Welcome to CHR! We’re a bunch of hot rod guy and gals who really do like to share what we know about the great sport of hot roddin! There are some extremely knowledgeable big block builders on this site with Pat and Jerry coming to mind as two of the best in the country. Hopefully they’ll chime in soon and give you advice based on their real world experience. Listen to them as they’ve covered every possible combination of build from budget to mega-bucks.

It would help us to know a bit more about what you have in mind. Racing means different things to different people. Do you intend to drag race, boat race, hill climb, in the mud or something else? Will you ever run this car on the street? Do you already own a vehicle that you’re intending to use?

We typically like to start at the rearend and work forward in terms of gears, transmission, stall converter and of course the weight of weight of the car. If you’ve not built an engine from scratch, you be wise to buy a couple books and read the cover-to-cover. One like this from Amazon would be a good place to start: http://www.amazon.com/Big-Block-Chev.../dp/1557884846 – it is twenty bucks well spent.

Speaking of money – you’ll find out very quickly that big horsepower is tied to big dollars. When someone on this site suggests a high quality part, you may wince at the cost associated with it but remember they’ll be speaking from experience. Your initial post indicates that you really need to learn more than, “… a few things…” and you need to know that the “…technical stuff…” is the most critical part of this venture unless you just want to spend a ton of money and end up with a huge doorstop. I certainly am not trying to discourage you and please don’t think me to be picking on you – but your project needs a lot of forethought and planning to be successful and no one here ever wants to hear the stories about thrashed engines due to lack of knowledge in assembly. It’s real easy to spend $10 or more per horsepower up to five hundred horses and then it can get astronomically expensive to increase horsepower properly.

So tell us what you what your car is and what your goals are and we’ll jump with more suggestions.

Again, welcome to CHR!
Glenn