XHP 260 and aluminum blocks

[Dan Case]

Originally Posted by MAStuart

Dan what's the deal on the 2 restamped to 4? What's the possibility the engine is the same one that alexopm said was fitted to the De Tomaso? He said it was shipped here and then removed in the same time frame as the one installed in the Ferrari. What I have been reading makes me wonder about it. Where do the XhP 260 numbers that were installed in cobra come from?

Your speculation is a good as anybody else's. Never mind how one engine could be installed and running in two different countries at the same time, how likely was it that a new car dealership and the Cobra owner removed the engine, crated it up well, took care of customs paper work and or any tariffs, loaned it to be used a long way off, get it returned, and then passed it on to a Ferrari owner? Why bother, Ford and Shelby had new engines in shipping crates and people to deal with shipping anywhere.

I would still like to see pictures of the engine in question. I found multiple references to the De Tomaso P70 car receiving a 289 size engine and a picture car before painting with the rear body work open with a engine with 4-2V Weber carburetors. Craig’s engine had and has been using just an prototype 260 4V iron intake since 1962 as far as the people that have known the Ferrari for decades. The prototype iron 4V 260 Ford iron intake manifold on Craig’s engine is casting “SK 12569” and intake assembly “SK 14036 $2A” (or serial number 2 of that version).

What are the low hanging fruit possibilities for Ford Fairlane engines with a “4” serial number.

Ford Numbered Engines

Experimental High Performance 260 (15 each made)

High Performance 260 (185 each made)

Experimental High Performance 289 five bolt bell housing (We have no idea how many were built in 1962 but #11 was logged as going into a racing Cobra.)

Production High Performance 289 five bolt bell housing (Less than ten and least three went into Cobras before March 2, 1963. The serial number of one has been published. Otherwise at least four of the first nine went into new Cobras.)

Experimental High Performance 289 six bolt bell housing. We have no idea how many were made or where they all went but Bob Mannel owned the near complete XHP-289-1 six bolt engine for several years.

Numbered by somebody else

Shelby American race shop assigned numbers to race engines.

Ford Advanced Vehicles had their own number system I have been told but I do not know for sure.

Holman-Moody had their own numbering system.

Lots of chances for a “4” engine in the 1962-63 time frame.

We have seen another block stamped XHP-260-2-something. In both cases, a little effort was used to deface the 2. Craig's engine also has cylinder block assembly number "C2OE6010J ASSY 4A" hand stamped into it. Another researcher, yes more than myself are still hunting technical details that can be documented, reported that engine XHP-260-2-14 went into a new Cobra. There is published picture showing an engine with a rocker arm cover marked XHP-260-14.

In the last week someone tried to get pictures of the stamping on CSX2008's cylinder block for me while Tom Cotter does his story on CSX3001 and CSX2008. Another set of dark cell phone pictures. I can just read enough to tell the block is from an XHP-260 engine. There is a chance that another researcher will get to examine the engines in both cars before they go back into storage. I was invited to do so, but it wouldn’t work out for me.

Where do the numbers come from, factory or magazine pictures from the time, a little factory documentation, and information hand stamped into cylinder blocks.