Stripped Model A engine block weight = 95 lbs

Waorani

Waorani

Member
I've got two stripped blocks I want to store on a shelf but was concerned about weight. Search here and google turned up all kinds of weights for various combinations of block/head/crank/etc and lots of "about, I think, around, probably, etc," but I never could find anything definitive for just a bare block. So I weighed both today with a digital crane scale and got:

- block w/ just intake/exhaust studs = 95lbs

- block w/ just head studs = 96lbs

I was a little surprised how light they actually were.
 
Waorani said:
I've got two stripped blocks I want to store on a shelf but was concerned about weight. Search here and google turned up all kinds of weights for various combinations of block/head/crank/etc and lots of "about, I think, around, probably, etc," but I never could find anything definitive for just a bare block. So I weighed both today with a digital crane scale and got:

- block w/ just intake/exhaust studs = 95lbs

- block w/ just head studs = 96lbs

I was a little surprised how light they actually were.
Click to expand...

It seems that way until I am lifting one onto the boring table, or the surfacer, -or the valve machine or honing tank, ...and then that 95 pounds feels like twice or three times that!! :eek: ;) :D
 
When I was 16 years old, I maybe weighed 135 pounds., I tossed 70-pound hay bales all day long, stayed out until the wee hours, got up early and went right back to tossing bales. Now 77 and have to have 40-pound water softener bags delivered to the basement. They feel like they weigh 100 pounds. Old age comes with challenges.
 
When we (my wife and I) had a rural general store, I would often have to deliver bags of cement. 25 to the tonne meant they weighed 40 kg each (88 lbs). I used to carry one under each arm without raising a sweat. I break out in beads of it these days just looking at a bag. Dunno how I did it!
 
What is the capacity of the crane scale? Could it be for normally weighing much heavier loads and not reading accurately on the low end? 95 pounds seems a bit on the light side, just bought a cylinder head which had a shipping weight of 40 pounds packaged in a cardboard box.....
 
The best saying heard about building race motors out of a Model A
“Is like trying to build a safe out of a tissue box”

95# is about right, equal to a good crank and girdle assembly

J
 
8EL said:
What is the capacity of the crane scale? Could it be for normally weighing much heavier loads and not reading accurately on the low end? 95 pounds seems a bit on the light side, just bought a cylinder head which had a shipping weight of 40 pounds packaged in a cardboard box.....
Click to expand...
1000 lb crane scale but it's a quality unit. Weighed the first one again on a shipping scale used for UPS and again 95 lbs. I can see how casting variations could easily cause a couple pounds variation.

As far as wrestling them around, every shop needs a hoist or three.
 
For sure with the casting variations, maybe it truly does only weigh that little, but it surprises me. Usually scales like gauges are more accurate at mid range in this case 500#. I would not expect that a 1000# gauge would accurately read 95# (9.5% of scale)....

Interesting and thought provoking none the less......
 
Makes me think of watching that guy at the Rouge, original Ford film, standing there pulling all that cast iron off the line sliding it to another line.... He was one hard working dude! It was coming at him as fast as he could work.

I couldn't work like that even as a youngster:eek:
 
I am 79. I can lift the blocks and carry them outside to paint them. When in my 20's I would lift a complete engine out of the car to exchange it with a better one. I recently did some concrete work with 80 pound sacks of pre mixed concrete. They got lighter by the end of the job. What I learned is that even an old person can build up muscles through exercise.
 
Jeff/Illinois said:
Makes me think of watching that guy at the Rouge, original Ford film, standing there pulling all that cast iron off the line sliding it to another line.... He was one hard working dude! It was coming at him as fast as he could work.

I couldn't work like that even as a youngster:eek:
Click to expand...
I thought about the same thing!
 
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