Photo by Todd Dziadosz

A phone call on Thursday morning to our good friend Wild Bill Devine revealed that he’s got lots of changes in store for the 2013 racing season. As one of the legends in door car racing, Devine has seen and done it all, from helping to pioneer the Pro 5.0 category back in the early 90’s with his famous white Mustang GT to his recent exploits with the ADRL and other outlaw sanctions in his 2001 Racecraft-built, 10.5-style Mustang. As the sales and marketing manager for Bullseye Power Turbochargers, Devine has his pulse on the racing industry and counts many friends among his competition.

His Mustang has been the only 8.2-deck small-block Ford powered machine to even compete in these categories, but for 2013, Devine’s stepping up his program. The car will compete for 2013 in the X-DRL, Donald Long’s races, and possibly even some NMCA action, although Devine feels that it’s hard on parts running the quarter-mile at the elevated speeds his car is capable of.

Last season, Devine ran into issues with the 8.2 engine after breaking a crankshaft towards the end of the season, and that got him thinking about making the change. “I’ve been running that crankshaft for years – I actually purchased it from the late Racin’ Jason Betwarda years and years ago. The decision to move up came after realizing that 8.2-style crankshafts to hold up to the power level I expect to make are basically unavailable anymore, so after a lot of consideration and research, I’ve decided to forgo the 8.2 deck engine that’s served me so well and move up to this 9.5-deck block.

“I purchased the aluminum Fontana block, fully machined, from Eric Dillard at ProLine Racing, and friend Ronnie Crawford has performed the assembly work down here in Florida. Dale Metlika at Pro Power sourced the GRP connecting rods, and one of my sponsors, Diamond Pistons, supplied their latest-technology pistons for me to use. Mark Eckmann from CarSafe has been a huge help to getting the car to its current state – without that help I wouldn’t be able to compete. Mary and Errol at TPS in Florida have been a huge help. Errol helps with the tuning and has done all of the fabrication work to adjust the plumbing for the larger-deck engine, plus he’s the one who piped it when I originally switched over to methanol.

“Tito Chassis did the fuel cell and carbon-fiber work, and if you can believe it, we do almost all of the work here at home in my one-and-a-half-car garage. And without my awesome wife, Cheryl, who has supported my addiction for all these years, where would I be?” he said.

Bill’s new engine will displace 438 cubic inches and will carry the same Visner Engine Development Yates-style cylinder heads and custom sheetmetal manifold that was atop the 8.2 bullet, and he expects to make substantially more horsepower with the new combination. Since the old setup ran an astounding 4.14 at 179.99 MPH, Devine is excited to see what it will do with the new setup. The car will be running a set of Bullseye Power’s 83mm “BatMo” turbochargers in the nose (instead of the 80’s it ran before), relies on alcohol for fuel, and Devine is one of the only competitors to continue racing with a Liberty’s Gears 5-speed transmission.

We were curious, when all of his competition seems to have switched to converter-driven transmissions over the last couple of years, why he’s stuck with the 5-speed. He explained, “Number one, it’s a big challenge that a lot of guys don’t want to take on because they don’t want to do the work associated with making it run properly. It separates me from all of the other cars. Number two, I believe that because the car always stays in the power band, you’re more in control. You also have the ability to grab a gear early to correct an unforeseen problem, while normally the chassis doesn’t unload because the car stays in the powerband going down the track.

“After running plenty of fast cars over the years, including Powerglide cars, I’ve found that automatics just aren’t as consistent on the track. I’ve learned that the stick is much less likely to get upset on the track than an automatic car is. It’s always under load – and I stick with this for the same reason Pro Stock does. In my opinion, no converter car will run with a stick car given the same combination. I think it’s safer, and driving an automatic car with a transbrake is no challenge at all. If I had an automatic car, I probably wouldn’t race. It’s not easy, and that’s why I like it. It’s always a challenge.”