(#701) Sheet Metal Intake Vs. Cast Intake: A Cautionary Tale

 

The Bruder bothers race in the X275 class. They dominated that class so much that the losers looked for a reason and they concluded that the sheet metal intake that the Bruders were using gave them an unfair advantage. They petitioned the race organizers to ban not only this intake but all sheet metal intakes and stipulate that only cast intakes would be allowed, which the organizers did.

 

Below is the old sheet metal intake made for the Bruders by John Marcella of Marcella Manifolds.

 

 

clic on pic to enlarge

 

So the Bruders contacted Marcella again to build them a cast intake. This is the new cast intake for the Bruder's SBF.

 

 

 

But guess what? The Bruder's X275 car still ran just as fast. Well, didn't this catch John Marcella with his pants down. Marcella now had to justify his very expensive sheet metal manifolds. He did this, in part, by saying that the new cast manifold was modified in such a way  so as to make it a cutting edge manifold. Although, from what I can determine, the Marcella cast intake was simply port matched (a good but old school practice) and he moved the carb flange a little to the rear (to what advantage, I am unsure).

However, Marcella still had a problem: how could he convince his customers to pony up a lot of money if a port matched off-the-shelf cast manifold delivered the goods? The solution: he said that the cast manifold may work but it was ugly - and who wants ugly?

So, behold the beautiful cast intake.

 

 

And a beauty it is. I would pay a lot of money for this work of art. But, make no mistake, one would be paying for beauty not for increased performance.

 

All of this begs a question: What information convinced the Bruders to buy the original sheet metal intake in the first place since it has proven to be no better than a port matched cast intake?

 

The story of the Bruder's intake adventure is a cautionary tale.