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a small block Chevy. Glenn was well known for his expertise on small block Chevy motors. He loved small block Chevys so much, he somehow got General Motors to sell him 100 small block Chevy bare blocks with four bolt mains. Needless to say , Glenn was popular with the Southern California drag racers.
Glenn started collecting parts, but had a somewhat limited budget. He built some nasty small block Chevys, so the engine was no problem. He got local chassis builder Jack Eskelson to build a chassis. He then enlisted my help building a front end and making billet lightweight front spindles at the college machine shop. Weight was very important in gas dragsters, as they could not create the overwhelming power produced with fuel.
Glenn started with a 327, 4 bolt main, small block Chevy, I am not sure how big the motor was, but knowing Glenn, he probably did not stroke the crank. I know he used Mickey Thompson forged pistons. He concentrated on the valve train and breathing. He generally put in very oversized exhaust valves, ported the exhaust ports into the water jackets and welded them up and ported again, continuing till the exhaust ports were huge. We discovered that round exhaust ports were much better than the square Chevy ports. We welded up the header bolt holes and moved them out and I made new header flanges with 1 3/4 dia. holes in them.
Glenn helped and was helped by friends like Chet Herbert, George Bolthoff and other small block Chevy specialists. Dick Harryman of Mechanical Research Development built his blowers and Glenn spun them fast. He used spark advances as much as 65 degrees, to help create horsepower.
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