V8 Chevy Rebuild

[roscobbc]

Keep it Stiff - I have the OEM drop base filter bottom from my Vette sitting in the mezzanine of my garage - would you like me to take a few images of it with a rule beside it. They will fit over both vacuum and mechanical secondary Holleys and teh Rochester Quadrajet. I'm guessing as it's off a big block it will be the lowest option available. A word of warning though......it may not fit over a billet throttle cable bracket assembly.

[roscobbc]

Keep it stiff said:

Gilbern built 202 of the GT between '59 and 66. It started out with an A series engine, a few of which were supercharged, they then moved on to the B series and towards the end a few were built with Ford V4, with Ford becoming the base for the Genie and Invader models that followed late '60s and into the '70s. There was only one V8, built by the factory at the request of a local racer, Ken Wilson, this is the car I'm restoring. The club have membership records on approx.100 GTs so in % terms the survival rate has been high.

I own another GT, a car I purchased in bits in 2019 and have been racing for the last few years'. This is a B series car, built in '64 and having built it to original specification I have FIA papers for it. Compared with MGBs, I run about mid-pack.

Can you run it in Bernies series?

[Keep it stiff]

roscobbc said:

Can you run it in Bernies series?

I have not enquired about Bernies but you are right that it could be a good option. HRDC have said I can run it in their All Stars and Equipe would be happy to have it in Libre.

Thanks for the offer on the filter. Hold fire for now, the responses on carb and filter height were very helpful, I will be spending a day in the garage on Sunday and now that I know the target I'm going to do a bit more manipulation with the engine on the crane to see where I can get to.

I had one other thought, is there scope to re-engineer the sump? It seems to be very deep at the front but shallow at the back. The pan is going to need anti-surge modification in any event, if there is scope to modify the pick-up and or shape of the pan, if so I might be able to win 50mm there.

I do not have any info on the original engine spec, I have seen it quoted as 4,700 cc and 5,000. The chairman of the Gilbern club knows this car well and gathered quite a lot on info, I have been researching too, for example the image below I found in a 1966 Autosport. Given that Ken Wilson owned some high-end race cars, and given the effort/cost of the Gilbern factory building this one-off GT, I rather suspect the original engine would have come from a race car and not a random crashed pick-up, unfortunately I will never know as the answer is sitting at the bottom of the sea somewhere.

A fact that is known is that the wheels on the Chevy GT came from Ken's BRM, an ex F1 car of the day, again perhaps another pointer that his engine would not have been stock.

The engine that is with the car at the moment was purchased by the previous owner, its condition is unknown. At the moment I'm less worried about engine spec, the objective for now is to make sure I can make it fit so that I can finalise the position and work out the engine mounting etc, all other mechanical considerations can follow on.

[aeropilot]

Keep it stiff said:

I do not have any info on the original engine spec, I have seen it quoted as 4,700 cc and 5,000. The chairman of the Gilbern club knows this car well and gathered quite a lot on info, I have been researching too, for example the image below I found in a 1966 Autosport. Given that Ken Wilson owned some high-end race cars, and given the effort/cost of the Gilbern factory building this one-off GT, I rather suspect the original engine would have come from a race car and not a random crashed pick-up, unfortunately I will never know as the answer is sitting at the bottom of the sea somewhere.

A Chevy 283ci is 4638cc, so the 4700 is the most likely for that time period.
Chevy didn't bring out a 302ci version (4949cc) of the small block until 1967.

I seriously doubt the original engine came from a race car, as there were very few race cars in Europe using Chevy small blocks in that time period, due to GM's withdraw of Chevy and Pontiac from all sanctioned motorsport in 1963, about the only small block race Chevy's in Europe had been the Brigg's Cunningham Fuelie Corvette's at Lemans from 1960 onwards.
Wilson would have had to have gone over to the USA to acquire such an engine, and the small block wasn't really being used for any racing in the USA at the time either. (Or he was able to buy a stock factory Corvette engine through a contact, as they were being supplied to Gordon Keeble, but these would have been 327's though, not a 283)
I still think it most likely it was a stock 283 4bbl from an Impala (or a Corvette) that had met an untimely end at the hands of a US serviceman.

[Oneball]

You want the deepest sump you can get in there. Ideally with wings too. Have a look at Milodon and Canton. I’ve got a 7.5” deep sump with wings, 5 trap doors, windage tray and crank scraper with a bottom feed pick up and still have to run the oil level right to the windage tray to stop oil surge issues.

[Oneball]

aeropilot said:

Keep it stiff said:

I do not have any info on the original engine spec, I have seen it quoted as 4,700 cc and 5,000. The chairman of the Gilbern club knows this car well and gathered quite a lot on info, I have been researching too, for example the image below I found in a 1966 Autosport. Given that Ken Wilson owned some high-end race cars, and given the effort/cost of the Gilbern factory building this one-off GT, I rather suspect the original engine would have come from a race car and not a random crashed pick-up, unfortunately I will never know as the answer is sitting at the bottom of the sea somewhere.

A Chevy 283ci is 4638cc, so the 4700 is the most likely for that time period.
Chevy didn't bring out a 302ci version (4949cc) of the small block until 1967.

I seriously doubt the original engine came from a race car, as there were very few race cars in Europe using Chevy small blocks in that time period, due to GM's withdraw of Chevy and Pontiac from all sanctioned motorsport in 1963, about the only small block race Chevy's in Europe had been the Brigg's Cunningham Fuelie Corvette's at Lemans from 1960 onwards.
Wilson would have had to have gone over to the USA to acquire such an engine, and the small block wasn't really being used for any racing in the USA at the time either. (Or he was able to buy a stock factory Corvette engine through a contact, as they were being supplied to Gordon Keeble, but these would have been 327's though, not a 283)
I still think it most likely it was a stock 283 4bbl from an Impala (or a Corvette) that had met an untimely end at the hands of a US serviceman.

There were quite a few European race cars using SBC, not in large numbers but they were being raced out the backdoor; Lister used the 283 from 1959 and Bizzarini the 327 from 1964. Lola and McLaren also using SBC from the mid sixties

Did you say Ken Wilson had a Lister? Was it a Chevy one? They ran Rochester FI, but I doubt that’s a route worth going down.

Edited by Oneball on Thursday 3rd August 20:18

Edited by Oneball on Thursday 3rd August 20:19

[aeropilot]

Oneball said:

aeropilot said:

Keep it stiff said:

I do not have any info on the original engine spec, I have seen it quoted as 4,700 cc and 5,000. The chairman of the Gilbern club knows this car well and gathered quite a lot on info, I have been researching too, for example the image below I found in a 1966 Autosport. Given that Ken Wilson owned some high-end race cars, and given the effort/cost of the Gilbern factory building this one-off GT, I rather suspect the original engine would have come from a race car and not a random crashed pick-up, unfortunately I will never know as the answer is sitting at the bottom of the sea somewhere.

A Chevy 283ci is 4638cc, so the 4700 is the most likely for that time period.
Chevy didn't bring out a 302ci version (4949cc) of the small block until 1967.

I seriously doubt the original engine came from a race car, as there were very few race cars in Europe using Chevy small blocks in that time period, due to GM's withdraw of Chevy and Pontiac from all sanctioned motorsport in 1963, about the only small block race Chevy's in Europe had been the Brigg's Cunningham Fuelie Corvette's at Lemans from 1960 onwards.
Wilson would have had to have gone over to the USA to acquire such an engine, and the small block wasn't really being used for any racing in the USA at the time either. (Or he was able to buy a stock factory Corvette engine through a contact, as they were being supplied to Gordon Keeble, but these would have been 327's though, not a 283)
I still think it most likely it was a stock 283 4bbl from an Impala (or a Corvette) that had met an untimely end at the hands of a US serviceman.

There were quite a few European race cars using SBC, not in large numbers but they were being raced out the backdoor; Lister used the 283 from 1959 and Bizzarini the 327 from 1964. Lola and McLaren also using SBC from the mid sixties

Lister is a possibility given the timeline, but these were factory stock engines though, so just because they were in race cars, doesn't make them any different to coming out of a crashed Chevy road car. Chevy used a forged crank in the 283 from 1957 though to 1964 after which they changed over to a cast crank as the 283 was no longer a high performance use engine after that.

[roscobbc]

Looks like the inlet manifold fitted is a Holley item - probably a street inlet given it has a heat riser crossover - I'd be inclined to initially run as-is with the supplied carb......OK its not a double pumper but will give a good starting point.

[Keep it stiff]

Oneball said:

There were quite a few European race cars using SBC, not in large numbers but they were being raced out the backdoor; Lister used the 283 from 1959 and Bizzarini the 327 from 1964. Lola and McLaren also using SBC from the mid sixties

Did you say Ken Wilson had a Lister? Was it a Chevy one? They ran Rochester FI, but I doubt that’s a route worth going down.

Edited by Oneball on Thursday 3rd August 20:18

Edited by Oneball on Thursday 3rd August 20:19

This the Lister Knobbly was a Jag, I have some poor quality pictures of Ken with is cars. The following is a copy/paste of a post I found on another forum:

Ken Wilson & Ron Fry both fell into that notorious motor sport catch-all of "wealthy amateur". Elsewhere I have seen Wilson described as a driver with "more money than talent" but I think that is a tad unfair. He had frequent success, perhaps assisted by the fact that, like Fry, he had the means to access some serious machinery.

Ron Fry's career is well documented, particularly when he moved on from his Ferrari 250GT/275LM and acquired his GT40's (chassis 1017 and then an update to 1073). The GT40 adventure ended with a big accident at Brands.

Ken Wilson is lesser known. A builder from Bridgend in South Wales he raced on both land and water. His Lister Jaguar Knobbly was the ex-Ecurie Nationale Belgique '58 Le Mans car whilst he also did a handful of events in his BRM P48 which, I believe, was the ex Tony Marsh car. By the late 60's he was racing a Lotus 30 (particularly at Llandow) but I can find no details of which chassis this was *****. He then moved onto a McLaren M1C (chassis 40/04) which was the ex-John Woolfe car. Alongside this he campaigned a Gilbern 1800GT fitted with either a Chevy or Cobra V8 - legend has it that this engine shared its time between the car and his racing powerboat. The Gilbern returned to 4 pot power when the boat sank with the loss of the V8.

I remember taking the Campbell steamer from Penarth Pier (Cardiff) to Weston-Super-Mare one year to watch the Weston Speed Trials. Wilson was entered, probably in the "30". When the car succumbed to engine failure the racing numbers were swapped onto his lumbering big Yank tow car (possibly a Fairline/Galaxie?). I remember the car being very noisy but, to borrow someone else's quote, it gathered momentum rather than accelerated down the Weston seafront.

[aeropilot]

If he was using a 'big yank station wagon' as a tow car back in the day, I'd say my theory of getting the Chevy 283 engine from a wrecked Impala/Corvette from one of the big yank scrap yards in East Anglia is definitely most likely, as its likely that he acquired that station wagon from one of the many Yank used car dealers in that area who got the stuff from US servicemen....which was pretty much the only source for such vehicles back then.

[Keep it stiff]

Good progress in the garage today. I re-fitted the engine mounts and then tried the block in a few different positions. The solution was always going to be a compromise between reasonable ground clearance for sump, creating enough space for the carb/filter, chassis clearance for the manifolds, the column UJs and avoiding a clash of bottom hose with the rack.

The best solution was keeping the height as it was previously and pulling the engine forward about 60 mm. What I have ended ticks all boxes except one, there is not room to get a standard filter housing on. I decide this was the lesser the evils, I run my other race cars without ail filters and there is just about room to improvise a guard as a precaution to ingesting debris.

My new steering column UJs were outrageously expensive but they are beautifully engineered and take a fraction of the space compared with the MG originals. The engine is sitting level side to side and front to back.

Having got to this conclusion I am now making new chassis brackets to mate with the engine mounts, as I do not have the ability to weld I'm making templates of wood and from these I will get someone to make them up for me. One of my templates fits fine, with the second one I went wrong and ran out of energy to correct it this evening, I will get these finished next weekend.

I could not resist doing a trial fit for the bonnet!

[aeropilot]

Keep it stiff said:

I run my other race cars without ail filters and there is just about room to improvise a guard as a precaution to ingesting debris.

I'd be more worried about the fire risk running without a filter, than any debris ingestion.......the flame shoots can be quite impressive from a 4bbl without a filter.

[roscobbc]

Surprisingly a GM drop base filter assembly (with reduced height element and K & N air filter top) may actually fit under the hood.......unless the underside of the hood as some intrusive reinforcing structure.

[Keep it stiff]

roscobbc said:

Surprisingly a GM drop base filter assembly (with reduced height element and K & N air filter top) may actually fit under the hood.......unless the underside of the hood as some intrusive reinforcing structure.

There was a some reinforcing under the hood but I removed it in anticipation of space being tight.

[roscobbc]

Keep it stiff said:

roscobbc said:

Surprisingly a GM drop base filter assembly (with reduced height element and K & N air filter top) may actually fit under the hood.......unless the underside of the hood as some intrusive reinforcing structure.

There was a some reinforcing under the hood but I removed it in anticipation of space being tight.

Design of GM's drop-base assembly is quite clever........interestingly much later tech though has shown actually how little air is actually drawn-in through the standard type of circular aur filter element in relation to its surface area - and perhaps more relevantly how little air (comparitively re. cubic inches and sizes of carbs generally used) and more importantly how much additional air an air filter top can actually draw in to the carb.

[Keep it stiff]

One of the things I did last weekend was to make wooden templates of the brackets I needed to connect the engine mounts to the chassis. I dropped these off at a local workshop and picked up the brackets on Thursday, a quick coat of paint and they were ready to fit today. I'm pretty pleased with the outcome, it took a bit of fine tuning with the grinder and I needed to add a spacing plate on one side and they are now fitted. For the first time I have the engine self-supported, not a block of wood or trolley jack in sight, a good milestone!

I spoke this week to a few potential suppliers of made-to-measure manifolds, next step is to visit with the car to see what can be done.

[Keep it stiff]

Engine now rebuilt and back in the car, new heads, new cam, electronic ignition, racing sump and a Holley. The dashboard needs to come out to get the dizzy cap on!

[aeropilot]

Keep it stiff said:

The dashboard needs to come out to get the dizzy cap on!

That's useful.

[some bloke]

What goodies are in there now? What size did it turn out to be?

[Keep it stiff]

It is a while since I updated. The Gilbern Chevy GT is now finished, now fitted with a 350, I don't know what it will put out but it should be enough. There have been a few bumps along the way, the first time I tried to start it the starter motor stripped teeth off the ring-gear and with that problem solved I took it to a track day only to find that the clutch plates would not separate. I should be able to put some test miles on it this week and I have it's debut race entry at Donington in a few weeks.

It has been a challenge and I'm sure there will still be a few to come!