Hey y’all, I have a Buick 340 that has a cracked cylinder head. Finding another set is dang near impossible. My question is whether or not Buick 300 heads will work. I’ve read a lot that they are the “same”. The only difference between the 300 and 340 was the block deck height. I am having trouble finding that if the 340 4 barrel intake manifold will bolt up to the 300 heads. Any info would be greatly appreciated! Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
B-O-P V8 heads will all work on Buick blocks. Buick developed the engine. Check cc's. Buick 300/340 blocks were cast iron. Buick 215 blocks were aluminum. All heads interchange. For something different, find a 1962-63 Oldsmobile F-85 Jetfire turbo engine and run it with factory methanol-water injection or bolt the intake/exhaust assembly to your Buick heads/block. ETA: Buick 340 engine is totally different from Buick 350 engine. Proceed with caution as both were made for one or two model years before GM sold 215/300/340 engine tooling to Rover Cars/British Leyland. ETA2: We installed 215 and 300 ci Buick engines in Vanguard Vetta Ventura cars in 1965-1967. 215 ci engines went in Vetta Ventura 3500 Series cars and 300 ci in Vetta Ventura 5000 Series cars. (215 ci is 3.5L and 300 ci is 5L) Shop foreman Tom Johnson driving the "factory racer" at Green Valley Raceway in 1966. (If the fender flares look oddly familiar it's because we copied the flares on Tom Johnson's younger brother Delmo Johnson's 1963 Corvette Grand Sport.)
IIRC the Olds 215 has a different head, the Pontiacs with them used the Buick heads but most Tempests got the Pontiac four. After '63 I believe all went their own way with engines leaving the 300 and 340 to Buick only (certainly Pontiacs got a 326 as the V8 option).
Boodlum ,That is a beautiful car.How many of them do you suppose were built? Sorry for the thread hijack.
19 Vetta Venturas were completed before I left Dallas for college. Franco Scaglione styled the Vetta Ventura. (Sergio Scaglietti styled the three 1959 Corvettes for Carroll Shelby.) Vetta Venturas were originally the Apollo car that Vanguard Corp. bought the rights to from the original California designers. There were 88 or so Apollos built both coupe and convertible models.
Thank y’all for the reply’s. It seems to me that the 300 heads are easier to find in comparison to 340s. So I should be okay replacing these with heads from a 300. Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
too bad they never made any hi-po parts for the 340. good running engine. I stockpile small blocks for myself. but you can upgrade to the buick 350. everything interchanges. throttle cable/rod may need work. my son wore out his 67 340 and it has a 350 4spd in it now. I put a b&m supercharger on it last year. when I get the 671 done for the dragster, i'll put the 471 on his. the 350 is a tough little engine.
Australian firm REPCO made lots of race parts for B-O-P engines. Even made OHC Formula 1 versions that Brabham cars BT11 and others used. Probably impossible to find any now. ETA: Some early Can-Am cars used Oldsmobile versions of the BOP engine. Dickie Smothers (Smothers brothers) ran one in his McKee MK7/Oldsmobile car. Something whispers to me Jim Hall tried an Olds BOP in an early Chaparral. Dick Smothers' McKee/Oldsmobile
seen a lot of uses for the 215. not much on the 300-340. there was a dual 215 dragster wayback. too bad all the hipo stuff from wayback disappeared.
Check over on the v8 Buick board. Heads, rockers and starter for sale for 300 bucks. Look in parts for sale section. Nov. 15th was date ad went up. Seller goes by dual quadism.
@Groadyhesh ......apparently I am the only other Buick 340 fan/owner on the HAMB. If you don’t find a head(s) close to wherever you are located, contact me. I think I have a spare set. Friday, I will double check my stash and update this post. Ray
Racers liked the aluminum Buick/Oldsmobile 215 V8 engines because they were the lightest weight production V8 in the world. Weighed less than 300 pounds complete, 320 with all accessories. The engine's internal design is also very good. Things like rod/stroke ratio is about perfect, would not scuff cylinder walls at high rpm. Buick in those days was GM division lead in engine design. And this was years before Mike Noble took over as chief engineer of Buick engine development. Mike Noble is the guy behind the Buick GNX engine, a V6 that was a direct descendant of the BOP V8. But that's another story.
There was a guy from homestead, Fl. ran an Austin Healy bug eyed Sprite with a weber carbed 215 Buick with 180 degree headers on it. He mostly road raced it , but every once in a while he would come to Miami- Hollywood and run it at the drag strip. with the road race tires he would pedal it to low 12's in the 1/4. If he would have had any traction it would have cut at least a second off that time.
After British Leyland bought the BOP engine production tooling from GM in 1966, they proceeded to shoehorn the BOP V8 into every British car possible. All the way until 2006 iirc. V8 MGBs called MGB Bulls were among my favorites. I can only imagine the handling characteristics of a Bug-Eye with a V8 LOL.
I have and have had both 340 and 350 Buick engines and they are not “totally different”. The main difference is the 10 cubic inches and the cylinder head’s shape/angles where the valve covers attach and the exhaust manifold mating surfaces. There is “no caution” required when dealing with these engines. Routine parts are readily available. While it is true the 340 was only produced in ‘66/‘67, the 350 intro’d in ‘68 went for a decade or so. And, to the best of my knowledge, the 300/340/350 tooling was not part of the sale to the Brits. The aluminum 215’s tooling was not the same as the iron engines that followed though the iron evolved from the aluminum design. To install a 300 crank in a 215 requires significant machine work to journals due to dimensional differences, though it was done to ‘stroke’ the 215’s. The iron V6, also evolved from the 215 design, minus 2 cylinders, for 198 cubes, shared the 215 bell housing bolt pattern which is unique to the ‘61/‘63 V8/V6.For 1964 models, not only was the V8 switched to iron and expanded to 300 cubes, the V6 grew to 225 cubes and both engines adopted what became known as the BOP bell housing bolt pattern shared with Olds 330 and Pontiac 326/389. As for the Apollo / Vette Ventura......this is the first time I have encountered the latter. I have been familiar with the Apollo since first seeing one at an auto show in Long Beach, CA when they were being introduced into the market. I loved the looks and mechanicals of the cars, but on a Sailor’s pay, all I could do was dream. Ray
been playing with buicks for over 50yrs. 455, v6 and now the 350 as seen in the fed. that engine has gone to 10k....just before I hit the wall at the valley. running n/a we turn 7500, 162 b&m at 65-7500, 471 at 6500. 671 should be no different with my driver. lol. gave up on the v8buick board. proved everything I did. too many 350 keyboard racers
GM sold rights to the 215 engine because they had casting problems with the location of the iron cylinder liners and a high rejection rate. Rover of England corrected the problem and then refined the engine. Larger capacity (cu in) versions are available up to 4.6 liters (and a few oddball larger sizes.) The 4.6 (appx 280 cu in) did have some problems with thin walls on cylinder liners and subsequent coolant leaking. Liners can be replaced. Buick 300 crankshafts can be fitted to stroke the Rover engines (and 215) but a rear seal adapter is required. Main Bearings are different and the Rover block has to be align bored (appx .020) to accept Buick bearings.That allowed undersize Buick bearings to be used if a crank needed grinding. I believe someone recently came out with some bearings that were for undersize journals but for a long time only standard bearings were available for Rover. Buick 300s also had a one year option of an aluminum head but hard to find. Those heads worked well for strokers due to combustion chamber size. The 4.6 Rover gives almost as much displacement as the stroked 5.0 without the hassle of changing heads or alignboring the main abearings oversize. The Rover also has both carb and fuel injected versions and is very very popular overseas. Check out D and D Fabrication if you are looking for ways to use the Buick/Olds aluminum engine. http://aluminumv8.com/Home/About One other thing, there are a lot of similarities between the design of the Buick/Rover engine block and LS Chevy. Anyone considering a Buick 300 should try to find an article by Marlin Davis in the March 2011 Hot Rod Magazine. Might be available on line in archives. He used a 300 Buick as the basis for the article.
@ekimneirbo .....the aluminum heads on a 300 Buick were the standard heads for 1964 models only, as was the aluminum intake....both replaced by iron versions in ‘65 and up. Ray
If you still need a set of heads, I have a good set of 1966 300/340 heads I can sell you. I can rebuild them if you want them/port them, if you want something turn key and ready to install. Thanks!
don't know where you are .im in norcal and ive got a pair of 340 heads I doubt ill ever need . never knew smothers bros raced ! learned something new today. what would be the advantage of alu. 300 heads on a 340 aside from the weight ?would the 340 intake fit ? no such thing as a alu. 4v for a 340 , right ?
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