Is building a stroked 318 better than a stroked 340/360?
Were the combo's highly tuned for each rod? Cam heads etc..
It's hard to do an apples to apples comparison, Eg.. Mainly what were talking about 318/340/360 vs there 4" stroke version, but what is an apples to apples comparison between a 365 vs 408?
Since both should be built with slightly different parts (cam, ports, Intake, exhaust to gears and stall) for whatever build level were talking about, and if one is better than the other (always make more power) you can't even build to the same power and compare. What are good comparable test between a 365 and 408?
But I get why people build 408s you can build 450-550 hp at street friendly ish rpms with little more than a credit card and a catalogue and don't have to run deep gears and high stall to get satisfactory results and it's light and small.
But If you flexible on the small part any 383/400/413/426 would fit the bill and could even add a 3.915 to any of these and keep good S/R/B ratios and run heads that don't strangle them.
The magazine started by pondering the cheap way to a 383 SBC, which involved using the 400 rods and either the 400 crank with the mains ground down or a 3.75" stroker crank.
As a baseline they dynoed the 350. Then they changed the crank and rods. Pistons to keep the compression the same, but used the 350 cam.
After dynoing that combination, they got pistons to work with the 5.7 rods. Again the cam was the 350 cam. Dynoed again.
Then they tried one or two cams to compensate for the increased displacement but kind of followed the 350 tune.
This test was intended to show how the different parts function in a budget street build, not race oriented.
That was pretty much before stroker kits with crank, rods, pistons and rings were readily available in choices of strokes and rod length. Now if you turn a bearing, especially a rod bearing, it is just as inexpensive to get a stroker kit with all the reciprocating parts that match. With that you still have to consider heads, valves, the port flows and camshaft. That is determined by the bank account and how serious you are prepared to get.
Now regarding the converter stall; if a fairly stock camshaft is chosen, the requirement for high stall is reduced. Again, how serious do you want to get.
For a good street engine a stroker crank in the mid stroke range, a cam speced for the added displacement, port matching and pocket porting with probably a bit larger intake valves, should provide a snappy street driver. If you want a more race oriented engine and car, throw the bank account at it.
