As 1970 approached, manufacturers were building high-horsepower engines as if they were preparing for war. Ford and Chrysler were at war with each other on the drag strips and the NASCAR high-banked ovals, with each trying to out-do the other in both power and aerodynamics (see also: “Aero Wars”.) Cadillac and Lincoln were striving to produce the largest torque wave necessary for that kind of luxurious shove that well-heeled buyers wanted. Even dowdy old AMC was getting in on the action.
GM was competitive, but in a strange way. The company at large had been trying to stay restrained in the face of the power escalation and had kept their heaviest hitters restrained to speciality items (think the “Swiss Cheese” Catalinas and any COPO-ordered machinery). The 400-cubic-inch engine limit for the intermediate lines didn’t help matters.
For 1970, any pretense of restraint would disappear. Chevrolet’s 454 joined Buick, Oldsmobile and Pontiac’s 455 in a full-frontal assault against the world, and even Cadillac offered 400 horsepower and 550 ft-lb of torque from the 500ci V8.
But for everything they legitimately sold, there were still restraint within the General’s walls. For example, there was never an LS6 Camaro for 1970. This combination is another never-seen item: the Pontiac Ram Air V cylinder head. The shortest explanation possible: John Z. DeLorean’s brother, George, was a sponsored Ford drag racer who happened to pick up on the Tunnel-Port heads for the 302. Somehow, those heads managed to make it into a Pontiac engineering lab and in short time, you have a cylinder head with sewer-sized intake ports that flowed like nothing else in the inventory.
Finding any factory Ram Air V parts from those days is like finding the jewel the old lady tossed at the Titanic in the movie. And building one is possible, as DCI Motorsports produces a recreation of the Ram Air V head, but there is a lot more to worry about than a simple head swap. That being said, now you can see one making pulls on the dyno. This 400-based 461-cubic-inch Pontiac was built to go into the 1970 GTO of Evan Perkins, Hemmings’ Director of Digital Content, and before it gets the chance for Pontiac fans something to think about at shows, he threw it on the Westech dyno to see how well the one-of-none engine runs.
We won’t give away the numbers. Just trust us: if a 1970 GTO can’t move with this engine, nothing will.