1952 caddy motor identification (guru needed)...what the heck is this thing???

I'm told this is a 52....but what is the apparatus on top of it. As you can see, it was in a speedboat long ago.....

 

Well what big round thing is the coil, and the boxy looking thing with the two carbs is the intake manifold, looks like a removable top.

I think that tube looking thing is probably the equivelent of a road draft tube.

I can't make out the donut lookin' think near the rocker cover.

But its a pretty neat lookin' engine. Good catch.

 

Hey thanks....



I'm wondering if it is a factory intake or maybe homemade tunnel ram type.

 

Looks like a pair of Stromberg Aerotype carbs on top of the "box".

 

Boat application...Spark Arrestor?

 

I have i fetish for caddy motors, id take that piece of junk off your hands for scrap price. Seriously, from what i can see it looks like a stock intake with a homemade apapta for the 2x2's. My .02

 

That's kinda what I was thinking too. It's a 13 hour drive (one way)from my place, so I wanted to get some concrete info on what it might be. Sure would make a cool hotrod motor.

 

I'm not familiar with boat motors. it looks like the runners are cast from here and the box is sheet metal? But it doesn't look backyard at all. I'll just about bet that its a marine option.

Hatch is it 13 hours in my direction. If its close for me I can give it a looksee if you want. I got plenty of hot rod motors here so I won't try and snag it from ya.

 

Is the "doughnut" thing an engine lift plate? Very very nice.

 

Is it a boat motor or was it a stationary motor used to pull an irrigation pump or a big generator? It looks like something my dad would have put together for shits and giggles.

 

Looking at the picture you can see a Frenzel (sp?) type blower laying on the ground in the fore front, painted the same color. Maybe this was set up with the Caddy in a type of blow through system? Looks like the Carbs are mounted to a block manifold, maybe plumbed to the blower then to the bottom of that block manifold into the intake?

Just a guess.

 

It looks to be either a setup out of a boat or it was used as a stationary motor for some piece of equipment. Around here they had a lot of engines that were set up on wind machines to circulate the air in the orchards in the early spring to reduce frost. They usually drove a 10/12 ft prop up on a tower.

Cool and interesting engine no matter what the story is.

 

..as far as the year goes they're pretty easy to i.d. ...there's a small pad in front of the pass cylinder head that will have a number stamped in..1st two numbers are the year..next two numbers are the model car it came in (eg; "62" is out of a Model 62).




.

 

53 1st year for Caddy 4 bbl.

 

It'd an early '50s Cad engine out of a boat. Go get it or let me know where it is and I'll take off tomorrow morning to get it. Maybe tonight!!!!!! It'd just Bitchin. You don't find this shit every day!!!!

 

I talked to the owner again today. The motor was in a hydroplane. Built from a new 52 motor by a rich kid for his shop project. The boat went 100mph. It was awarded the "golden hammer award" in Popular Mechanics...june of 1956. The present owner says the blower, which is the unit in the lower part of the pic, mounts to the brackets off the bellhousing....very different! Now comes the money discussion......

 

Hatch

This shit excites me. This is something a '50 style rod could be built around. Yeah money. Some of these people would rather sit on something like this for no reason rather than let it go to somebody that would make good use of it. Hope you or somebody else worthy can get it and do right by it.
A guy in my club let a 48 Plymouth convertible rust away rather than sell it to somebody who would restore it. I can hardly make myself speak to him.

 

So that blower was hooked to the motor, interesting. Curious how it worked?

 

I don't know how it worked, but he called me on an ad I was running about buying old caddy speed parts..... It's for sale, and we just have to come to a price. I'm thinking ...eliminate the supercharger, and build a bitchin car around it. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
'

 

The tube on the back would have had a bilge blower hooked to it.

 

I have no clue what a bilge blower is, but that is the road draft tube...

can you learn me what you are describing??

 

Well.....i'm buying this thing. Should be interesting to get there and see it in person.

 

Be Careful.... alot of boat engines were designed to run backwards. Looks like it's a stock cast iron manifold with an adaptor to mount the twin carbs on it. The only way for the blower to hook up would be a snout that mounted on both of the carbs. That supercharger looks like one of those early pancake ones... kaiser I think?