Hi all,
I have a Mopar Action magazine, Aug. 1996, where they did an article on the slant six. A lot was mentioned on Doug Dutra and his work on these engines.
On page 90 they mentioned a company, T.A.P.S. (Tenessee Applied Physical Sciences) by Dale Divis. They supposedly got a streetable, 8.8:1 compression 225 engine in a 1970 Dart Swinger to record 205 net horsepower, do 80 MPH, low 17 sec. in the quarter mile, and get 27-MPG highway fuel economy. Has anybody heard of this company or its products?

Shannon

That company and their products appeared towards the end of the life of the old "Slant-6 News". The article made some tempting claims (like the ones you mention) but was very vague about the magic used to do this. The carburetor was a "specially modified" Carter AFB four barrel, if I recall, and the manifold was also "specially modified". If you ask me, the claims are more than a little improbable. I'd like to see some independent tests (NOT by the company trying to get people to buy their "special modifications") and hear some in-use reports, but I never heard a single one. Remember the Chrysler Power "Torque Plus" scam. Torque Plus was an intake manifold gasket sandwich (for V8s) with pieces of window screen in the intake port punchouts of the gasket. The company claimed (and Chrysler Power trumpeted) huge, vast increases in performance, driveability, economy, and quite possibly the taste of your morning coffee. Turns out in the end that the company was lying and Chrysler Power got caught in the lie. I don't remember if this was before or after Chrysler Power "got religion" and started being more a church bulletin than a performance magazine, but the bottom line is: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is!

DS


redbear@vrx.net

Shannon,
I called and talked with the "owner" and "head engineer" of TAPs right when "they" started advertising in the SSCA SL6 News.

I quickly realized that this was a "one man show" company with the major focus of this system being the creation of excellient fuel atomization and fuel mixture distribution. Here is how:

1) A screen was installed under the carb. to break-up big fuel droplets. (and kill some cfm flow) (good call Dan S. !)

2) The intake manifold's heat system was altered to "super-heat" the intake to help encourage more mixture vaporzation.

3) The carb's jetting was "maximized". (and the accelerator pump "shot" was minimized) The owner viewed this as "Proprietary Info", top secret, would have to kill ya if I told ya stuff)

4) I also had some indication that the carb's position on the manifold was also changed but here again, it was "top secret".

I do not know if this person is still around and don't get me wrong, finding a great working combo. of parts is valuble. (has value) My personal view is to try to share this type of info. rather then try to make a buck off it.

Hey it is a free country and I am all for free enterprise but "buyer beware" also applies, there is no "black magic" here. (I have pulled 28-32 MPG. out of Slants before (so has Ma Mopar) but you sure don't get that while running 13's (205 HP) at the dragstrip) You always need a cretain amount of fuel to make a certain level of HP, it's called physics. A good computer controled EFI system will yield equal or even better results.
DD

Shortly after the T.A.P.S ad appeared in the Slant Six News I called and spoke with Dale Davis. He wouldn't give me any information on the modifications in his carburetor. Quite frankly that was enough for me to say "goodbye". However, just out of curiosity I asked whether I would get the information if I bought his modified carburetor. The answer was still no. I think the price back then (at least ten years ago) was $550. I'd be surprised if he ever sold any.

Bob D



BBobbias@aol.com

yeah, I think I'll stick to what I know will work and be reliable; Electronic fuel injection and overdrive transmission. I've seen several,super heat the gas and air mixture type fuel systems for tremendous gas mileage increases. Don't want anything to do with these systems. One recent system that got a lot of people believing was a complete scam. I got caught up in it myself but got out real fast. Others didn't and lost a lot of money and time for their efforts.

Shannon

Doug is absolutely right. You can achieve those kind of results with EFI and a little finessing. My wife's 3.8L bonneville makes 195 hp and easily gets 28mpg highway. My 4.1L (250) Ford six makes roughly 200 hp and get 25-26 mpg highway. EFI and OD makes it a lot easier. But there's no "magic bullet" carb that will just bolt on to get those results.

MustangSix EFI Crossflow page
mustangsix@fordsix.com

1) A screen was installed under the carb. to break-up big fuel droplets. (and kill some cfm flow) (good call Dan S. !)

2) The intake manifold's heat system was altered to "super-heat" the intake to help encourage more mixture vaporzation.

3) The carb's jetting was "maximized". (and the accelerator pump "shot" was minimized) The owner viewed this as "Proprietary Info", top secret, would have to kill ya if I told ya stuff)

Basically, these are the kind of things I've done to my 80 Aspen. I installed two fine mesh screens and a fab'd aluminum heated (coolant) spacer under the carb. This did kill some power, but significantly improved driveability (especially in cold weather) and fuel mileage. I was averaging about 20 mpg with a best of about 23 mpg before I leaned my jetting from #65s to #63s. I've yet to determine my fuel mileage with this jetting. This is with a 1bbl, lockup 904 and 2.9x(?) rear.

Mitch

mb589@aol.com

Quite a few years ago, back around '94 or '95, I had ordered a few older back issues of Mopar Collector's Guide magazine, and it just so happened that one of them was the April 1992 issue. I have it right here beside my computer now. The /6 4 bbl kit from this Davis guy is on pages 46 and 47. At the time, I thought it was pretty cool, and had called to ask about it, even though I knew I had no cash for it. The guy had a bit of an attitude, so I probably wouldn't have bought it even if I could have afforded it. But I noticed in the copy of his ad on page 47, the words "UP TO" are included in front of each claim. He makes no mention of cams bigger than the 244 MP (which is NOT even a medium size cam), no head work, and no exhaust system work. As anyone who has ever done work on a /6 head knows, the stock ports are just plain SAD. Too small and WAY too restrictive.

My 3330 pound '71 valiant has run 16.3 @ 84 with a built up /6. Using the weight/speed in 1/4 mile chart in the MP engines book as my conversion standard (shows NET hp), I have 168 NET hp in the engine right now. That's with cam, compression (9:1), carb, and headers with 3.21 gears. Any car like it running only low 17's at 80 is not putting out 205 hp. More like 143 according to the MP chart for a 3330 pound car.

In any case, I've never heard a thing about this guy since that article, so I can only assume he's out of business. And I'd be surprised if he sold more than 5 kits.

In the Mopar Action article, it mentions that /6 main bearings are 440 size. BUT, since the /6 was designed about 5 years BEFORE the 440, wouldn't it be correct to say that the 440 has /6 main bearing sizes?!?!