All aluminum 409???

[tripowerguy]

Say Ingnition Man, maybe you can shed some light on a Smokey subject. During the gas shortage of the 70's Smokey was supposed to have invented a carbon fiber engine that needed no coolant and was in V twin configuration. The V twins could be put together to make up V 4's to V 8's. The thing is that the story goes that the manufacturing rights were bought from Smokey and then shelfed. Smokey tried to buy them back but couldn't get the deal done. Urban legend has ot that he was bought out by oil interests.: Roy

 

[impalaragpat]

all alum 409 pic

Stole this from racing days post by oil4kids. Is this an all alum 409 , or am I seeing things?
Pat

 

[SS425HP]

Am I seeing a brace from the right valve cover to the air filter?????
Sure looks like something there.
I'd say this was just the regular Chevrolet Orange all over. Water Pump was aluminum. It looks different to me.

JMHO


Fred

 

[wrench]

z-11 photo

What appears to be a brace is actually an intake runner.

 

[348NUT]

This has become a very interesting thread! I was born in 1970 so I'm afraid I can't input much.

 

[IgnitionMan]

Original 396-427 concept first paper flogged in late 1961, as a racing engine to replace the W engine.

Crankshafts were produced early 1962 for 427 mystery engine dyno/racing development. I do know that one of the aluminum W engines in that storage area had had a number of different evaluation packages in it, and ended up with a Z11 3.625 stroke crankshaft/parts in it, the other with different parts/rods/pistons, and a forged 427 3.760 stroke development crankshaft.

The reason(s) for the new engine design over the W engine were head flow and intake angles, lighter pistons and reciprocating/rotating weights, efficiency and horsepower/torque ooutput.

The W engines were never really intended for passenger car installation as they were developed for medium to heavy truck use. Chevy then needed an engine to combat sales from F-o-r-d and Mopar, and the 1958 Chevy's were heavier platforms than the earlier shoeboxes. Writing was on the wall way back in 1953, big car, bigger engine.

 

[Rockfish39]

Originally posted by IgnitionMan
Original 396-427 concept first paper flogged in late 1961, as a racing engine to replace the W engine.

Crankshafts were produced early 1962 for 427 mystery engine dyno/racing development. .

Dave,

I dont know what your former occupation was before you went into business for yourself , but if I had to guess at it, I'd say the you're a Engineer of some flavor. Maybe an EE, maybe a ME, I cant really tell which.

BUT, IT sure sounds to me like you know a thing or two about technical concept papers and development cycles. It also sounds like you've had the pleasure of experiencing the extra-ordinarily long time it takes to get any approval , not to mention funding, from management for a development project.

Rockfish

 

[sot bchm]

aluminum 409

Iwas colecting parts back in the late 70's at a chevy dealer the parts manager was checking # and rear out loud something about a aluminum M 400 model if that helps anyone with old gm parts manuals

 

[SS425HP]

Mystery Motor

Smokey Yunick had said the ( I think ) Mark 11 motor was a GREAT MOTOR. The production version ( Mark 4 ) That was released in 65, was a totaly different motor, and not near as good. Read that somewhere, but don't ask where. Gist of the matter was he liked the 62-3 version, but not the later production motor. Don't know what the differences were, but he did!

Fred

 

[oil4kids]

switch pitch powerglide

Jim Hall's Chaparral had a very inventive switch pitch powerglide transmission..... a 2 speed torque converter from the Buick super turbine parts bin.

Years ago i did a big article on the switch pitch turbo 400 for the Chevelle report, for the National Chevelle owners Association, of course now long gone.

 

[Tom Kochtanek]

Aluminum SBCs

Richard:

Your mention of the 1960 CERV (Chevrolet Experimental Racing Vehicle) and its all-aluminum 283 developed by Zora sparked my interest. This engine used a "high silicone content that required no cylinder liners" and included cast aluminum heads as well as water pump, flywheel, clutch pressure plate and starter motor case. A magnesium intake and Hillborn fuel injection combined to turn out 353 HP at 6200 RPM -- quite good for that period (even if it was a SBC ).

These designs led to the development of an aluminum 327 variant that displaced 377 cubes and put out nearly 500 horses. This was the engine that was placed in those five 1963 Grand Sports (Chevy's attempt to beat the Shelby AC Cobras). In 1960 Bill France, NASCAR founder, put up $10,000 to anyone who could lap Daytona Speedway at 180 MPH or more. Duntov had already done this at 170 MPH in that aluminum 283. He was able to not only exceed that 180 MPH mark at Daytona with the 377 CI, but was able to AVERAGE 206 MPH at GM's Milford Proving Ground (home court advantage?), a 4.5 mile oval track. Now that's cooking !!!!

Unfortunately for the "W" engine, at one time considered as an option for the Corvette, Duntov dismissed the 409 block as "too large and too heavy" and felt that these characteristics made it wrong for the Corvette. Maybe for that fiberglass jewel, but we got ours in the 61-62-63-64-65 full sized passenger cars, the highlight of course being 1963 and the 427 Z-11.

How cool would it have been to see the 283 CERV engine, an aluminum 377, an aluminum 409, and an L-88 with aluminum heads all lined up in a row? I wonder if these were ever at Smokey's garage at the same time?

Hey, if you have one of these aluminum SBCs I think Phil Reed would still let you come to the 348-409 convention, wouldn't he? But then you'd probably have a "W" engine as well .

Cheers,
TomK

 

[region rat]

I know this thread hasn't had much interest layely, But before Chevrolet made any alloy blocks, in the later 50's they contracted Paul Wright from P&S foundry to do patterns and cast some blocks for them. When he had them done, he told me 3 guys came to his shop in Akron . They gave him a breifcase fuyll of cash and took everything back to GM.
They made oabout 450 BBC aluminum blocks after GM quit making them. Some had YENKO cast by the front caover. He did several other blocks, including the Mopar pro stock block for Wayne County speed shop.
Very smart guy, well under the radar.
Great to have met him.
Bob

 

[427John]

I know this thread hasn't had much interest layely, But before Chevrolet made any alloy blocks, in the later 50's they contracted Paul Wright from P&S foundry to do patterns and cast some blocks for them. When he had them done, he told me 3 guys came to his shop in Akron . They gave him a breifcase fuyll of cash and took everything back to GM.
They made oabout 450 BBC aluminum blocks after GM quit making them. Some had YENKO cast by the front caover. He did several other blocks, including the Mopar pro stock block for Wayne County speed shop.
Very smart guy, well under the radar.
Great to have met him.
Bob

Did they do any Ford blocks? Years ago I was looking at some Boss 429 stuff and one of the blocks the guy had was an aluminum Boss 429 block that had a P&S cast onto the front of the driver side cylinder bank.It was only partially machined and had a lot left to do.

 

[region rat]

Yes, John, He mentioned doing a couple of Ford blocks. He also did some stuff for Warren Johnson when they made bore spacing bigger. He also made Hornet rockers. He had a few iron blocks that weren't machined. 12" deck BBC based blocks. He said they made 800 Cubic inch offshore boat motors. He wanted to machine my blocks for me. He had open heart and didn't last very long after that. Great guy to meet.
Bob

 

[427John]

Were the blocks he did use the aluminum bore or were they meant to use a pressed in iron sleeve? I think they either used a different alloy or a different heat treatment for the aluminum bore blocks. Ford made a very few blocks that had iron sleeves and a casting number for the 494 Can Am program,I think the alloy/heat treatment change was a later development, if his were sleeved he may have prototyped them for Ford, if his were aluminum bore then they might have been a later development, Don Nicholson used either one of the Can AM blocks or one of his in conjunction with some development mule aluminum 429PI heads to make the very first all aluminum wedge head BBF for Pro Stock.

 

[region rat]

All the blocks he spoke of were with iron sleeves. Probably ductile moly. Very tough.. He hooked me up with LA Sleeve for my blocks.High quality.
Bob

 

[La Hot Rods]

We're the Mopar P/S blocks built on the big block chevy platform?

 

[region rat]

Thety were for a long time. I was told the NHRA pointed out thet were Chrysler Corp and they should have their own block. They were using a BBC Dart with B-1 or B-2 heads. They just used the Mopar head bolt pattern. That was when Paul got involved.

 

[region rat]

all alum 409 pic

Stole this from racing days post by oil4kids. Is this an all alum 409 , or am I seeing things?
Pat

Since I am a little color blind, I can tell that the engine is orange.