Did this thread die? I was just getting to enjoy it. Hey Dick, thanks for opening the door for my other favorite Ford vehicle. I love the tank almost as much as the 53-55's.

 

The 534 Ford, 549 IHC, and corresponding Reo ???" engine were all designed by the same engineers, I've seen them and don't believe they resemble the small Ford Y-blocks at all. They may be deep skirted like the y-blocks, however.

The V12 and V16 Cadillacs were not flatheads; V8s, yes, until 1948.

 

I know the 534 is a different animal then the "Y" block 239-312 group. I couldnt remember if the 534 had a deep skirt block, I suffer from C.R.S.
Buddy has a beat to hell 50s Mack dumptruck that still sees use with a 707 cid flathead Mack 6 cylinder.

 

I hope not, its interesting to talk about old different motors. I always wondered why the exhaust manifold crossed over on the Y block Fords above the water pump area (and some of the larger Lincolns)

 

The Marmon V16 of 1931 = 491ci, aluminum construction, overhead valves, and 200 horsepower. Yes, the very same Marmon name that earlier fathered the Marmon Wasp, and later gave birth to Marmon-Herrington All Wheel Drive.

 

Forget the motors, lets talk about the tank....lol kidding.

 

Didn't mean to step on your toes. I saw what you had said upon a re -read of your post, after I posted!
Hall-Scott, although not a flathead, had a six cylinder of about 1150ci that powered the Ward-LaFrance and Kenworth 6x6 6 ton wreckers of WWII. The fuel usage was something like one or two mpg.

 

Oh yeah, tank related. Chrysler put together 5 flathead six cylinder engines, I think they were the 250ci, around a common crankcase for a (Sherman?) tank. Five carbs and five distributors to tinker with.

 

No worries. With gas prices (probably on the rise) these days stuff like that requires a bank robbery to fill them up.

 

Speaking of tanks did you guys see that site about a year ago about a Russian T34 recovered from a lake ?

 

Chrysler made some tanks, White had a gas motor, Continental, GM. I think a few others. I remember seeing the Chrysler info, but can't track it down. There were a lot of different things going on to make the best tank. The Sherman was light and more managable than the others, but it lacked heavy armor. It is interesting to think about the engines back then, and then look at the motors now days. Who would of thought that only 55-70 years ago, the engine was so primitive, yet so complex, and now we look at them and say wow, those actually worked. Technology, isn't it wonderful

 

No, I missed that one.

 

The Lincoln Zephyr V12, also used in 1940/48 Continentals

1936/40 = 267 cid

1941/42 = 292 cid

1946/48 = 305 cid

The term "Hot Rod Lincoln" was based on the 1953/54 Lincoln Mexican Road Race cars prepared and driven by Bill Stroppe of Long Beach CA. The engines were Lincoln Y blocks of 317 cid. The 1954 Lincoln won. The car still exists and was (the last time I heard) in Harrah's Automobile Collection in Reno NV. Harrah died in 1977, and the hotels/casinos and the car collection were sold to Holiday Inns. The museum only has several hundred cars today (it was over 1500 once) and is now known as the National Auto Museum.

Cadillac had the first V16. Introduced in 1930, one month before the Marmon V16 it was a OHV of 452 cid. In 1938 the OHV V16 was replaced by a 135 degree flathead V16 of 431 cid.

Cadillac also introduced a OHV V12 in 1930. It was 368 cid. The OHV V12 and V16 engines were a thing of beauty. The two engines featured polished aluminum valve covers, the exhaust manifolds were porcelainized black, and all the wires were hidden away under covers.

I bought a 1930 Cadillac V16 7 passenger Imperial sedan from a UCLA student in 1961 for $25.00! After a little work, I got it to run. It got 5 MPG. I sold it in 1962 for $300.00.

My first car was a 1936 Lincoln Zephyr sedan with 35K original miles. I paid $100.00 for it in 1956. It had been traded in at my dad's Olds Dealership. My dad thought I was nuts buying it. Just before he died in 1997, he still thought I was nuts buying these old rolling piles of misery. By this time, I had owned well over 300 cars.

 

Not a Y-block but this is an 1100 cubic inch V8 from a WWII Sherman tank. It was rated at 500 HP with dual overhead cams and four valves per cylinder...pretty high tech for an engine built in the 40s...

 

This is the one time, and probably the only time, I'm going to dispute Numbers. The real hot rod Lincoln, as in the song, was and is still, owned by an old country western singer from, I believe, Washington state.
He wrote the song on his way to do a concert way back when. I don't remember much about the song itself, but I used to listen to it on the radio back in the '50s. I think it had something to do with winning a street race on the way to the concert, but I'm not sure.

The story, as told in Rod & Custom mag was that an old timer walked up to a street rodder getting some work done on his car(lube, oil change, whatever) and mentioned that he had a car like that.
The rodder sloughed it off as,"yeah, yeah, I've heard that BS before." But the old guy invited him to see the car and it turned out to be the original Hotrod Lincoln.
The young rodder contacted a well known rod shop in the northwest about the car and along with some donations from other shops and manufacturers, the car was rebuilt free of charge for the old guy!

By the way, I have a collection of R&C dating back to the 25 cent "little pages."
I still have the one where the mechanical engineer said man would never go faster thn 140MPH in the 1/4 mile. He missed it by a whole bunch!