History Mickey Thompson's 427 Ford Hemi V8--and its amazing secret

Yes, it's a hemi. No, it's not a Chrysler. It's a big-block 427 CID Ford hemi engineered by Mickey Thompson in 1963. But wait until you see inside---you might not believe your eyes.


Mickey Thompson's 427 Ford Hemi V8--and its fascinating secret | Mac's Motor City Garage.com

 

Too cool..........actually.....pretty frekn' incredible really. Just got lost in more attached reading. Thanks for the link man. Wow.

 

Mickey Thompson's 427 Ford FE Hemi with articulated pushrods. They even stuffed one into a Thunderbolt. I recall seeing it for sale on e-Bay at one stage, serious $$$$
http://www.hotrod.com/techarticles/...y_thompsons_427_ford_hemi_engine/viewall.html
http://www.woodyg.com/fairlane/mt64tbolt/

 

Great read,Bill.Mickey Thompson was quite an innovator.

 

Interesting. Those pushrods look like they are destined to fail.

 

He was a straight up genious. Cool read. Thanks!

 

Thanks, I wrote that piece back in 2010. Wes Allison shot and produced the cool retro lead photo.

 

Neat article and pretty creative on those pushrods! Mickey Thompson sure was a doer and not a follower.

 

I have always believed Mickey Thompson was one of the top five in hot rodding but after doing a lot of research for my book about the '65 Super Stock Nationals I have moved him up to the top. I have found no one who accomplished more than him. The new car manufacturers gave him everything he asked for because they knew he would produce results. It's a shame someone took his life when he still had so much to give.

 

A lot of forward thinking I love the ideas and the way he put it all together.

 

Woody's site is closed however I managed to get these archived records here.

New site is www.fastfairlane.com

Vehicle Description
Mickey Thompson's 1964 Ford Thunderbolt 427 "Hemi" Fully Restored Original Car!

GENERAL INFORMATION

Mickey Thompson's 1964 Ford Thunderbolt 427 "Hemi"

Year: 1964
Make: Ford
Model: Fairlane 500
Sub Model: Thunderbolt
Odometer: 01 (Mileage Exempt / not actual)
Vin #: 4F41K118364

Body: 2 Door Coupe
Engine: 427 "Hemi"
Number Of Cylinders: 8
Transmission: 4 speed
Exterior Color: Vintage Burgundy
Interior Color: Gold / Fawn vinyl

Mickey Thompson's 1964 FORD 427 HEMI THUNDERBOLT

"T-Bolts" are rare, but Mickey Thompson's Hemi-powered version is the rarest version of them all!!!" This car is extremely RARE and is one of the most sought after "Muscle Cars" in the world! The car has been fully restored and is in showroom condition. The car was appraised at $500,000 in 1999 and has photo / other documentation included.

In 1964, Ford Company built only 100 factory light weight Thunderbolts. The first 11 were painted Vintage Burgundy, the remaining 89 were painted Wimbledon White. Today 40 years later, less than 60 originals are known to exist. This car number 10, is even rarer.

It was Ford's first experiment with a Hemispherical head engine. Car number 10 was the second "Thunderbolt" sold to Mickey Thompson for $1.00. He also purchased car #7 which was driven By Butch Leal as an unaltered factory original. It was the car #10 that Mickey entered into a contract with Ford to design and engineer a hemispherical head version of the Ford 427 Center oiler engine.

The heads were cast from Chrysler hemi heads and machined to fit the Ford block. The intake manifold was designed with the carburetors side by side. The name "Thompson" was cast directly into the valve covers.

 

The Jess Tyree ex-M/T Thunderbolt has one of three sets of M/T Ford hemi heads that are known to exist. Some say that only four sets of heads were actually finished, and if so, that's a pretty good survival rate.

 

The Mickey Thompson hemi was a real cool motor. It was built for race and it shows. It also shows that it was a super low prediction piece. I've had the chance to be a part of working on one and they are very crude pieces of machinery. The head castings are terrible. The push rod set up is what looks like an after though abomination and if can remember writely there was something really goofy with the rockers too. The head gaskets leak. It's one of those amazing awesome engines that is also a total piece of crap too lol. Kinda like a flathead.lol

 

Not surprising as they built only a handful.

Don't know about the M/T heads but guys who worked with the Ardun heads when they were new tell a similar story. The heads were basically raw castings and took a lot of patience and development to make them work well.

 

Looks like a back yard cobble job by someone who didn't understand parameters fundamental to valve train design.

A good example of just because you can doesn't mean you should.

 

As far as the segmented push rod goes, the middle segment was in a fitted bore. My guess is he built it to qualify and race. I don't think he expected it to last 100000 miles.

 

There are a few companies producing Hemi heads for the 385 series of Ford blocks, Kaase builds a bolt on kit.

 

Great piece of history, thanks.


jerry

 

Yes, looks like it worked well enough in the rpm range the engine was designed to operate.

 

Honestly, some aircraft engineering encompasses segmented/articulated push rods on various configurations........including and up to heavily strained engine applications.

Not to go completely off the reservation in discussion of avionic history...........just because you can means WHY THE HELL NOT ? !

Genius is not always inventing new. It's the reconfiguration of existing examples....in thereto for, unheard of capacities. If Mickey Thompson isn't a genius.....who would be in your definition? More so, what is a genius with balls ? If you think Mnnesota Fats is the answer.....you could be a bit wrong.

 

Apparently, you don't know too much about Mickey Thompson, or you wouldn't have made the ridiculous statements above.

 

That patterns for the big block Ford Hemi heads survived, it would interesting to see if anymore would be built in the future. Though not for racing but maybe for a interesting project.

 

There are companies building hemi Ford heads, but the engineering has come a long way from the 1960's technology. Hell I would bet the A460 wedge heads of today are better then the MT Hemi heads of the 1960's.

 

I'm sure the flow and dyno numbers would be well behind most any modern 7-liter V8. But this setup has the history --- and the eyeball appeal when the hood is open.

 

I'm glad there are folks around that can invision/build this sort of thing. I sure couldn't. And thanks you v8bob.

 

Aussie friends say the Holden Repco F5000 engine used an articulated pushrod, but I can't find a pic. If anyone has one, I would be much obliged.

 

More good news...Another significant player in this story is still going strong. Jess Tyree. Yep, he is still driving and creating cool drag cars. He had a tough go for a couple of years, but is as wild as ever. Best of luck on your latest project, Jess.

 

From what I can find, the Repco-Holden used production Holden 308 head/block castings, so there would have been no need for articulated push-rods.

Turns out that Repco were also involved in another F5000 engine , which was based on the Aussie Leyland P76 aluminium V8 (an evolution of the old aluminium 215 Olds), and it sounds like there were some heads developed for that that used articulated pushrods, so that might be what your Aussie friends were thinking of?


Here's some info (from http://primotipo.com/tag/mclarenm232-repco-leyland/)

"In search of ‘the unfair advantage’ over the heavy Holden and Chevrolet engined cars, Repco’s Phil Irving spotted the new Leyland P76 family car engine, a 4.4 litre aluminium block V8, at the Melbourne Motor Show. Elfins John Lanyon quickly did a deal with Leyland and Repco to jointly fund development of an F5000 variant of the new engine for a car specifically designed for it to distribute the weight in a fashion more akin to an F1 car, rather than the ‘tail happy’ F5000′s"

"Repco developed an engine with a capacity of 4931cc,a 94mm bore, and 89mm stroke. As originally developed the engine used the P76 cylinder block fitted with special liners & main bearing stiffening plates, the cast iron crank was replaced with steel units after initial failures. Cylinder heads were P76 with flowed inlet and exhaust ports and larger valves. Pistons, con-rods and bearings were Repco, as was the dry sump setup which utilised 3 stage pressure and scavenge pumps. Fuel injection was Lucas and a Repco Lorimer dual point distributor fed by coils provided the spark."

"Mc Cormack engaged famous Aussie engineer Phil Irving (ex Repco, Vincent) to further develop the engine from its Repco base. Irving designed new heads cast by Comalco, which eliminated separate valve guides and seats. The design also featured a ‘bent’ pushrod to allow more room for straight inlet ports. John said ‘Power increased to around 435bhp, and 410 ft/lbs of torque, more mid range punch than the Repco Holden."


Here's something else I found on another website ...

"In a motorsport footnote, Repco which was once Australia's biggest automotive parts manufacturer got together with Phil Irving (reknown designer and builder of the Repco-Brabham race engine, also of Vincent motorcycle fame) to build a Formula 5000 race engine based on the P-76 V8. Later development was carried out independantly, after Repco Engine Development Company closed down. A Repco-Leyland was fitted to the McLaren M23 of Gold Star champion John McCormack. Initial output was 390 hp (vs 192 hp for stock P-76) but to address this relative lack of power against other competing race engines, new heads were designed by Phil Irving and cast from a special 'hypereutetic' alloy from Comalco. "Comalco were working towards eliminating valve guides and seats, and thus these heads had none. The design also featured a 'bent' pushrod, with a shuttle running in a bush in the head between two short pushrods to allow more room for straight inlet ports." This left the P-76 block as the only production-sourced component, as this was a requirement within Formula 5000 rules. Power increased to 420 hp and 420 ft/lbs of torque - this latter figure was sensational, being about 40 higher than the Repco-Holdens, renowned for their mid-range. An alternate cam returned 470 hp and 380 ft/lbs. Unfortunately, additional stresses imposed by these new big port, big valve heads then overstressed the package to the point of regular failure via a cracked block. Many retirements ensued until the project was eventually dropped after a few hard years and McCormack reverted back to the reliable Repco-Holden"