Levy Racing Engines - Driving impressions

[Robert Logan]

Firstly let me explain my connection with Gordon Levy of Levy Racing : he is my US agent and he also supplies some of our engines.

I have just had the pleasure of driving both of Gordons 342 and 306 engines in our cars. They are very different and can be used for many different applications.

The 342 was the first engine I drove , just before Christmas in a 'turn key' we produced for an Australian customer. The engine was dynoed at 436 HP and 410 ft.lbs. and although down in HP (this was due to a calaulated figure), it was more than the 425 asked for. The Audi / Gatrag box is still happy with the figures and the owner is very impressed with the performance of the car especially the wheel spin at 4600 RPM in every gear.

The 306 I drove for the first time lastWednesday and the performance of this engine is the reason for the thread. I thought that the 342 was GREAT but the 306 is the engine for me. It spins to 7500 although I only spun her to 7000 but it just pulls and pulls (like a teenager at midnight)
I was amazed at the strength. I have been told by others that Gordons engines can be Fragile but I have seen none of this. He builds an excellent engine and I am pleased that our company are associated with his and would recommend others to use his engines.

Best wishes,

Robert

 

Gordon, could you provide additional information on these two engines, especialy the 306.

 

Gordon,
Whatever you're doing I want it. A 306 is the one for me, and NO for the LAST time I don't want 900hp. Your a nut the 306 will be just fine.

 

They sound great: are they both ADR legal?
and...
do you publish torque curves for these beasts?
Thanks

Rob

 

[Gordon Levy]

Robert, I'm glad you like the engines. The 306 is over 450hp and 380 lbft of torque. it was designed as a budget minded road race engine. The specs are;
.030 302 block
steel crank
long H beam rods
Main girdle
forged pistons 11-1 compression
Custom solid flat tappet cam
Victor Jr heads
we do offer a couple of upgrades for this package. 1 is a solid roller cam, 2 sportsman block, 3 port work.
we can also do some compression changes depending on how you want to use this engine. The price on the base comfiguration is about $8000 U.S. without induction.
The 342, we have made some changes to this engine and it is now 347 cid.
The engine is laid out like this:
.030 block
steel crank
I beam rods
Forged pistons 10-1 compression
Custom designed hydrolic roller cam
victor Jr heads
This is a 6500 rpm engine and I believe we have about 50 more hp than the 342 I sent to Robert. This engine is priced at $5000 without induction.
You can use ether a carb or injection on these engines.
Feel free to ask questions.

 

[Ian K]

Gordon, I just reread your post.

Is the 306 also a long rod conversion?
If so, how much longer than stock are the H
beams? And, is the wrist pin offset so
that the rod is not perpendicular to the
crank at TDC? I read a great article about
long rod mods (they tested out a 351W, stock
ECU, and Twisted Wedge heads -- easily
hit 400+ HP without much else).

Also, can you give us some details on your
destroked 351?

Thanks,

Ian

 

[Gordon Levy]

The destroked 351 is an interesting engine. We use a 351 with a 302 crank. with 16-1 compression and Victor Sr heads, this engine will produce over 700hp and rev to 10,000 rpm's. It is a bit pricie.
On the long rod 302 we are moving the wrist pin in the piston up a bit. The longer the rod the less load the crank see's.

 

Gordon,
how long can the rods be on a 3 inch stroke, without using stepped pins etc to clear the piston rings?
Have you seen gains in road engines using the longest rods?

 

[Gordon Levy]

Long rods would help a street engine. What a long rod is trying to achieve is less the 2.0 rod ratio. The lower the number the less the load is on the crank. This will let you spin the engine at higher revs. The draw back is it will take some torque out of the engine but give higher rpm hp.

 

[Gordon Levy]

We haven't experimented with off set pins. I really haven't found a need. As far as intersecting with the oil ring. For street engines we don't move the pin that high. For full race engines we do. Moving the pin into the oil ring doesn't hurt at all but it will use a little more oil.

 

[Ian K]

How about offsetting the wrist pin to one
side a little. You'll need to rebalance,
but you substantially decrease the
moment of inertia on downstrokes. This
improves efficiency of the combustion,
making more power and even improving fuel economy. Have you tinkered with that idea
any? Also, does moving the pin up a little
intersect the oil ring? Or, you don't go that
far?

Ian