Re: Chevy into Packard

Posted by Mike On 2011/1/5 14:46:11

I still think the small Chevy is the wrong motor for this car. There's plenty of parts availability for other V8's. If he want's longetivity with less wear and tear and long miles between issues, a big block Chevy or a Pontiac/caddy/olds would still be the better way to go, BY FAR.

With a 400 or 455 pontiac block and about 5K into a motor total, you can have about 400-450 horses and about 550-600 ft lbs of torque (which a packard needs, torque)....All at or below 5500 rpm. Try that in a small block. And that's not to even working that motor that hard. On a budget you could build that motor for about 3k.

Couple that with some decent rear gearing and a 200r4 or 700r4 and you'd have quite the long distance cruiser. With a quadrajet (not edelbrock or holley, has to be spreadbore) built by a real professional, you could be getting well into the mid 20's OR MORE for fuel mileage.

The low RPM powerhouse would be much better than a higher RPM, more radical small block for almost the same price.

Edit: Autozone and Advanced auto and the like still stock parts for pontiac and olds and caddy V8s, they're not outdated or odd or un-available.

Most of your parts that fail on the road (ignition modules, alternators, power steering pumps, etc) are shared across GM brands anways, and even if a starter or water pump went (you should get well over 100,000 miles NO PROBLEM on a correctly built moderate pontiac motor) they usually have them the next day.

I don't see a SBC offering any advantage over the other gm divisions that built their motors for cars in the weight class of the packard. But i do see disadvantages.