And forged rods do break around 600hp I've found.....
This is what needs to change.
It's not the horsepower, it's the torque.
PMR's are supposed to break around 400hp or less. So why am I still running a PMR motor near 500 hp for well over 2 years?
Let me give you guys a scenario that actually happened the day I dyno'ed my truck.
I threw my truck on the rollers, saw the HP number, and my jaw dropped. Everything I had ever been told about PMR's ran through my mind. I was amazed my motor was still alive.
Then a few trucks later, another guy runs 1hp higher than my truck, but WELL over 100 ft/lbs of torque. At that point it became crystal clear (unlike the smoke out of his tailpipe).
He was running injectors "capable" of that power, but he had 1) smaller nozzles, and 2) far more low RPM fueling. Those two combined gave him really no increase in HP, but a huge jump in torque...... simply because of the amount of fuel he was getting in the lower RPM range.
In case anyone was wondering, he was running 238/100's. I was running 250/200's.
Now if I ran the same HP and gobs more torque, would my wimpy PMR motor survive? Who really knows. However, the higher that torque number goes, the less chance there is of it living.
If I was really shooting for torque, I could have easily given it a ton more fuel at lower RPM's. That would have brought my peak torque at a much lower RPM. I would have blown that guy away on the dyno.
But here's the key.... I would have achieved that at a sacrifice of much more fueling at lower RPM's, resulting in much higher cylinder pressures. That's what kills engines, folks.
Those of you worried about stock PMR's, or stock bottom ends.... know this: keep the bottom-end fueling in check. Those torque numbers are for show, and nothing else. If you really want a motor to perform, and live at the same time.... keep that low RPM fueling dialed waaaaaaaaaaaaay back.
Of course there is absolutely ZERO guarantee of any motor living beyond the factory calibrations. I'm simply pointing out the obvious here regarding performance modifications with fueling and cylinder pressures. Keep CP's in check, and the easiest way to diagnose that is to see what kind of torque numbers you're putting up. More torque = higher cylinder pressures. Period.