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Mk IV, Superblower, CRS and other Continuation Cars Forum / What's in an inch? 7 Litre Lightweight Prototype 428 to 427
« on: March 01, 2021, 15:55:15 »
Hi,
I'm bored of lockdown so thought I'd start a thread on here about my engine change.
I bought AK1318, the one off MKIV Lightweight prototype back in October 2019. Many of you have been very helpful in helping me pull the history of the car together and this is hugely appreciated. The car was originally fitted with a 428CJ FE engine rather than a 427 s.o. Not entirely sure why but hey ho. Thunder Road had undertaken quite a bit of fettling on the car since I bought it so I asked them to pull the engine out for me to rebuild during winter and lockdown. All was going well until a chap I had entrusted the block to for cleaning dropped the block and cracked it. Not good. After a financial settlement and much thought, I decided to step up from a 428 to a 427 side oiler. Much further thought regarding original vs aftermarket steel vs aftermarket Aluminium and I eventually decided to source an original steel 60's side oiler block from the US. Also to stick with an original forged steel $ crank.
Even that wasn't straight forward - one block which was supposedly "mint" arrived only to find that it had two sleeves - so it went back. Second time lucky however and I am now the proud owner of a virtually unused original late 60's side oiler block. I have also found an original $ crank which has been hot rodded to 3.98" stroke. Combined with a hone to the first oversize (+017) this should produce a 454ci FE side oiler.
I am going for period look where possible but modern performance. As such, FE guru Blair Patrick is preparing a set of custom CNC "Pro-Port" heads and carburation expert Jim Inglese (who worked on the original Cobras back in the day) has supplied a Webber-esque 8 stack injection system to sit on top of them.
The only downside is timing. Apparently there is a global shortage of cam cores and mine requires a custom grind. The earliest this will be available is end April meaning that the engine probably won't be back in the UK until end May and back in the car until end June.
Very much looking forward to that however
If I can work out how to insert images, I'll post pics as we get progress but for now I'm afraid it's mostly "before" plus a few pictures of "bits" as I've got hold of them.
I'm bored of lockdown so thought I'd start a thread on here about my engine change.
I bought AK1318, the one off MKIV Lightweight prototype back in October 2019. Many of you have been very helpful in helping me pull the history of the car together and this is hugely appreciated. The car was originally fitted with a 428CJ FE engine rather than a 427 s.o. Not entirely sure why but hey ho. Thunder Road had undertaken quite a bit of fettling on the car since I bought it so I asked them to pull the engine out for me to rebuild during winter and lockdown. All was going well until a chap I had entrusted the block to for cleaning dropped the block and cracked it. Not good. After a financial settlement and much thought, I decided to step up from a 428 to a 427 side oiler. Much further thought regarding original vs aftermarket steel vs aftermarket Aluminium and I eventually decided to source an original steel 60's side oiler block from the US. Also to stick with an original forged steel $ crank.
Even that wasn't straight forward - one block which was supposedly "mint" arrived only to find that it had two sleeves - so it went back. Second time lucky however and I am now the proud owner of a virtually unused original late 60's side oiler block. I have also found an original $ crank which has been hot rodded to 3.98" stroke. Combined with a hone to the first oversize (+017) this should produce a 454ci FE side oiler.
I am going for period look where possible but modern performance. As such, FE guru Blair Patrick is preparing a set of custom CNC "Pro-Port" heads and carburation expert Jim Inglese (who worked on the original Cobras back in the day) has supplied a Webber-esque 8 stack injection system to sit on top of them.
The only downside is timing. Apparently there is a global shortage of cam cores and mine requires a custom grind. The earliest this will be available is end April meaning that the engine probably won't be back in the UK until end May and back in the car until end June.
Very much looking forward to that however
If I can work out how to insert images, I'll post pics as we get progress but for now I'm afraid it's mostly "before" plus a few pictures of "bits" as I've got hold of them.