Quote:
Originally Posted by AZMike427
SPF #751 that I just purchased was recently freshened and runs great but it has a timing gear drive setup. Needless to say it's loud and doesn't represent the true sound of an FE cobra. I'd like to have that swapped out as well as addressing a few minor things/leaks. I did a search and didn't find much on FE guys in AZ- does anyone have a recommendation? I don't mind throwing it in my enclosed trailer and hauling it to So Cal as well but I thought I'd check to see if anyone has a reference. Thanks in advance!
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*** Fair Warning : Lot's of personal opinion, and editorial commentary below. If anything I state here offends anyone, well then- That's your problem, not mine...
New Guy Mike: I don't think you should need an "FE Specialist" to fix leaks, or to swap a gear drive with a timing chain - Those are both "low hanging fruit" on the basic engine repair complexity tree. Bob B's recommended shop should be able to easily handle it, as can Jeff Classic (Jeff's shop:
Cobras N Vettes)
Hauling the car all the way to California to do these repairs should be a non-starter.. Complete overkill.
Now, all of that being said, I can personally understand 100% why you would want to get rid of the gear drive- Gear Drives were the "wannabe race car" sound of the late 80's and early 90's... All my gearhead friends in High School would save their tips from the pizza place to buy a Pete Jackson gear drive, so that their "400 horsepower" 327 (which actually made about 150hp, and could barely wheeze their 74 Camaro down the quarter mile in 15 seconds) would whine like it had a blower....
And, the popular street wisdom at the time was that racing teams would use gear drive to prevent the cam from skipping a tooth as they blasted down the track; which again, the average teenager-owned, wuss-bag street machine was in
zero danger of ever doing, unless the timing chain was stretched out from a half-million miles of common teenage male pattern abuse...
Today, the fake "gear drive blower whine" of the 80's has been superceded by the equally ridiculous "ghost cam" - EFI guys are now deliberately tuning their fuel injection controllers to misfire on every 5th spark pulse at idle, so that the engine will lope and shake like it's got a long duration cam inside it, even though the stock cam they are
actually running in the engine, should idle like a brand new Cadillac...
It's all pure, 100% fakery. Fake blower whine, fake cam lope.
And then, there are the guys that will paint their wheels with spray paint, just to make them look like DOW7 coated magnesium... don't even get me started on
THOSE guys- They are the worst of the worst (self-deprecating humor- It's how I keep my perspectives "fair and balanced"
)
So yes- Unless you're running a normally aspirated, 900HP drag racing engine that runs 14:1 compression, and revs to 12,000RPM, then the gear drive is nothing but a big, whiney noise maker... Get it out of there.