What engines were used on irrigation pumps etc?

For you F.E. Ford guys, the 428 that were common on irrigation motors used the good crank (Cobra Jet) and the good block. The heads are shit but the short block is a great foundation. A 10/10 428 block will bring some good money and that crank is very hot property too.

 

There's some orange orchards in Riverside,on the way to slddnmatt's house that have a bunch of flatheads on poles,that run the water irrigation. There are still out there too...

 

I spent a couple of years in Denver City Texas working in a machine ship. We rebuild several irrigation engines. Lots of 413 chryslers, 455 olds, 292 sixes, one farmer had a couple of 302 GMC sixes with the hydros still attached. Came out of tanks. Another only used Hemi industrial engines. We never got to rebuild them. He always got a new one if one quit and stacked the old one up in his barn. Must have had 20. It was in the early 70's and I heard someone bought all of them off of him for a song.

 

I have owned industrial irrigation engines of many types over the years including GMC V 12's. right now I have several 331 chrysler hemi industrials for sale but they were not used for irrigation but rather aircraft tugs.

 

I think most of the Chrysler Industrial engines were made at the Maysville, Michigan plant, along with the Chrysler Marine engines. I remember being involved with their crankshafts in the mid to late 60’s, and some of the industrial cranks were carbo-nitride hardened, unlike the automotive cranks, which were not hardened.

When I was at Olds Experimental back in the late 50‘s and early 60’s, a guy from Texas used to come up with a big flat bed truck and take back a bunch of engines back to Texas to be used to drive irrigation pumps. He ran them ran flat out for days and days. Claimed that he had tried others, but the Olds engines held up the best. Kind of like a big water brake dyno I guess. Sometime he would bring a couple of the used engines back to use for evaluation. I never saw any broken, but they sure were worn out.
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My wife’s cousin is a big farmer in Kansas. He runs his irrigation pumps with John Deere diesels now, but used to use Chryslers. 413’s I think. Last time I was out there he had big pile of those old Chrysler engines laying out behind a building. He also had a GMC pickup not being used anymore, maybe 1955? Nice shape. Had a Hydra-Matic emblem on the fender. That’s cool too.

 

ya a few flatheads run the propellers in the orange groves to not let the frost settle on the trees, i had my eye on a couple and they pulled the engines out before the poles came down. there were some that they just knocked over they had flathead sixes in them. use to be a orange grove sprayer up the street from me that had a industrial hemi to run the pump, missed that one too...

 

I had one a few years ago.....it was a 354, was taged not stamped and it also came from the factory with the crank turned 10/10....plain valve covers......great looking exhaust manafolds.bastard water pump, and intake.sodium valves and big flat bottom oil pan..............painted yellow

 

MY 331 cad was from a field pump in bakersfield i bought it from SQUEEK BELL . When he found it had a vertex mag- edmunds rare fined ex manfolds the block had no serial numbers . The speed equip is long gone. I rebuilt it and now is in my 51 ford pickup.

 

the 331's seem to be the most common i have seen. they were used in wind machines and backup hospital power plants.

 

Saw a few flat head continentals but they were inlines.

 

There was one of those engines sitting in a local truck wrecking yard last year. I thought about buying it, for what I don't know other than just V8 history. It looked really heavy though.

 

When I was at UAL you could order a 331 Chrysler tug motor out of the parts catalog. never tried it. The 31 Plymouth four cylinder that was the first Ply in my roadster came from an orchard in Gilroy where it had been a pump motor.

 

On our farm, we used Chrysler 440's and Olds 455's.
Powerful!

 

hell a few of the larger pumps where powered by the god of V8s too, the all aluminium dual over head cam ford GAA

 

Here is a vintage wind machine that is in front of a local wind machine mfg.


Most pumps are and have been electric in this area for years but a few are hooked to pto's on farm tractors.

When we use to run back and forth to Waco every couple of years I used to see about every model of engine (big sixes and eights) that you could imagine hooked to pumps beside the highways.

 

There were probably thousands of hemi Chryslers used on ittigation pumps throughout Texas. I've driven past yards out west of Houston which had piles and rows of hemis in them. They were used in the oil and gas industry too.

 

I believe a lot of 346 cadillac flatheads were used for almost any purpose.
They ran tanks, buses, landing barges, gensets, welders and pumps.

I read an WW2 article that said if a tank did not have 2 x 346 flatheads in it then it was running 5 x chrysler 6 cylinder flatheads making a total of 30 cylinders pushing those suckers along.

Interesting threads indeed.

 

sold one of these not long ago, a 56,331 engine. if it's a true industrial engine it will have a gear set up on the cam and crank and the cam is reversed rotation but the one i sold had a timing chain set up, which makes the same as the reg production auto engine. they made em both ways.

 

i recently picked up a running ind.331 in an orchard sprayer,and a 49 merc flathead in a trailer linked to a 36 inch saw blade.all ag use.

 

The original Ignitor (Petronix) ignition system was designed to be used on pump engines, towmotors, fork lifts and refer compressors.

 

Theres one at the cranberry boggs here in nantucket HEMI been tryin to weasel it out of em they still use it till this day its badass and loud.

 

you mean one of these?


regards,Rod

 

Oh yes, 428's. There are also industrial 427 FE's too, machined WITHOUT the crossbolts for the mains. With new main caps, they can be machined for the crossbolted mains.

Quite a variety out there.

Steve

 

Around here everyone ran what they had. Lots of Y blocks, 6 cylinders and a few Hemi's. Up on the plains (around Lubbock) the water was deep enough (Ogallala Aquifer) that they used big motors. Mostly 400+ cubic inch Chevy, Ford and Chryslers.

Kinda of interesting that after Don Hardy slowed down on race cars and V-8 Vega/S-10 kits he started manufacturing and selling "energy efficient" irrigation engines. He figured out how to make a 6 cylinder (Fords, I believe) do the job of the big blocks and use a lot less fuel. He's sold a ton of them and is still in the irrigation engine business. I drove by there one day and there was a lot full of big block engines pretty close to his shop. That's been 15 years ago and I don't know if they were his or someone elses.
Larry T