Packard Forum Index » Pre-War (1899-1942)

Sorry for continuing off-topic, but a while ago there was a thread that digressed into how well-dressed the engines were in the early pre-war era, with some pictures of the first Cadillac V16, and Packard, Lincoln, and Duesenberg engines. At the time I said I had a photo of the Marmon V16 but was unable to post it. Well, I found it.

The engine block was a single one-piece aluminum casting which was unbelievably complex, more so than the Packard and Pierce-Arrow V12s which were themselves pushing the limits of casting technology. Just by comparison consider the huge difficulties Ford had casting their first and far simplier V8 blocks - story has it thousands were scrapped before they resolve the issues. That Marmon found the resources to pull this off is amazing, and for that matter that Packard and Pierce-Arrow got their one-piece V12 castings done at about the same time, is perhaps nearly as amazing.

The Marmon was a wet sleeve design and at 200 hp far more potent than the Cadillac V16. Pity so few found buyers and even more so that so few remain. This photo from Pebble Beach.

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Now that's what I call impressive!

O_D, Beautiful engine, simple and clean looking - elegant. Also note that Marmon used a cross flow cylinder head design with intake on one side and exhaust on the other. I believe all the other multi-cylinder v-type engines at that time had all the ports on one side (inside). This made routing exhaust a bit of a problem and crowded the top side of the engine and placed a lot of heat near the carburetor and intake manifold. Thanks for sharing the photo.

(o{}o)