Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Flathead

Ran across this article on the old Flathead Ford V8 engines. My dad had a 1950 Ford Coupe, with a flathead. Three speed transmission, Smitty exhaust and triple Stromberg carburetors. One of the fastest cars in Kissimmee Florida back in 1956.
link to article

old girlfriend's dad had one of those in a 46 Merc, that was pretty worked. He had a set of triple deuce carbs on it also...

He'd take it out on old Hwy 12 in Central Minnesota, where there was little traffic, and light those rear tires up...

Probably not the fastest car on the road in the local area, but it certainly could hold its own.....

I'd bet John, that about 75% of the 'fire members have never seen a Ford flathead engine.

I have. Know where there is one sitting in an old junk car.

You would loose that bet here as a classmate in high school had one in a '52 Ford Coupe with a 3/4 cam in it and it ran like a "Rapped Ape!" He was on the Washington State Patrol's most wanted drivers list.

Not sure if his records still stand, but at one time my buddy had the worlds fastest flathead in the streamliner we built together.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zObNF9Xp2SQ





Pretty trick with reverse flow heads to prevent the heat build up from the conventional flow heads. I don't think I have any pics of the turbo motor

Several HS friends were running these in 37 to 51 Fords/Mercs and we learned how to do a lot of good things on them. (Most of those did not look anywhere as good as that pic). If my mem is any good, it was a challenge to get potential perf out of those triple Stromberg setups without some sophisticated (for us, at that time) cam revision, valve work and what we called "porting and relieving" in the intake setup.

In those days, some "in" terminology applied to the extent of the mods were "1/2 mill. 3/4 mil, full mill" etc.. And, then there were "spring shackles","chop and channel" jobs, etc..

It all was a lot of fun for inexperienced kids and not real expensive as we ran around scrounging stuff - and there was a lot available for those engines. Seems like we always were looking for Lincoln Zephyr gears, too.

I worked on those flatheads a lot but never had one of my own - never had a cute Ford/Merc coupe or tudor.

Once I had some $$ I was able to get an old 56 Chev with that Duntov designed V8 - the OHV deal was much more interesting that the flatheads. Have been a GM V8 guy ever since.

I have 2 of em.

One runs, one don't. An f1 and a two door, both are 51's

One of my neighbors is restoring a 34 ford truck that has one in it. He had 3 of them at one point, and one 4 banger for a model A pickup he's working on.

My 37 and 40 deluxe coupes both had flatheads.My 47 had a 56 police interceptor,with columbia two speed rear end. I miss them,paid 75 for the 37,100 for the forty and 47.I miss them.A couple of years ago seven were sold for scrap in town here.I live in the house where I bought the 37.

You might be right, but I've owned two of them, a 53 and a 54. Had two because the parts interchanged and they always needed fixing.

I have rebuilt several of them back when. I hated doing a valve job on them.

I thought the 54 was a overhead?

Yes 54 was an overhead. 53 was the last flathead.

My best buddy and I tore down a 8BA block flat-head Ford V-8, put new piston rings on the pistons, added new rod bearings, new gaskets all around and put it all back together and had it running in four hours flat.

Loved those old flat-heads and, believe it or not, you could open the hood and see the ground on either side of the exhaust manifolds... something you sure can't do these days !!!

Incidentally, Ford went to small block (244 cubic inches, I think) overhead valve V-8s in 1954... and it "ruled" over the Chevys in '54, but when Chevy went to their ohv V-8 in 1955, the "party" was over... and it got worse in '56 and even WORSE in '57 when Chevy "punched-out" their 265 cu.in. OHV V-8 to their famous 283 cu.in. small block V-8. That engine was a "screamer" !!!

I got a new 1954 Victoria hard-top in June of '54 which, after the Chevy's beat me to death, I eventually got the engine "exchanged" for a "punched-out" V-8, 312 cu.in. block with a "track-grind" full-race, high-lift cam and a "blown" (supercharged) 3-deuce carb set-up with progressive linkage. I had the heads milled down to 12:1... had to torque the head-bolts down to 150 lbs.

It had dual exhaust pipes, glass-pak mufflers together with big, fat chrome laker-pipes coming out just behind the front wheels, running down just under the edge of the car's body and kicking out just in front of the rear wheels.

It was my "Chevy-killer"... and it DID "destroy" Chevy V-8s !!!

I use to wash that car on warm, lazy summer Saturday afternoons and would remove the plugs on the laker-pipes and just sit and listen to that big V-8 idle... ta-chukka-ta-chukka-ta-chukka... gawd, what beautiful "music" that big-cam'd V-8 made !~!~!

Those days surely were my "Happy Days"... Ohhhhhh YEAHHHH !~!~!


Strength & Honor...

Ron T.

Nice!

A buddy of mine has a 39 Merc convertible. Both of us being 46, most people that see it can't believe it doesn't have a small block Chevy or an LS swap in it. Hit me up with an FB request and you can look at a few videos of it running.

old guy I know who has since passed away was from Miles City.

he was a high school shop teacher.... Bill told me that to do a valve job, he use to loosen the heads, take the bolts off, and then give the engine a little crank, and those heads job popped right up...

have to take his word for it, but he was quite the innovative mechanical type guy... he use to work wonders with all sorts of mechanical stuff.... I use to bring him things so he'd have something to work on in the garage when he couldn't sleep at night...

What was the supercharger?

12:1 compression with a supercharger?