Quote:
Originally Posted by rotorwrench
The aftermarket crowd latched on to the better bang for the buck that the bow-tie engines gave so the Ford engines were always more expensive to build. The bow-tie V8 was always a bit more compact too but not a lot. When racers tied in with Ford products, they always did well with them. The Purple Hogs could have been bigger winners in 1955 if they hadn't had so much trouble with their front suspensions. Later on in the 60s Caroll Shelby did well with Fords and others did too. Chrysler had to do a lot of work on the Hemi to get it to beat the Ford FE 427s.
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I'm truly asking, but I thought by the time Shelby got involved, the Y block was a footnote in Ford's history books. I do know Shelby made some serious HP with Fords 289's.
Please correct me if I'm wrong for I'd really like to know. I don't know much about Shelby's beginnings.
The 354 and 392 Hemi's seemed to be immediate hit with racers. Guys realized very early that these motors could make some serious power, especially on juice. Desoto's baby hemi was cool, but weren't able to realize the tremendous power on tap with the big hemis.
Interesting, the Hemi wasn't anything new. The French and some Italian engineers introduced the hemi-head in the race engines in the teens. Once they tore things up, Miller jumped on the design and used it in his engines.