: How much hands-on work do you do on engines at your shop?
Fulton: I do as much as anybody there. I have to; I mean, that’s the success of my business, the fact that I have been hands on. You can’t just let that stuff go, it ain’t going to take care of itself. I’ve always raced where I’m small. I mean, I ain’t like Hendricks or any of those NASCAR guys and even some of the people in Pro Stock. They’ve got a lot of money in the pile taking care of things, but I’ve got to make my dollars take care of themselves, so it requires that I’m there doing it. It would have never got to where it is if I wasn’t there every day working hands on.
: So anyone who buys a Fulton Competition engine can be assured that Gene Fulton personally had a hand in building it?
Fulton: Oh yeah, absolutely. The reason I dominated Pro Mod so much in the ‘90s and lately is because I am so hands on. It really gets down to repairs sometimes. These guys can tear up some pretty ugly stuff and my success has been in being able to repair whatever they managed to tear up. They’d burn a hole through the side of a head and I’d put it all back together and make it look like it did originally. They’d tear something up on Sunday and I could have it repaired maybe Monday or Tuesday and they could go race the next week. Just doing that for all the racers has been a big plus. I mean, most of these engine builders, they can go buy parts and do a certain amount of machine work and put together a pretty good motor, but when it comes to fixing anything that tears up, whoa!
When that sucker comes back with two seats burned out and the guides burned out and a hole in the ports, it’s ‘Oh God, where do I start? Who am I gonna’ get to fix this?’ Whereas I can take something like that and put it all back together and you can’t hardly tell anything happened.
: Are your big motors based on a Chevy design?
Fulton: They sure are, but I’ve had them lengthened and we spread the bore centers out for a bigger bore. We’ve gone from a 4.840 stock big-block to 5.200 bore centers.
With thinner bore spacing the bores come together and there’s no room for a head gasket and there’s no strength, so you spread the bores out so you can have a head gasket and more strength around the bores. Well, first thing you know you get those bores to their limit and it becomes a never-ending thing. And we’re using billet material now for the block itself which is a lot stronger so I can push those limits more than I could before because the material is more stable.
: You already have an 870-cubic-inch engine available, but you’re planning on bringing out an even bigger one soon. What can you tell us about it?
Fulton: Well, bigger ain’t always better, but bigger ain’t bad. And a lot of people want it, so I’m just going to take the one I’ve got and push it out to 904 inches. It just takes a bigger bore, basically. I’ll just have to push the bore up to pretty much its limit. I mean, you can make a longer block and bigger bore spacing, but I’ve really watched that in the construction. I’ve made it where it would fit the cars right. If it’s too heavy or too big it doesn’t do anybody any good. I’ve got the curb weight of it pretty good to where it’s about all you can do without sacrificing strength.
