It is interesting to me that Toyota developed a completely new V8 for NASCAR, but how many do they have to put on the street to backup thenew erngine. I just returned from a round trip to York PA, Phila PA and back to Richmond in the last few days and I looked for Toyota V8s on the highway but only saw two. It is interesting that they destroked the crank design of the SBC-type for higher rpm and that the recent problems the Gibbs team has had with horpepower calibration were due to trying to hide the HP of the Toyota at over 640 HP. I am trying to understand that situation and my take is that Toyota got a lot of breaks that were too successful and the team was trying to keep their advantage by hiding what the true HP was. I also thought the block limit was 355 cu in (silly me) when it turns out that they use 358 cu in. Thus with a shorter stroke the Toyoto V8s must have larger diameter bores and pistons. Even so it is pretty amazing that all the NASCAR engines are running at close to 2 HP/cu. in. Just for the record I enjoy watching Carl Edwards and the Ford team must have something under the hood because on that last lap pass, he stayed ahead. Just for Dave's curiosity, I am an old Fordnatic but I just don't have the money for a modern flathead or the patience to messaround with the long snout water pump on the Ford SBC so I took the easy way out with a SBC.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder