1959 Mercury Colony Park Dyno

Please don't think that anything said or implied bothers me. I put this thread up as an educational post. You have to admit that you don't see many dynos of wagons or the 430 motor. At least I haven't found any. I think the amount of money spent on doing the dyno was well worth it. If even one person learns from it besides me.

 

Thank you for the kind comments. Finding parts or having them made for the motor was an experience, as was the car itself. I wonder which parts will be harder your motors or the 430 Marine I have...

 

Respectable numbers in my opinion. With a dyno you know what you have saves a lot of guessing. In my experience most guesses are just that, a guess.Some of my friends would be mad if they dyno'ed their engines after hearing their guesstimations .

 

Maybe, you should have dynoed your engine after it has broken in. Once the compression rings seat and internal friction has reduced, your horsepower rating could only get higher, even if minimal. A big generator is only going to rob horsepower through weight, since generators were replaced only because they couldn't rob much power for producing electricity. They look nice. But, do you eventually plan on replacing it with an alternator?
Actually, the 5 blade clutch fan will only rob horsepower at idle and low speeds.
A set of headers would greatly increase low-end torque and reduce weight. I hate to say all this after the rebuild, since it was alot of meticulous work. But, if you could have gotten hold of a rare original tri-power manifold or, better yet, an aftermarket aluminum (another weight-reducing item) Edelbrock tri, you wouldn't have been disappointed by your results. Even, a spreadbore Holley/Quadrajet manifold would have made you smile and have saved you fuel. It's too bad, Ford limited production of the original "400" hp Marauder engine. One has to be lucky to find the original high compression OEM replacement pistons sitting on some shelf covered with dust.
What people here do when exotic parts are desired and there are enough of them interested, they join related clubs and pool in money to have that part manufactured in bulk which will reduce that part's price. For example, NSU tt http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xI57j1VnFio owners who established their own club decided they wanted an aluminum oilpan for their engines. They all pitched in to get some shop to CNC limited production of them. If there were enough organized 430 MEL owners available to have aftermarket goodies produced, that would be awesome

 

The 430 Marine..

 

Originally Posted by shelby18
Thank you for the kind comments. Finding parts or having them made for the motor was an experience, as was the car itself. I wonder which parts will be harder your motors or the 430 Marine I have...

Nothing funny about it, personally I have not heard of the 430 marine but I have a old hot rod magazine some where and several pages were about the development of the 427 and all it's variations, one cool pic was a 427 Marine engine.


Edit, 430 Marine ...

The 430 MEL was adopted as the engine of choice for Chris-Craft boats. A detailed analysis of its strengths and weaknesses can be found at this Chris-Craft forum.



A pair of early 430HO Chris Craft engines, with HJAC paragon transmissions and 2.5 to 1 paragon reduction gears. The HJAC tranny had hydraulic reverse. Parts for this transmission are no longer supported by Paragon. Note this an engine with generator and single 103060 water pump.

 

Please don't read into it, was not making fun of it, just saying his marine engine would be a more difficult to parts source than mine.
Apparently should have used a different smiley..

 

No worries. I've been studying up on the Marine engine for awhile. The photos you posted are from another forum acquaintance of mine. He and I have been trading thoughts on our projects for about four years now.

The wagons are coming home!

 

We did get together on the MEL forum to have the Marauder valve covers done by Moon (the original manufacturer) it turned out fantastic!

 

Those numbers seem fine to me, especially when you consider the net hp numbers vs. the gross hp numbers and account for power lost through the drivetrain.