First, what I have is not really an opionion. The 427 was machined and assembled on its own dedicated assembly line. The marine/industrial deviation was to leave OUT the sideoiling machining process.
I think you may be misunderstanding what I am saying. A 427 is a a 427 because of the crossbolted mains and the 4.23 bore. Both of those are unique to the 427. The dimensions of the rotating assembly are the same in a 390 or 427.
I would like to see a picture of one of these non-crossbolted 427s with screw in freeze plugs. The only ones I have seen have press in plugs which indicates they were cast, machined and assembled on the 390 assembly lines. If I can see one with screw in plugs I will be the first to say it was built on the 427 line.

Yes, if you have a 390 with 427 cylinders, it displaces 425 (not 427) cubic inches.

David

 

A 427 is a 427 because of the displacement. All the Ford 427 had the same bore and stroke. I defer the point to you that, in the marine and industrial engines, they deviated to leave out the side oiler drilling process, HOWEVER they all displaced 427 cu. in. The 427 industrials had flat top pistons with the valve closer bumps in them and had big nut rods. Some had forged cranks and some had 390 cranks. All had FT heads and intakes. All 427 industrials were cast in a side oiler casting, not the (what you are calling) 390 castings. True, they do not have screw in freeze plugs, nor have they been drilled for the side oiler but they are 427 blocks.

Ford used the industrial/marine engines as a way of selling off excess inventory. They sold the 427 because the 429 was coming to nascar and performed better. They later sold 428s as industrials also. These engines were SCJ/CJ blocks with FT heads and intakes. I've dismantled a bunch of these and I know what I saw. Ford also sold the 460 as an industrial engine when they phased in the new modular engine, the 4.6,5.4, and 6.8-V10. I have seen a V-10 on display as an industrial, lately, so Ford may have something new up their sleeve.

Oh, and no, my 427 industrial in my 66 Ranger does not displace 425 cu. in. It has been bored .030 and stroked with a 428 crank so it has more like 458 cu.in. The original bore WAS 4.23

 

Guys, get this marine engine thing out of your heads. 427 marine engines had the crossblot mains. ALL of them. From what I've seen, there were about 7 of 10 of them center oilers, and the other 3 of 10 side oiled. All of the boat engines I have come across were cast as side oilers, but only a few drilled that way. Ford made all sorts of weird industrial and FT applications. You might find a block that was not machined for crossbolts. I believe this is because the blocks were tested for core shift and found to have something the matter with them. Rather than toss them in the trash, they were fitted with standard caps and used in less demanding applications. I would be VERY carefull if trying to use an old industrial block for an engine build. DF

 

66Ranger- "A 427 is a 427 because of the displacement"

Wrong, it DOES NOT measure out to 427, but actually 424 and change, 425 if you round up.

Now, if you are Ford and you are coming out with a hot new engine, but the Mopars boys have their 413/426 Wedge and Chevy has their own 427 (A bored out 409) do you come out with a 424? No way! Inflate the figure to make it look cool.

Josh

 

The old chevy W-series Z11 427 really measured out to 426.4 cid, they all were playing the numbers game. BTW it was a stroked 409 but who cares, only 57 made.

Barry

 

4.23 * 4.23 * .7854 * 3.784 * 8 = 425.4149

Not that anybody is counting.

 

>4.23 * 4.23 * .7854 * 3.784 * 8 = 425.4149
>
>Not that anybody is counting.

Ha! (4.23/2)^2 * pi(3.1415926536) * 3.784 * 8 = 425.41395. You overestimated the displacement by 0.00095 ci! That's an error of 0.0002%! At least you were right if the result is only calculated to the one hundredth of a cubic inch....

;-)

 

The 427 marine/industrial program had nothing to do with selling excess 427's. The Chris Craft program started as early as 1966 and Ford was still heavy into the 427's until well up into the 70's. In addition, the marine blocks (as dinosaurfan correctly stated) were mostly the cast as side oilers, machined as center oiler solid lifter blocks. These blocks would not have been acceptable to use in NASCAR or sports car racing. Since Ford had a difficult time keeping up with 427 production just for racing needs (one of the reasons a lot of Cobra's got 428's) I tend to agree with dinosaurfan that 427's that made it to the marine/industrial program may have had defects, even if very small.
By the way, Ford was still selling 427 service blocks into the 80's. I ordered and got a brand new one and a brand new steel crank in 1981 from Fred Jones Ford in Tulsa Oklahoma.
David

 

>Ha! (4.23/2)^2 * pi(3.1415926536) * 3.784 * 8 = 425.41395.
>You overestimated the displacement by 0.00095 ci! That's an
>error of 0.0002%! At least you were right if the result is
>only calculated to the one hundredth of a cubic inch....
>
>;-)


Time to git a rope and find a sturdy branch...

 

Mypoint with the statement 'A 427 is a 427" was merely to illustrate that Ford would not go to the trouble to make a special bore or stroke to make an industrial engine. The point was that whatever bore and stroke was being used on the performance motor, it was the same ans the marine/industrial unit.
I think that there are those 'out there' who want to downgrade or look down on the noncross bolted 427s as not being worthy of being called 427. The only reason the 427 was crossbolted and sideoiled was to give the motor longevity on the highspeed long oval tracks. If those modifications had been neccessary for street use, they would have done it to the 428. My theory is that the 427 was slated for street use (Cougar GTE) but it wasn't torquey enough to compete with the 396 Chevy, so Ford went with the 428.
The oiling system on the FE block is adequate for street use. The weak point is the back throw on the crank (4-8). Nearly every FE that I have seen that was thrashed was due to lack of oiling on that journal. I'll admit that most of my experience was with stationary industrials These engines would run 24-7 for months at a time. Maybe if Ford had drilled the sideoiler passages, they would have lasted longer.
I have taken several 427 industrials and made truck motors out of them with FE heads and intakes. We stroked 2 of them with 428 cranks and bored them .030 with no problems associated with the block. One did fail due to a piston coming apart but this cannot be blamed on the block or the oiling system.
One thing that I have noticed-- The Chevys that I have outrun didn't seem to notice whether the 427 was a '425' or if it was crossbolted or sideoiled. All they could see was FORD on the tailgate!!!!!!!!!!

 

This almost goes back to the original post. The 427 when retooled with sideoiler tooling was an out and our racing engine. All good duy parts, forged steel crank, forged pistons, valve train, etc. The reason it did not go in many cars was cost. A good tuned side oiler will pull 500 hp and 500 ft lbs of torque, enough to compete with any street engine at the time.
There were many problems with putting these beasts in street cars. First, the only bodies that would accept these engines was full size Fords Mercs' and Trucks (yes, in 1966 ford did build 12 427 F-100).
The performance crowd was heading toward the smaller bodies. Ford had no exhaust manifolds that would fit the 427 heads in the smaller bodies. The valve covers required for the tall cams would not clear the brake master cylinders.
Ford cast up special "Ball Glove exhaust manifolds" and mad a slighlty taller "powered by Ford" valve cover. All of these things were tried, even putting 390 heads on the 67 & 68 GT500 so the horizontal bolt pattern exhausts could be used in the mustang and fairlane.
Development of the CJ head proved that a standard production engine could perfom very well and still be civilized. When the CJ appeared in 68, the 427 was exiled to the race track and the water.

 

 

How about a cross bolt 390? Where they ever made?

 

No, but they can certainly be added. You will see lots of 428 with crossbolts added.