degreeing cam shafts (real hidden HP)

[wheatlandbrawler]

well as some of you might have noticed by my build i am a do it your selfer, all the way down to my engine and trans builds. when i built my first engine i did the age old line up your marks at top dead center bolt it togeather and go.... man was i wrong. after an afternoon of hanging out at A.E.M. the local race shop. and dyno spot a guy took in a circle burner engine that he built at home but wanted to see the numbers it was layin down. it was your standard circle burner claimer engine, nothing really fancy. so they fire it up for its first pull, and the thing was huffin just to make 386hp..... so imidiately everyone goes into trouble shooting mode... they go in pull the valve covers off, and distributor pull out the timing light and go to checking everything over. everything within reach seems to be fine. they button it up and make another pull this time with a little more timing in it..... it started detonating and made 372hp. so not only is this guy sweating a little bit but the shop owner is a little confused. so he asks what would prove to be the question of all questions. "did you degree your cam shaft in?" and the guy said no.

(remind you i have never degreed mine in either) so they got out the degree wheel a dial indicator and piston stop with a calculator and got it degreed in according to the cam card.

they made a pull after degreeing the cam in and it yeilded huge results i was simply amazed. it went from making 386hp to 447hp this was after feeding it some timing through out the pulls as well but i was amazed. i imediately went home and bought a degree wheel.

so i got my cam degreed in now. its so much easier then it looks. so i recomend doing it if you havnt!