Dyno testing a stock(?) 1972 440

Low compression obviously isn't the hurdle to good horse power everyone thinks it is. Those of us who've built engines as kids in school already know that. We just slapped intakes, carbs, cams and headers on stock engines and they ran great. We didn't care about dyno numbers......nobody had access back then like they do now. We did go to the drag strip a lot. Some people just cannot get their heads around anything under 9.5 compression. It makes no sense to run compression on the ragged edge of detonation for a street car, yet you simply cannot tell people that. They'd rather believe some foolish magazine article backed by sponsors trying to sell parts and forum gurus telling them they have to run a Jones cam or compression at 11:1 on pump gas. All that's just a bunch of bullcrap and if you follow that advice get ready to spend a LOT of money on specialized machine work to make it happen. It's NOT budget friendly. And most people I know don't have money fallin outta their asshole.


Everyone I know builds nothing less than 10:1 on pump gas and most of us are well over 11:1 and it’s not hard or any more expensive.


You can’t think and build like a broke *** 17 year old but the cost to build one with compression isn’t any more money than to build it with less compression.


Compression ratio is power. To leave it low on purpose is really short sighted.