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CADDY TIPS

crowhater

crowhater

Well-known member
Guys I am no expert but I have learned a few tricks if you are interested.

A direct drive Caddy will make more torque with the stock intake. If you take a 1" carb spacer and divide the two sides it is good for another 50 RPM.

If you spray the inside of your transome on a aluninum boat with undercoating you will reduce the noise on your boat. You can buy spray undercoating at most auto parts stores.

Switching from the heavy cast crank pully to the stamped steel pully will give your caddy motor more snap.

I made my rear motor mounts with 3/4" all thread on my direct drive boat and this allows you to adjust your boat quickly. during duck season I run heavy and need a little more lift but come summer I can adjust the boat for running ligher by lowering the motor with a quick turn.

you can pick up speed and lower your drag by spraying your polly with BLACK BEAUTY tire spray.

If you put a freeze plug in the hole under your water neck on a caddy instead of running a thermostat it will flow more water to the back two cylinders.

Caddy motors collect water on the top of the vally pan from condinsation. I drilled throught the intake and installed a breather to solve this problem. I also painted the valley part of the intake pan to fight any rust.

The distributer on Caddys will get water in them if they have a vacum advance that is not sealed. the water will run drain down the shaft and get in your motor. I drilled a small hole in the low side of the bottom of the distributer to fix this problem.

please share any tricks you might know because us guys in Texas do not have as many people to learn from.
 
For anyone thinking of changing a Caddy from a direct drive to a Stinger Gear box. Do it now!! You will be amazed. I got a deal from Waterthunder for a 2.38/1 soft drive. Some things to consider is it raised my engine about 4 inches and I had to move it forward about 4 inches. The forward was a piece of cake. But I had to raise my cage to compensate for the change in height. It was just easier to go that route instead of lowering the engine stand.

Thanks to WT and Ruagatr for putting up with me.
 
boblee74":ox6tacxl said:
I made my rear motor mounts with 3/4" all thread on my direct drive boat and this allows you to adjust your boat quickly.
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Can you post pictures?
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I sold that boat but I will see if I can find a picture. The way it worked is like this. I shortened the back stand and ran the 3/4" all thread through the stand like a normal boat with a polly washer and nut on both sides. Then you put the direct drive bellhousing mounts on your all thread with a nut under them and over them, don't froget your polly washers. Now you can adjust your motor up or down by lowering or raising the nut and then lock it tight with the other nut. You will have about an inch of exsposed (3/4" ALL THREAD) between the nut on the top side of the engine stand and the nut that is on the under side of the bellhousing mount. I hop ethis explains it.
 
WHAT IS THE MOUNTING DIFERENCE BTWEEN A 472 AND A SB 350.
 
Ted
The Caddy motor was a little wider then the SBC. I converted my direct drive engine stand from a SBC to a 500 Caddy. To tell you the truth it was pretty easy and we had about 4 hours and a case of beer invested in doing it. If you Pm me with your email address I can send you some pictures of the stand after I converted it and before it was painted.
 
Ok I know this has been on before but what is the weight on a cady 500-472 compared to a small block chevy with cast heads.
 
caddy's are not just heavy cast iron it has alot of nickel content in the castings which makes it lighter.
 
Ted":1mjyreuq said:
That just seams to light for a big block.
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Ted,
I have no reason to lie to you. A cadillac motor is not a SBC or a BBC. The heads are not as heavy and if you wanted you could shave 50lbs off the crank. Potter machined a Caddy crank down to 27lbs if I am correct. The block can be bored more then 100 over. Bottom line the motor are cheap, easy to find and make tons of torque. Unlike the old day there are more people making performance parts and the cost of these parts is dropping. I paid around 7K for my motor and it will spank a 502 and even though many will call me lier it will out perform a 572. I must admit that when it comes to power / weight ratio the Waterthunder motor are real nice. If we could get Potter to make Caddy blocks out of Aluninum I think we would have the perfect airboat motor.
 
Um :roll: You can try this yourself but! :wink: http://www.mesteel.com/info/carbon/conv ... tor_kg.htm

They list 13 types of nickel and they were all heavier than cast iron. I used 1" round by 100" long to get a larger number. Looks like 10 to 20% heavier so I suspect that they can use thinner castings with the additional nickel content. I know 10% nickel small block sure wear better.
 
Lets use some real information here. Cadillac 500 cranks weigh 74lbs. The most anyone has taken off one is right at 20 lbs. Mine is 18 lbs lighter than stock. If you go to Cadillacpower.com, a member weighed all the parts for a sbc and a cadillac. The cadillac, in similar trim, weighs 110lbs more. When you start shaving parts for aluminum intakes etc, it gets closer to 60 lbs.

Charles
 
Cowhater no offense I just a little take by the results. I was never into cads. I was building Fords and Chevy SB for the road off road. Now i own an air boat. Wish i would started along time ago- but glad i didn't i was to wild when i was younger.
 
Ruagatr":1ov66v88 said:
Lets use some real information here. Cadillac 500 cranks weigh 74lbs. The most anyone has taken off one is right at 20 lbs. Mine is 18 lbs lighter than stock. If you go to Cadillacpower.com, a member weighed all the parts for a sbc and a cadillac. The cadillac, in similar trim, weighs 110lbs more. When you start shaving parts for aluminum intakes etc, it gets closer to 60 lbs.

Charles
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Well the hotrod article about the 507 Potter motor is wrong and Potter is not telling the truth then. I have it on my desk and it reads that he cut the crank weight below that number. I have not seen the crank on a scale so I could be incorrect .
 
The lightest SBC crank forging I have ever seen was a 302 crank that weighed 38 pounds

It's hard to see a Cad crank being 27...are they cast or forged>?
 
The crank for the EMC was billet custom, therefore I was able to trim more off of it w/o hurting the integrity of the crank. 18 to 20 lbs is all I'd cut off a stocker for sure. It takes about 6 to 7 days of pure hell to do it.
 
Cadillac Performance Pts.":1r13px1s said:
The crank for the EMC was billet custom, therefore I was able to trim more off of it w/o hurting the integrity of the crank. 18 to 20 lbs is all I'd cut off a stocker for sure. It takes about 6 to 7 days of pure hell to do it.
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Sorry, Richard I should not have spoken for you. I thought you turned down a stock crank. I will buy that turned down crank from you for a case of beer if you install it for free. :D
 
Ok so i gather were saying 100 lb heavier with a cast intake. I trying to see if a cad motor will work for this hull. I only looking at stock motors i not building a new one.
 
Ted--you are correct. With the Edelbrock, it is within about 60 pounds....but it will push twice as hard.

Charles
 
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