Iron v. Aluminum

[Barry_R]

Aluminum shifts and moves more than iron under heat and stress. I am in the apparent minority here - but I really prefer iron blocks. Not old busted up ones though.

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by Barry_R

Aluminum shifts and moves more than iron under heat and stress. I am in the apparent minority here - but I really prefer iron blocks. Not old busted up ones though.

My truly smart friends, who are clearly a minority of people that I know, feel the same way. FWIW, I went with a nice clean 428 CJ block .025 over. Eventually though, aluminum will be the only reasonable cost alternative.

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by Barry_R

Aluminum shifts and moves more than iron under heat and stress. I am in the apparent minority here - but I really prefer iron blocks. Not old busted up ones though.

Barry, can an aluminum block suffer core shift from the repeated heat and stress cycles from hard running? Or is core shift limited solely to the foundry? For example, could we see a sonic test of an aluminum block look like this one with obvious CS (granted this is a Buick 455) if it originally came from the foundry with good sonic testing numbers?

[RICK LAKE]

Barry_R Barry in some cases, it's all about the application and useage of the motor. I have an iron block in my shed. It's a 390 block with 428 crank. For street driving I may have stayed withthat setup. I wanted to use my car for autocross and roadracing. Iron was not the answer for this. I want a lite car. Aluminum every where I could. Heads, Intake, Block, timing cover, valve covers, even the spacer on the crank. With your kit I came in at 508 pounds. Over 600ft of torque and 540 HP at the crank. Small block weight and good power. You know how hard it is to find an old FE core for building. I am gald Mike Lefevers got CS to build their heads and blocks. Over heating with aluminum was an issue but now is fixed. 8 years on the 452 motor now 3 with the 482 kit. this is with the same block. Alot of abuse and some upgrades in the block from helicoils to timecerts in all the holes. Given the flexability of aluminum or iron and the fact you can repair it alot easier, I like it for racing.
Iron for a street car or 1/4 car with the water jckets fill to the bottom of the water pump holes is better IMO that an aluminum block. Some of this also depends on aluminum or iron heads and intake.
With all this being said, how is the cammer motor going to be run? Can we hope for the 800HP level to get reached? Rick L.

[RICK LAKE]

patrickt Looks like 3 sleeves is needed for that 455 block. Looks like the bores where done off center on 2,4,6,. Must be a monday morning or friday night special or the boring bar was worn with play. Sun is out go, get the paper Rick

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by RICK LAKE

patrickt -- Sun is out go, get the paper Rick

That's exactly what I'm about to do! Then I'll get my cup of coffee and head to the library.