California residents also have the Right to Opt-Out of the sale of their personal information see the Do Not Sell My Personal Information page. The first second-generation Oldmobile V8 330cuin (5.4L) "Jetfire Rocket" introduced in 1964 and produced through 1967. However not practical to drive around pittsburgh, pa. To many hills for that single chamber master cylinder. These carburetors did not open progressively; they were either open or closed. Oldsmobiles first OHV V8, dubbed the Rocket engine, had a 3.75-inch (95.3mm) bore and a 3.44-inch (87.3mm) stroke, compared to 3.25 inches (82.6mm) and 3.88 inches (98.4mm) respectively for the straight eight the Rocket replaced. Its taken economic downturns, the occasional oil embargo, and mounting signs of environmental calamity to get Americans to take a real interest in how much fuel they use; even then, that interest never seems to last for long after the latest crisis has passed. Maybe just intake or vacuum leak. Note the quadrant for the Hydra-Matic atop the steering column. Free shipping on many items | Browse your favorite brands | affordable prices. As the diagram below illustrates, an L-head engine has its valves in the side(s) of the block. (The basic Eighty-Eight was rarer, accounting for only about 35,000.) 442 . Concern about diminishing oil reserves is nothing new in the twenties, some engineers feared the U.S. would be out of oil within 30 years but it was not until the seventies that those fears entered the public consciousness. A popular modification made to the 403 to increase power was to swap on early Oldsmobile 350 heads to boost compression. You must be at least 18 to comment. It also used the .921in lifter bore size of the Toronado Rocket. in. The PYPF cookie normally expires in approximately four weeks, the 01A1 cookie in approximately one year. In 1985, roller lifters, floating piston wrist pins, and swirl port intake runners were added. 394s were produced from 19591964 and were available on many Olds models. Such cookies and/or stored data items may be set by various domains (such as, though not necessarily limited to, youtube.com; youtube-nocookie.com; googlevideo.com; ytimg.com; google.com; accounts.google.com; www.googleadservices.com; and/or doubleclick.net, which is part of the DoubleClick advertising service, also owned by Google LLC). The starting gun of that race was sounded by Oldsmobile, with its advanced new overhead-valve V8 and the new mid-size model that shared its name: the 1949-1950 Oldsmobile Rocket 88. Submitting a comment signifies your acceptance of our. 74-81; Bob McVay, Oldsmobile Starfire Road Test, Motor Trend Vol. 1955 Oldsmobile 88. One by one, every other American manufacturer brought out its own OHV V8 engine: Chrysler and Studebaker in 1951; Lincoln in 1952; Buick and Dodge in 1953; Ford and Mercury in 1954; Chevrolet, Pontiac, Plymouth, and Packard in 1955; and AMC in 1956. In an OHV engine, by contrast, the valves are a fair distance away from the crankshaft, which makes operating them far more complicated. [citation needed], Introduced in the middle of the 1957 model year,[6] the 1957 and 1958 J-2 Golden Rocket had three two-barrel (twin choke) carburetors with a vacuum-operated linkage. That never happened; by the fifties, the industry was far more interested in advertised horsepower than gas mileage. Comes in plastic display showcase. (5,880 cc) engine was a massive straight eight with nine main bearings may have played a role in that!) From 1949 until 1951, the 2-barrel carburetor 303 produced 135hp (101kW) and 253lbft (343Nm). The prototypes, which first ran in November 1946, were 287 cu. 330s were painted gold and had forged steel crankshafts. While the 260s were not very powerful compared to the larger 350 and 403 V8s, fuel economy was almost as good as the base V6. This is incorrect, in the context of wider vs. narrower bore sizes with the same displacement. 303 Oldsmobile V8 parts in-stock with same-day shipping. The means exist to do the same work while burning less fuel; the question is whether a meaningful number of American consumers will accept those means while theres still fuel left to burn. I would certainly agree that the Rocket V-8 was overshadowed pretty quickly, in part because Oldsmobile didnt pursue the competition or performance avenues to the same extent Pontiac did in the late 50s. NASCAR held nine Grand National races in 1949, of which stock Rocket 88s won six. The engine proved so popular, the division's 88 models were popularly called Rocket 88s. Monday - Saturday: 9-5. Original revolutionary Hydra-Matic SUPER DRIVE 3-speed automatic transmission, spare tire, and a couple of extra chrome wheel covers. 1949 Oldsmobiles proclaimed that they had Futuramic styling (theres even a Futuramic badge on the front fenders), but it was updating a basic body introduced in 1941. Flory. Second, the combustion chambers of a flathead engine have a lot of surface area; more surface area means more opportunities for the heat of combustion to escape (which engineers call heat rejection) before its had the chance to do any useful work. Now that we have DISCONTINUED our use of Google Analytics tracking on this website, this cookie no longer functions no additional analytics data will be collected, with or without the cookie. A 1958 2-barrel version produced 265hp (198kW) and 390lbft (530Nm), but had problems with early camshaft failures due to the high preload valve spring forces. For sale 1967 Oldsmobile Delta 88 custom, 2 door hardtop. In the spirit of trying to improve a fantastic article. The Oldsmobile Rocket 88 has a current value close to $96,250 at some auctions. in. U.S. Pat. Incidentally, the Rocket engine was not Oldsmobiles first V8. I received some information from Harvey Crane. Talk to the experts. Even in markets where fuel is substantially more expensive than in the U.S., fuel efficiency is widely regarded in purely economic terms. Classic Car Deals (844) 676-0714. in. They normally expire after about one year. Oldsmobile V8s can be grouped into five "generations.". The Rocket, along with the 1949 Cadillac V8, were the first post-war OHV crossflow cylinder head V8 engines produced by General Motors. Well, Oldsmobile had had a hard time finding its way once GM started trying to define the identities of each of its brands as the _______ brand (which, it must be said, was fast becoming the most meaningful distinction between them. [22] The 260 V8 received VIN code "F" and had a sales code of LV8. The cookies normally expire in about 10 days, and are not set at all if you do not access any password-protected content. ), If one was trying to tally how many Rocket engines were built in Olds cars in 1949-50, do you have those numbers? Deciding Burrells ideas had promise, Wolfram and Skinner organized a new advance design group to develop a new overhead-valve (OHV) V8 engine and assigned Burrell to lead it. The Ford/Mercury flathead V8 was of course a popular choice up until the early part of the decade (and had been since its introduction in 1932) but the introduction of the new overhead valve V8s Cadillac and Oldsmobile in 1949 and Chrysler and Studebaker in 1951 were a game-changer for the performance crowd. Generally, getting up to 1819 mpg on the highway was not unusual for early 50s Oldsmobiles even with Hydra-Matic, although that required a lot of steady-speed cruising at reasonable legal speeds. The development testing, however, had been done using the smaller B-body Olds 76 as a test mule. A cheaper solution (pioneered by Buick back in the days before General Motors was formed) was to leave the camshaft in the block, as in a flathead engine, but add long metal pushrods to allow the camshaft to actuate the valves remotely. If you delete or disable these cookies, your existing preferences will be lost and you may not be able to save your privacy settings for this website. It was released one year earlier than the tall deck 425, and debuted the standard 3.385in (86.0mm) stroke; bore was 3.938in (100.0mm). An 88 also won the first grueling Carrera Panamericana, the 2,176-mile (3,500-km) Mexican Road Race. It has been noted to go up to $100,000 at some auctions. It was rated at 350 horsepower (261kW) and 440lbft (597Nm) of torque with a Rochester 4-barrel, and 360hp (268kW) with the L69 tri 2-barrel option in 1966. In shape and size, the Oldsmobile Rocket 88 is not much different from the Pontiac Streamline and Chevrolet Fleetline whose body shell it shares. 34-41; Arch Brown, Richard Langworth, and the Auto Editors of Consumer Guide, Great Cars of the 20th Century (Lincolnwood, IL: Publications International, Ltd., 1998); F. Gibson Butler, History of the Rocket Engine, originally written 15 November 1977 and excerpted in Desert Rocket Report: Newsletter of the Oldsmobile Club of Arizona October 2004, pp. I can see it now. Using the 5 liter Rover block and crankshaft, a maximum displacement of 317.8cuin (5,208cc) is theoretically possible.[14]. The final 1990 configuration was rated at 140hp (100kW) at 3200 rpm and 255lbft (346Nm) of torque at 2000 rpm. Since the valves of a flathead are also in the block, the camshaft can actuate the valves directly. in. in. "Affordable Aluminum V8's [sic]", in, Turbo Hydramatic 425 FWD 3-speed automatic, "1975-79 Cadillac Electronic Fuel Injection", "Oldsmobile 403 Engine - Car Craft Magazine", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Oldsmobile_V8_engine&oldid=1138357918, 1968 and 1969 400s shared the Olds big-block standard 4.25in (108mm) stroke with the 455 but used a, 19681970 Oldsmobile Toronado GT (W34), 400hp (300kW), This page was last edited on 9 February 2023, at 06:46. A smaller 260cuin (4.3L) V8 was created for the new Oldsmobile Omega in 1975 by decreasing the bore to 3.5in (89mm). (Google, DoubleClick, YouTube, and other related marks and logos are trademarks of Google LLC. Total Oldsmobile sales for the 1949 model year, including exports and Canadian production, were almost 294,000, a 64% improvement from the year before. The standard 1965-1967 425cuin (7.0L) was called the Super Rocket, and was the most powerful engine option for the Oldsmobile 88 and 98 of 1965-1967. 1955 Oldsmobile Super 88, 324-V8, 4 bbl carburetor, engine free, I have owned this since 1973, good 4-speed hydramatic transmission, interior useable, nice dash. The super-fuels the engineers wanted would probably have added even more. Additionally, the 403 had windowed main webs, which reduced the internal strength of the block in the crankcase area. An Ultra High Compression Toronado Rocket version of the 425cuin (7.0L) V8 was made for the 1966 Toronado. (4,213 cc) L-head six. More Oldsmobile Classics 44. The Cadillac engine and the Chrysler FirePower had more power out of the box and as much or more potential. They had long since lost genuine autonomy anyhow. ), These third-party cookies may be set in connection with embedded video players for content hosted on the Vimeo video platform, for purposes such as (without limitation) managing video settings, storing video preferences, providing certain functionality (e.g., allowing you to pause a video at a particular point), associating your video viewing and other activity with your Vimeo account (if you have one), showing you advertising, ensuring proper functioning of the service, preventing abuse, and/or compiling user analytics data. Oldsmobile might be gone, but the Rocket brand hasn't been forgotten by collectors shopping for a 1950s American automotive icon. The iThemes Security plugin may also set the itsec-hb-login-xx cookie, which helps to protect the site against "brute force" hacking attempts; that cookie normally expires in about one hour. Some early 307s were painted GM Corporate blue, but most were painted satin black. These changes increased torque to 250lbft (340Nm) but lowered power to 170hp (130kW), while lowering the RPM at which peak power and torque was achieved. The end of the Korean conflict sent the country in a foreign exchange crisis that lasted until the middle 90s, cutting imports and providing the basis for national production. The Vimeo Cookie Policy does not currently disclose the normal durations of the cookies and similar technologies the Vimeo platform uses, but it appears that some may remain in your browser (or other user agent) for as long as your settings permit. Oldsmobile Rocket 88 s by Year 1958 Oldsmobile Rocket 88. 1951 Oldsmobile Rocket 88. [13] It could also be fitted with high-compression cylinder heads from the Morgan +8. Some competitors were a bit faster all-out and a few could beat the Olds off the line, but the 88 was one of the fastest cars in America in 1949. I never had one apart to that extent, but my understanding from the theory of operation is that there is a pivoting pawl that will engage a toothed wheel when the engine is stopped with reverse selected. It uses a 3.8in (97mm) bore (in common with the Buick 231 V6 and 350 V8) with a 3.385in (86.0mm) stroke. Particularly by 50s standards, the flathead Ford wasnt an outstanding engine, which I think even a lot of loyalists would have readily admitted, but you could get them by the cartload and there was a huge, well-entrenched aftermarket for them. The first generation of Oldsmobile 88 was introduced in 1949. These limitations hurt both power and fuel economy. Nonetheless, both Oldsmobile and Cadillac deemed it a good compromise. Simplified diagram of the cylinder of a flathead (L-head) engine. (4,705 cc) and were designed to take advantage of research that had been done by GM Research VP Charles Kettering on high-compression engines (of which well have more to say below). In short, the flatheads breathing ability is only mediocre. Instead, influenced by the Space Race between the United States and the USSR, the legendary Rocket was born, available in Oldsmobile's 88, Super 88, and 98 models. Even a heavier 55 Super 88 with the later 324 (like the one tested by both Motor Trend and Motor Life it looks to be the same car) could manage up to 19 mpg at a steady 60 mph, dropping to 1213 mpg in mixed use. 1750 Enterprise Way Suite 109 Marietta, GA 30067. The combination of good low-RPM torque, the Quadrajet four-barrel carburetor, and the THM-200-4R three speed plus overdrive automatic transmission having a lockup torque converter allowed for fairly good performance, and fuel economy considered reasonable for the era, even in the larger and heavier model cars. A diagram of where the hydraulic or solid lifter fits in a flathead might be helpful to readers. Some persist for only a few minutes, or until you close your browser (or other user agent); others may remain in your browser (or other user agent) as long as your individual settings permit. Most components and accessories are interchangeable. "Alternative Engines: Part 2--Buick V8", in, Davis, Marlan. New brakes, wide Whitewall tires and classic stereo and speaker. Oldsmobile 1949 Oldsmobile Eighty-Eight History Gallery Valuation Rocket 88 (1949 - 1953) 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 These are standard specifications - not necessarily specifications for the vehicle (s) in the photo (s). Its output of 0.45 hp per cubic inch was 7% better than the 0.42 hp per cubic inch of the popular and widely produced 100hp (75kW) 1949 Ford Flathead V8. Thanks, I have enjoyed reading your many excellent articles. Classifieds for Classic Oldsmobile Rocket 88. Plus, there is a cool mix of a preserved chrome cruiser with the right upgrades to make it more enjoyable for modern times. A pushrod layout is more expensive than a flatheads valve gear and the extra mass of pushrods and rocker arms hurts mechanical efficiency. 50,000 cars were imported in 1952, US brands comprising some 90% of that total.
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