Back in high school, I had my 67 Firebird as a daily driver. When I bought the car for $1500.00, but it needed alot of work. Well, my folks wouldn't let me register or drive the car untill the body work and paint was done. They figured that once I'd put that much time and money into the car, I wouldn't go out and do somethign really stupid in it. Well, after a year of my work and the bodymans work, the car was done. The first night out cruising in the car the engine seized. Well out came that 400 and I found a 400 from a 197 Catalina in a junkyard for $100.00. We took it hime, cleaned the sludge off the outside, stuck a Comp Cams 292 cam and lifters in it. The engine that came with the car had roller rockers and a Holley 650 speradbore carb on it, so we reused them with a stock cast iron intake, the 3 tube headers that came on the car, and the famous "Saturday Night Special" 2000 stall converter. I had like $350.00 in that engine. Cheap gasket set form Nationwise. That car actually ran pretty strong from about 2500rpm up to about 5000rpm, smoking like a freight train from worn rings, but hey it was running adn sounded good thru the Cherry Bomb header mufflers

(hey, I was 17). With the open 2.56 rear end, cheap white letter radials, and ALOT of tire spin, that engine ran a best of 9.75 1/8th mile. Our timing system didn't give a mph, just an ET. I know, that's a low 15 second car, but for a cheap drivetrain, I figured that was ok. I was sure a posi and 4.10's would have dropped that car down into the 8 second range, especially with the used up circle track slicks we could get from local racers for free! Found out later, that's how they saved the disposal fees, left it up to us to dispose of them. Sad part was, that was among the fastest cars on the street in my hometown back in the day. There was a 71 Challenger with a 440 and everything fiberglas possible, and a 350 Monza with 4.56's that were the elite, but man, remember how fast we thought we were back then?