I love my small block chevy's. Prefer a proper early 327 over a later 350. They are hard to beat for the money to get a good running engine, cheaply dress it up, and they drop in most early cars without needing to bash the firewall in or ditch the hood/add bubbles to hood sides and make it easy to get all the brackets, mounts, etc to get you up and running quickly. Outside of the small blocks, I am a sucker for a 348/409 Chevy W motor. Some small block stuff interchanges, super torque and cant beat the valve covers. Still a good amount of support for them, some stuff harder to find and can get expensive in a hurry just like any other vintage engine. Have a 348 in our 61 Impala, building a 409 for it to drop in this winter. Had a 34 5 five window that we shoved a 348 with 6x2s in. It dropped right in the place where a 302 Ford was, so the firewall had already been replaced with a deep recessed one.
When I was in high school, just after in plumbing and electricity were invented, Chevy hadn't gotten the overwhelming use it does today. Armed with those memories, decided be different from the crowd and return to my long ago high school days, when there were an abundance of choices used. A friend of mine that worked with, saw my frustration with not being able to find a 291 DeSoto, After a year's search, he came to me and asked how it was going. I told him of my frustration and he said he picked up a hemi from a kid that wasn't allowed to store it under the stairwell in his apartment building. I got it for free if I hauled it off immediately! The next day headed over with a hoist and a couple of friends and hauled it off. It was a 354 out of a '58 Dodge 2 1/2 truck. I put passenger car heads of a '56 on it. Rebuilt it, boring it to 4" standard, balanced it, had Schneider custom grind a cam away I went! It now has about 40K. miles on it and runs absolutely flawlessly. I soon realized that old Hemi parts are made out of a rare alloy, unobtanium! Once my wallet recovered, am extremely happy with it. It also looks cool with those enormous heads hanging the frame rails! It runs 70 lbs of oil pressure and 180-185 degrees year around. Would I do it again? In a heartbeat!
The Why? part of your question is pretty obvious. They're plentiful, affordable, stock rebuild or high performance parts can be bought anywhere, they fit in older cars.
Yes. The small block Chevrolet gained popularity for all of the same reasons that the Ford flathead did twenty years earlier.
I was blessed enough to be mentored in the old car hobby by some great old-timers who were around rodding and customizing in the relevent era. I remember one guy in particular, Ted Prada, who actually ran a nice Y block in his 58 Ford, saying "you young guys hate chevys because everyone has one. In the 50s, when the Chevy came out, we were all scrambling to get one. Nobody wanted flatheads and y blocks anymore". There's no question that SBCs are common and somewhat cliche, even though finding decent Gen 1 SBCs are getting more difficult, and they're becoming more phased out by LS counterparts. However, there is nothing more traditional or HAMB-relevant than a SBC. In fact, I would argue that less common engines like the big Gen 2 Oldsmobiles (ie 330, 400, 425, 455), Cadillac 427, 472, 500, big Buicks, big block Fords, etc., are not HAMB relevant engines and don't belong in a traditional build. I'd even venture to say that LA Chryslers and BBCs barely meet the cutoff by 1 year, and really don't fit the aesthetic either unless the rest of the car is mid-60s appropriate.
Have a Cad 390 in my '40 Ford, and a 331 in my '32 A roadster. The main reason I bought the roadster 25 years ago was that it didn't have a belly-button motor in it... No sbc's for this old guy.
For a street car, my motor of choice is a small block Mopar. With the right combination of parts they can run pretty well. Dress up parts are pretty limited, air cleaners or valve covers are pretty much the choices. Most of what is available these days have those ugly modern "M" labels. I don't open my hood very often, so my stuff looks like the motor that used to be in grandma's car. No fluff, just reliable fun. Finding small block Mopar stuff is getting pretty tough these days. Most of the modern Mopar motors are junk compared to the older stuff. Everyone wants the modern Hemi, they don't look anything like the early Hemi did, and look even more odd in the older cars, as far as I'm concerned. Its a good thing my building days are mostly behind me now. I have no idea what motor I would put in a hot rod if I couldn't find a small block Mopar.
I am sorry to say that I do own one SBC. I am, however, very happy to say it is in matching numbers C2 Corvette. Otherwise my tastes run to flatheads, early hemi's, Olds Rockets, and a 9 bearing 356 Packard.
A 330 Olds in a 1964 Vista Cruiser is HAMB relevant. A 330 Olds in a 1955 Super 88 is not, unless the build style is specific to 1964/5 This is illustrative of the point I'm trying to make. Some folks will say, "Cool, they're keeping it (insert vehicle brand) in a (insert same vehicle brand)", and ignore the fact that for a period build the engine utilized wasn't even available yet.
Cost and parts availability is a big factor, I don't have any Chevy or Ford V8 but when you throw $5000 in an engine to barely make 100hp compared to how much you can get out of an SBC for the same money and in the end have about the same gas mileage, it makes you think twice.
Expense! Crate SBF & SBC Engines are readily available and not every one has the ability to repair or even find parts for other engines. Many are finding our LS’s are not the cure all either as they are butt ugly unless covered up and not attractive in a hood less car. Ours:
A later engine in an early car is "not relevant"? That's practically all we do. As long as both the car and the engine are 1965 or older. Any era you want to emulate, from the time the car was manufactured through 1965. Edit: Or even an engine built after 1965 as long as it retains the basic architecture of its earlier renditions. My engine is from a 1978 motorhome. Basically the same engine as the 413. Still relevant.
With the LS be swapped into anything on 4 wheels or even two the chevy small block is getting a fresh look as a vintage motor it's not my cup of tea but the 327 has just enough cool factor over the 283 or 350 and they sound better. I get guys asking me why I'm building a early olds and why not a cheaper small block I just say why not. So many people say wow that's the real deal yes it is that's why. I have 2 YBLOCKS and a FE that YBLOCK is such a fun engine and the legendary FE do l need to say more.
This site has a lot of knowledgeable hands-on people that post here. I have always done just about everything on my cars. All of the motors that I have run over the years were assembled by me. When I go to the local cruise nights, I find a lot of cars have crate motors in them. I know part of that is because you can get some at affordable prices, but the other part of it is people with little knowledge about motors. For the most part I do not care about what people want to do with their cars, but in a few cases I have been disappointed. I asked a guy with a 63 Biscayne with 409 emblems if he would open his hood. When he did there was a big block Chevy and no 409. He did say that he still had the motor but decided to get a crate instead of paying to have the 409 rebuilt.
Almost any vintage motor with the right cam, exhaust, and multiple carbs sounds great at 3500-5500 rpm with the throttle wide open! Most even sound pretty good at an idle! I was sitting at a red traffic light once. The car behind me was just another passenger car. The car that pulled up behind him had a lope cam, thundering headers, and glass packs. Even at an idle, I swear I could feel through my seat, every cylinder on what ever motor was in that car as it fired, whatever brand it was. Oh for the number of times I wished that car was not between us! I did everything I could think of, but I just couldn't see what kind of car it was. The car behind me was always blocking my view. I've had some hot motors before, but that one still stands out, all these years later. I can still feel each the cylinders firing now! Man, if I could just go back and get a short ride in that car!
@gene-koning The HAMB has had discussions and lots of ideas why some engines are more intense ground pounders than others. No real consensus, though. Here's a thread. https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/ever-notice-how-some-cars-shake-the-ground.723322/ I was at a show in St Ignace. 1967 Chevelle sitting there idling. I was standing maybe 20 ft away. I can feel it through my whole body. I was somewhat mesmerized by the experience. LOL Another time at a mud bog event. I watched one of the top class contenders make a run. The sound of the engine was unbelievable. Really nasty, in a good way. I had to find out what it was. Went and asked the owner driver. I couldn't believe when he said "289".
Years ago, in my "modified class" dirt track car, I installed a pretty hot 340. The cam had .510 lift, 294 duration on a 109 lobe center line. It was the cam Mopar suggested for a 1/2 mile oval track (it worked out well for us). We had blown up the old motor a few days before, this one was in my street car! The set of headers I had available (I sure was not going to cut up my street headers) didn't really fit in the chassis very well, so I just chopped up an old set, with just the down tubes remaining, no collectors (think modified funny car style zoomies). Our class was always parked at the top of the hill, away from the fast late model class. I fired the car up, unloaded it from the open car trailer, turned it around and shut it off. By the time I was climbing out of the car, probably 1/2 the late model guys were on their way up the hill. Dumbfounded, I asked the first guy that arrived at my car what was going on? His answer surprised me a bit, they all wanted to see which car the mean sounding motor was in. The comments were that most of them had never heard a small block Mopar that sounded like that, big blocks and Hemis, yes, but never a small block (not many built small block Mopars at that time). It was not a ground pounder like the one mentioned above, but the motor ran as good as it sounded.
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