Deep In The 9s
I have waited a long time to feature this car, and I am sure you will all agree it was worth the wait. The car is Geoff Campbell-Brown's silver 1974 LH Torana. This car is a work of art. Not only does it run way down in the low 9 second area, and get close to 150 mph, it does it all with a naturally aspirated small block Chev. This car is very nice to look at, very well built and tough as a two dollar steak. So let's get acquainted with Geoff and his beast.
Let's start with the business. The engine is a Chev 408 cuber with a Dart block and lightweight SCAT crank. The rods are Vanolia 6" Aluminium pushing JE custom forged pistons with low drag rings. The cam is courtesy of Comp Cams and has a 4/7 swap. Crower Hippo lifters and Crower push rods get the valves moving in the 15 degree Dart heads, which flow 375 CFM. Xeldine provided the Titanium valve and retainers, which have Radius groove locks, and PSI springs shut the valves, and Jesel shaft mount pro comp rockers open them. Twin Braswell 900 CFM carbies sit on top of the custom sheet metal intake manifold. The fuel comes from a 500 gallon/hour Holley fuel pump, through a 4 port Magnafuel regulator. A Jesel front mount Dizzy delivers the spark via an MSD7AL2 with a 2 step. The engine also has a Barnes 4 stage dry sump pump. The exhaust are 2 1/8" Fender Walls running into twin 4" Gonzo mufflers. This combination has run this car to 9.08 @ 147.5. mph, and has made 825 horsies and 620 ft/lb torque on the engine dyno. This time was run 2 days ago, 28/7/08 at the Powercruise Pro-Street Shootout where Geoff also won Modified Street Unblown, beating some of the top street cars in the country. Congratulations on winning in one very tough class to win mate.
To handle the low 9s out of the small block, the car needs something special in the drive train too. The Powerglide transmission has a Deadenbear case and a 7200 rpm Melva converter, and the shifting comes from a B&M Bandit shifter. The diff is a 9" and is 4.56:1 with a Strange carrier and pro pinion support, with 35 spline Mosser axles. The suspension on the car is virtually stock and that is how Geoff races it. It is still on springs. The shocks on the back are custom with 90/10s on the front. The brakes are HQ disk and drum set up. The wheels are 15 x 10s on the rear and 15 x 5s up front, with Mickey Thomson ET Drags on the rear, 28 x 10s and Nankang front runners on the front.
The inside of the car has been well looked after as well, with Kirkey aluminium race seats and a custom dash with Autometer guages and a custom black/grey velour trim. No need to talk about stereos in this beast as there is no time to be chuckin a CD in at nearly 150 mph. That cowl scoop on the bonnet is a bit of a story. It took Geoff 8 months to build. He started with a standard cowl scoop, but couldn't find one big enough that would still fit on the Torrie, so he got a smaller one and fabricated it himself, which goes to show, Geoff is pretty handy with just about anything for the car. The first time I saw this car out was at a Powercruise event, and I was with Gup beside Geoff in the Torana. Geoff was stretching up pretty high to try and see over the giant scoop. When we got back to the pits, I asked Geoff if he wanted a phone book to sit on. He told me he was already sitting on 4 jumpers.........
The amazing thing about this car is just what it is, and how rare a car of this kind is getting these days. There are a lot of cars that have some of the features of this car, but not many that have all of them. 9.24 out of any car is impressive, but when you consider this car is naturally aspirated, a small block, on 10 inch tyres, on standard suspension and completely all original steel except for the front bumper bar, it just shows that it is an absolute work of art with one huge set of balls.
Unfortunately nobody can create something this good alone, so there is a list of people Geoff wanted to thank. Colin Lloyd from Headsense for engine and head work - Geoff's father John and his lovely girl Karah - David Bowles for towing and just general help (That's Bowlsey to Powercruise fans) - Bruce Woodward from Performance Wholesale - Lou Galea and last but not least his crew, Jamie O'Brien and Nick Mottran, Thanks to Geoff for coming and meeting me on a windy arse afternoon for the shoot and thanks to Bowlesy for towing that day too, and the other unknown spectators who showed up. Oh and thanks to the manager of Big W Springfield for not kickin us out of there........................
