big chevy connecting rod reccomendation

[David Vizard]

Since I never (like 99% of us) have as big a budget as I would like by a long shot I try never to put a part in an engine that is gross overkill.

The Scat rod shown below is one of their budget rods.

This was in my Caribbean crew chief's 496BBC dragster before it escaped out through the side of the block.

Motor is fed on nitrous and as such makes about 1300 hp. These rods have seen 6 seasons racing in the islands. In over 200 competitive passes it has not lost a round.
Rev limit is 7700 rpm.

As you can see even with a catastrophic block failure the rod survived.

I am sure there will be some who have contradictory experiences but for me these rods have done sterling duty and are not that much in cost. If you have had any of these rods fail let me know so I can add your experiences to my data bank.

At the shop here we are slowly putting together a 540 build with mostly parts left over from my BBC books. We are targeting 1000 hp on the motor and about 300 more with the N2O in action. This build will be using these low buck Scat rods.

BTW all this is going into a 2400 lb Vega.
DV

[Dan Timberlake]

Hi David,

"it escaped out through the side of the block."
I'm thinking the scoliotic rod in the picture may have been in that broken engine, but was probably not THE rod that actually perforated the block.

Am I close?

regards,

Dan T

[stealth]

I’m sure if we could run the numbers the statistics would show that “budget” Eagle/Scat H beams have been in more engines by a VERY wide margin over Premium rod manufactures.

Used by pretty much all of the custom engine shops with thousands of success stores.
Used in lower budge builds that typically do not get the TLC in engine prep as expensive builds
Used in these applications were a “good tune-up” is usually not optimized i.e. No dyno time, power adders not fully developed, detonation, etc…
Generally beat on with reckless disregard by up-and-comers in every form of racing.

Sooo…. I’d say these “budget” Rods have earned some street cred… and respect.

[Mark O'Neal]

I've sold over 100,000 sets of "budget" rods over the past 30 years.....and I don't see them break any more often than I do premium rods, and I'm still waiting for someone to show me the giant pile of broke "budget" cranks and rods that broke as a result of the part, not the assembler or tuner...or (God forbid) the driver.

Had it not been for these parts, this industry would have been a lot smaller than it has been since the lat 1980's. This has put a lot of Americans to work, making available to racers at lot of stuff that I never even dreamed about when I was a kid.

[needforspeed66gt]

My 2 cents.

The Molnar rods with ARP 2000 bolts will give you all the comfort you need on a well built short block and a good top end.

You cannot do better than Tom's rods for the price - I've never had to resize a set out of the box, and they hold dimension when you torque cycle them. He has the design and manufacturing process down pat.