About DCI Motorsports Inc.
DCI Motorsports, Inc. opened its doors in 1983 and actually began as a carb shop. The principles in the business at that time were Don Johnston, his wife and partner, Cindy, his uncle John Ferguson, and his wife Seena. Soon thereafter, building carbs graduated to building engines. A few years later, Don bought out his uncle and not long after the business became dedicated to high performance Pontiacs. This progression led to designing and manufacturing engine parts, including valve covers and sheetmetal intakes, and gaining valuable experience building turbocharged, supercharged and nitrous engines.
Today, the 2,000 square foot shop caters to any Pontiac from restored 13-second stockers to 7-second chassis cars and has a faithful following in Ohio. The facility contains a SuperFlow 600 flow bench and will soon have a Stuska dyno for engine testing. As this article depicts, DCI is currently undertaking its most ambitious project, producing aluminum race heads for Pontiacs, which will be followed up with a matching intake manifold.
Customer cars in the above photo include this 428-powered, five-speed manual '68 Firebird owned by Paul Knapp that was about to leave for Power Tour. The bracket racing '75 Firebird with a 406 that runs 11.18 at 122 mph is owned by Rodney Spicer. The '81 Grand Prix with a transplanted 400 Pontiac engine belongs to Roger Roman and Don's old GP racer is on the other side. The tube chassis Bird owned by Jim Scott packs a DCI-built 455 engine, and runs 8.74 at 154 mph. -TD
Bounty Hunter
Want to earn some dough with Tiger heads? Don Johnston has put up a challenge to any customer who buys his heads. The first, to put a door slammer in the 6-second zone with his heads installed albeit with nitrous a blower or turbos, will collect a check for $5,000.
He would also like to see a normally aspirated 1,000hp engine sporting Tiger heads on the dyno. For this, there will be a money prize as well. How much has yet to be determined. Contact DCI for the official rules and restrictions regarding these two offers. -TD
A comparison of intake/intake...
A comparison of intake/intake and exhaust/exhaust show the difference between 2.25-inch and 2.11 intakes and 1.80-inch and 1.77 exhaust valves.
For durability and because...
For durability and because of the needed offsets (see next photo), a shaft rocker system will be employed. T&D will make one for you as shown here for approximately $1,300 but Don has plans of offering his own soon after the heads are released with a projected price point of under $1,000.
When you have sewer-sized...
When you have sewer-sized ports capped with manhole covers, the geometry has to change in order to bolt onto a Pontiac-style block. To that end, offset intake rockers and lifters are required. Note the difference between the intake rocker (.450-.500 offset) and lifter (offset .180-.200) on the left and the exhaust rocker and lifter, which have has zero offset on the right.
Don is flow testing the exhaust...
Don is flow testing the exhaust port. Readings were good but he realized that the exhaust extension that is bolted on to simulate a header was pointed right at the console and did affect exhaust flow. Don's brother Paul Johnston took note of the flow test data as Don flowed the port.
Here is one of the many blueprints...
Here is one of the many blueprints for the Tiger head.