It looks like Ford owns the next few days 428,429 430, so let's see those 428 Hemi's I'm not really a Ford guy so what's the difference between the 427, 428 and 429? other then one cubic inch.
429 is a totally different design. 428 is not as good as a 427. The 427 has cross bolted main caps and a variety of different heads all the way up to TunnelPort. 428 Cobra Jet is good but lacks the better block among other things.
I wouldn't go so far as to say the 428 'wasn't as good'... It was definitely a more street-friendly design. The 427 was designed, built and sold as a NASCAR race motor and if ultimate power was your goal that's the one you wanted. But it did have it's street drawbacks; it got abysmal gas mileage, you couldn't get power steering/brakes or an automatic with it, only came with solid lifters (except for the rare last-gasp '68 Cougar GTE version, which was seriously detuned and only existed to keep the 427 legal for NASCAR one more year. It was also the only one sold with an automatic transmission) and tended to be an oil-burner due to thin cylinder walls. The more exotic versions were never sold in a regular production car, making most of those parts rare and expensive. Ford was very ambivalent about selling them to the 'general public', limiting availability to only the full-size cars through '66 (excluding the Thunderbolts and handful of '66 Fairlanes they built for drag racing), finally offering a RPO 427 in the smaller Fairlane in '67, but perversely only in the Fairlane 500, not the Fairlane GT. Mercury did offer them more widely in their line and snuck a few handfuls of them in Comets out in '66-67, but had zero promotion of them to avoid upsetting the higher-ups. The high maintenance needed was the primary reason, along with the limited 'race car' warranty and the fact that they didn't meet Ford's production NVH standards. The vast majority of dealers wanted nothing to do with them because of all that. It also didn't help that both GM and Chrysler sold big-inch motors in much more tractable versions, even if those weren't as powerful. The 428 was built to address this. While not as powerful initially, it had far better street manners and was something that could be sold to any buyer, have a 'normal' warranty and option list, and meet Ford's NVH standards. It even made it's way (briefly) into pickup trucks. Then Tasca started digging around in the parts books and the rest is history. The 428CJ rivaled the 427's drag racing stock and super stock successes and was accessible to more people. These days with the much better availability of FE parts, there's little performance difference between the two unless building a all-out, max effort race motor. Of course, finding a usable original block for either motor won't be easy as neither motor was ever built in real quantity.
One last comment.... NHRA split the Mopar Hemi super stock cars out into their own separate class a number of years ago because of the Hemi's performance advantage over the wedge-head motors. I've often wondered that if Ford had built the minimum number of Cammer-powered cars how that would have played out.... They both have hemi heads....
Pretty sure the Pontiac V8 super duty engines were either 421 (early 60’s)or 455 cid (‘73-‘74) Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
Yep, I believe you're right, the 428 Poncho was a barge pusher like the 428 Ford, don't think they ever had a performance version like the Cobra Jet, just went right to the 455, and (finally) came up with some HD factory rods for the SD455
I wouldn't exactly call the Pontiac 428 a barge pusher, at least not the 390 horse version. If GM had allowed those in the Firebirds & GTOs things would have been very interesting IMO.
427.........FE...............Side-oiler........Tunnel port......It had all the cool names but the truth-be-told the 428 was better mannered(by a long shot) and lotsa 427 "stuff" could be bolt on the 428 to make it as killer as you wanted. Jus say'in 6sally6
Not quite the Super Cobra Jet had higher nickle content blocks (among other improvements) so it's more of a toss up more nickle or 4 bolt mains.
Steve, I’ve not heard of an OE installation of a 428 into a pick up truck. Please educate me, I love Ford Trucks and FE engines. Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
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