History Is it time to start hoarding older motors and trans

I don't know why but I have a weakness for motors. I just love how they work. Reciprocating art. I'd like to get me some of that heavy duty shelving like they have in the big warehouses and just stack em up in the barn. However modern engines just don't have the same appeal to me. Old ones are just pretty in their simplicity.

 

I have 12 or so engines, narrowed it down from over 20. An engine collection is a pain in the ass. But OP you are correct they will be more difficult to find later on.

 

I keep the ones I know were runners here, the rest live outside under a cover. There are five 429/460s and four SBFs from 289 to 351w's and a one and a half horse Fairbanks hit and miss just for fun. Will I ever use them? Maybe maybe not, but I have them and every body collects something.

 

You'd probably be better off hoarding AR-15's before someone decides you can't own them.

 

I don't save a lot of old motors...I've found that when I rebuild and engine I wind up tossing almost every part (rods, crank, heads, intake, etc) and usually just use the block. And sometimes I buy a new block, too. That's because the aftermarket stuff is usually better anyway. This applies to the '60/70's stuff anyway.

 

I have two 390 Cadillacs...one that's a runner from a '62 cad and the other one that's disassembled...I've been into these '59-'62 motors since I bought my '59 Coupe deVille in 1994, and that's what's in that car, and in my '30 Model A coupe and in my '49 Mercury...it's always good to have a couple around just in case something goes wrong with one of the built ones...but I'm always on the lookout for more of 'em...give me a shout if you know of some of these that need a new home (920)979-4802


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Well, if you think that you'll ever have a use for one, and you've got a roof to put it under, buy it now, because it certainly isn't going to get any easier to find an old engine 5 or 10 or 20 years from now. If you buy it at a reasonable price, I can't see how you're going to lose on it. It won't take much for it to appreciate more than a savings account.

 

We have more junkyards now than 30 years ago locally.

 

I agree totally, i always keep old parts, engines and trans. in a shed as said these are getting harder to find. i've even bought a few old cars very cheap just for parts and keep some i had toatled or just rusted out. if you have enough room for storage you wouldn't believe how this saves on parts.

 

yea I wiosh I had gathered up some 409s and 426s when I was a young man and they could be had.

here is the deal, if you plan on playing with cars for a long time you should collect things that are not as rare today but are cool. I have seen more then my share of hotrods built in the last 20 years that the fella picked the stuff up when he was young and sat on it wanting to build the ultimate rod someday. Got old and the kids were gone and had the time and knowledge to build a sweet totally old school rod.

 

I've got 3 SB fords, 2 460s, 2 400s, 2 2.3s and a couple of flatheads scattered across 2 states. Storage is a problem, with at least 4 of them still in the hulks they originally powered. Take up too much floor space and eventually I'll (rightly so) run afoul of the zoning regulations.

Time to thin the herd, as I hate to put up a shed to store things I'll never get to. Except for the flatheads nothing else will have significant value before I'm gone.

 

Ya, I too have the fever, but only for the flatheads and early sbc. I keep mine inside my shop and I like looking at them dreaming about how I will use them, sure. But I think it is our responsibility to preserve them for the future. The way people are now with the disposable mind set I'm not sure how much of this stuff will survive. Well, at least that's what I tell my wife.

 

Ive been hoarding nailheads for a while but I have sold two of them lately. Got to finance a 409 build I just started.

 

You mean im not suppossed to already been doing that?
a few corvair motors, at least one of each type... 56 porsche, few Vws. (I end up working on alot of aircooled stuff)...
olds 425 and 350, ford 390, ford 360, cobra jet 428, 2 327s, a 289, 235 inliner, banger, and now a 52 flatty...

 

Well put Sir, I have stuff from way back in the late sixties and early seventies. Things like a Franklin quick change with wide five hubs and Buick finned brakes I have been holding for 35 years!

 

Another way to store engines is to disassemble them and put everything in a 55 gallon drum and cover with waste oil.



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I started collecting vintage engines just for the fun of the hunt. Hopefully somebody will need them someday... 331 Cadillac, 401 Buick Nailhead, 292 Y-block to name a few. More for preservation of the hobby than to make money.

 

If i did that i would forget which tank is waste oil and which has a motor in it and send off a motor... i have a memory like a gold fish....
hEY LOOK A cAStle!

 

G'day, I have been storing sbc and bbc engines in P30 Chevy Vans. We also have a bunch of stuff at my cousins farm in weather tight old grain silos and in pickup box trailers with toppers. The fun stuff is either at the shop or in my garage. We have a couple of LS7 big blocks, a couple of Corvette L82's, an newer style LT1. I did just part with an LS7 that I traded for a Richmond gear 6 speed and shifter.

Out in my garage is the strange stuff like 12 cross ram intakes, 4 Smokey ram intakes, a couple of old school LT1 intakes, and about a dozen different tunnel rams and new intakes. I think there are about 10 or more pairs of LT1 and L82 valve covers. Some of it is rare and all of it probably will be.

Recently I have been talked out of some of the cross rams and might let some others go. A local restorer has been working on me to "share the wealth" so to speak.

ms

 

The shit I've got so far......440 Chrysler 1973, 283 sbc 1960, and a 366 or 427 bbc, not sure til I check the #s. All three engines are still bolted to their original transmissions too.

 

Me too.

 

I've got a couple of early 60's 283 motors buried in the garage.

 

I've saved sbc, bbc, a 331 Hemi,Ford & Merc flatheads, early T-10s & M20/21s & other "stuff". Getting too old to keep track of it all & moving from one side of the garage to the other, out back to the shed, etc. When the roadster & last '67 PU are done I'm having a yard sale.

 

I've got a short bell 331, a supposedly rebuilt, hopped up '49 Olds Rocket, a complete '51 Mercury, and a couple of more partial flatheads (which I have enough parts to finish rebuilding). Last summer, I made a "universal" test stand so I could sort the wheat from the chaff. Last summer, I determined the hemi was a good solid running engine (except for a leaky rear main seal). It'll go on a storage stand. The '51 Mercury is the next to go on the test stand (it was supposed to be a good runner out of a nice Montana car some local idiots ruined trying to put it on some later Lincoln chassis). After that it's the Rocket (which does look rebuilt with Gotha rockers and an Isky cam).

I'm getting a bit older now and have one more car project to finish. I find that getting these engines mounted on the stand and started and running is the size of project that suits me these days.

As to saving them? I've got a little more room under the stairs in the shop, and while I'm not actively looking, I would grab any flathead, Hemi, Rocket, or nailhead I could find at a reasonable price. Maybe a 320 Buick or a big GMC 6 as well. Probably not gonna' happen, though.

 

Just wondering at what point some of you guys become the hoarders that never sell anything that we all complain about??

 

Probably because no one wants to pay the price.

 

The hemi was in the classifieds last fall for $2500. I believe that's a very good price for an engine you can see run for any period of time you want. Not one inquiry.

 

The way I see it is that all of this shit is out there for sale for a certain price to anyone willing to pay it. If someone decides to buy fifty engines and pile them in their garage, so what? When one of my friends crushed most of the old iron he had in his field, the people whining about him doing it were the same ones who wouldn't buy any of it from him when it was for sale to the public.

 

I consider any engine I look at to be a 'rebuildable' engine at best. The idea that I can but a 'good running' engine for a hot rod project is shaky....I just would never start out with an engine that I didn't know, for sure, was right. Plus what are the odds that it will be cammed and piston'd and cylinder headed the way you want?

 

I have a 348 Chevy, a few Hemis and, some trannys but, lately I've been trying to hoard 57-64 Olds Pontiac rear ends and their parts.