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Nissan - didn't the Pulsar have an engine with twin plug heads?
Chrysler Hemis and Semi Hemi Fords?
These engines ran good on racetracks but were very difficult to run on the street. There cannot be any doubt that the small block chevy is the best engine of all time. With over 65 million produced and its legendary ability to be easily modified and longevity thats a very easy pick for best engine. It's track record is untouchable also for you bench racers.
Basically, what happened is these people didn't maintain their cars. The Dart got oil added once the light came on, which, in my experience, means it was down to about 2 quarts. The oil and filter were rarely, if ever, changed. Coolant wasn't checked until the temp gauge spiked, and usually, a belt or hose wasn't replaced until it broke!
Well, the Dart was able to put up with that for about 100,000 miles, and finally succumbed to just sitting around and not being used. The Stanza, however, was dead meat after about 5 years! About a year after they got the Escort, the county threatened to tow the Dart. They'd let it sit at the curb in front of their house, but cancelled the insurance and turned in their tags. They offered to give it to me if I could get it started. Well, I did, but then it started spraying fuel. It was just a little leak that could easily be fixed, but to these people, fuel leak = "A-Team" style explosion, so they wouldn't let me have something so "dangerous." Please. If they could've seen some of the cars I've driven since then!
My impression is that Stude V8s were decent engines by early '50s standards but didn't have the benefit of updating. They were heavy but small displacement engines, typical of low-cost V8s until the thinwall Chevy came along. Most Studes were either 259 or 289 CID although I think a handful were bored to 304.
Probably the same story as the Rambler V8--not much money to modernize engines--but at least that engine was fairly light and could be brought out to 401 CID.
Back around 1971 when I had my Studes I knew an old-time machinist who swore by Studebaker V8s. I remember him telling me you could really bore out that engine, much like the Y block and the other old boat anchors. That pretty much ended with the Chevy small block. The early 283s could easily take an overbore to 301 CID (.060" over) but by the early '60s even that was pretty marginal, and I think the 289 won't take much more than .030 over.
-Jason
A bean counter must have told the powertrain development group - "Why design a new engine when you can just slap another set of cylinders on an existing V6?"
-Jason
Some of those engines with short production runs actually served as the basis for the engine that replaced them. My understanding is that the '67-up Buick big block, Chevy porcupine and Ford FE were evolutionary changes with similar blocks but different heads and bigger bearings. Not necessarily clean slate designs, just major updates. I think the "new" 318 ('67-up) was the old polysphere block with redesigned heads (which would explain why they're so heavy) and for all I know the polysphere was based on the hemi, and if so that's one heck of a production run.
The Packard 352 and 374(?) did have a very short run, just two years I think, from 1955-56. '57 Packards used the supercharged Stude V8. The Stude actually had a long run for an engine without any significant changes, from '51 to '64. In '65 Stude used the Chevy 283.
As far as the Yamaha/Ford V8, I almost feel sorry for Ford on that one. The original V6 5 speed was a SCREAMER that sold poorly because of what market research said was a lack of an automatic. Ford introduced an auto and still poor sales. They toned down the performance(even though the 3.4 V8 had 15/20 more horsepower than the V6) upped the "touring content" and the car still didn't sell. Of course that controversial styling didn't help!!!
All in all, 240ish horsepower out of 3.4 liters is respectable and it was a jewel of a motor. I just don't think people ever got over the family/rental car roots of the Taurus.
BTW, I had a '93 SHO and LOVED the fact it was such a sleeper!!
The early hemis weren't around that long either, and since the Dodge version appeared last (1953) and left first (last year 1957) that might be the record for a production run by a manufacturer that wasn't in serious trouble (well, *really* serious trouble, Chrysler was always in mildly serious trouble) by the end of the run.
Clevelands weren't around that long either, only from 1970-74 if you don't count the 351M and 400.
That's about it. Just off the top of my head I can't think of another American V8 that didn't last at least ten years.
BTW the Y block hung around through 1963 as the 292, then was replaced in '64 by the 260. I'm just about positive it was used in trucks later than that.
The 273 came out in I think '64, first as a two barrel and later as a very strong 235 hp four barrel. When I first met my wife she still had a '64 Valiant Signet (two door hardtop with buckets) 273 Torqueflite she'd bought new--Andre, eat your heart out. Fun car, very attractive in dark blue and very quick off the line. We sold it for big bucks ($2500?) in 1987 when she bought a new car but I'm kind of sorry we did.
Oh yeah, one other tidbit...the 318 did change a little bit for 1968. The '57-67 editions were the old poly-head "wide-block", that was easily identifiable by the "sawtooth" edge on the valve covers. That and the fact that the engine just looked physically large compared to the later editions. The '68 and onward 318's were on the 273 LA block, which also spawned the 340 and the 360. I think the LA block was about 100 lb lighter than the older poly-head A block.
Speedshift, sounds like your wife had a pretty sweet Valiant. What did you get in '87...the T-bird? I like the older Valiants because you could get a wide array of trim levels and body styles, whereas they cheapened them in '67 so they wouldn't compete too much with the Barracuda.
The 273 four barrel is one of the unsung heroes of the '60s. Smaller than the 340 so it doesn't have the great rep and completely overshadowed by the HiPo 289/271, but according to Roger Huntington both put out 190 net hp.
Considering how rare and expensive the HiPo was, the 273/235 was a bargain then and now. You could get it in the Dart and Valiant as well as the Barracuda, with automatic as well as four speed. The only Falcon V8 was the 289 two barrel, and while you could get the HiPo in various Comets, Fairlanes and Mustangs, the two barrels are far more common.
Almost always fitted with a two-barrel carburetor the 318LA was not a pretentious motor, but a darn good utility motor used in boats and everything Chrysler ever built, including big trucks and police cars. They're still used in those Ingersol-Rand compressors and our auxilary power plant engine at work is a 360, the big brother of the 318.
The 318LA was introduced in late 1966 in big Dodge trucks, phased in the 1967 Plymouth and Dodge cars. It is, as already been mentioned, the big brother to the 273, and predecessors to the 340 and 360 motors. The 318LA utilized some characteristically conservative but typical Chrysler design and manufacturing features. The piston, connecting rod, rod cap and wrist pin each weighed the same within 1 gram. For most years the wrist pins were full-floating and used locks. Unlike the Ford or GM approach, the 318LA used a constant pressure rotor-style oil pump. Like all engines manufactured by Chrysler between 1957 and 1996, a valve lifter can be removed from the block by just removing the valve cover and using a special tool. Oddly though, the "LA" series is the only engines to come from Chrysler that did not have the oil pump on the outside of the block.
The 318LA's efficient combustion chamber design allowed Chrysler to meet emission standards for a number of years in the 1970s without having to be fitted with some of the power-robbing and trouble prone add-on devices used by its competitors.
Dusty
The next was an '89 Gran Fury ex cop car. It was retired at 73,000 miles, because of a bad camshaft. Supposedly, Chrysler had a batch of bad camshafts in '89 that would fail at the #8 lobe. If you got a bad one, it usually let go between 70 and 90,000 miles, but if you got a good one, the engine lasted the life of the car. Unfortunately, this one had a bad one! The dealership I bought it from got a 318 out of an '88 Diplomat that had been wrecked with 75K on it, and dropped it in. Now at 117,000 miles, it has a bum starter, or something else refusing to make it catch, but the engine itself has been fine.
Recently, I picked up a '79 New Yorker with a 360 2-bbl. Considering the added weight, and all the smog stuff they put on cars in the late '70's, not to mention taller gearing, the NY'er really doesn't feel that much slower than the Gran Fury. I've heard that the 360's though, weren't as reliable as the 318, because of a smaller water jacket or something like that. At least, I heard that the R-body cop cars that used them around '79-80 usually failed around 90,000 miles. My NY'er has about 85K on it, so hopefully it won't follow suit!
Packard generally put their engines together well, however. They were really a lot better car than the Studebaker that absorbed them.
And I'm sure that there were 318's that popped, by comparatively they had few problems and very few had problems when you compare them to their competitors.
Dusty
-mike
Those 100,000 miles weren't exactly easy ones, either. Grandmom only worked about 2-3 miles away, and Granddad was retired by then, so most of that driving was short trips. They also had a trailer that they pulled with it, when they went on vacations.
The small-block Olds V-8 was superior in most aspects to the Chevy, IMO. Unfortunately it suffered from a lack of development in the emission control era and was dropped in favor of the higher-volume Chevy V-8.
2017 Cadillac ATS Performance Premium 3.6
Lol, that's what my Grandfather said about Army cooking in WWII!
It reads..."Original rebuilt 400 engine, rebuilt Turbo 400 transmission, dual exhaust, power steering, brakes, a/c, power top, tilt steering"
"1000 miles on stock 400 rebuild. New pistons and rings; new rod, main, and cam bearings; new timing chain and gears; new water pump; new oil pump and screen; new Pontiac blueprint Ram Air cam and lifters; Rebuilt 4-bbl Rochester carb (original 2-bbl and intake included); heads rebuilt, block machined (all maching work done by NAPA)"
Most of it sounds like it's just a typical rebuild, but I'm curious about the "blueprint Ram Air cam and lifters". Is that anything significant?
If I'm right it'd have to be based on the Ram Air III cam, an excellent street cam with a "distinctive" but fairly smooth idle. The other Ram Air cams were definitely lumpy.
I spoke to a shop owner just yesterday who is selling his daughters '84 Cutlass with 120+K miles. It has the 307 engine. He is a died in the wool Chevy guy but said he was amazed that all that had been done to the engine was a waterpump and maintenance.
On another note (yes, I'm rambling) I alway thought that in the '60s Chrysler had good engines and ugly cars. Now I think they have some of the most beautiful cars on the road, but some of the worst engineering. If they could ever get it all together, GM, Ford, and a lot of the imports would be in for trouble. IMHO.
Jim
http://www.compcams.com/information/whatsnew/NewsDetails.asp?ListHistoryID=-1997070293
It looks like I was sorta kinda right. The idea is to increase net lift by opening the valves more quickly than a stock cam, while still conforming to the stock cam specs because of a class racing restriction.
I think these were also called "cheater cams" but it's been a while since this stuff was important. They must be a lot harder on the valve train than the stock cam--there isn't that gradual take-up of slack when the valves are opened and closed. Of course racing engines aren't expected to go 100k and if the entire valvetrain is HD aftermarket stuff maybe the durability is still there.
Maybe that's why your Pontiac spins the tires going into second ;-).
This project car was refreshing because instead of just spending thousands and thousands of dollars on aftermarket parts and bolting them into a red Camaro, they instead went to the junkyard, took the smallest car the General ever made and dropped in the biggest engine the General ever made.
The car was strictly low budget. The engine was so far back in the chassis that the carburetor was at about the base of the windshield. You drove from the back seat. The front suspension did not have to be modified due to favorable weight distrubution from the engine being so far back. The rear end was from a 4.3 powered S-10 pick up. The car ran about elevens in the quarter with the boneyard motor through single exhaust.