I was trying to let Ross know that it would be easy for him to change to Victor, and make it work well without much trouble. In my experiences of porting the last 36 years, I have found that I can take a piece of junk that no one wants, and spend a few hours reworking it, and make it into a decent intake manifold that will give as much power as a "name" intake that hasn't been reworked. An engine is just an airpump that wants just enough air to perform at whatever level it is capable of performing at(cubic inches), and any more air available will not make more horsepower, no matter what the name of the intake, camshaft, block, head, etc., unless you can get it to overfill the cylinder. To that end, velocity, not having to make many turns,(including under the carb)and proper supply volumn will net the best horsepower, regardless if it is a "performer" or a sheetmetal manifold. I have built stock block 302 cubic inch SBF's that use stock E-7 heads that I port with 1.9/1.54 valves that flow only 220cfm, a .500 lift cam with 224/224, and make 400HP. The intake manifold will only flow 290cfm. I also build/port SBF heads that flow 380/280 cfm, the intake flows 410 cfm, and make enough HP to propel a fox mustang to 9.42 @145 NA. I probably port 30 sets of SBF heads to every 1 set of FE, but the theory still holds the same whether its a 732CI BBC or a 289 SBF.
I have extensively reworked the Port O Sonic, also, with welding, epoxy, spacers, turtles, and the Victor simply is easier to get more airflow, and the velocity is higher at 28 Hg on the flowbench. No one used to care about flow through the intake manifold, but when I started balancing the runners airflow, and matching the airflow to the head airflow +120%, then my engines started to consistently win. In the EFI world, I have always ported the intakes and plenums to flow so that they do not pull the heads down, when attached together, and that is a winning combination. Joe-JDC.
