63Banshee

What are your thoughts good, bad, or indifferent?

Crash Dummy

Dave,

There are a few members running AR engines... maybe they will pipe in. I'm installing one of their 355CI/Dart head engines this weekend, but it will still be a week or two before I can fire it up as I still have to send this thing off to a muffler shop to route the sidepipes to the new headers. I can tell you that I have gotten really good support up to this point as I have probably popped 12-15 e-mails to Mark asking everything I can think of to get everything set up right before I do start it. He's given me everthing from timing advance, initial start-up recommendations, header sizes to maximize HP, distributor information, plug gap, break-in period and help with a stripped bolt hole I found in the waterpump area. Most... if not all... are reconditioned SBC blocks(mine came out of a '72 Z-28 Camaro), so I guess they missed it. Not a real problem as he gave me the depth I could drill in and heli-coil the hole. A great looking engine... I guess we will see what happens from here on out. Like a few others, I do plan on putting this vette on the strip, so obviously I'll be slinging the rods around enough to get a good idea how good of work they do. Everything that I see in the engine it is built to do it though.

GrandSportC3

You've probably read about my experience in the other thread... I'm a completely satisfied customer.. with both - quality of their eingine and customer support.. Mark is great!!

GrandSportC3

Another great thing is that the advertised horsepower is not just a bogus number... After dyno testing the car - it dynoed at approx. 365 RWHP.. and the peak HP hasn't even been reached... The engine has never been professionally tuned.. A good dyno tuning usually adds another 15 - 20 HP...
Assuming a 20% drivetrain loss - the power is very close to the number that they've advertised...

tshort

I too have bought from AR but still haven't received my engine yet. Should be here next week or so. I have been very pleased with their customer support and Mark's willingness to sell me the right engine for my needs and answer my numerous emails and phone calls.

63Banshee

How long have you been waiting?

tshort

Well, it's kind of a long story. When I first ordered back in December they said they were running way behind and that it would take about 3 weeks before they could ship it out. That was cool. 2 1/2 weeks went by and I asked them if they could put on a different intake, and add a flywheel. The engine was actually already built but just waiting on shipping. Mark said no problem and it took him a while to find the intake I was wanting. I then saw a new motor they had advertised on Ebay with the new Edelbrock E-TEC heads and asked about it. It sounded much better and I asked if they could build one of those for me instead. Once again he had no problems with doing that. Well a few weeks later he called me and said they were having quality problems with the heads from Edelbrock and asked if I wanted to wait it out or go with the original engine I had planned. I said wait because this was just before I was going to Africa for work and wouldn't be back for over a month. Well, I just got back and Edelbrock still hasn't gotten the head problem fixed so I asked Mark to just build and send the original engine we talked about.
Mark could have just sent me the E-TEC engine untested like a lot of other places will do and I would have been very dissapointed. I like his honesty and I don't mind waiting if it's for good reasons....and most of them my fault :D
Mine should be shipping out this week.

mpro71vette

I bought one of their engines too, Mark is great! Before I bought the engine I was sending emails left and right asking questions, he answered them all and I'm not talking taking a couple of days to answer, he did it wth in the hour. I sent him an email this morning because I am having trouble installing the pilot bushing, answered me with in a hour and gave me some ideas! He knows how to sell them, knows how to back his engines up and builds very high quality!

Captain_Kaboom

I called the guys at Maxhorsepower.com right before New Years. They have discontinued the engines you see listed on their webpage.

I bought a 240 HP crate longblock from http://www.rebuiltcarengines.com. Engines are definately a bit milder, but it came with a 3 year/unimited mile warranty, parts and labor. Good 'nuff for my daily driver, I can add HP later!

63Banshee

Right now Golen is leading the pack. I'm making my mind up by tomorrow.

88'Cubka

Does AR Racing have a website? Could someone please post it if they do? Thanks!

GrandSportC3

http://www.maxhorsepower.com/

However - they don't have the racing engines on their website.. They only advertise their HP engines on Ebay...

63Banshee

http://www.maxhorsepower.com