Inliners International Forums General Discussion Engines 194 to 292 questions

I have a rebuilt 194 in my 63 nova wagon with a powerglide. Not having enough power, i located a 292. I have a offy 4-barrel manifold, and havent decided on a carb. I know i have to fab up a right hand motor mount, but my question is if i can use the 194 nova oil pan on the 292? Is it deep enough to clear the 292's bigger crank? I also have a b+m 3000 holshot converter i want to put behind the 292, but is a 3000 stall to much? Can i put the 194(no siameased exhaust) head on the 292 for increased compression? what would be the compression be? Thank you.

~Travis
Leavenworth, WA

I can't answer your questions, but there is one thing you didn't mention. The 292 block is about 2 inches taller than 194, is there enough clearance for it?

Larry
63 C20 292 daily driver
68 C20 327 sound to be

I have a 230 with a 194 oil pan in my Nova. In the rear of the pan I can tell you there is not much clearance. Someone on mine used the pan to hold the rear of the engine while pulling the transmission and made the #6 rod tap the pan... I thought I had a rod bearing going out. Could not see a dent from the outside of the pan. If the 292 has a bigger swing??.. I dought the crank would clear.... but I do not know for sure.

Clyde

Yes there is enough room as far a height wise, but as far as the pan do i just need to weld in a inch for clearance on the crank?

As far as the carbs go, most likely choices for a 4 barrel on a 292 are the Holley 390 cfm 4160/#8007 or the Carter AFB 500 cfm or its E/brok clone. I ran the Holley for years on an Offy intake. Good set up. I like the AFBs because they are easy to rebuild and tune.
Since I run a pickup truck in the desert, I prefer the stock 292 oilpan due to its depth and volume. (6 quarts incl 51061 oil filter). 292s like a LOT of oil to keep clean and cool. Novas, I hear, have a unique oilpan shape, so I can't advise about either internal or subchassis clearances.
I bet Larry "Twisted 6" could answer that one.

A few years back I was into those early Novas, rebuilt the little 194 motor, running a just under 400cfm carb. Wow what a huge jump in performance with just that carb on an Offy intake. For all the trouble and mods involved, I would find a 250 (GEE ONLY 56 cubes over where you started), easy swap and no headaches, OK only a few minor headaches compared to the job of sticking the 292 under that hood. One more item re. the Nova motors, they are unique to the Nova chassis, ie. pan and oil pump. Be sure to pick up a copy of Leo's book "Chevrolet Inline Six-Cylinder Power Manual". That early Nova is a great little ride, wish I had my SS back.

I have read that book cover to cover, its a awesome book. So i guess my question is has anyone put a 292 in a early nova?


~Travis
Leavenworth, WA

I have a 63 Chevy II race car with a 292 and previously had 66 street car also with a 292.

The left motor mount from the 194 will work perfectly as is. The right side you will either need to modify the mount or the subframe adapter due to the rearward location of the 292 mount. I went to electric fuel pumps on both cars. On the 66, we used a 250 Chevy II pan (center sump) and needed to shim the motor up ~ 1/8" to clear the steering linkage. It may have been due to having dropped spindles, but I am not sure.
The race car has a truck rear sump pan and clears everything.

If you use a stock two groove balancer you should be ok length wise. I used a Fluid Dampner on the 66 and ended up with two small electric fans, one push and one pull due to clearance issues.
On the 63, cut the core support to put a big radiator in.

With a 2X4 Clifford manifold, we needed to cut and weld the adapters to the manifold so there would be enough clearance for the stock hood. With a 1x4 Clifford manifold it worked with a very thin air filter with no mods. Used Edelbrock 600's on both combinations.

Depending on mods to the motor, which tranny you are using and rear gears, the 3000 stall may or may not work. For a point of reference, my 66 had minor head work, a Clifford 264H cam, ~ 9:1 compression, a 700R4
(3.06 1st gear) and 4:10 rear and worked really well with a 2600 stall. It actually stalled at ~2300-2400.

There is always debate on the 194 vs the larger heads. If you do not want to do a lot of head work, you will probably be better off cutting the stock head to gain compression due to its better, at least stock, flow characteristics.

Good luck on the project.

hey Travis! i've got a '65 nova wagon w/ '70 250 and th350. currently running a '66 194 head. boosted my comp to around 10.3:1, and depending on exactly which chamber size yours is, should give you a little over 13:1. like Bruce said, you'd probably be better off milling the stock head. with the head swap i lost a bit of low-end torque but picked up significant power at higher rpm. think it may help a bit when i finally get the clifford intake and headers and holley 390 out of the garage and into the car. i'm just over the mountains in kent, and make trips to Leavenworth/Wenatchee fairly often, if ya ever wanna exchange thoughts/ideas. know some parts sources as well. good luck with the project!

bucky

Thanks for the response, i was going to use the stock powergilde but update it with a shift kit and turbo splines. I'm still undecided about what to do, i have this newly rebuilt 194 in the car which makes a nice runner. But a 292 with a 3000 stall converter would be a lot of fun in the wagon. How much should i shave off the 292's head to get the compression up to about 9.5 to 1?
So bucky you do any racing at Pacific Raceways? My dad and i run a rear engine dragster that does low 9's, mostly run in yakima but make it over to kent couple times a year.

~Travis
Leavenworth, WA

Once again for a reference on your compression question, propane 30 over pistons with a .030 cut on the head ended up with ~8.5 to 1.

When you get the wagon together, you should bring over to Boise Labor day weekend for the Oldies @ Firebird. We only had 8 cars in the Inliner/Flathead class, but it was a very good time.... Five out of the eight were pictured on their website.

i live 5 minutes from pacific raceway, and get out there occasionally but recently only as a spectator. last time i raced was spring 2000 at the import vs domestic drags, when i still had my 69 nova. been meaning to take the wagon out and see what it'll do (gotta be better than the novas 18.8 @ 73), but haven't really had a chance. maybe after i get the intake and exhaust done i'll get it out there this year.... only time, and $$ will tell.

bucky

Well sadly to say, due to some unexpected expensives, a 292 looks out of the question for right now. I have updated the ignition with a petronix kit and coil. So for the time being i'm going to put this offy intake on the 194. Can i put a 4 barrel on this engine or am i better of with a two barrel? Anyone have one for sale?

Thanks,
Travis
Leavenworth,WA

I ran into a guy a couple of months ago that had the 4 barrel offy and a 390 holley. He was happy with it and recomended it. He was getting about 16 MPH. It was a 194 in a 63 nova with the powerglide trans. I plan to do the same to my 230 in my 62 Nova sometime also.

Clyde

Thanks for the response. Would any edelbrock carbs work? How come a little 390 holley is so much more money then a 500 or 650?


~Travis
Leavenworth, WA

For a stock 194, an Edelbrock 500 may be too big. If that is what you will be using when you go to a 292, you do not have much to lose. Make sure you get the jet and metering rod kit, as you will definitely need to reduce the amount of fuel from the standard setting.

A decent alternative might be one of the Holley/Weber two barrels with adapter for the stock manifold. You might call Tom Langdon and ask him. He has the parts and knowledge to help..

What about a 500cfm holley two barrel?

I am not very familar with the big Holley two barrel, but I believe it is basically half of a Dominator. I would think it would be difficult to tune for a small street motor as it is not a progressive carb. Both barrels would be getting fuel at the same time.

The local circle track use them on ~260 cube inlines as they are restricted to a two barrel on a stock manifold. Of course these are light weight cars and are usually either flat out or off and driveability is not an issue.

I ran a Holley 500 on my 261, different engine, but the carb requirement is probably similar or a little less on the 261.With 68 main jets, it ran quite well,just alittle soft on low speed response and got the same gas mileage as the 500 Carter 4 bbl I had on it previously. I'm now running the rare 2305 Holley 500 cfm staged two barrel.It was originally intended for use on 2 litre racing engines, the idle circuit was way too lean, instead of drilling the idle restrictions, I used a Holley 2300 metering block, and had to increase the primary main jet to a #62 from a # 55. The 2305 staged carb power valve only feeds the primary barrel, so I plugged the other power valve channel on the 2300 metering block.Runs very well thank you, better than the properly jetted Carter 500.Restricting the power valve channel on a non staged 2300 carb will help, as at least on a 261,the old 6 doesn't seem to require as much full throttle enrichening as the 2300 was designed to provide for V-8's.A lot of guys have problems with Holleys but they are very easy to modify as compared to the Carter or Edelbrock.It's been my experience that modified 6's need carb tuning , you think it runs pretty good, a few small carb changes and it runs even better.
A Holley 500 is the front half of a 780 CFM 4bbl, 4bbls are cfm rated differently than 4 bbls,the actual conversion is around 1.4 so a 500 cfm 2bbl would be rated at around 380 cfm if it was a 4bbl.

[This message has been edited by Tony P (edited 11-22-2003).]