. We’ll get into them more in our next installment. and combination for your goals and budget. Your engine builder will have years of experience to draw from to help in parts choice as well.

A word of caution: watch out for the web blogs, forums, and YouTube videos where anyone can and will say and do whatever they want without fear of repercussion. There are some excellent information sources on all these places, however, sometimes you have to sort

through 100 pieces of fluff to get to something good, and still you have no way of ensuring accuracy. Bottom line: use the virtual world wisely as it is always best to talk to people with some level of firsthand knowledge and accountability.

GOAL AND (NATURAL) ASPIRATIONS

A naturally-aspirated 427 cubic inch LS 7 that runs around 13:1 compression is the goal. It could possibly be a touch bigger, as the goal is to make 850-plus flywheel horsepower.

This engine will likely rev in excess of 8000 rpm so a custom-grind solid roller camshaft in the 750-plus lift area is needed. Some big lift and big duration will be required to make sure the cylinder heads and intake are used to their full potential.

New Generation Engines is the Project HGC engine builder and they know their stuff. They have suggested several parts that they prefer to go together on builds such as this, so Misener will couple their advice with the information gathered from various manufacturers, other builds and the internet over the past 10 months. That’s right— research on parts for this motor started almost a year ago, so we’re telling you again: don’t rush into anything. Instead, do your due diligence. Any parts collected must still fit the project goal and fall within the budget, though, so there will have to be choices for various parts without compromising performance and durability.

Project HGC will be using an iron block. The block will need to be an aftermarket 6-bolt block that is 4.125 bore to work with specific cylinder heads (see below). The block will be a DART LS Next part # 31837211.Some may ask why not aluminum? There is a total package budget to be considered here, so it is a give-and-take process.

The mill will use a fully forged rotating assembly and for the crankshaft, Misener and New Gen have

been looking at the Callies Magnum XL crank. “It’s a great piece and it’s lightweight,” said New Generation’s Al Blanchard “And we need lightweight to accomplish Jay’s goals”.

Callies Ultra I beam rods #U17171 are also being considered. Pistons will have to be custom to reach the compression goals, so we’ll talk more about those later in the game.

For cylinder heads, the goal for the car is to combine solid performance with reliability rather than just big and bad. “We don’t want to build a maintenance monster,” said Misener. “So we will go with a cylinder head that should make great power with consistency, all while being on the edge.” The heads will be Mast Motorsports LS7 285 cc CNC heads. These heads are actually used in the ARCA Series which is a supporting series that runs with Nascar. They are designed to run at 8500 rpm for 250 laps, so they seem to fit the bill.

The heads will use Manley spring kit # 221422-16, Retainers #23619-16, Locks #13153 and Locators #4213116. T&D shaft-mount rockers will be used, either TD2008-70-70 or TD2008-80-80, depending on ratio.

Watch for our continuing coverage of PROJECT HOMEGROWN COPO. Once Misener gets back on track following the fire repairs we’ll check in with him and the crew at New Generation Engines to discuss the heads and intake and flow the heads on New Generation Engines’ Superflow flow bench to see just how well they perform. We’ll also look at installing the Optic Armor windows throughout the car.

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