What happened to Project 460?
Well, there is good news and bad news.

The bad news.... our 460 Ford Racing Crate Motor lasted two runs before it self destructed!

Yeah, we couldn't believe it either. A $6000 crate motor, that was bought for the very reason that it was professionally built and broken in on the dyno, blew up with less than 2 miles on the clock! Well maybe blown up is a bit dramatic. The 460 simply started knocking ferociously half way down the strip, and then cut out.

Needless to say Victor Silva, the owner of the Mach 1, was pretty distraught. After all, how much bad luck can one person have? Victor was in such a rush to figure out what happened, he pulled the motor that day, before we even had a chance to get the cameras out to his place. The first sign of what happened was evident when the heads came off. All the pistons had nicks where the valves had smacked into them. Examining the heads revealed several bent valves. It was obvious this wasn't one or two valve springs or locks giving out, but a wholesale timing problem, such as a broken timing chain or gear.

Pulling the timing chain cover led to the piece of evidence we were looking for -a broken timing gear bolt. It looked as if the bolt had been over torqued, and sheared due to fatigue. In either case, we knew it wasn't out fault since we had never so much as removed a valve cover on this crate motor.

A call was placed to FRPP's tech line, where we explained the problem. Eventhough FRPP products do not have a warranty, we were pleased that they were willing to resolve the problem. In fact they were so accommodating, we got the suspicion they have gone through this before!

They had us crate up the motor and ship it back for inspection. Even though this is a pain in the ass to do, FRPP paid the freight costs. They told us they'd inspect the motor and either repair it, or replace it. In either case it would take 4 to 6 weeks -meaning no bracket events for Victor.

A month later we got the call that a brand new motor was on it's way back. A few days later Victor had it installed back into the '69 Mach 1 Mustang, and we were ready to get back out to the track. After being the driver of two blown motors in less than a couple months, it was no surprise that Victor was nervous about making the maiden voyage with the new, new 460. He kept his foot out of it for the first few runs, making sure oil pressure was good, no detonation present, and no funny sounds being emitted from the big block.

With all systems cleared to go, Victor started taking the 460 a little higher in the rpm range. Shifting at a conservative 5500 rpm, the 460 clicked off a 11.39 @ 118 with a 1.58 60ft! Now that finally put a smile on Vic's face! With another 1000 rpm of usable powerband remaining, we have no doubt the 535 HP motor can produce consistent 10 second ET's. The only challenge now is to build up Victors confidence enough to where he'll run the motor as hard as he has all the others.

Stay tuned for more updates on Project 460!