Ford behind the times???

Is that a serious question ?

The quality and general competence of Ford's cars has improved immeasurably in the last 8 to 10 years (starting with the Mk1 Mondeo), despite Ford being completely fk'ed (as far as being a car company is concerned anyway).

And I suspect that the general public is too concerned with 'buzzwords' in advertising literature and magazines to make a really informed choice most of the time :/

My current Rover is a '97 "R" and it has an iron block.

My previous Peugeot was a '95 "N" and it had an iron block.

Who cares ?

Whether a car has an alloy/steel/iron engine block, has an importance of about 0.00000000003%

Name one.

Well, durrr, that's why they're so popular - inexpensive to make, inexpensive to service. :)

So how many people on the street know:

How many valves their engine has? What wheels are driven? What the firing order is? How many camshafts? What grade of engine oil is needed? What the maximum power output of the engine is? Where it's produced? What the maximum torque output of the engine is? Where it's produced? What materials are used in the engine's construction?

So on and so forth.

Almost all are, though!

Fiat are in deeper poo, though!

I recall somebody telling me he wanted a 16v engine in his next car. Even though he didn't appreciate what it meant!

Not steel - Cast Iron. They sold Cosworth off as they kept demanding new or special crankcases. Some did have steel reinforcing bars cast in. The problem with Ford is that the design dates back to the 50's and is really poor by even mid 70's standards but the cost of replacing the transfer line that machines the block prevents them moving to anything else.

What the f*ck is wrong with Cast Iron?

Nissan used to make a Cast Iron engine called the CA18DET it's all alloy replacement the SR20DET weighs 20Kg more! If you tune it you eventually reach the point where you have to remove the liners and then bore the block to fit thicker spun cast iron liners so it holds together. No such expense or additional weight with the Cast Iron CA18DET.

BMW's 1500cc turbo 4 cylinder F1 engine that powered the Williams was initially made using 2000cc Cast Iron blocks ripped from production cars they bought back with 100K+ miles on them. They eventually started heat treating new blocks to simulate 100K miles of use. It could put out 1428+bhp! (that's where the dyno ran out of marks on the scale but you can bet a tech had got a protactor and penciled some more in) Current F1 3.5L V10 alloy engines can't match the old turbo's.

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16 rear wheels no idea 2 10 40w 122 at 4000rpm i think 105nm i think iron and other hard metal stuff :)

Well my old '81 Escort and '84 Fiesta 1.3 were certainly OHC lumps.

Infact the early MkIII escorts were all CVH, except the 1.1 which had the venerable kent/velencia all iron pushrod lump - the rest of europe got a

1.1 CVH instead.

And ford has a new OHC duratec motor in the Ka..

To be honest, I reckon that, in this case, we got the best deal. Much as I hate the Kent lump, I can't help but think a 1.1CVH would be even worse.

*cough*

I think you mean 'tarted up CVH'.

I thought they had about 5k on them, the owners got a new engine for = free.

The standard block was only good for about 1200bhp, after that they scratched a bit of sand out of the mould to beef them up, left them in = the yard out the back and pissed on them! This apparently makes them = stronger.

Paul

Oops BRABHAM BMW BT54 not Williams.

Oops again it was 100,000 Km - well seasoned and fully stress relived. They are still moving about and changing shape at 5K.

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DervMan made the world a better place for us by saying..

the Diesel is iron isn't it? Don't think there's a pushrod Ford used in Europe anymore though. In fact, I think the 4.7 in the Towncar is the Mustang quad cam thing. Don't know though, not looked.

Hmm, most common cars in Britain will be 3 series BMW's soon. They're outselling Mondeos something like 2-1.

8 Front 1-3-4-2 I suspect 2 10-40 (but I put that in virtually anything) 148 Bhp @ flywheel 140 lb ft ( I think ) @ Flywheel Alloy head, iron block.

The 1.3 and 1.6 Duratec are only related to the CVH because they have a Ford badge on them somewhere.

haha, I think he meant at what RPM :D

kinda proves the point tho.

This is Vamp tho :)

And Italian makers fitted them before that. However the PSA engines smoke when they get to 60K miles and the Fiats barely run for more than a few miles and there's "quite a bit" of publicity about the problems with the Rover (johnny come lately) alloy engines which mix steel and alloy in stupid ways.

FWIW, there's little advantage to having an alloy block. Modern casting techniques mean that a cast iron engine can be as light as (or even lighter than) an alloy engine, because although iron is denser than aluminium it's also stronger.

Only a k*****ad would think that alloy block means more advanced.

Look at the figures for engine reliability, Ford is up there with the Japanese makers. Rover and PSA are down there with the Wartburg Knight and the Yugo.