@Nevada_545 I think about the low end torque and gearing of the 1950 Chevrolet one ton pickup I once owned. It had a,235 cubic inch straight 6 and a 4 speed transmission where first gear was extra low and 4th gear was direct drive. In normal driving, I would start off in 2nd gear. I stretched fence with that truck using the extra low gear. I wonder if I would dare do this today with a truck with eco-boost and an automatic transmission.
I rode a,lot of miles in the Flxible Clipper buses powered by the 322 cubic inch straight 8_Buick enfines–the same engine that powered the 1948 Roadmaster. These buses had a 5 speed manual transmission where the 5th gear was an overdrive. A,friend bought one of these buses when it was taken out of service and converted it to an RV. He got about 8 mpg on the highway. These buses could run along at 75 mph. It would be interesting to put a,modern 2.5 liter turbocharged Buick in one of those Flxible Clipper and see how well it would perform.
@Triedaq: I’ve got a F150 with the 300" I6 and a 5-speed, and I pull stumps with it regularly. Can’t beat a straight 6 for torque just off idle!
@meanjoe75fan I think the Ford 300 ci 6 is one of the best engines for the way I used a truck when I lived out in the country. At the time, I couldn’t afford a late model truck so I settled for a 1950 Chevy one ton that I bought in 1972 for $115. I pulled out of the gravel pit with a load of sand and weighed out at 9500 GVW. I would buy hay out of the field and Ioad on 50 bales. You and I know what trucks are all about–work.
Not as well,I’m afraid,Triedaq.
My local pick-and-pull junkyard is a treasure trove of information as well as parts if you know how to look at it. There are the usual wrecked cars totaled out by insurance. There are a bunches of 10-15 year old Chrysler cars, Saabs and tons of 25 year old (300,000 mile!!) Saturns with no body damage scrapped because parts are no longer available (Saabs/Saturns) or worth fixing (Chryslers).
In the back of the yard are the oldest vehicles in the place. A group of 30 year old, worn, rusted old Ford pickups, and a couple Chevys with no paint and dented beds… all with straight 6 engines!
I grew up in the country, although we didn’t have a farm. We, and our neighbors had small acreages. When any of us got a replacement vehicle, the first thing that was added was a trailer hitch. None of us could justify a pickup truck or had the money for one. Most of the cars back then had,frames-- the cars,weren’t unit construction. We didn’t think too much about overloading the trailers. I’m not sure that the turbocharged unit body cars today would,handle the work we made cars do back then.
Later, when I did have my,own place in the country, the,old pickup I,bought for $115 was a necessity. We started with a five acre empty beanfield. We had a house built, but I fenced in 4,acres for a,pasture, hauled hay and straw for our horse, etc. A utility trailer would have,taken,too many,trips to haul what the truck would carry in one load. When I had the acreage under control , I sold the truck and bought a utility trailer and bought the hay 10 bales,at a,time,from the local,farm,store.
I used to see cars on the,bighways, pulling U-Haul trailers. ,Now, when people move, they use a U-Haul truck and,haul the caer behind on a dolly. Cars aren’t made to do the work we,used,to make them,do back then.
Personally, I prefer low end grunt every time. One of my motorcycles is a big inch flathead Harley that I’ve owned for over 35 years. Prior to and during those 35 years I’ve owned a number of other motorcycles of varying makes and sizes including AJSs, Triumphs, Harleys, and my one sacrifice to brand new; a 1000 CC BMW.
Out of all of those bikes, none of them hold a candle to the sheer joy of the flathead. It doesn’t have the top end that other bikes have but will loaf along all day long at a fast idle doing 70 MPH and pull from a dead stop without hesitation in 3rd gear.
I’ve been on road trips with other people and several of them have made the comment after riding beside me that “they can hear the cylinders firing individually” while making their late model Harleys sound like they’re revving to the moon.
Just for hoots, me and a friend marked off quarter mile on a deserted highway and he used a stop watch to see how fast I could run a quarter mile. It was a shade under 19 seconds and that’s not shabby at all for low horsepower, limited RPMs, and running a foot clutch with a hand shift.
An old Harley panhead I own used to belong to a friend of mine. One night the car quit on his wife about 6 blocks from the house. He towed the car home with the Harley and a rope and no problem.
There’s a lot to be said for low end tractor power and that’s my preference any day of the week.
Regarding the Buick Regal, at what speed are you even going to be able to take advantage of the full horsepower and torque? I would suspect that with most Buick drivers they’re going to be in the lower regions of the power band and never approach anywhere near the max rated power.
Back in the the late 194Os through 1953, Ford offered its famed flathead V8 engine and an inline,6 engine. Up to about 50 mph, the 6 would out accelerate the V8. The torque of the 6 reached irs, peak at a lower rpm than the V8. In 1952, Ford replaced the flathead 6 with an OHV. 6. That engine really outperformed the flathead V8. Ford didn’t say .much about this because in 1952 and 1953 Ford charged more for the flathead V8 than for the 6. That changed in. 1954 when Ford came out with the. Y block V8. Many farmers I knew who bought Ford trucks back then bought the 6. It was considered a better engine for farm use.
The three speeds that I had driven back in the nineties usually topped out at around 40 mph in first gear. I assume that they are all based on the Simpson gear set, which typically had a first gear ratio of around 2.7.
Consider today’s jeep Cherokee, which goes 85 mph with the engine doing 2k rpm in ninth gear. Since the top gear is 9.8 times that of first gear, the Jeep’s engine would be doing 6k rpm at around 25 mph in first gear while engines in three speed cars is about 2/3 of their way towards the redline.
If paired with today’s transmissions, the engine’s power range is a lot more accessible, provided that the owner is willing to access it. Since modern transmissions can multiply torque of a low torque engine much more than before (2.7x vs 9.8x), we don’t need heavy locomotive sized engine nor complicated turbos.
Back about 1949, our neighbor had a 1947 Pontiac Torpedo with the 8 cylinder engine. For the next several years, he would buy.a house trailer and the same size as the house trailer in the Lucille Ball, Desi Arnez movie “The. Long, Long Trailer” here in. Indiana and tow it to Florida with his 1947 Pontiac. He and his wife would stay in the trailer for the winter, then sell the trailer for more than he paid for it. They would return to Indiana,in the spring and do the same thing the next year. Later, he acquired a used 1951 Buick Roadmaster he used to pull these trailers. About the only car today that might be able to do this would be a Dodge Charger V8.
Had an old 223 Ford six,not that economical but it was great engine,seen a 262 or two also,not common but around.I think Ford said it had more power but used hardly any more gas then the 223.