How Blackbird Performance Turned a 'Poor Man's Demon' into a 900+ HP Gen 3 Hemi Race Car
Mike Helman’s G3 Hemi powered dream began life as a potent 6.4l 1320 Challenger. Long before we met him, he had begun its transformation into the ‘Poor Man’s Demon’. With numerous upgrades, including a very capable Whipple 3.0l, he was well into the full race car journey with the car when it arrived.
He brought us the car late September last year to complete several steps in making it a faster, more consistent and easier to tune race car. These changes included a Sipple upgraded transmission and torque converter, upgrading the engine with a number of changes including forged internals and after some careful consideration of late, and in an effort to make it more simply tunable, a Holley Dominator tied into the remaining factory electronics with a B3R Bridge Module.
Mike has been in incredibly patient with us as the projects ahead of him in our shop grew in scope and consumed far more resources than initially envisioned, delaying his.
Well today, we got back on it, and after the engine upgrades to forged internals, Blackbird Performance Race Prep ported heads, a Blackbird Performance Mach 2 cam, and selected tweaks here and there, we put his reassembled, by the always awesome, Ben the Builder, engine on the dyno today to check it out and begin tuning it up.
Keep in mind, he wanted the next step forward, not a giant leap, so we kept the blower spinning slow, the tune up incredibly safe and gave it a few pulls on the dyno to insure all was well. His slightly lightened Challenger had previously run 10.4s @ 134 and with now over 900 real horsepower under the loud pedal, mid 9s should be within reach.
You gotta love G3 Hemi’s, on 6-7 psi of boost, running the Whipple just over half speed, and making over 900+ HP.
We have yet another engine to test tomorrow and then it’s high time to get this thing back to the shop, back in the car, add it’s Holley augmented brain, and then back to the track to make the next leg in Mike’s G3 Hemi powered dream a reality.
A big thanks to him for his patience and trusting us with his Poor Man’s Demon.
