I'm a fan of the short deck 302 strokers because they are cheap and reliable
and there aren't any problems to solve with the chassis, firewall, headers,
ect....and the payoff is real world street power via a big fat and flat torque
curve. Mine made 386HP at 5,650 RPM and was making 354 ft # torque at 3,000
rpm. don't know about numbers below that level, as all dyno tests started at
3,000 rpm. That's with 9.6 to 1 compression and very modest cam timing. 14#
vacumn, so it's got exceptional throttle response throught the prm range.
Lots of kits and parts out there...Pay attention to the treatment given the
ring package, wrist pin and piston. The engine folks I regard don't get too
carried away about the longer rods actually creating more torque, but they do
seem to think that you can move the curves around a little bit...sorry....some
risk at igniting controversy....seems an irrelevent nit to me.
The flip side... that level of power in a 289/302 is also obtainable but the
the result is not nearly as easy to live with on the street.
Regards,
Ken Mattice
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