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What are the best V8 engines ever made?
I just saw an article in Car craft about the ten
worst V8s.What are your opinions on the best?
Not only the most powerful but the most
influential,best designed etc.
My choiches in no particular order:
Chrysler 426 Hemi
Chrysler 340 Six pack
Chevrolet 350
Chevrolet Aluminum 427
Chevrolet 327
Ford Boss 429
Ford SCJ 428
Most underrated:
Chrysler 318
Chrysler 360
Chrysler 392 Hemi
Ford 351M
Buick 455
Most overrated:
Chrysler Late 440
Chevrolet 350
Ford 302
worst V8s.What are your opinions on the best?
Not only the most powerful but the most
influential,best designed etc.
My choiches in no particular order:
Chrysler 426 Hemi
Chrysler 340 Six pack
Chevrolet 350
Chevrolet Aluminum 427
Chevrolet 327
Ford Boss 429
Ford SCJ 428
Most underrated:
Chrysler 318
Chrysler 360
Chrysler 392 Hemi
Ford 351M
Buick 455
Most overrated:
Chrysler Late 440
Chevrolet 350
Ford 302
Tagged:
1
Comments
They held up well, didn't leak oil like the Chevys and would really fly!
My 65 Riviera Grand Sport - 425 - 2-4bbl carbs would lay rubber for a block without trying.
It also got 8 mpg on super premium fuel!
It is common knowledge that top fuel dragsters use custom made blocks for thier engines. What many don't realize that in thirty plus years the basic design of that block hasn't changed all that much,it is based on the Chrysler Hemi. I will say that the best high performance engine to date in my opinion is the Vipers awesome V10, but I asked about V8's. Who can argue with the V10's 450 horsepower, 490 FTLBS. of torque? And this is sae net,not the gross ratings of old,you need to increase those numbers approx. 20% to compare them to an older engine. I include the 350 Chevy only because of the fact of thier popularity, I think they are very overrated, I have rebuilt an '88 350,and '75 360 together with the help of the owner of the 350,and even he mentioned the difference in the quality of the castings.
I will be the first to admit that I have little knowledge of Fords and Chevys,I have been a Mopar fan since I knew what a car was, this is why I wanted to see everyone's input to this list. The 302 Fords I have seen may be fast if modified,but what isn't? I have pummeled too many 302 Mousetangs(sic) with my Cuda to have any great respect for them. I am not saying they are all junk, maybe it is because around here all the younger kids drive them and they measure performance in how loud the stereo goes.
Ok one more word about the Hemi,in a recent Mopar Action article a dyno pull from 1967 was found in a Chrysler archive. It was of a 66 Hemi,and it showed 475 hp. This is gross horsepower,however, this was a 66 which is the weakest of the 426's. Now doesn't that make you wonder how they rated those old engines,the Hemi was supposedly 425 hp,but so wasn't every other heavy hitting big block.
The greatest thing I can say about Buicks is I would love to see a Yellow and black GSX in my driveway,About a '70.
Brings up another point. Is it just my taste or is 1970 about the pinnicle of muscle car styling?
I'll tell you what won't be making any best V-8 list any time soon-Ford V-8's from about the mid 70's until the introduction of fuel injectors. They are huge, drink gas by the gallon full, and don't make that much power. #&%@ Emission controls!
One final note, I do think the Ford FE motor is an old archaic design and even in the 60's was a heavy yet sturdy block. The sides of the block extended past the center line of the crank to allow cross bolting the mains, a design being utilized in the newer blocks today by both G.M. and Ford. I just want to say for the last time that I felt it needed to be defended as a series of motors that deserved Historic recognition. Your original flame of this series of engines I felt needed to be addressed. I'm done.
Pontiacs 421 Super Duty in 1962. Free-flowing cylinder heads, forged-steel crank, rods, 4-bolt main, 11:1 compression, twin 4-bbls on a high-rise intake, and factory headers.
Also the 400 RA Series of engines ending with the Ram Air V engine in 1969.
And the last Big Cube, big HP, and huge torque engine put in a Muscle car at the start of the Horsepower Ice Age: The SD 455. It’s fitting that Pontiac, which starting the muscle car movement, would fire the last shot in the super car wars with the Super Duty 455 of 1973-74. When most car companies were turning their attention to increasing fuel mileage and decreasing emissions, the SD 455 was placed in 1973 and 1974 Firebird Formulas and Trans Ams.
I found a little blurb on the engine when I was searching nameplate history.
Oldsmobile engineers had been working on their own V-8 engine, (in the late 40's) building four prototypes. But General Motors pulled the plug on the junior division efforts. They wanted The Caddy, to be first with a contemporary overhead-valve V-8.
[i]"Many of the Olds and Cadillac design principles had been developed by GM's legendary engineer, Charles Kettering. Thus the Olds engineers had intended that their new baby should be named "Kettering V-8."[/i]
Rocket 88 won out on the name choice.
Probably another GM decision so not to glorify engineers?
I had a 64 Catalina once upon a time. It had the 421 - single 4bbl. It also had been factory ordered with a three speed on the column. What a sleeper that car was!
It was a 421 SD Catalina. The ones with the lightweight body parts. Aluminum bumpers and bumper braces, aluminum fenders and fender aprons, and aluminum radiator and radiator core. It may have had a swiss cheese frame too. The 421 SDs in this type of car ran high twelves at 110-115 mph. Not to bad. My LS1 Formula can't do that...Well with me in it anyway!
Seems that they always burned oil and used a lot of gas. Only three main bearings but I guess that was enough.
I love the sound of a flathead with a split manifold and short glasspacks.
And, Shifty, I would never knock a flathead. They were strong runners for their time.
And that sweet sound!.....Still, a Chevy six made some fine music too!
Find a steep hill ( 2 AM in a residential neighborhood) Go over the crest of the hill about 40MPH, slide it into second gear, and let out the clutch....!
re Briggs & Stratton,
first time I heard of those flatheads I had just finished tearing down and rebuilding an old B&S lawn mower engine, and that was exactly what I though about.
Thanks for the input everyone,now lets see the lists...Most influential...Most underrated...most durable...Most overrated?
How about your dream V8's?What V8 would you put into what vehicle to make a dream ride?
Go here and click on 2.3MB of insanity
http://www.geocities.com/MotorCity/Track/6965/neon.htm
My dad was a mechanical engineer for 45 years at GM Research Labs in the GM Tech Center. The last 15 years or so he was head of the design room where they drew up all of the blueprints for engines, anyway he loves old boats and at a old boat show we recently attended together he pointed out the compactness of those flatheads. But I was drawn to a old DeSoto Hemi that just looked gorgeous in the engine compartment of an old speed boat. And talk about the sweet sound of a V-8 exhaust, those old boats had no exhaust system at all(after the manifolds), they just exhausted below the water line and at speed the pipes were not covered by water at all.
A point I'd like to make about small blocks vs. big blocks is that during the evolution of the American V-8 engine in the 50's, that a lot of the motors were "big blocks", but small displacement. This makes for a lot of excess weight. For example the now defunct Pontiac V-8 had identical external dimensions for all displacements from 326 cid to 455! Of course the old adage "there's no substitute for cubic inches" was a mainstay in Detroit's engine technology for years. Who needs double overhead cams, 4 valves per cylinder, variable cam timing, etc, when you have 450 to 500 cubes under the hood. Anyway, those small displacement big blocks of the late 50's and early 60's really were boat anchors. The big 3 brought out the small blocks to lighten up their cars.
There is hope on the horizon, consider the new SBC, the LS1. The only thing it shares with the old SBC is the bore spacing, so it really is a new design. It's available now in 4.8, 5.3, 5.7, 6.0 and now a 8 liter versions. All of which would probably put an old 60's big block to shame in terms of output, efficiency and durability.