Here is how the engine was tuned for the 400 plus horsepower.

Engine was bored 30 over.
The heads were ported and polished
525 camshaft
Holley 650 Spread Bore Carburetor
Stock Exhaust Manifold
Edlebrock Performance Manifold (matched to the engine)
Mallory Performance Electronic Ignition
Dual 2 1/2" Xlerator Performance Mufflers
Stainless Steel Exhaust Tips

The transmission and rear-end are the next to be worked on. I will be posting specs on the tranny soon.

My father just bought a new race car. It is a 1966 chevelle with a 358 in the engine compartment. The cool thing about this car is the fact that it is a replica of a car that Smokey Yunick built. Will have to go to my father's site to read more about the history, click here.

Here is a short video that I was able to take shortly after I video taped my caprice.

The same day that I came up to see family, dad and I went to the gym and we took the car too. I did some 360 degree walk around and one video behind the wheel. If you are going to watch these, you must have your bass turned up so you can hear the engine properly. The cylinders on a 454 are not small so the sound is quite low.

Last time I was up to see my family, dad told me that the engine kept over heating. His thoughts were because of the radiator that he had just put in. He didn't think it was quite right for this engine so he replaced it was an aluminum radiator built to cool down a 1000hp engine ($650).

Needless to say, the radiator did the trick and the car has zero faults in it.

The car does have some weak points but those will be getting replaced. 1) The transmission is a 350 turbo which will not hold up to the engine if you give it to much. The transmission will be replaced with a 700R4 with a manual shift. 2) The rear-end is still stock and not built for 400hp. 3) The rims and tires are old and not wide enough. The width on the rim is determinate to the max with that the car can handle on all four locations. We want to be able to service this thing with some ease and not be replacing rear tires every so often. These are later topics to talk about.

Years have gone by that I have not driven the car. I came up to see my family and get an oil change for my mini van when I realized that the caprice was sitting out back of my dad's shop (Olson Auto Service Inc.). I asked dad about it but he was kind of quiet on the matter and I also noticed that his Bronco was missing. It turns out that he traded the Bronco for work and a new engine for the car. The engine is a 454 putting out over 400hp. Apparently someone built it for a street car and ran out of money. We have always wanted a big engine to replace the 4.3L, and now we have it.

After a couple of months went by, dad informed me that the engine and exhaust have been installed and he let me hear that thing on my cell phone. You can see what I mean by listening and watching this video.

The car wouldn't be as good unless it had some tunes to go with it. Now, knowing that we were going to install a very sophisticated interior, I held off from going to far but I did have some 9" x 6s" installed and a little better than stock bass system so the music can be better quality.

One thing you have to learn about this project and my father and I. We are very patient people who will do what they say, but it might take some time after other things are complete. The finished interior will have a very nice sound system and very comfortable seats. More to come on the interior at a later date.

After the stereo was updated a little bit I then left to go to college and during that time, the car only saw me on the summer weekends. At the end of my college career, I did not drive the car much at all and it sat for a couple of years without any attention.

While it was at the auto body shop (Devine Auto, Eau Claire, WI), we were allowed to come in and take a look at the progress that was going on.

The next day after I got the car back, we were going to a car show and in this picture you can see my Dad's 1930 Model A and also our red boat with a 454 big block.



The car doesn't quite look done though. We decided to get the bumpers powder coated black to really finish it off. All of the trim around the windows are all black and since we didn't want any chrome on it besides it's future rims the bumpers had to be black.

We drove the caprice to my dad's shop (Olson Auto Service Inc.) where I started to take it apart. I needed to remove the front two fenders and both of the doors.

Here is a picture of the car before I took it apart. Don't you just love that color green....right.

Here I took off the front bumper, fenders, hood, and doors. I also removed the stickers, rear bumper and lights so they wouldn't have to when they start stripping down the color.


This car was out of my hands for little over one month, I was going nuts.