We recently bought a 72 cutlass and it's currently set up for drag racing it's got a 455 in it that's supped up to a 472 it's too much power ( lol) for what we want to do with it my question is what would it take to take it back down to stock? I'm not an engine guy I can do the work myself if I just knew what would need to be done. Thanks for the help guys.

 

Oh...too much power? I hate that! I don't know, you can't really make a bigger engine smaller. We would need to know what's been done to it. You could put a stock intake and carb on it, if it's got fancy heads you can swap them back. You can change the camshaft closer to stock. The size of the engine is probably not really the prob, it's the way it behaves. Someone here might even swap you for a good stock motor.

 

Most complain that there is not enough power... The 472 is cubic inches and means it has had machine work done to it. The internals determine what kind of power it will put out. Do you know what parts have been installed inside the engine, stroke, pistons, and cam. Do you know what the compression is? This info will help determine a direction to take.

 

i might trade you for my mild build 455. its only putting out 312RWHP and 384RWTQ

 

probably start with changing rear end gears, tc and cam. that will mellow it out.

 

Remember, as with increasing performance, if you want to reduce performance, you need to do it as a package, not one part at a time, so that everything works together, and it has enough power in the right places.

Maybe it'd be easier to just put a stop under the gas pedal, or increase the radius of the lever that the throttle cable pulls on at the carburetor.

Welcome to ClassicOlds.

- Eric

 

Find out what you have first. The size of the engine won't change. But if you know your compression ratio, cam, torque converter stall and rear gear you can determine how radical the combo is. But if its a street car, the only thing you should need to tame it is the accelerator pedal.

 

The other thing I would say, along the lines of one suggestion above, is that if you find someone who would like to swap their less-powerful engine for yours, you both have the advantage that you can drive the other car first to see if you like it.

That being said, in such a situation, you could always just swap cars.

- Eric