25HP Induction System!

PROBLEM/SOLUTION:

Do feel like your dragging an anchor. You can feel surges of power and then it sort of plateaus out. We found that the Pantera gains low end torque and 12 horse power to the rear wheels by replacing just the intake manifold. This gain is because back in the late 60’s bigger was better. Ford designed the 351 Cleveland to run NASCAR. They basically put big block heads on a small block motor. This was fine at 7500 RPM, but we do not run at that speed unless we spend big bucks on the motor to spin that fast and stay together. They have later found that bigger is not necessarily better in this case because the atomized fuel droplets are flowing so slowly through the induction system that they actually fall out of suspension. This produces bigger droplets which leads to incomplete combustion and loss of power.

BENEFIT:
The Edelbrock performer manifold reduces the size of the plenum runners which increases the rate of flow, which keeps the fuel in suspension better and produces the extra HP and a lot more low end torque. In a Pantera low end torque is what really sets this car apart from other higher priced exotics. There are lots of improvements that have been made on the Cleveland motor in regards to increasing torque and power but this is the simplest and by far the biggest bang for the dollar.

By doing a number of chassis dyno tests we found that by just changing the original Autolite carburetor to a new smog legal 600 Holly that we picked up 12 house power. This is again accomplished through better fuel atomization which the Holly’s do much better. This requires intake manifold machining since the butterflies don’t line up with the ports. Replacing the manifold with a new Edelbrock is surely the best solution and results in a combined 25 horsepower increase. This is surely the best single power/economy improvement you can make to the Pantera.

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