what about the use in farm combines? i know 327's with steel cranks were used in them. overall if you are restoring a vette or want to sell one to a guy who is restoring one it shouldnt really matter, otherwise its just bragging rites. what crosses the finish line first matters i guess.
Most of the early Vettes with cast valve covers were solid lifter engines. IE 283-327 Most had steel cranks 327s had 202 valves finned balancers & windage trays.On the high per models 340hp & above The 350 hp 327 had cast valve covers with a hyd cam but the rest was 365hp items. With the Vette restores it is very common to find the right casting # and date codes and then restamp the pad.
I bought a pair of power pack cylinder heads at a swap meet that were supposed to be vette heads. I bought them cause they had 194 intakes. First power packs I ever saw with 194's
The same 327 that came in the 65 vette was also in the 65 chevelle,malibu, everyone can state it came out of a corvette,and just because it has the vette valve covers people fall for the shit and pay more,same as with the 289 ford ,throw a set of shelby cobra valve covers on it and up goes the price.if you don"t know to check id numbers on an engine you can get screwed easy .
Unless the 327 was something steeper than 300 hp (as in 340, 340, 365, or 375), it made no difference if it was born in a Corvette or your mom's BelAir station wagon. As some of the other guys have already stated, a "Corvette" small block was no more than a Chevy parts counter away anyway; countless 283s and 327s got the Corvette treatment that way, in the form of a Duntov cam, solid lifters, and a 1110891 dual point distributor. Although Chevy stopped using the 891 dual points on the assembly line after the 1961 model year, I've seen several of them with date codes in the 1964-65 range---probably something some kid bought over the parts counter for his '55. As to the cast aluminum valve covers, Chevrolet sold them cheaper than Offenhauser, Edelbrock, or even Cal Custom sold their covers, so all sorts of sbcs ended up with them. I found a receipt from the local Chevy dealership in a drawer in my mother's house from when my brother bought a Duntov setup for the engine in his '62 Impala in 1969. The cam was $19.00, and the solid lifters were 96 cents a piece!
Unless you really have a need for these, if they are truly Corvette parts, I suggest you get in touch with some of the aforementioned "matching numbers geeks" and you can probably sell them for enough to get a good start on what you really want to build.
When I was a wee one, a drag racer told me not to be fooled by the vette engine claims. He said it was the weight of the car and the gears that made the difference, the motor was the same as a truck.
What difference does it really make? If it's not in the Corvette it came out of, it's not a numbers matching car and loses value. One engine is stamped for one car. You can take one Corvette engine and put it in another Corvette and it's still not a numbers matching car. If it's because of performance, not all Corvettes had hipo engines and lots of Chevelles, Novas, Camaros, etc. had engines that were identical to the Corvette engines (standard or hipo) other than the numbers stamped on the pad. Larry T
Bought a small block from a fellow car club member that told me it was a 307. I got it home and saw the oil pan was different. The bottom of the pan was almost as long as top and held 7 (? I think) quarts. Turned out it was a 65 fuelie motor with the double hump heads. Also the heads did'nt have any mounting holes in the front for any brackets either.
Off topic but the claims of rare unobtainium engines all being located near me always made me smile! Often in the day folks would come in needing valve cover gaskets for thier "Boss 302 Ford" and early I would quizz them in doubt but learned some needed the trip back to the store to exchange thier "Boss" 8 bolt gaskets for the much more common 6 bolt 302 gaskets and to think that all those folks were misled by the folks they bought the vehicle from!?
Yep I worked for Chevrolet when the hi-po parts were cheap. Even to the late 80s you could buy 302,327,350,400 parts as cheap as the aftermarket Nope The solid lifter & fuelies were totally different. It holds an extra qt or so. Almost looks like a mail box. True But there were high horse small blocks that only came in Vettes
when i was first getting started and was reading hot rod mag. when it had the green tint to the pages. i thought all corvettes came with 3-4 extra motors. corvette adds nothing to the motor. if it is a L79 in a vette or a chevell or nova they all had the same spects.
Yes you are right. But there are differences....oil pan 2.5 ramshorn exhaust.... Ill bet more than that ..
If it's for sale it's probably a Corvette motor. If it's not for sale it's definitely a Corvette motor! If you buy it as a Corvette motor it's probably out of an old van from Mexico.
------------------------------- Huh??? I gotta' call big time B.S on this bit of misinformation. First, ALL 265's and MOST 283's had steel cranks, regardless of what they were installed in. Secondly ALL pre-'68 327s had steel cranks, regardless of what they were installed in. Thirdly, a whole lot of non-Corvette 350's had steel cranks too - Fairly rare, but a few installed in passenger cars, particularly in early-'68, - but especially ALL the 350's used in any year medium and heavy-duty trucks and in industrial and marine applications as well. "A steel crank's a sure fire way to spot a 'Vette motor" you say?? In that case, man, call me, 'cause I got an absolute sh*t load of those "sure-fire" 'Vette" motors" for you!!! Mart3406 ===========================
I have the original 350 "'vette" engine out off my old black 74 corvette..whoopee frickin do! It's rated at less than 200 HP.
----------------- You mean to say, that some unscrupulous and dishonest sellers would actually stoop to slapping a pair of Corvette or Cobra valve covers onto a regular old engine, just to try and fool some really, really stupid buyers and get more money out of them?? Please ...tell me you're making this up and that it ain't really so!!! Mart3406 ============================
------------------- Yeah, maybe only 200 hp, but I'll bet the valve covers make it look like it's got more! And how about those even more wonderful and amazing 305 'Vette' engines that some California-bound Corvettes got in those years!! Woo hoo!!! Mart3406 ======================
I have said it before, and I will say it again. 15 out of every 10 Corvette engines ever made are out there for sale or still on the road.
All small journal 327's had steel cranks. The ONLY way to tell if it was out of a Corvette is the front pad stamping under the front of the passenger side cylinder head. If anyone tells you differently, they are wrong.
Reminds me of when I was looking to buy a 350 for my '62 Impala Wagon. I asked a salvage yard guy if he had any, he says "I got one from an old phone company van and one from a Corvette" I asked him what the difference was. He said "About 500 bucks" I told him I would take the one from the truck. He said that was a smart move as I probably couldn't handle the power of the vette engine (it was a '79 L-48 that looked like it went sidways into a pole) The engine I ended up with was low miles, steel crank and 4 bolt main. Heck it even had crosshatch in the bores. The "vette" engine was probably beat half to death.
not all small j. 327's were steel cranks. i have a few that are cast. not all L79 motors had 2 1/4 inch exhaust manifolds. in fact chey stopped using them in 65. in fact the impala used the same exhaust manifold as the vette till 67. even the 300 hp. implalas had the 2 1/4 manifolds.
Our friend Heathen is exactly right. You can "spec" an engine with all the right parts: cam, heads, etc; and/or build one with a generic passenger car engine. The components are still the same, so what's the difference? For whatever it's worth, my 26 T roadster had a 68 Vette 327 large journal crank engine in it that appeared to "match all the numbers". That fact made it seem more desirable to all those who were interested in buying it. To this day, I'm guessing it WAS a Vette mill, but I couldn't swear to it. By the way, it ran STRONG!!! Good Luck. Build whatever you want!
The Jalopy Journal
