The Chevy small block turned 60 this year. Could they design and build an engine this strong and durable during the Government Motors years?
Posted on 03/11/2015 6:22:47 PM PDT by Impala64ssa
Ford made some fine smallblocks as well.
1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2.
I loved the Ford straight 6 300ci in their Pick Ups. Great engine that you could actually work on.
The design of which was ripped off from Chevy.
(That oughta get something started.)
I had an ‘81 Ford pickup as my coal mine truck. It was sold with a granny low gear, which helped me navigate around the various mine sites.
I replaced all four tires in ‘82.
All three companies did. I don’t know how many miles I have on Mopar 318s. Only let me down once due to a bad fuel pump. I duct taped a 5 gal can to the roof, ran a siphon to the carb, and drove it home.
I had a 72 Mercury Montego with a 289 smallblock out of a 67 Fairlane police car.
You could just about walk around the engine compartment under the hood but the car was very quick.
LOL Still got that memorized. I finally got around to tuning up the 64 and replacing the plug wires.
LOL no argument from me. All the smallblocks were great.
Thanks for posting this. Lots of hard work and tinkering went into what we can be grateful to drive and admre today.
We have one on a backup generator at work. I told the boss that it will probably still be running when we are both dead.
First car was a 1966 Chevy Malibu with a 283. wonderful car, good pick up, good fuel economy. Unfortunately, ‘Body by Fisher’ meant many many many rust holes in the floor by 1980.
“I loved the Ford straight 6 300ci in their Pick Ups. Great engine that you could actually work on.”
Bulletproof motor if there ever was one. Would run forever. No timing chain. The same torque as the 302 V-8 at 1000 less RPM.
Also used extensively as an industrial motor. Worked on many in Asplundh chippers.
And the water pump was easy to change.
I always preferred the Mopar small block because it didn’t need 4-bolt mains and Chrysler engineers had a knack for good vale sizing for drivability. However, you spend enough time following a small block Chevy on the racetrack, you realize that it is the better mousetrap and when you make the switch, you discover that you actually can win, not end up in third or fourth.
>>All three companies did. I don’t know how many miles I have on Mopar 318s<<
I had a Satellite with the 318.
The only downside was those damn hydraulic lifters — you couldn’t adjust the tappets like the Chevy and Ford V-8s.
Damn, I loved that car!
My 2000 Tahoe came equipped with the small block Chevy. I know that was the last year in the Tahoe not sure about the vans.
“The design of which was ripped off from Chevy”
+1
There are some technical inaccuracies in the article; the 348/409 was an interesting motor, but a technological dead-end with its combustion chamber in the piston and the head being essentially flat. This was called the “W” engine, not the “rat”, which was the 396/(402)/427/454. The W engine’s pistons were incredibly heavy and the engine had zero rev potential. It was big and torquey, though, fine for a truck, which was its original purpose.
The greatest innovations of the small block IMO were the stamped rocker arms (cheaper than dirt and they worked very well/lasted forever on a street engine) and the block being strong enough to avoid an oil pan “skirt” (basically, the entire oil pan was stamped), saving enormous weight.
They saved a lot of money on those rockers, leaving lots to spend elsewhere on the engine.
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