crankshaft
When Ford introduced its Y-block engine in 1954, it labeled the engine the worthy successor to the venerable Flathead. The Flathead gained a loyal following of hot rodders and racers, but the big Cadillac overhead-valve V-8 and Oldsmobile’s Rocket 88 were stealing Ford’s thunder in terms of power, so something had to be done, and Ford decided to respond. The answer was a clean-sheet V-8 design, featuring overhead valves and improved cooling compared to the old Flathead. It was dubbed the “Y-block” because of the way it looked and because of its deep skirt and tall cylinder heads.
Time and time again, our advice to those interested in learning about stout-running engines is that it’s the total combination that makes it all happen—considering, of course, that components are prepped, cleaned and assembled as if in a “clean room.”
Thirty-five years and $636 ago, we bought an 80,000-mile ’62 fuel-injected Corvette in Fresno, California. Sadly, the car had been stolen once. The fuel injection was gone as well as the T-10 four-speed transmission. A pair of bare 461-X heads was in the trunk. The engine was found to have a rocking rear cam bearing, which caused oil to shut off to the rocker arms at high rpm. At the time, the prognosis was that it could not be fixed, so the motor was replaced with a ’68 350hp 327. Since 1976, the car has been in storage, along with the original engine.