There is a persistent legend that around 1950 FoMoCo built some aluminum
flathead blocks as a 'cheater' item for NASCAR racing. But the story
goes that the blocks were not successful, and not used, because they
flexed too much under load. I imagine that the said flexing would show
up in main bearing trouble and head gasket blowing. One imagines that a
lot of deep knowledge and experience are needed to produce successful
aluminum blocks like the Lincoln Mark VIII unit, and a few others that
have been made for everyday use.
It is not true that there are no good original used flathead blocks
left. I just acquired a couple from the Midwest that passed a magnaflux
and pressure test. The problem is that probably two out of three of the
existing blocks are too badly cracked to use, and finding the good ones
means a lot of onerous dismantling, hot tanking, crack-testing by
someone who knows where to look, and pressure testing, all of which
costs money. The honest vendor from whom I got these went through a
bunch of this, and said he's out of the used block business for the time
being.
I've got an idea that there are a lot of flathead blocks out there, if
you can stand to find them and go through all the above to use them.
The flathead fellas I know seem to have good blocks they collected long
ago, but, don't readily part with them because they're not easy to
replace.
Dennis Carpenter in NC is still offering new blocks (whole shortblocks,
rather, he doesn't want to sell his blocks only) if you care to pay his
price for them. I gather these are NOS Ford military equipment, but
same as the car blocks.
ArdunBill
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