We DID It!!!!
We made it to World of Speed. We used a 1957 Packard (Studebaker) 289 cubic inch engine that was all original and reportedly had only 22,000 miles on it before the owner tried to race a train and lost. The block suffered some damage but was useable. The pan and valve covers were wadded up so we replaced them. New freeze plugs, replaced the cam with a used R1 cam to get an aluminum cam gear for good measure, new valve springs and all new gaskets and seals. Unfortunately we didn't want to disturb the internals so we didn't replace the head gaskets. Bad call on our part. Installed a Novi 2000 belt driven centrifugal supercharger in place of the factory McCullough. Used an R2 blow through carb and an ice water intercooler. We figured the engine could push the car to 130 or 140. A 1957 Golden Hawk similarly equipped ran 147 in '57 so that was our model. We made six runs. Once we got the tune right we saw the car exceed all our expectations running 159 miles per hour!! Everyone was very surprised and pleased to see this "used" engine run that fast. We knew going into the last run that we were pushing compression betwee en two cylinders but didn't want to go home without knowing just what it could do. The car handled extremely well. We got the front end dead nuts on. It started and ended in the groove I put it in. I was able to drive it with my finger tips and never had to make a correction. Not even when I hit the ruts at the four mile mark. It was blast to drive and the reality was everything I dreamed it would be. Awesome!!