HOMEGROWN COPO #13 - Engine Dyno.....SUCCESS!

Our naturally aspirated LS makes almost 1,000HP! Yes, it’s only been 2 months since our last update on “Project Homegrown COPO”; a tribute build to the venerable Chevrolet COPO Camaro, RPM style! As you might guess, everything finally started rolling along well with the engine build and the guys at New Generation Engines were able to work their magic. We have now completed and dynoed the mill, and the results are amazing…this thing is a monster!

You might remember back in our April issue that we had just ordered pushrods and tall valve covers, and needed to locate a crank mandrel and install some fittings to facilitate the vacuum pump install.

Here’s how things went down…

We received our Comp Cams 8.500 length push rods and after a thorough inspection (we inspect every part, new or used), we installed them along with our shaft mount Jesel rocker arms (part # KPS430173 – 1.7 Ratio Shaft Mount Rocker) that are specific for our Mast Motorsports heads. Next, we took care of remaining items such as installing the We uncovered the almost complete Project Homegrown Camaro LS engine. It had only been 2 months, but seemed like forever. Back at the start of April we were waiting on pushrods, rocker covers and a few other odds and ends to finish it up.

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Check out these bad boys!

Our Jesel rocker arms (part # KPS-430173 – 1.7 Ratio Shaft Mount Rocker) are specifically made for the Mast Motorsports cylinder heads. Al went to work, checked everything over and installed the rockers.

Next up, we worked on cooling with our Meziere water pump and also installed the vacuum pump, and then carburetor. The project motor will be Holley EFI once installed, but it was easy to be able to use one of Al’s tricked out 1150 “Dyno Doms” on the engine dyno.

Watch Now as the RPM Magazine HomeGrown COPO Engine Gets Dyno’ed

fittings in the valley pan for the know we just had to lay some vacuum pump system, valve cov- cash bets on horsepower numers and we fully dressed this mo- bers before we lit the candle! tor to prepare it for the engine dyno at New Gen. I can’t explain the excitement starting to build in the shop as we realized that this motor, built mostly during the pandemic, was finally coming into its own. You www.rpmmag.com

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Hoses, belts, valve covers, plugs, coils and wires were next up.

This gives us a great base reference point as to what this badass naturally aspirated mill can do...

Once we got it over into the dyno room and set up on the New Gen system, we primed it using Maxima Racing Oil’s Semi-Syn 20W-50. We started using Maxima products in earnest last season and have been very impressed with the results in our Coyote Mustang drag car. When we tore the engine down at season’s end for regular maintenance, the bearings looked like virtually new; we were sold and have been using Maxima products on our engines, including this RPM Project build since.

For the dyno, to keep things simple and easy, we used an MSD ignition box to control the timing and spark and we installed one of New Generation’s “Dyno Carbs”. Specifically, we used one of their 1150 cfm Dominators that has been tricked out by Al from New Gen. Now, if you’re sharp and have been following along with RPM Project HGC, you know that the engine will be fed and controlled by a Holley EFI system, and you would be correct. But, with

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We used this Moroso 85500 1-quart Billet Breather Tank to contain any potential fluids from the vacuum pump and used Maxima Racing Oil’s SemiSyn 20W-50 race oil. Now it was off to the dyno room for final hook up and dyno sessions.

As you can see, once you get to the dyno room there is still some work to be done. Fuel, cooling, and dyno control connections must be made, but when it was time to go we were all ready to rock! www.rpmmag.com

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As they say, numbers don’t lie, and as they say in racing, dyno sheets don’t lie. The first sheet is the 912hp run and the second is our 969hp pull.

We were shooting for 2hp per cube (2 x 440ci = 880hp) and got a standing-ovation 2.2, and we are very happy with the results here!

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the EFI system already fully wired and installed in the HGC chassis, we opted for dynoing at this stage with the carb. Once the mill is between the Camaro rails, we’ll be running it on our in-house chassis dyno at Misener Motorsports. Also, this gives us a great base reference point as to what this badass naturally aspirated mill can do.

Engine dynoing serves many purposes along with getting us gearheads all jacked up at the sound of horsepower! It allows us the opportunity to get a feel for the combination and provides a good indication of how the parts we have carefully chosen (with the manufacturer’s technical support) are working together. Is it making the power we anticipated, and if not, what do we need to change to maximize the potential before the engine goes in the car? Also, and we consider this a positive as opposed a negative, if something is going to fail, we’d rather it fail on the dyno.

All bets were down, and on first fire up the motor sounded clean, crisp and smooth, surprisingly smooth actually, it didn’t sound as radical as we expected considering the cam specs. First, after proper run in, we made a couple easy pulls and then a fullout pull and we hit the rev limiter about 6800rpm, making 892hp! Sweet! Keep in mind that we have seen similar combinations like this make about 850hp and our goal with the RPM project motor was to actually make 2hp per cubic inch, which would put us at 880 flywheel hp with our 440-inch motor.

We already exceeded our goal on the first pull at a paltry 6,800 rpm!

Now it was time to tweak this bad Hombre. The MSD box we were using was set up for a different motor that had been on the dyno, so we made some changes there. At this point we are feeling real good and we know this thing should easily hit right around

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SOURCES (Engine): ATI

http://www.atiracing.com/

Meziere

https://www.meziere.com/

800-208-1755 Moroso

410-298-4343

https://www.moroso.com/

DART

203-453-6571

248-362-1188

Mast Motorsports

https://dartheads.com/

Canton

https://www.cantonracingproducts.com/

203-481-9460 COMP

https://www.compcams.com/

https://www.mastmotorsports.com/

866-551-4916 Maxima Racing Oils

https://maximausa.com/

901-795-2400

619-449-5000

Holley EFI

New Generation Engines 905-892-3255

https://www.holley.com/

866-464-6553 Jesel

https://www.jesel.com/

732-901-1800 Lunati

https://www.lunatipower.com/

662-892-1500

Ross Racing

https://www.rosspistons.com/

310-536-0100 Total Seal

https://www.totalseal.com/

623-587-7400

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A job well done! From left to right: Al Blanchard (New Generation Engines), Jay Misener and Andrew Blanchard (New Generation Engines).

8000rpm, so we checked some plugs and made a timing adjustment so we can hit this big boy again. We ended the night at 954hp and 715ftlbs! We were ecstatic to say the least, as we had ready well surpassed our goal of 2hp per cubic inch. We let the oil drain overnight so we could get back at it the following afternoon with fresh oil and plugs.

For day 2, on top of the plugs and oil, we tightened up the valve adjustment just a touch and added a carb spacer that was hanging in the dyno room and that bumped us up to 108

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969hp at 7750 RPM and 731ft. lbs. at 6550rpm! We were blown away!

The engine delivered over and above our expectations, however (and there is always a “however”), a race engine like this should ideally make peak horsepower about 1500rpm above where it makes peak torque. We’re at about 1200, so all things being equal we have a bit of room to grow, just a little. We believe this could be one of two things, or perhaps maybe even both. First, is that although we have a header with 2-inch primary tubes, we only have a 3-inch collector and that’s

a lot of power to make for that size collector. Secondly, the valves may be a little heavy. We used stainless steel valves whereas many naturally aspirated builds like this use lightweight titanium valves. I truly believe that with a bigger header and titanium valves we could make north of 1000 flywheel hp. Will we do that? Probably not, as we are more than happy with what we have made (2.2 hp per cubic inch) and its time to put this bad boy home under the hood of the Camaro!

RPM

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