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Tim Ayers · 01-22-2021, 07:46 PM

Sometime after that I was out to Barger-Mattson wrecking yard and found a blown 350-cid Corvette engine in the inventory. I bought the camshaft, heads, distributor, intake manifold and carburetor and commenced to put them on my engine. What a difference in power that made. It still didn’t match up to the flathead I used to have, but it was about 50 percent better than the stock 283. The only problem was that the carburetor was a 750-cfm Quadrajet and while a 350 might handle that, the 283 would not. I ultimately pulled off the intake manifold and carburetor and put a 4GC Rochester in its place, then everything worked like it was supposed to. Later on, I pulled the manifold off again and put a 2GC Rochester carburetor on it as the 2GC was easier to work on than the 4GC. Since I only drive the ’32 about once a year and I don’t do much hot rodding anymore, that is about all I need. When I put the Chevrolet motor in the ’32, I found that, while the flathead with its high revolutions handled the 4.44 differential OK, the 283 did not so, again, I changed differentials and went back to the 3.78 ratio, which the 283 handles OK.

This story is like a car wreck. I can't stop looking at it. This passage is just too good to not share. Even includes the mandatory bench racing equivalent of the cherry on top: The Corvette SBC. Nothing else will do.

01-22-2021, 07:46 PM	#25
Tim Ayers Senior Member Join Date: May 2010 Location: NJ Posts: 6,179	Re: ultimate flathead Sometime after that I was out to Barger-Mattson wrecking yard and found a blown 350-cid Corvette engine in the inventory. I bought the camshaft, heads, distributor, intake manifold and carburetor and commenced to put them on my engine. What a difference in power that made. It still didn’t match up to the flathead I used to have, but it was about 50 percent better than the stock 283. The only problem was that the carburetor was a 750-cfm Quadrajet and while a 350 might handle that, the 283 would not. I ultimately pulled off the intake manifold and carburetor and put a 4GC Rochester in its place, then everything worked like it was supposed to. Later on, I pulled the manifold off again and put a 2GC Rochester carburetor on it as the 2GC was easier to work on than the 4GC. Since I only drive the ’32 about once a year and I don’t do much hot rodding anymore, that is about all I need. When I put the Chevrolet motor in the ’32, I found that, while the flathead with its high revolutions handled the 4.44 differential OK, the 283 did not so, again, I changed differentials and went back to the 3.78 ratio, which the 283 handles OK. This story is like a car wreck. I can't stop looking at it. This passage is just too good to not share. Even includes the mandatory bench racing equivalent of the cherry on top: The Corvette SBC. Nothing else will do.