The Red Opel of Shaheed “Doc” ran an excellent time of 10.9
seconds on the quarter mile at Killarney MSA drags this weekend. It is now ranked
with the fastest cars in South
Africa. We are very pleased to see it up there
with the very strong Hondas. Extensive work was done to get the car to this
performance level. Docs motto was always “We make use of what we have and we
work around that”.
When we first started with the project I noticed the head
would not suffice with the increased capacity of the 2.4l. Though still using the standard valves, a good port and flow was
required. Specific seat widths, angle, port-shape and volume were calculated to
support the bottom end modifications. The head and block was cc’d so we could
make a better choice on cams and to get all volumes to specifications.
The valve springs needed adjustment and I could shim the
solid lifters as required.
Best of all for us is that all of the work and most of the machining
gets done in our own garages.
After I calculated everything we could assemble. Well all
this is much easier said then
done. With a few minor issues we are well aware of the
outcome was very pleasing. Will follow this with a look at what it takes to
build a race head.