FE-FC Holden Discussion Forum

gidday,

    have had my ute for almost two years and am looking at spucing her up a bit. not sure which way to go either hot up 138 or progress to another 6(179 or 202). any ideas on how much to do the 138 and options which may be better eg supercharging.

     still running on 4 drums need to upgrade these,any hints, tips or advice would be appreciated .  

 ;)Its much harder to hot up a grey as there arent as many aftermarket bits you can buy off the shelf,its not my prefrence but if your going to upgrade the brakes to hr disc brake front you might as well drop in a good red as its much easier if you have done the front end first!!but remember if you upgrade the grey to a red you will have to change gearboxs as well and you will need to change the diff ratio as well and a whole heap of other stuff like rear wheel cylinders ,exhaust,booster,so on and so on!!its not just as easy as throwing in a red!!think of this before you go down that road as it will be costly,especialy if you have to pay some one else to do the work,talk to plenty of blokes who have done it before,if need be join a car club!!thats my 2 bobs worth!!cheers jamie ;)

A stock 132/138 has about 60-70HP, a standard 149 has 100HP, and onward and upward from there.

If you modify a grey you can get the 100HP to match a stock 149 reasonably easily through some better breathing but you will be stuck with a weak bottom end and an ever shortening parts supply. If you want to add a supercharger to a grey you'll need to spend dollars on engine internals and cross your fingers every time you drive it hoping that the crankshaft doesn't blow to pieces. And at the end you'll still only have say 160hp, maybe 200hp, about the same as a decent 202 with some basic breathing improvements.

The question is, do you want to keep it original or not, because Jamie is spot on, once you put the red in it, lots of other changes will need to take place, including floor mods to suit the required gearbox change.

These vehicles are far from from race cars anyway,  so IMHO its not that sensible or rewarding to attempt to make them into one. Its different if you go the whole hog with V8's etc etc, but remember that once your 100HP grey powered FC gets blown off at the lights by a baseball cap wearing Hyundia driver you might think again about the value of originality.....

Anyway, just my thoughts, and you asked for peoples input ;-)


Cheers,

Craig.

maybe you should talk to tate engineering about a brock style grey motor, brock says the power to weight ratio in his new grey powered holden is simular to a xu-1 and it still has stock rocker gear on top, it also looks very period under the bonnet and is built to run over 6000rpm all day.
It should give you enough power to turn that hyundai drivers cap back around the right way.
anyway, how much were you going to spend.

Spot on Leon, an XU1 that Brock is referring to has a power output of 160 to 190hp ex factory, and an XU1 weighs almost the same as an FE/FC (1070kgs for the XU1, not sure on FX/FJ shape, but would be similar). And there is the point, if you modify a grey to get that amount of power how much would it cost?

Doesn't that engine use a Vauxhaul crank? Modifying the block/crank to suit wouldn't be cheap, say $6K or more? Plus special exhaust, carby work etc etc. Expensive way to get a couple of hundred horsepower.

And to get somewhere between 160 and 190hp. Still doesn't make sense to me, but each to their own and good luck to blokes who have a go and modify the greys.

If they had the choice would they have left the grey in Brocks Holden?

Interesting discussion anyway.

Cheers,

Craig.

hmm, a grey @ 6500rpm with a big open exhaust could be hard for some to choose over any other, may not be the most powerfull but looks like a lot of fun.

thanks for all the ideas there is certainly a great deal of options im hoping to have initial budget of 15 - $20000 to spend which to some sounds like a lot seems like a lot to me but considering quote i got for paint the other day for $10 - $12000, $10 being that i pull it all apart and put it back together $20000 doesnt quite cut the mustard.

much thought and listening to those in the know is needed. thanks, i welcome any input, brock grey does sound interesting

well another option surfaced, buy another ute which i did,its rats airforce ute. 8) cant wait for it to arrive,probably next wednesday.
can someone help me find info on red 149 motors what mods available etc... i did type in the search function could not find a link probably having a boy look as my wife would say. any help appreciated