Block availability

tubman said:
Yesterday, I sold one of my spare engines to a guy who is building an A-V8. He only needed a good block, but he bought and paid for a good complete engine because he can't find a good 8BA block. He has gone through five different blocks, all of which were cracked. You would think that up here in North Central Minnesota these blocks should be easy to find, but apparently not. This guy is no "Rookie" either, being deeply involved with Model "T"'s for a long time (he wanted something a little faster this time). I would have thought that a simple "Wanted" ad either here or on the "H.A.M.B." would have turned a couple up, but I guess that doesn't work any more either. It looks to me like the day of the crack-free $400 8BA block is gone. Given this, I'd hate to be in the position of trying to find an earlier block. Anybody else seeing this?

Tod - How are you coming along?
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Trying to clear out the pipeline. It has been a real war trying to get things done lately. I haven't stopped, just slowed more than I like. I had other stuff in the works first that is just getting about out of the way. I think about this every day because I have a stock block sitting right next to my desk.

Tod
 
I have a couple of 21 Stud engines I would be glad to part with but never really advertised them thinking a club member may be looking for one. Now they could go or will scrap them probably and also a fresh L.B . rebuilt but that is another story! also I think there is a 59 also. kx
 
Tell my wife they are hard to find! That way she won’t look at me funny everytime I come home with a truck load of them! :)

You know if all you guys weren’t hoarding these things they might be more plentiful.(oh and I don’t consider 12 engines hoarding :)
 

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Aww ,Ralph Hoarding is about 30 or more , the only thing I don't like is having to move all this " JUNK" as my ex wife called it. lol, I am going to thin the herd in the near future , I am getting too crippled up to be fooling around with too much, I want to build an A V-8 after I get my first pickup back together, at least mabe I'll break even after storing and moving all this I been hoarding I mean,"ugh collecting" for over 50 years , I found parts I forgot I had, I plan to put it out for you Ford Barn friends first. after I get a couple 59s built and an 8 BA. I can't seem to shake the teenager syndrome of wanting to Hop up everything I put together,The next one will be a 371 blown 8BA. I will need a model A to put it in, I am thinking about selling of the 41 pickup parts and the 46 ton and a half , just in case some may be interested, I have a slew of pinto and early Stang parts , some are new some are rebuilt and never installed. I will post them as soon as I can, Still cleaning out the storage containers for now.
 
It's been my experience over the years that the 8BA blocks crack much more frequently than the 59A and earlier flatheads. I have torn down at least a hundred and 90% of the cracked ones were 8BAs.
 
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You can have 10 blocks you think are fine, but after proper testing, 90% of them will turn out to be cracked, at least in my experience.

There is one truism here : If you overpay for a good block, another will show up much cheaper within a couple of weeks.:eek:
 
tubman said:
After reading some of these posts, I now realize the guy I sold the engine to got a hell of a deal. Oh well, he seems to be a real nice guy.
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After reading here I am thinking I too got a heck of a deal on the 53 Merc parts car. Seems people are paying as much for a block as I paid for the whole car. Of course I am assuming my block is not cracked and I won't know that for a while. Still got to get it unseized but I'm taking it slow and careful hearing how valuable an un-cracked 8BA is.
I think I better go and check on that 46 truck engine block I have stored away too. Its getting worth more all the time. :)
 
I wonder how many who have had a block magna-fluxed, had a hidden block crack show up after assembly.

Fourdy
 
tubman said:
You can have 10 blocks you think are fine, but after proper testing, 90% of them will turn out to be cracked, at least in my experience.

There is one truism here : If you overpay for a good block, another will show up much cheaper within a couple of weeks.:eek:
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Agree, I bet there are lots of cars running with blocks that would need repair or replacement if they were taken apart for rebuild.
 
Ive got 8 blocks laying around. A couple of merc cranks and misc other parts. Never enough starters or generators. A couple are suppose to magnefluxed, one 8ba visually looks real nice still sports original green paint, 50 merc truck. One 8ba is low miles rebuild that dropped a valve guide when the clip fell out years ago and has brass pins in a couple of cracks between the water jacket and head bolts. A couple of seized blocks.

I wonder how many running engines are out there working fine with cracks?
 
36coupe said:
Ive got 8 blocks laying around. A couple of merc cranks and misc other parts. Never enough starters or generators. A couple are suppose to magnefluxed, one 8ba visually looks real nice still sports original green paint, 50 merc truck. One 8ba is low miles rebuild that dropped a valve guide when the clip fell out years ago and has brass pins in a couple of cracks between the water jacket and head bolts. A couple of seized blocks.

I wonder how many running engines are out there working fine with cracks?
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A lot, I'll bet. When I was a poor college student, the engine in my '52 Ford started to smoke really badly and was suddenly low on power. I pulled it apart and found one broken piston and several others with broken rings. I found a suitable piston in the "piston pile" at the local junkyard, bought a set of rings and a gasket set from Sears. I honed the cylinders, replaced the pistons and rings, and bolted it back together. It ran fine for several more years. As a matter of fact, I ended up selling it to a friend who needed some cheap transportation for his little brother.

As I was putting it back together, I counted 7 (yes, seven) cracks between the cylinders and valves. Since there were no chunks missing, I shrugged my shoulders and finished bolting it back together. It did lose a little coolant at first, but a bottle or two of Barr's Leaks helped that. Never missed a beat while I had it. If I encountered a block like that today, it would immediately go on the scrap heap.
 
I have followed this thread with great interest as I am a newbie to V8 flatheads. I have bought some acreage and starting a farm with a passion for old 39 Ford Pickup. My 8BA block was cracked in multiple places with one long crack running down through the cylinder. I started my search for another block and found several from West Coast to Northern USA. It was not the asking price the seller wanted that caused me to step back, but the shipping. If you pay $500 for block and the quotes I got to ship ranged from $750 to $1,200 and you get it to find out it is cracked that kinda wipes out my restoration project for a year. Sure the seller, would guarantee the block and if cracked just ship back they would refund the $500. I would have shipping both ways kinda did not make good sense to me.

I continued my search following up lead after lead and yes 4 miles from me I found a garage that were full of vehicles being restored and flathead engines laying everywhere. After going by and talking to the guy several times and him showing me every block he had that had been laying outside in the weather for 30 years he finally seen I was truly interested in restoring my pickup and showed me the good blocks inside another building he had. Un be knowing to me, but not him he priced me a Mercury 239 block and 4 inch crank for $350 and guaranteed it.

The block is at the machine shop and I am a happy camper. My pockets are not deep, but rather very shallow. When I text it is because I am on the move and can keep things moving along.

Just my two cents worth.
 
Fourdy said:
I wonder how many who have had a block magna-fluxed, had a hidden block crack show up after assembly.

Fourdy
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Happened to me years ago. That's why I made my block off plates and pressure test every block before building now.
 
I just had a really nice looking 81A block. Stripped it and pulled all the studs (without breaking any), pressure tested it and found a leak in the exhaust crossover passage. Lesson learned: test it before pulling all those studs.
 
When I was in school you could buy a flathead engine guaranteed for less than $100 or one out of the pile for $15. The clean engines were always bad, but the crud coated one
most often ran good. I stripped a lot of clean ones before finding that out.
Water pumps were also hard to judge if they would leak.
Bruce
 
flatjack9 said:
Happened to me years ago. That's why I made my block off plates and pressure test every block before building now.
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Been thinking about home pressure testing. I have some good scraps of firestone epdm rubber roofing left over from my woodie roof. 60 mil thick. Would this work as a 'head gasket' under a head? I would only use the holes for the studs/bolts. A similar 'block off plate' could be made from a water pump body without the impeller. Anyone done this??? And what psi do we test at? The air could come in at the water pumps through a section of old bicycle inner tube connecting the two sides with the valve stem in the center.
 
GB SISSON said:
Been thinking about home pressure testing. I have some good scraps of firestone epdm rubber roofing left over from my woodie roof. 60 mil thick. Would this work as a 'head gasket' under a head? I would only use the holes for the studs/bolts. A similar 'block off plate' could be made from a water pump body without the impeller. Anyone done this??? And what psi do we test at? The air could come in at the water pumps through a section of old bicycle inner tube connecting the two sides with the valve stem in the center.
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That should work fine, I just made a gasket with only the bolt holes, and pressured the water pump outlet. Did one side at a time.
 
Kahuna said:
Four years ago I went thru the same thing: 5 blocks, all bad.
I finally got a good one from Vern Tardell in Santa Rosa, CA.
To double check everything I took the block to John Beck in
Chico, CA. John is always heavily involved in the Engine Masters
Challenge.
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Hey Kahuna - good to see that somebody else on this board knows John Beck. He is a Hell of a good guy - has done all our engine dyno work for the FlatCad engine. Also, he setup all our tunes for Bonneville (so we knew were to start out when we switched over the Alky from gas).

My favorite comment on the dyno - when we decided to throw 10% Nitro into the motor for one last pull:

FlatCad Crew: "John . . . do you think this engine can take 10% Nitro - we're already making 650 HP???" (This said with a bit of concern for the soon to be pull).

John: "Well . . . Hmmmmmmm . . . let me take all my years of experience related to running a blown 1940 Cadillac engine on 20 lbs of boost, alky and now nitro . . . Hmmmmmmm".

Now everybody is getting the point - but we still want his answer:

John: "Hell if I know . . . you guys are the first ones doing this . . . you're pretty much making it all up now aren't yah?!".

With that said, down went the dyno handle - and we lost the head gaskets at about 4500 RPM. BUT - the pull was looking REALLY good up until then! LOL
 
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