Show your slant 6 a body!

PART TWO:


I BELIEVE that a turbocharged slant six motor is about 80-100 pounds
lighter than an iron small block. Can't prove that, but I'd bet on it.

Advantage slant six

The "bling" factor at shows might be of interest to some. A nice-looking small block has a LOT of competition at car shows and usually needs to have something really special, in cosmetic appeal, to win an award, just because there are so many... But, a slant six with a turbo on it is such a rarity, judges HAVE to pay attention.

Advantage, slant six

Then, there are the negative factors... and, there are some!

You can always put a turbo on a small block and go much faster than you could EVER hope to go with a slant six


Advantage, small block

No roller cams are available for slant six engine (no available roller-tappet cores) so, the ZDDP issue is always a problem.

Advantage, small block

You REALLY need both an intercooler AND a chemical intercooler (alcohol injector) for a hi-boost turbo slant six, and they don't give these away. None is needed on a normally-aspirated small block,

Advantage, small block

I don't think that a turbocharged slant six is a very good bracket car for drag racing, because of problems with turbo-spool on takeoff, and consistency. We are not building our car to run brackets; if we wanted to win bracket races, we'd build something else.

Advantage; small block

Detonation under boost will destroy a turbocharged motor on boost, quicker than you can say "turbo." So, fuel of sufficient octane is always going to be a problem. E-85 would be the perfect hi-octane fuel, but the quality of it at the pump is so iffy, you just can't trust it when it comes to boosted motors. The normally-aspirated small block, with high-compression pistons is choosy when it comes to octane, too, but the results from normally-aspirated detonation are usually not as "catastrophic" as when it happens with, say, 25 pounds of boost. So, I have to say that the turbo slant six is a problem child in that area. Bear in mind that I originally said a "500-horsepower" turbo slant six. That's what we are talking about, here, But to be realistic, the great bulk of whatever turbocharged slant six motors come to pass, MOST will never see boost levels that high, and the picture changes greatly at 7-10 pounds of boost. But, that wasn't the argument, here. Soooooo...

Advantage, small block

The sound of a well-tuned, high-revving small block at full song, is music to almost everyone's ears. Slant sixes with turbos are quiet: the turbo impeller sort of homoginizes the sound waves...

Advantage small block



Due to the very-limited rpm range (less than 5,500rpm, tops, usually) the slant six turbo motor doesn't need a high rpm ignition system like a high-winding, 500 HP, normally-aspirated small block. A stock distributor will work fine, with no worries about effective spark at 7,000 rpm... 'cause, that boosted slant 6 is never gonna see even 6,000 rpm, much less 7,000...

Advantage, slant six

There are no aftermarket (aluminum, or otherwise) cylinder heads for the slant six, so the best you can do is to port the original head, and add some cheap 1/75"/1.5" valves (some folks have used 318 valves.) And, there's only ONE head to deal with, so there's just no place to spend money (of the quantity the V8 car can absorb) on the head. A complete ported head for a slant 6, ready to run, will be cheaper than a pair of aftermarket V8 heads that will support 500 horsepower, I believe.

Advantage, slant six



I hope that after reading all this meandering set of posts, I have made a case for it being actually cheaper to build a 500 HP turbo slant 6 than it is to make the same amount of power with a normally-aspirated, small block V8.

Just my 2-ceents... Your Mileage May Vary.... :cheers: