70 replies to this topic

[biercemountain]

I've been rereading Pete Lyon's wonderful book "Can Am" and continue to be puzzled by the distinct lack of success Ford engines had in the series. I understand that there was never a serious factory effort but it seems like more could have been done with Ford's big blocks. The success at LeMans with the 427s obviously didn't pave the way for 70's Can Am glory.

What was it about the Chevy powerplants that made them so superior and why did the Fords prove to be either under-powered or fragile?

On a side note, why was Chevy the powerplant of choice in F5000? The Boss 302 was strong in TransAm, yet you don't hear about them in single seaters (not that I'm anything close to an expert in that area).

Edited by biercemountain, 09 September 2010 - 12:48.

[Ray Bell]

There were some, of course...

The Holman & Moody car, 'Honker' was it not? It had a NASCAR type engine IIRC. The Lotus 70s were built around the Ford 302.

I guess it was just familiarity and ease of access to appropriate parts. In the Can-Am there was also the push from Chevrolet to help Jim Hall, and McLaren must have done some sort of deal with them to get their special engines. Two front running teams using the engines will often lead to a lot of copycat activity.

Don't forget that Dan Gurney tried his Eagle-Weslake headed Ford engines, and that the Lotus 30s and 40s were also Ford powered. A couple of the converted Cooper Monacos were as well... and there was the King Cobra... the list goes on, it seems.

One possible reason for the lack of big block Fords might well be the effort they were expending in other areas of the sport, in particular Le Mans and NASCAR.

[buckaluck]

The Chevy power plant from 69 on was an all Aluminum saving quite a bit of weight and developed more horsepower then the cast iron Fords so to be competitive the Chevy was chosen. There were no funds from Ford to develop any of their motors and they had just spent tons of money to win Le Mans. Not sure why the Boss 302 was not used in F5000 as you say it was quite developed from the Trans Am series so should have been an easy choice to select from the only issue may have been cost i'm sure the chevy's cost less then the Ford 302 and with no support from Ford it may have just been to costly. Chevy spent lots of money to develop the Big Block Can Am motor Ford spent their dollars in Trans Am and Nascar during that time, Ford did spend money on their 429 but I think that motor was more suited for Nascar then road racing and being cast iron vs Chevy's 494 those extra 65 cubic inches plus the motors lighter weight just put the 429 at a disadvantage.
Chevy most likely had a exclusive arrangement with Reynolds Aluminum most likely preventing Ford access to the Aluminum that was needed
to cast and the cost to develop their own mix was prohibitive. I do believe they did try but things didn't pan out well for those motors.
I'm sure there are more details and reasons that others can provide.

Buck

[kayemod]

One reason for a Chevy preference, certainly in the early days, was that compared to the equivalent Ford, the ubiquitous small block Chevy was more suited to racing and tuning, though of course both were originally planned as engines for ordinary road cars. The Ford was considerably lighter, but although both had a similar bore limit, a higher deck height on the Chevy meant that it could be stroked to an extra litre, which wasn't possible with the Ford 350, though the later 351 block was better. In the entire history of CanAm, there was only ever a single Ford win, scored by Dan Gurney in a Lola T70 with a high-revving 305ci (5 litre) engine with his own Gurney-Weslake heads. This engine had a near 2000 revs and about 30 hp advantage over contemporary Chevys in the McLarens and most others, but in comparison it lacked the torque and driveability their extra litre or so of displacement gave them. When McLarens and others won all the time with Chevys, that became the obvious route to follow, but McLaren and Chaparral both got a lot of 'unofficial' help from GM, special alloy big blocks etc, and GM clearly appreciated the publicity that winning provided. In comparison, although they occasionally appeared with one-off engines, Ford never really seemed to be serious about CanAm, which was surprising considering the success the 7 litre Mk IVs had at LeMans, surely they could have done it if they'd really wanted to, but that would have meant finding a team capable of taking on McLaren.

[RA Historian]

Ford had very limited success in F-5000. Just two wins in 1970 by George Follmer in a Lotus 70 powered by Ford. In the 1968-69 Can Am era, an occasional big block Ford would show up, only to disappear after a few races due to lack of (take your pick) 1-money, 2-development, 3-interest. Two that come to mind are the "429er", a 494 (?) ci aluminum block Ford V-8 in a modified McLaren M6B entered by Holman-Moody and driven by Mario Andretti. Showed some speed but went away fairly quickly. The other was the Ford G7A, briefly explained as essentially a Ford Mk IV with the top chopped off, although it was a bit more than that. This was entered by the Agapiou Brothers and driven by George Follmer and John Cannon, among others. Unlike the "429er", this car did not even show much speed. It too faded away without leaving any mark.
Tom

Edited by RA Historian, 09 September 2010 - 23:12.

[fbarrett]

In general, aftermarket Chevrolet engine development in the early 1960s was far ahead of that for Ford, which only started its Total Performance program around the time of the Cobra's introduction in 1963. (Even today, just looking at a Ford 289 V-8, you can't help but marvel at how compact it is, and Chevrolet's 283 is about the same.) But the hot-rodders and racers (and factory engineers) had been developing Chevy V-8s for so long that they were far ahead of Ford. Here's a question: Why didn't Ford ever commission Cosworth to develop a viable Can-Am engine? Maybe Cosworth didn't have the experience with big engines that US designers and builders had. The relatively fragile Ford 255-ci four-cam Indy V-8 never worked in the GT40 and wasn't adaptable to Can-Am needs. What if Ford had truly turned Gurney (and Phil Remington?) loose on a large-displacement Can-Am engine project?

Frank

Edited by fbarrett, 09 September 2010 - 22:56.

[RA Historian]

The relatively fragile Ford 255-ci four-cam Indy V-8 never worked in the GT40 and wasn't adaptable to Can-Am needs.

Frank

I had forgotten that, Frank. Now I do recall that George Bignotti put a four cam Indy Ford V-8 in a Lola T-70 and that Mario Andretti drove it a few times. I seem to recall that it may have been increased in displacement, maybe to around five liters. Nonetheless, it really did not have much of a record at all.

Tom

[elansprint72]

Good news for those of us who have Formula Ford or Lotus TC motors: Ford are making new block castings.

[Lee Nicolle]

I think the answer is develoment. In 5l racing the Ford at that time was no match for the Chev. Unless you had the very few special blocks, cranks etc you would bever be in the race power wise and unless you used Clevo heads [Boss engine] you would never have the power. And the Boss had all top end power and less driveability. Strength wise modern Windsor blocks are so much stronger and the heads advailable make very good power these days.Though even now the size of the block is a limiting factor unless you use a tall deck block.
As for the big block the development was mostly in the 427 FE engine which is a very big lump of iron. They got very good power and eventually reliability from them but they are just too big and heavy for a Can Am car. The 429 was new in 71 and had no development though is a decent and reasonable weight engine, in some respects a big Windsor.But an alloy Chev with near 10 years of development would be hard to beat. The 429 and later 460 though really was built as a modern smooth passenger car engine though Boss 429s are strong thing for the day.
Did they ever use the 429 in Nascar? I know they used the Cleveland up til the early 80s which would have been a real adventure in reliability as the oiling is very average as is the coolant flow and compared with a Chev are very heavy and a big handgrenade, though on their day powerfull. I know I race one!! Though in a fairly reliable state of tune. These days the performance parts are reasonably hard to get unlike the Windsor which has near the amount of gear advailable as a Chev. Probably more good stuff advailable here in Oz as in the US for the Cleveland.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by elansprint72
Good news for those of us who have Formula Ford or Lotus TC motors: Ford are making new block castings.

Kidding?

Wouldn't it be nicer if someone in the aftermarket made one that didn't flex so much?

Originally posted by Lee Nicolle
.....Did they ever use the 429 in Nascar?.....

There was a seven litre limit on NASCAR engines from the very early sixties. Ford ran 427s, which was seven litres.

Originally posted by Tom
I had forgotten that, Frank. Now I do recall that George Bignotti put a four cam Indy Ford V-8 in a Lola T-70 and that Mario Andretti drove it a few times. I seem to recall that it may have been increased in displacement, maybe to around five liters. Nonetheless, it really did not have much of a record at all.

However, the pushrod Ford that ran at Indy didn't really do too badly...

From memory, it almost won the race.

[BRG]

Good news for those of us who have Formula Ford or Lotus TC motors: Ford are making new block castings.

Is that the 116E block?

[Ray Bell]

As I understand it, and I might be wrong, it can't really be the one block...

The FF 1600 engine used a taller block than the Twin Cam motor, didn't it?

I'm told that the block being 'reproduced' has some enhancements to it, a few selected areas where extra metal has been added.

[BRG]

From (often faulty) memory, the TC used the 1498cc pre-crossflow block with a slight bore increase to take it to 1558cc although the Series 1 Elans did briefly use the standard 1498cc bore. The original FFord engine was the 1598cc crossflow Cortina GT engine. But you can build a Twin Cam motor using either block and the crossflow one can go up to 1840cc quite reliably.

[HistoricMustang]

Did they ever use the 429 in Nascar?

Hi Lee.

I seem to remember the 429 came along about the time NASCAR was banning the larger power plants. It never really got the chance to dance on the ovals of NA$CAR.

One of those bad boys stuffed in a Mustang was an experience!

Henry

[arttidesco]

I wonder did Can Am ever get anything like the coverage of Indy, Daytona or Le Mans and from 1966 lets not forget Ford had F1 covered too, in the non specialist press ? Those events were always going to make the main news where as did anyone ever make the front page of a national non specialist publication for winning a Can Am race at say Road America (no offence intended toward that excellent venue or that amazing series) ?

[Tmeranda]

I wonder did Can Am ever get anything like the coverage of Indy, Daytona or Le Mans and from 1966 lets not forget Ford had F1 covered too, in the non specialist press ? Those events were always going to make the main news where as did anyone ever make the front page of a national non specialist publication for winning a Can Am race at say Road America (no offence intended toward that excellent venue or that amazing series) ?

In those days the only real coverage was devoted to the Indy 500. Even the Daytona 500 was back page stuff. I can remember having to wait days until I found out who won the '67 Le Mans. Coverage of the CanAm series was nowhere.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by BRG[/i]
From (often faulty) memory, the TC used the 1498cc pre-crossflow block with a slight bore increase to take it to 1558cc although the Series 1 Elans did briefly use the standard 1498cc bore. The original FFord engine was the 1598cc crossflow Cortina GT engine. But you can build a Twin Cam motor using either block and the crossflow one can go up to 1840cc quite reliably.

My memory may sometimes be faulty... but...

I seem to recall that FFord changed engines in the first year or two, going from the single-sided (ie. exhaust and inlet on the one side of the head) to the crossflow, which didn't come out until 1968.

The crossflow engine had a taller block. Trust me. I have a friend who fitted up a twin cam head to one, he had to make a spacer for the timing chest, maybe 10mm or so.

'Reliably'? Nothing great in the way of reliability for either engine if they're worked hard.

[BRG]

The crossflow engine had a taller block. Trust me. I have a friend who fitted up a twin cam head to one, he had to make a spacer for the timing chest, maybe 10mm or so.

Oh, no arguments there. They are certainly a little different.

[GeoffR]

Wouldn't it be nicer if someone in the aftermarket made one that didn't flex so much?

They do, Google "Millington Diamond" - 2.5 litre 4 cylinder that make 300+ horsepower.
As used by these guys ...

[BRG]

The Millington Diamond is developed from the Sierra/Escort Cosworth engine. Which was developed in turn from the Pinto engine, rather than the Kent pushrod motor.

[Manfred Cubenoggin]

I seem to recall a photo in Road & Track magazine of the season-ending Formula A round...1969?...at Sebring that showed Tony A2Z's Eagle...had he not already secured the SCCA title?...parked at the roadside with a gigantic pool of black liquid under it. This was from recollection a Ford V-8 from the shops of Falconer & Dunn. The motor had comprehensively ventilated itself.

[RA Historian]

You recall right, Manfred. It was at Sebring, late December, 1969, for the final SCCA Continental Championship race of the year (F-5000, as we all know it). For whatever reason, the entrant of Tony Adamowicz's Eagle pulled the Chevy V-8 with which Tony had put away the title, and replaced it with a Ford V-8. As I recall, it had four big exhaust pipes trailing hihg out the back, making it look rather fearsome. As you say, it did not work!

Tom

[Bob Riebe]

Hi Lee.

I seem to remember the 429 came along about the time NASCAR was banning the larger power plants. It never really got the chance to dance on the ovals of NA$CAR.

One of those bad boys stuffed in a Mustang was an experience!

Henry

The Boss 429 had approximately seventy some wins.

[Bob Riebe]

I think the answer is develoment. In 5l racing the Ford at that time was no match for the Chev. Unless you had the very few special blocks, cranks etc you would bever be in the race power wise and unless you used Clevo heads [Boss engine] you would never have the power. And the Boss had all top end power and less driveability. Strength wise modern Windsor blocks are so much stronger and the heads advailable make very good power these days.Though even now the size of the block is a limiting factor unless you use a tall deck block.
As for the big block the development was mostly in the 427 FE engine which is a very big lump of iron. They got very good power and eventually reliability from them but they are just too big and heavy for a Can Am car. The 429 was new in 71 and had no development though is a decent and reasonable weight engine, in some respects a big Windsor.But an alloy Chev with near 10 years of development would be hard to beat. The 429 and later 460 though really was built as a modern smooth passenger car engine though Boss 429s are strong thing for the day.
Did they ever use the 429 in Nascar? I know they used the Cleveland up til the early 80s which would have been a real adventure in reliability as the oiling is very average as is the coolant flow and compared with a Chev are very heavy and a big handgrenade, though on their day powerfull. I know I race one!! Though in a fairly reliable state of tune. These days the performance parts are reasonably hard to get unlike the Windsor which has near the amount of gear advailable as a Chev. Probably more good stuff advailable here in Oz as in the US for the Cleveland.

The FE was lighter than the 385 series, and neither had a weight disadvantage to the Chevy if cast from similar metal.
The Boss 385s had an oiling difference from the wedge blocks that made interchangebility difficult, but not impossible.

The short deck Boss Windsor blocks were as strong or stronger than the Chevys and a good deal lighter. They were really first produced for the Tunnel-port 302s. There was no difference between the street and race blocks.
Until fairly recently, they were the only four-bolt main Windsors produced by Ford, in iron, and the only ones ever put into a production car.

Ford never put any emphasis on a performance 385, outside of the Boss, until the past several years; Jon Kasse has been the driving force behind many Ford performance products of late.

Edited by Bob Riebe, 14 September 2010 - 18:45.

[Bob Riebe]

What if Ford had truly turned Gurney (and Phil Remington?) loose on a large-displacement Can-Am engine project?

Frank

Some where along the way, Gurney must have burned his bridge to Ford and he was denied a Alloy Boss big-block when they finally arrived.

[Muskrat]

Mind you it is Amazing the power levels you can now get out of Ford SBF's, with all the trick stuff and top builders in the US!

My 302 based one is winging its way over from the states at the my.

[McGuire]

There was a seven litre limit on NASCAR engines from the very early sixties. Ford ran 427s, which was seven litres.

Both the 427 FE and the Boss 429 (385 series) ran in NASCAR, often at the same time. In 1963 NASCAR imposed a 7.0 liter (427.177 ci) displacement limit. However, in 1968 the limit was raised to 430 cubic inches, in part to allow cleanup overbores. So the Boss 429 was legal in NASCAR and ran in the Grand National Series with considerable success, beginning in 1969 and continuing into the early '70s when the small-block era began. The 427 FE was also used by some Ford teams during this period, depending on the regulations in place at the time -- the Boss 429 was typically given a tighter carb restriction than the FE. Also, there was a considerable amount of FE equipment in the hands of privateers.

I should mention that I am simplifying the matter quite a bit -- NASCAR had a number of multiple displacement limits in place through these years, generally coupled to weight and wheelbase or weight/displacement ratio. For example, the aero specials such as the Dodge Daytona/Plymouth Superbird and the Ford Talladega/Mercury Cyclone Spoiler were never outlawed outright; instead, they were limited to 305 ci, rendering them uncompetitive.

Some may find this interesting... while the Ford FE was advertised as 7 liters or 427 ci, its actual displacement in production form was 425.366 ci. (4.232 in. x 3.78 in.) The 427 Chevy was 425.587 ci -- same nominal bore and stroke as the Chrysler 426, 4.25 x 3.75 in. However, some GM sources quoted the 427 Chev's exact dimensions as 4.251 x 3.746, for 425.33 ci.

[Tom Smith]

I've been rereading Pete Lyon's wonderful book "Can Am" and continue to be puzzled by the distinct lack of success Ford engines had in the series. I understand that there was never a serious factory effort but it seems like more could have been done with Ford's big blocks. The success at LeMans with the 427s obviously didn't pave the way for 70's Can Am glory.

What was it about the Chevy powerplants that made them so superior and why did the Fords prove to be either under-powered or fragile?

On a side note, why was Chevy the powerplant of choice in F5000? The Boss 302 was strong in TransAm, yet you don't hear about them in single seaters (not that I'm anything close to an expert in that area).

The Ford Can Am motor was a 3 valve 2 cam hemi, somewhere around 495 cubes. I remember one night Mario was talking about when he drove it and he said the throttle bores were much too large which destroyed the drivability so bad that he drove with one hand on the fuel shut off valve all the time. He said it stopped producing power at around 70% throttle opening and as he was trying to explain the situation to some of the Ford engineers, one of them leaned over the engine and cracked the throttle open. Mario said the engineer was wearing a tie and it got completely sucked into one of the intake stacks and damn near choked the guy.

[Ray Bell]

Ah well, that just shows it doesn't belong in this thread...

It wasn't a pushrod motor.

[Bob Riebe]

The Ford Can Am motor was a 3 valve 2 cam hemi, somewhere around 495 cubes. I remember one night Mario was talking about when he drove it and he said the throttle bores were much too large which destroyed the drivability so bad that he drove with one hand on the fuel shut off valve all the time. He said it stopped producing power at around 70% throttle opening and as he was trying to explain the situation to some of the Ford engineers, one of them leaned over the engine and cracked the throttle open. Mario said the engineer was wearing a tie and it got completely sucked into one of the intake stacks and damn near choked the guy.

That was the "Calliope" which was never actually raced in a Can-Am race.
Supposedly a gent now has one, and was said to be, some time back, getting it ready to be put into a car.


Alloy FE and Boss 429 engines were, along with iron versions of the FE.
The Boss version was 494 inch version of said same.

Edited by Bob Riebe, 15 September 2010 - 05:48.

[Muskrat]

So not a pushrod lump then!

Hotrod Magazine did a review on the above engine a while back - all there articles are online - great read's.

That big Holman & Moody Fairlane rebuild is in there too (SPA 6 fia banned it afte the first year - closer examination showing it to basically be a full spaceframe cheater car!

[Bob Riebe]

So not a pushrod lump then!

Hotrod Magazine did a review on the above engine a while back - all there articles are online - great read's.

That big Holman & Moody Fairlane rebuild is in there too (SPA 6 fia banned it afte the first year - closer examination showing it to basically be a full spaceframe cheater car!

Yes it was a push-rod engine.

[Ray Bell]

With two cams?

How did that work?

[McGuire]

With two cams?

How did that work?

The Ford Calliope was a quasi-hemi with three valves per cylinder, two small intakes and one large exhaust. (The placard above is a misprint.) If you look at a conventional pushrod hemi like the Chrysler (and I know you have) you can see that half the pushrods must run at a bad angle, not only for valvetrain geometry but for overall engine architecture. With two camshafts in the block positioned over and under, one intake and one exhaust, you can fix that. Among other things -- also, the intake and exhaust cams can be independently phased, just like DOHC. With the addition of VVT, there are significant emissions and efficiency benefits to this, so the two-cams-in-block concept was recently revived on a GM experimental engine known as the XV8. There is some info on the web about that engine if you would care to google it.

I know a few people who were involved on the Calliope project... it's possible the name was not attached with complete affection. Some say it needed more time, while others say it was just a nightmare, period.

[Lee Nicolle]

The FE was lighter than the 385 series, and neither had a weight disadvantage to the Chevy if cast from similar metal.
The Boss 385s had an oiling difference from the wedge blocks that made interchangebility difficult, but not impossible.

The short deck Boss Windsor blocks were as strong or stronger than the Chevys and a good deal lighter. They were really first produced for the Tunnel-port 302s. There was no difference between the street and race blocks.
Until fairly recently, they were the only four-bolt main Windsors produced by Ford, in iron, and the only ones ever put into a production car.

Ford never put any emphasis on a performance 385, outside of the Boss, until the past several years; Jon Kasse has been the driving force behind many Ford performance products of late.

I will beg to differ on the FE being lighter than the 429. Have worked on and moved both around. The 429 would be a similar weight to a BB Chev, possibly lighter.
The early Windsor blocks are very light but not nearly as strong as later ones. Having weighed a 69 and a 89 block recently about 15lbs heavier, and stronger,Whereas a Chev is almost the other way. And a 69 block normally bores .060 wheras a an 89 block maxes at .030.And the blocks are lighter. Though the Ford is normally .030 max what ever the year.

[Bob Riebe]

I will beg to differ on the FE being lighter than the 429. Have worked on and moved both around. The 429 would be a similar weight to a BB Chev, possibly lighter.
The early Windsor blocks are very light but not nearly as strong as later ones. Having weighed a 69 and a 89 block recently about 15lbs heavier, and stronger,Whereas a Chev is almost the other way. And a 69 block normally bores .060 wheras a an 89 block maxes at .030.And the blocks are lighter. Though the Ford is normally .030 max what ever the year.

Ford FE big block 650 (332-428 CID)
Ford FE big block 670 ('59 352 CID)
Ford FE 625
Ford 427 SOHC 680
Ford 429/460 V8 640
Ford 429-460 720
Ford 460 V8 720

Chevy big block V8 685 Mark IV
Chevy big block V8 --- Mark V
Chevy 454 675
Chevy 7.4L V8 656 iron, no intake, exh, carb, starter
Chevy 427 ZL-1 550

Now these say little about what just what fully fitted block and heads weigh standing alone but this list is the only one that give an idea what engines weigh.
http://fixrambler.co...weightchart.txt

If I won the lottery, I would spend several million to get the Calliope sorted.

Edited by Bob Riebe, 16 September 2010 - 04:30.

[Muskrat]

I think what is being done with the Current NASCAR engines makes the overly complex Calliope a dead end project (I think it did a few Can-am races behing Mario Andretti and never rocked the Can-am world).

Current NASCAR lumps make 900bhp from a tad over 6 litres

[biercemountain]

I think what is being done with the Current NASCAR engines makes the overly complex Calliope a dead end project (I think it did a few Can-am races behing Mario Andretti and never rocked the Can-am world).

Current NASCAR lumps make 900bhp from a tad over 6 litres

Would a Nascar lump really work in a prototype chassis? They obviously have plenty of power but aren't they rather heavy and lack the drivability for road racing.

[Muskrat]

Would a Nascar lump really work in a prototype chassis? They obviously have plenty of power but aren't they rather heavy and lack the drivability for road racing.

Modern NASCAR lumps don't have much in common with a SBF or SBC or Mopar lumps - they are built to a spec that Nascar hand out - they are state of the art race engines. Teams have switch from Chevy to Toyota and all the parts are the same (as all one off parts - just have to have Toyota part no.s stamped on them instead of the chevy ones. These things rev to 10k easy (generally keep to about 9 though). They are all alloy and do a fair few road course races each year. 140 - 150bhp per litre from a pushrod 3v V8 is really something.

[Ray Bell]

Hence they life their Carrillos... etc...

One run and then the rods go to eBay for someone with lower expectations to use them up.

[Muskrat]

Hence they life their Carrillos... etc...

One run and then the rods go to eBay for someone with lower expectations to use them up.

Same with cranks! Forged is fine for most Classic / Historic racing below about 8k.

[ray b]

Yes it was a push-rod engine.

''With two cams?

How did that work''


block started life as a push rod motor
they added heads with the cams on top and drives for them

much like the repco V8 in 66 in F-1

[Ray Bell]

That's not what I understood McGuire to say...

He was talking about pushrod and rocker angles.

[Lee Nicolle]

Modern NASCAR lumps don't have much in common with a SBF or SBC or Mopar lumps - they are built to a spec that Nascar hand out - they are state of the art race engines. Teams have switch from Chevy to Toyota and all the parts are the same (as all one off parts - just have to have Toyota part no.s stamped on them instead of the chevy ones. These things rev to 10k easy (generally keep to about 9 though). They are all alloy and do a fair few road course races each year. 140 - 150bhp per litre from a pushrod 3v V8 is really something.

Those engines are still based on a small block Chev, Ford, Mopar. The Toyotas are a joke, a pushrod engine supposedly based on a 4800 cc Landcruiser V8. They are all iron block with very trick internals, heads,intakes, oiling etc still using a carby. But are really a useless engine for anything except full throttle on ovals. They use different spec engines for restrictor plate tracks and also for road courses though their engines still really do not suit road courses, way too much top end power and not a great deal of driveability.
To use one in a sports/ racing car would have be detuned a lot, smaller flowing heads, intakes, cams etc. The superspeedway engines make power from about 7800 to 9500 rpm and they run them past that.
As Ray said a lot of their stuff is lifed severely which is why that industry creates so much s/h stuff. The average road racer or dirt tracker can use a lot of it but the heads and engines are really useless as an assembly.Look on ebay though for clutches, rods, valve train components, even oil pumps and the like. And not just the premier class but the next levels down sell stuff off or buy it them selves. But a lot of the stuff is getting too specialised. Last clutch I bought had a non standard bigger diameter[except Nascar] spline on it meaning a new set of plates to use on a normal T10 gearbox spline.

[Bob Riebe]

Modern NASCAR lumps don't have much in common with a SBF or SBC or Mopar lumps - they are built to a spec that Nascar hand out - they are state of the art race engines. Teams have switch from Chevy to Toyota and all the parts are the same (as all one off parts - just have to have Toyota part no.s stamped on them instead of the chevy ones. These things rev to 10k easy (generally keep to about 9 though). They are all alloy and do a fair few road course races each year. 140 - 150bhp per litre from a pushrod 3v V8 is really something.

That is simply wrong.

[Bob Riebe]

Those engines are still based on a small block Chev, Ford, Mopar. The Toyotas are a joke, a pushrod engine supposedly based on a 4800 cc Landcruiser V8. They are all iron block with very trick internals, heads,intakes, oiling etc still using a carby. But are really a useless engine for anything except full throttle on ovals. They use different spec engines for restrictor plate tracks and also for road courses though their engines still really do not suit road courses, way too much top end power and not a great deal of driveability.
To use one in a sports/ racing car would have be detuned a lot, smaller flowing heads, intakes, cams etc. The superspeedway engines make power from about 7800 to 9500 rpm and they run them past that.
As Ray said a lot of their stuff is lifed severely which is why that industry creates so much s/h stuff. The average road racer or dirt tracker can use a lot of it but the heads and engines are really useless as an assembly.Look on ebay though for clutches, rods, valve train components, even oil pumps and the like. And not just the premier class but the next levels down sell stuff off or buy it them selves. But a lot of the stuff is getting too specialised. Last clutch I bought had a non standard bigger diameter[except Nascar] spline on it meaning a new set of plates to use on a normal T10 gearbox spline.

The Ford was the last one still using a production based engine, now with the new FR9 they like Chevy and Dodge use engines which are not related to the production engines.
The Dodge is in its sixth incarnation, I do not know about the Chevy, but I was told it was NASCAR that forbid them to use anything related to the LS engine.
Toyota took some of the best engine builders in the U.S. and created an engine with the knowledge gained from previous engines by the big three, or so I was told.

Ford did have a better idea as they ran the same basic layout for over thirty years.

The heads are alloy.

Edited by Bob Riebe, 17 September 2010 - 02:10.

[Bob Riebe]

''With two cams?

How did that work''


block started life as a push rod motor
they added heads with the cams on top and drives for them

much like the repco V8 in 66 in F-1

427 3-valve "Calliope"
This engine was intended to run at LeMans, but rule changes outlawed it before it was ever fired. Displacing 427 cubic inches, it was out of place in a class limited to 183 CID. Two engines were produced. One even made it into a test car.

Even though mainly of aluminum construction, this monster weighed 577 lbs.

But it was no boat anchor. The Calliope produced 630 (supposedly reliable) horsepower at 6400 RPM.


While displacing 427 cubic inches, the Calliope was no FE family engine. It used an aluminum block engine with cast iron cylinder liners. Bore was 4.34", stroke was 3.60". The unique feature of this engine are its twin camshafts, one for the intake valves and one for the exhaust. Both are in the block in an over-under arrangement. The intake camshaft lies 6" above the crankshaft centerline. Pushrods from the intake cam run parallel to the cylinder bores. The exhaust camshaft is found 4.5" above the intake cam. Its pushrods lie in a horizontal plane. The camshafts are driven by chains as are the pressure and scavenge pumps for the dry-sump oiling system.

The aluminum cylinder heads feature 3 valves per cylinder, two intakes and a single exhaust, in a pent-roof combustion chamber. The heads are sealed with copper O-rings. No intake manifold is used. Hilborn style injection stacks are cast integrally with the cylinder head. No coolant passes between the block and heads. External water lines are used instead. To shorten the engine to assist in fitting it to the racecar chassis, the standard front mounted water pump is replaced by two pumps on the cylinder banks, similar to the scheme used on the Flathead V-8.

[Muskrat]

That is simply wrong.

We live in hard times - this is just being sensible. All this is in the Hot Rod online Features pages.

The Toyoto is not base on any of their engine (yep they are iron block tough). Ebay is the place for this stuff second hand though.

[Muskrat]

Here you go - This will explain how Good a Current NASCAR "Pushrod" lump can be:-

http://www.hotrod.co...gine/index.html

And

http://www.hotrod.co...s/ford_fr9.html

Edited by Muskrat, 17 September 2010 - 12:37.

[Bob Riebe]

It is a bit odd, Dodge (Mopar) created an engine just for sprint car racing, Ford had the Boss headed Windsor cast in aluminum, but Chevy boys still run a version of the Mouse motor, with heads at least basically similar in port layout to the original stryle.
The Chevy engine was never the best for output, I wonder why they have not switched to at least a different form of heads as the Chevy factory did use them (similar to Cleveland heads) for awhile in NASCAR and they still are listed.

At a car show earlier this year, I saw aTrans-Am race related '68 Z-28 set-up with Yunick designed small-block hemi heads; I would give a lot of money for that car and engine.

Edited by Bob Riebe, 17 September 2010 - 17:35.