C'mon, Jim. If cost equations ever entered into the discussion, none of us would bother with old cars and certainly not Packards.
It's just an interesting technical exercise to discover what makes an old straight eight go a bit faster.
I do agree with most of your summation, but strongly disagree with:
Quote:
These are fairly low (~8:1?)compression to begin with, so I wouldn't worry about the head issues. You won't see pre-ignition or detonation until much higher and partly an octane issue.
Flatheads absolutely begin to have pinging/pre-ignition/detonation problems when compression ratios go above 8:1. Just ask anyone who has extensive experience with the '54 359" with 8.7 compression. The large surface area has too many corners and dead spots. That's also the reason flatheads can't tolerate much ignition advance.
jack vines
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