Retro Windsor? Ford Fans don't dispair!

[NASSTY]

Walked into the local library last night as the Mrs was craving for some chocolate (32 weeks prego ). Spotted Wheels Mag sitting on the shelf so naturally I had a look.

The cover has FPV & Ford's answer to Chebby's LS2's & L76's.

GT and GTP's now 320kw and XR8's now get the 290 Boss.

But that wasn't the best news. In a sidebar to the article the mag wrote that Ford are developing a new OHV V8 that can range in capacity from 351 to 427 cu's.

The new engine will apparently be released in 2010 when the all new Falcon is due. The article stated that the current triton range of OHC engines hasn't been as warmly received as Ford has originally hoped hense the backflip.

Good news if you're thinking of building and wanting a compact Ford V8 drive train.

[Rebel1]

By 2010 there wont be any ford anything.

Sadly, they would have lost all their previously loyal clients to the dark side.

sad really....very very sad..... can you tell that I'm really really upset?

[Philm]

The move to the OHC engines only created a perfect opportunity for aftermarket blocks and components.

The small block windsor is now better than ever, blocks from Dart, world are affordable and almost indistructable. You can even get alloy blocks if money is not a problem.

I think the real tragedy is that although the basic size and configuration is the same most high performance "Ford" small blocks would not have any geniune ford parts in them.

Phil

[NASSTY]

Originally Posted by Rebel1

By 2010 there wont be any ford anything.

Hmmm might not be any Chebby either!

Originally Posted by Rebel1

Sadly, they would have lost all their previously loyal clients to the dark side.

Les, I sense your journey to the darkside is almost complete. (insert breathing in helmet noises here! )

Originally Posted by Rebel1

sad really....very very sad..... can you tell that I'm really really upset?

Upset that you bought a Chebby?!?

Cheers

[Naumoff]

Does anyone Down under have a replica Cobra with a old school carburetor on it?

[Rebel1]

Nope Al, actually I have been disappointed with ford for a long time. Keep in mind that every car I have owned has been a ford with the exception of the last being the magna.

I believe the difficulties ford currently face with falling sales has more to do with the decisions made by ford to walk away from their older small block engines. Holden are enjoying increased sales of their commodore. The GM organization decided wisely that their small block engines were well liked, indeed loved by many, and decided to develop a whole family of updated engines around that basic design.

Ford elected to develop a whole new ( read more expensive to manufacture) engine which had no lineage at all. Huge great big hulking things that were expensive to modify and much more difficult to fit into tight platforms. If you want to put a cam in one you had to buy at least two cams, in many cases four .

We are also in a time when being green and alternate fuels are an area of concern to consumers. Ford has done little by comparison to other manufacturers in this area. Other manufacturers (ok, read chev in this instance, but also others) not being faced with the expense of a whole new engine design, could concentrate outgoings on these "other" areas of concern to address consumer concerns.

Engine manufacturing plants, in these days, need a much larger market than their home market. They need an international market which demand a smaller more efficient engine which can run on a variety of fuels, and fit smaller, less flexible platforms.

Sadly ford misread market forces some years ago.

Sheezzz.....that'll teach ya to get me going on a friday.

[Tenrocca]

Originally Posted by Naumoff

Does anyone Down under have a replica Cobra with a old school carburetor on it?

There was one but we ran him outa town... (seriously - there are many on the older cars)...

A little off topic, has anyone seen the new transformers movie where the gal tells the guy he has a "high rise double pumper"....heres the scene Im taking about (about 1:15).....Now I dont know a lot about engines but.....

http://jalopnik.com/cars/this-is-our...led-265745.php

This really annoyed me, and if the girl wasnt so god damn hot I would have thrown something at the screen (BTW - I was dragged along by the kids)

[Bryan Wilson]

Naumoff,
My Cobra is only legal in Australia due to it's age.



Cheers,
Bryan

[Beejay]

Personally I think Ford lost the plot a while back by not encouraging the aftermarket suppliers. Ever since the "black oak" computers it has been hard to hot up some Ford models with decent bang for buck.

Just think about all the new LS1 powered Holdens that must be sold every year simply because people know that they are easy to modify and personalise.

Ben

[David Hodgson]

I don't think they went too far wrong with o'head cams or new design block, they just made it too BIGG and not enough ALLOY.

[Rebel1]

Dave, would you believe the blocks are not much (if any) larger than the older blocks.

I was surprised when a mate ripped down a 5.4 and by the time he got the heads etc off there was bugger all of it left sizewise.

The heads are huge.

[Bryan Wilson]

Geelong the place where Ford was first made in Australia is closing its engine plant and will import engines from overseas.
http://www.webwombat.com.au/motoring...ts-factory.htm
Cheers,
Bryan

[Kanga]

Thats very interesting, my information is that ford will again drop the V8 all together as soon as 2008. The current v8 isn't much chop, it's expensive and hard to get good power from and no good software to tune them.


steve

[Rebel1]

Originally Posted by Bryan Wilson

Geelong the place where Ford was first made in Australia is closing its engine plant and will import engines from overseas.
http://www.webwombat.com.au/motoring...ts-factory.htm
Cheers,
Bryan

And with the closing Bryan, goes the Australian designed in line 6 cylinder.

Another great engine dies.

[NASSTY]

Hi Les,

I agree with you.

Fords biggest selling vehicle is a F150 truck. Not surprising then that the triton V8 is biased towards this car. IE It has a very long stroke for torque and a truck is big that who cares how big it is. It's also a modular design, sharing components with 3.5ltr V6's, 4.6 & 5.4 V8s and 6.8ltr V10's so the truck bias flows through all of them.

Not so good for cars though.

My daily driver is a BF with the SOHC 5.4 (230kw and 500nm) and ZF 6 speed auto and its an awesome combo IMO. The big difference is the bottom end of these motors compaired to the quad cammers; there's lots of it. The motor has variable cam timing and it's very smooth. It's basically a truck engine as was the windsor V8. Pulls like a train all the way to the limiter which is unfortunately set at 5500rpm.


But, I think and (agree with you Les) that I think Ford has misread the market and been a bit too smart with the Triton as it deviates away from the KISS principal that works so well with OHV designs.

It's also annoying that GM has found it quite easy to keep improving their small block while Ford threw away theirs.

Ford has also misread the market in that people who buy V8's aren't as concerned about fuel prices as those who don't. Performance matters more. GM understand this better which is reflected in their marketing and their priorities in their engineering. HP matters.

Cheers

Originally Posted by Rebel1

Nope Al, actually I have been disappointed with ford for a long time. Keep in mind that every car I have owned has been a ford with the exception of the last being the magna.

I believe the difficulties ford currently face with falling sales has more to do with the decisions made by ford to walk away from their older small block engines. Holden are enjoying increased sales of their commodore. The GM organization decided wisely that their small block engines were well liked, indeed loved by many, and decided to develop a whole family of updated engines around that basic design.

Ford elected to develop a whole new ( read more expensive to manufacture) engine which had no lineage at all. Huge great big hulking things that were expensive to modify and much more difficult to fit into tight platforms. If you want to put a cam in one you had to buy at least two cams, in many cases four .

We are also in a time when being green and alternate fuels are an area of concern to consumers. Ford has done little by comparison to other manufacturers in this area. Other manufacturers (ok, read chev in this instance, but also others) not being faced with the expense of a whole new engine design, could concentrate outgoings on these "other" areas of concern to address consumer concerns.

Engine manufacturing plants, in these days, need a much larger market than their home market. They need an international market which demand a smaller more efficient engine which can run on a variety of fuels, and fit smaller, less flexible platforms.

Sadly ford misread market forces some years ago.

Sheezzz.....that'll teach ya to get me going on a friday.

[NASSTY]

Originally Posted by Kanga

Thats very interesting, my information is that ford will again drop the V8 all together as soon as 2008. The current v8 isn't much chop, it's expensive and hard to get good power from and no good software to tune them.


steve

Yep, for too long there wasn't as much you could do to a Ford in regards to tuning.

Fortunately good software is now available

Edit: Oops, changed LS1 to Ford

[Rebel1]

Originally Posted by Beejay

Just think about all the new LS1 powered Holdens that must be sold every year simply because people know that they are easy to modify and personalise.

Ben

Forget modify, look what folks are getting LS1's to develop......unopened even.

Deep down I would still prefer a ford just like Bryan's above.

[Rebel1]

Originally Posted by NASSTY

Ford has also misread the market in that people who buy V8's aren't as concerned about fuel prices as those who don't. Performance matters more. GM understand this better which is reflected in their marketing and their priorities in their engineering. HP matters.

Cheers

Excellent point Al.
Australia ( and I think America) is a land of boat and caravan towing, horse float pulling consumers who demand that low down torque.

The SUV market is healthy for this very reason.

We want our primary car to do many things and in todays world we demand a car which can double as a business limo and pull whatever toy we have.

Mum can drive some buzzbox for the more mundane chores but the main vehicle better be able to cut it at work, and on the weekend.

[lovehamr]

Dang guys, I don't know what sort of parts make it over to your island but here the aftermarket has really stepped up on the modular Ford engines with some of them like the 4.6l supercharged Cobras (Mustang) reaching almost legendary status (nicknamed "terminators") and running the GM competition (Camaros and Firebirds) into extinction. After the retro looking, and modular powered, 05 Mustang came along and kicked everyones ass here the other big 2 (GM and Chrysler) have come running with "me to, me to", retro styled pony cars to try and head off the Mustang stampede. But the momentum has already swung the Mustang way just as it did in 1964/65 and the aftermarket has jammed it into high gear as well. Over here the quick way to serious power with the mod motors is with a supercharger. Smog approved, 1 day install, in some cases double the power. The only down side that I see here is the extra plumbing!

2 cents from across the big pond, Steve

[Blair]

I may be an idiot but this is how I see it:

There is no replacement for displacement.

Therefore:

VE SS = 270kw / 6.0l = 45kw to the litre
HSV GTS = 307 / 6.0 = 51
LS7 = 373 / 7.0 = 53
GT DOHC = 290 / 5.4 = 53
XR8 = 260 / 5.4 = 48
4.6DOHC = 240 / 4.6 = 52

You are always going to get more power for less money the bigger the displacement.

Last time I looked brand new DOHC eninges were the same price as a LS1/2.

The moral of the story is simple; if you want more power and bigger cubes go the Chev. If you are die hard Ford fan or like the DOHC setup (like me) adn want to mess with people who have bigger cubes just add boost. Supercharger kits are only 4 grand now!