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From: Bob O.
Email: punch@proaxis.com
Remote Name: 216.239.186.26
Date: September 12, 2002
I can remember about a year ago reading a post on another Mopar list where a guy was saying that his Mom had a Plymouth with a 318 poly in it that was running strong after a quarter of a million miles without major overhaul. He said that it smoked a little but still ran well when they finally junked the car because of terminal rust. The reason for Mopar or others not producing a lot of performance parts for polys is that (IMHO) the original mid-fifties polys were hemis with cheapo heads, and carried a stigma as a result, and this carried over to the 2nd generation polys (including the original 318) despite the fact that these were NOT modified hemis. This continued until the new LA engines were introduced with great fanfare, which were consequently freed from the stigma. A guy I know in England (and who owns a highly successful company making high performance versions of the small Buick V8 put in Rover vehicles) told me that he took an unmodified 318 poly and measured gas flow and was amazed at what a free-breathing engine it was. His only criticism was of the stock exhaust manifolds, but he stated that even these didn't detract significantly from the surprising power characteristics of the engine. I own a British-built Bristol car with a Canadian 313 poly in it, and in its unmodified "PowerPak" form (with stock everything, including cam and AFB) with TorqueFlite and 3.31 rear axle this 3800 lb car was road tested by a British motoring magazine in December 1964 as having a 0-60 time of 9.1 sec and top speed of 128 mph, which was the same as a Ferrari 250GT 2+2 of the same year. Now, anyone got any opinions of long-term reliability and ease of maintenance on Ferrari engines?
