Whipple vs. Magnacharger
 

Well I'm scrapping the idea of swapping my 350 for a 496... Its just going to cost to much. So supercharging the 350 is the way I'm going! My question is which is better and why. A Magnacharger or a Whipple. I know most everyone is using Whipples. I'm just curious why nobody talks about the Magnacharger. FYI this is going on an '87 350 magnum.

I would just use a small roots blower like a Wieand 177 or B&M 174.

Procharger.... :D


John jr

If you think it will cost to much for a 496 you really do not want to start playing with a blower of any kind . :eek:

Innercooled Whipple is the only way to go. Had them all, and this is by far the best setup.

Just my experienced opinion.

Chris

What compression ratio is your motor? I thought 350 mags are 9.5 in the late 80's

To be honest I'm not sure what the Mag is.... I'm pretty sure it's 9.0 to 1 but I could be wrong on this.

Jeff,
In order to get my 496 block converted for marine use it would cost over $6000 in all the little parts. It's very hard to find anything for this motor and when you do it's big bucks!!!!!! Raylar heads for example are somewhere around $3500.00 and there only good for 50 hp. I can get AFR heads for my small block and there good for 80+ hp and only cost $1500. So if I put $6000 in the small block I would have one wicked motor with far more power than a stock 496 ho.

a really good set of heads and a cam will put you at the power level a 9.1 blower will make for 1/2 the $$$ and twice the reliability.

X2

Dude.. I been here....

Youll be dicking with this till the end of time if you bolt a blower on a stock small block. I chased blown small blocks around for years - unless you are going to do a complete teardown and rebuild stay away from blowers of any kind.

Spend your money like this.

Exhaust (without spending the money on this your pi$$ing up a rope)
AFR/Brodix heads/intake combo
good "relatively" mild roller cam setup

Go boating.

There are NO shortcuts in engine building. I know you wanted to hear it would be ok to bolt a blower on- its not, and the blower sales guys will rarely level with you about this.


UD

Uncle Dave and everyone else! Thanks for the advice. This spring I was trying to decide what to do. Some guys were telling me I should just bold on a blower and call it a day! I though it sounded a bit to good to be true, so I chose to go the 496 route. However the cost for what you get is just not worth it. I know you can build a mean small block for not a ton of dough. So I guess I'm going to go with what I was going to this spring. That is a set of AFR heads and a new cam and intake! If I'm still not satisfied then I'll build a forged blower block with a lonely 350 4 bolt I have. Either way thanks for all the input and I'm always open to opinions!
Thanks

Once you have your wicked small block built youll need to worry about steering..

Heres a pict of my small block rig I coverted from a bolwer rig to a NA rig and it runs great .

Here's my little 20 foot tunnel hull with a 406 SB brodix heads,demon 850 carb, imco exhaust, Mercury ITS steering system with a a new bravo 1 XR.

I also have a bigger 28 footer with an Ilmor 710 in it.

UD

I think I would have to build a super wicked SB to need to worry about steering. With a solid built 383 i should hit about 480+ hp and 510 tq. Even with those numbers I'll be lucky to see the mid 60's. My boat is not light, although for a 24' boat it not bad, just over 4000 lbs. At 270 hp I'm getting 46 on the GPS. So another 200 hp should at least get me into the low 60's.

BTW thats a nice set-up!

If you build up a good running, naturally aspirated 383 or 406, you will quite easily make between 450 and 500 hp, with a much lighter package than a big block. That should get you into the 60's, with a lot less money spent than switching to a big block or blower.

If you are going to go blower, I would definately recommend a fuel injected Whipple setup.

Chris

CB is right on, if you do go blower stick with the whipple and go injected.

This way you'll have a common setup in the industry that can be tuned by someone vs guessing with a magnacharger.

Curious if you are pulling the engine to do a 383 kit then you can beef it up with the internals you need to put a blower on it.

With a new top end cam combo you can probably just bolt the new stuff on.

IF you are pulling the block, rather than screwing around with a kit you can just buy a shortblock all ready to go and bolt up your pieces to it. (actually a world products 454 short block would be cool and give you even more grunt.)

BE carefull on the cam selection especially in the area of valve overlap. Street rod guys usually cam up to make a good top end # vs broad torque and such a setup will likely cause water reversion.

Whats your budget, and what exhaust systems are you leaning toward?

Try this- go put both hands on the bottom of your skeg and lift up and tell me how much play is in the gimble.


UD

oh .. thanks for the compliment on my seteup.

UD

UD-
My budget for this winter is going to be around $3500 for now. Knowing me though that may grow. What I'm planning on is to go with the 180 AFR heads and a 270 x-treme marine cam with a RPM air gap manifold. For the exhaust I'm leaning towards an imco set-up but thats up in the air. This is a winter project so I have time to get everything in order. As for the 383 block I have a 355 four bolt 2 piece seal block I'm thinking about using for that project. When I build that I want to do it right. I may have my current block bored (1 piece roller)and converted to a 4 bolt. I'm not really sure.

I'll get back to you on the gimbal play this weekend. I'm not around my boat now.

I would look at Revolution Marine for a killer small block exhaust setup. I have used these on several small block marine buildups with great success. Very cost effective also.

The rest of your part ideas seem like good choices..ie cam intake, and heads.

Chris

Interesting find CB,

These look like a VERY nice manifold especially for the dough they are charging.


UD

With a buget of 3500 your not going to be able to build much of a small block either. :eek:

All I'm building this year is the top half! Thats more than enough for heads, intake, carb, cam and maybe exhaust. When I get to the the block I have one with all the machining done. All I need is the rotating assembly. Plus my brother is a mechanic so all my labor is free and parts are cheap.

Thats the sprit, just keep at it. Youll get there!
3500 can get some parts for sure.

http://joplin.craigslist.org/pts/1293959768.html
A good start and about 200 off.

Keep us up to speed an take picts!

UD

I just upgraded my merc 6.2s 200cc e tech heads crane roller cam edel rpm intake 750 holly carbs Hie igntions with msd in cap rev limters stock bottem end gained 10mph in twin engine 292 formula! I did not spend alot of money for that kind of gain but I had good bottem ends!

Performance Boat Alchemy ??
 

Endevor:

I have read a few of your posts and you seem to have a highly constrained budget for performance boating.
If you start doing the neccessary work on nthe small blocks for a lot more horsepower and torque from small blocks that would be needed for your requirements you will quickly outspend your budget and end up with a unused "trailer queen" in your driveway, an empty wallet and a lot of wasted time and frustration!
Your Formula is a good size heavily built boat that will take big torque and moderate power for even decent cruise and top end performance and your not going to get that with a normally aspirated reliable small block even with big $$ rework and upgrades.
At Raylar, we have a moto for performance boat engines
"THERE IS NO REPLACEMENT FOR DISPLACEMENT"
Sell your small block, buy a good used or remaned 496HO Mercruiser engine ($8000 to $11,000), put a nice Dana Exhaust on it for about $2400. The 465 HP and 580 ft/lbs of torque will run your Formula just fine for now. when your budget gets a little bigger, put one of our Raylar complete HO525 _BCK103 kits on the 496 for $7.2K and whola, 570 HP, 625 ft/lbs of torque and a good reliable, 87-89 pump gas freshwater cooled electronic engine and now you've got all you need in that hull for good speeds. Want to go faster, save your COIN, sell your boat with the good power and buy a fast boat, like a Sunsation, Outerlimits, Nortec,Active Thunder, Fountain, etc. If you really want to go faster, then buy one of the high speed cats, Skater, MTI, DCB, Redline, etc.
Performance Boating IS A "COSTS MONEY" SPORT AND RECREATION"!! When you got the money, you can go faster, in the mean time use and enjoy your boat, quit "bench racing" with all the bloggers and friends and aquaintences, you ain't gonna get a lot of real something for a little nothing!!

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar

Unfortunately... Ray speaks the truth in regards to money needed to go fast.

My personal example:

I bought a used 1999 Eliminator 22ft Eagle with a 350 in it. When I got it, it did about 54 mph, and I paid 16k for it. It was immaculate. I got the "go faster" bug really soon. I started with putting exhaust on it ($2k all said and done), and I was now going 56.5 mph. I put a new intake and carb on it ($1k all said and done), and was now going 58mph. I put new edelbrock heads in it, along with a cam and lifters ($2.5k) and was now hitting 62mph. I did all the work by myself to save on money. So now in a years time... I had about $22k in the boat over a years period of time.

Right about then... my buddy bought the exact same boat for $17.5k with a 454 mag in it. It did 67mph, and could out accelarate me any where, any time... I was bummed. I decided that I was going to build a 540 for my boat, and make it really fast. I bought a little at a time, and over 14 months spent $21k in motor, Bravo outdrive, and various parts to make the boat work. My family missed out on an entire season of boating because of my passion. When I finally put it all together and set up... the boat did 91mph! Problem was.. the hull was never intended to go that fast and it was terribly unstable and rough riding.

Over 26 months.. I had spent around $43k on my boat. I figured that out, and realized that was a average of almost $1700 per month for a really quick.. poor handling boat.

I sold the boat for $19k... that is all it was worth, and took that money and put it down on my Nordic. I now spend $500 per month for a fantastic handeling, 91mph boat, that I never have to work on. It is turn key.

Save yourself a lot of work, money, and grief... sell your boat as is... and go buy something that will do what you want it to.

You will be money and time ahead. You wont regret it.

Chris

This sport has a diminishing rate of return in almost every area but fun.




UD

Not to hijack the thread, but Ray I see you like the Dana exhaust for the 496's any reason over say cmi's ? I know the cmi's are a grand more for polished.

Amen brother !!

Chris

So Many Choices! So Little Money!
 

Conman:

Their are a few good exhaust headers for the 496 Merc engines on the market and Dana, and CMI both make good systems. The reason I like the Dana header manifold kits for single applications is that the Dana Flo-torque header manifolds are real headers with equal length internal tubes and a real merge collector in the riser that makes real horsepower and torque on the 496's , about 40hp more than stock 496 manifolds and they come in a complete turnkey kit (we helped design and test) and the whole kit package for these strong beautiful polished or custom color powder coated header manifolds is only about $2500 and the kit is easy to install and they are structurally strong.

When you take a CMI Sportube kit for the 496's which in kit form polished will also make about 40HP+ on a stock 496 the kit costs about $4500-$5000 per engine if installed without Captains Call. If you have or want to keep Captains Call or Silent Choice or Corsa Quick & Quiet and use the CMI Sporttube headers you have to loose the old switchable system and buy a CMI addtional kit for about another $1200.
This is why CMI has now come out with the CMI E-top package for 496's that will work with Captains Call, etc and these headers sell for between $3000 and $3500 depending on satin finish or polished. The problem here is that this header style will only make about 20-25HP more at best on a stock 496 not the 40HP+ the Dana's and CMI Sporttubes will make. The one disadvantage to the Dana header manifolds is that they are about 1" wider per side than Merc stock 496 exhaust or CMI headers ,so on a twin installation in some boats the Dana's may not fit with limited narrow distances between the two engines on some boats. I hope this helps clarify why Raylar and I feel that the Dana header manifold kits are still the best "BANG for the Buck" when it comes to Merc 496 exhaust packages so far in the industry.
496 Merc header class 1A is now dismissed!

Hope this info helps all looking at merc 496 header kit systems.

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar

Trust me I know about the laws of diminishing returns.... I've spent thousands on my sailboat just to gain 2-3 knots in light air. A good feathering prop is $3500.00 alone! My Formula is priority #2. So yes I'm looking to get some more speed for less money. But like the sailboat, its not cheap. Either way it looks like I'm back to square one. I wish there were more used parts available for the 496 that I started. Oh well, I guess its time to start saving!

Ray will the dana's work with stock silent choice? I now know why cmi hides the dyno results on the 496 headers, I'm not dropping $3500 for 20-25horse. I also looked at the lightning headers, I'd have to get rid of the silent choice but supposedly they're 50-60hp on a 496 so they claim

The standard Dana Flo-torque exhaust header manifolds and risers will work with stock silent choice, captains call, etc. Just dont run the engine above 1500 rpms with the switchable system closed to thru the prop.

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar

Thanks Ray, I'm trying to decide to do some minor mods on the 496 or pull the motor and go to a 540. I have an 04 Velocity 290sc, it's going 70 with the stock 496 and labbed Bravo 4 blade 28 pitch prop. I'd like to see 80plus but probably would be happy with 75. I think I need 14hp per 1 mile per hour.

Anyway if I do go with headers i'm pretty well sold on the Dana's as everything i've heard is positive, and as most of us know your the guy who knows the 496 motor better than anyone.

Conman:
Depending on which version 496 is pushing your Velocity 70ish now it should not be difficult to get a 496 like yours equipped with Raylar bolt on upgrades and some exhaust and get you up in that 80ish range with the engine and setup you have, it just takes some of your hard earned dollars. Let me know if we can help.

Best Regards

Mine's the 496mag Ho, I've had my eye on the 496 raylar upgrade kits since the May 2006 powerboat magazine featured all of the upgrade kits including yours, the price has gone up over 1k since then, however our paychecks are not. It might be something to consider in the future, I just like the 540 idea, it's a good motor for a single screw boat, simple and straight forward. I just haven't made up my mind yet.

Don't Progress Backwards!
 

Conman, not sure what year and model your boat is, but if its late model, equipped with 496 new, don't degrade the value of the boat and future resale value by installing an older technology carb 540 engine in a newer boat that already has a closed cooling efi present day technology engine. You will ruin the retained value of your boat unless its an older model boat. Just save your dollars and make the 496 upgrades in the future as you can. That merc 496 will live many hours into the future when you can make upgrades!

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar