Early Pontiac 389 speed and hop up parts?

What do you guys know of for these things? Valve covers, pans, well... anything finned and sexy. Speed parts?

I've been doing some research and I am having some trouble finding anything at all really.... not exactly a "common" motor I guess?

 

YA NEED TO GET OUT TO EVERY SWAP MEET YOU CAN FIND...

I HAVE A 6X2, 3X2, & SINGLE 4bbl EARLY PONTIAC MANIFOLD.
3 DIFFERENT SETS OF FINNED VALVE COVERS.
AND A FAIR SELECTION OF OLD CHROMED STUFF.

BUT ITS ALL NOT FOR SALE AS I RUN A '60 389 IN A CHOPPED F-100
AND HAVE AN EXTRA THAT WILL GO IN MY '55 F-350 DUALLY

ONE HINT..... YA DONT FIND MUCH OF ANYTHING SITTING IN FRONT OF YOUR COMPUTER

 

A Pontiac is a Pontiac. The intake holes moved over the years, but everything else is the same. Moon, and Offy make nice finned valve covers. There are several Pontiac-specific builders out there.

Early tri-power intakes are cheap, and plentiful. Post an ad here, or just hit ebay for what you need.
Heads swap between all engines.

http://kre-power.com

http://nunzi-pontiac-expert.com

http://jbp-pontiac.com

Stay away from an assnut named Bruce Fulper.

What do you have? Year? How fast do you wanna go?

 

I've got a tripower intake for an early Pontiac 389, I'd trade it straight up for a later 389 tripower intake if you found one.

 

How "early" we talkin? I think cams, heads and things like that are interchangeable if you use the right intake for the later heads. Mooneyes, and Offy both have killer looking valve covers. I got a set of each if you'd like a picture. Dual point type ignition should fit early stuff, and that's still available. And like Desoto says, the intakes are around if you look and have a little loot to burn. Especially Tri-power stuff. LOTS of those were made

 

WOW amen on the Fulper guy aka crock n roll engineering- I know from a very expensive experience.

 

I run two 389's one with a tri power and the other a 2 barrel. good motor and like others have said tri powers are out there and inexpensive compared to most. also finned covers are available. What will get you is the cost to rebuild one. The tri power really makes these engines come alive!

 

Not to hijack your thread, but what would I look for to determine an early tri-power intake vesus a late. I headed to a swap meet tommorrow(thurs) and will be looking for such a creature.

 

The motor is a 59' 389. Many parts are not interchangeable with later models from what I have found out.

I can't really go to swap meets unless there are some...lol. There's not exactly a huge market for swap meets in Minnesota area at the present time.

As for the cost to rebuild, I've found a complete rebuild kit that has everything I will need to get it back to perfect spec (less machining obviously) for $659.00. I'd say that's relatively cheap, and worth investing.

 

Quick 'n dirty, the late '65 & '66 intakes have 10 bolts attaching them to the heads, '64 and earlier have 12.

The '65 and '66 intakes bring the good $$, the earlier ones go for a lot less. The '66 unit uses all 3 large Rochester carbs, '59 - '65 use the smaller carb in the center, '57 & '58 use all 3 small carbs.

 

I've bought stuff at swap meets for ponchos and I don't even have one. Anyone need a wh DuCoil or a early chev 3 spd adapter? You just can't pass up stuff when you see it. (pontiac)

 

draggin gto-
could the early ones be modified to work with the later

 

Ive had a Du-coil, and a Grant/Spalding flamethrower, both old school, very cool looking distributors that run 2 coils. If you happen to find a perfect NOS flamethrower, let me know. Mine walked off recently. All pontiac V8 dizzys interchange, so that opens up a lot of options.

Ive had a few cool valve covers. The ones I have right now, and old no-name finned ones made by edelbrock. They are very symlar to the ones moon sells. I have seen a few other variations, old cal custom ones, I just saw some cool ass M/T ones go on ebay recently, hadnt seen another pair like them before(diffrent from the common, later ones). Offy makes some cool ones too.

Moon makes a bitchen timing cover, but to the best of my knowledge, there are no provisions for a water pump, so its race only. I think that the huge timing cover/water pump housing would be damn sexy smoothed and chromed.

As far as intakes go, there are 6x2's, 2x4's, 3x2's, 1x4's, and even though I havent seen one for sale, there are some blower intakes out there. My personal favorite is the X2, its a 6x2 cross ram. It looks killer, and is more streetable than a 6x2 log type intake. Ive had a few, but the only one I had left, walked off recently. If you find an X2 drilled for 4 bolt carbs, with the driver rear mounting tab broken(or repaired...), let me know. 55-60 intakes interchange, no problem, and some aftermarket intakes will fit 55-64(I believe), but you have to plug off some water passages or something. Ive never messed with with a pontiac newer than 1960, so Im not positive on that.

Ive never seen an aftermarket oil pan, but you said you have a 59, you might want to consider switching to a 1960 389 oil pan, because I believe it holds an extra quart.

I have seen an aftermarket valley cover, but its not finned, and requires a lot of fitting....

Gothica(spelling), made some cool steel roller rockers for the 56-60 pontiacs. Same ratio as stock. You can run normal alum roller rockers out of jegs, if you change the studs. I have also seen some light weight valve spring retainers.

Cams for almost all pontiac V8s are interchangeable, lifters should be too.

Schiefer made a light weight alum. fly wheel for em...

The 1960 Hod rod Annual, has a build up, and a lot of dyno testing/R&D on the 1960 389. I believe Vic Edelbrock, and Ed Iscanderian(sp?), were doing/involved with the build. Let me know if you cant find one. I dont have a scanner, but might be able to have some photo copys made and mailed to anyone who needs the info, because it really is pretty cool. It has a lot of useful information, more so for building a motor, doing head mods, ect., but there is some stuff at the beginning where they test some diffrent factory 3x2's.

They are kinda heavy, but were legitmate hot rod motors, biggest limitations with them were the valves, because at least in the early motors, it is not possible to run oversized valves.

Thats just about all I can think of right now....

Please help keep an eye out for my stolen X2, and my spalding flamethrower, that stuff was really important to me.


Thanks,
Cory

 

Oil pan is an oil pan, '60 motor is 5 and a half quarts or so if I remember right. If yours is pitted up from rust, a 301 pan even fits the early one.

As far as valve covers go, there are some minor differences but with a little extra goop on them you can use later ones on the early heads.

I have a rebuilt '59 389 and it has a '77 301 front cover on it, a '77 301 distributor in it, and I have other stuff for it. All D-port headers physically bolt to your heads, intakes are not too hard to find (I have 2 of the stock iron 4bbls now), the only places these are really different are the trans bolt pattern and the intake manifold bolt pattern.


If you change the cam be aware for 59-60 you can alter the valve train geometry, test crank the motor to be sure you're not hitting the pistons with the valves.

 

DAMN! Now THAT'S some good info guys! Thanks a ton!

NY, I've heard about the valves. Someone mentioned running later 389 heads? Heard anything like that?

SmallTown, thanks for that reply. That's exactly the kind of information I was looking for.

 

I can get all the Offenhauser parts for the early 389 (manifolds and valve covers, oil filter by pass, valve cover breathers, etc)

Dan Marvin, Owner
Exeter Auto Supply

 

Like someone said, later valve covers will work, you just have to use a lot of blue goo in the back corners.

 

You may want to think twice about going with that cheap rebuild kit because some of those parts are going to be just that, i.e., cheap. You'd be better off piecing a rebuild together using quality components. Any of the known Pontiac engine builders will help you select the right parts.

 

There was a finned valley cover on ebay a while back that went for several hundered dollars. It was beautiful.

 

I think the company was called Gotha.

 

Gothica(spelling), made some cool steel roller rockers for the 56-60 pontiacs. Same ratio as stock. You can run normal alum roller rockers out of jegs, if you change the studs. I have also seen some light weight valve spring retainers.

THE CORRCT NAME IS GOTHA ... I HAVE SOME ON MY 389 @1.65 RATIO AND I DONT RECOMEND RUNNING THEM.

AS FOR RUNNING JEGS ALUMINUM ROCKER OR ANY LATE ROCKER..... IT CANT BE DONE BY CHANGING THE STUD.
"55~"60 HEADS HAVE A DIFFERENT ROCKER GEOMETRY THAN THE LATER ONES AND THE EARLY ROCKER ARE SHORTER.

IF YOU PUT THE LATE ROCKER ON AN EARLY HEAD THE TIP OF THE ROCKER LANDS ABOUT 1/2 WAY OFF THE TIP OF THE VALVE.

 

Butler Performance for the go fast goodies also Nunzi's I think he is in New York ? they both can give you all the info you need as well as machine work and parts.these guys are Poncho only so they know thier stuff.

 

I've got an Edelbrock EP4B intake (not for sale), and it's got two water ports near the front of the gasket surface. One hole gets plugged for '55-'60 heads, and the other one does for use with '61-'64 heads. There's a guy that sells on Ebay--his name escapes me right now--but he appears to have cleaned out an old speed shop, and he regularly lists sets of screw in rocker studs for the early engines that oil the rockers through the stud.

 

That's Jim from California Speed and Sport. Not out of business. Here in New Brunswick since 1945. oldspeedtees on Ebay.

Cafe-racer, your 59 block has the early bellhousing pattern. You need to bolt an early hydro to it, or use an adapter. Wilcap makes them for @ $300.

 

I've got a manual tranny bellhousing for the block (early one that bolts right up), plus everything I need to run a manual but a tranny right now. I was driving myself nuts looking for the early bellhousing mount starter setup on ebay and such, but it turns out the seller had it to go with the motor for me.

 

What do you not like about the gotha rockers?

 

If you have '65 or later heads don't bother with '64 and earlier intakes. The front water crossover design is very different between the two types of intakes.

You might be able to make it work with enough hacking, but it is for sure not an easy mod. Find the right intake for your heads, they are out there. This is one thing you'll probably have to pay some decent scratch for, the '66 intakes are fetching $400+ now.

 

Here is a late model 400 we will be running with Offy valve covers and a tri-power. For tri-power info or rebuilding check out www.pontiactripower.com the guy is awesome.

 

http://www.pontiacheaven.org/

 

Cool, some good info