1963 F85 215 V8

[raw muscle cars]

Saw this on E-bay, neat car 63 F85 Cutlass ? Cool engine read it was 10.25 comp all aluminum, 215 cui. Anyone know about these?
Richard

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayIS...mMakeTrack=true

[TN2Lane]

The motor is a derivative of the Buick 215 of the same vintage. GM gave up on it before it's time and sold the tooling to Rover. It lives on today in Land Rovers and was used by a slew of smaller European makes.

Olds had a factory alcohol injected(!) turbocharger for this known as the Jetfire - even had a boost gauge on the console. The early F85s were pretty light, so it made for a peppy little package by standards of the day.

On the other hand, if GM had stuck with the 215, we'd probably never have seen a big block in an A body.

[olredalert]

-----You know, I was just looking that car over on E-B and theres something wrong under the hood that I cant quite put my finger on. For one, I think the Olds had a different aluminum motor with the same displacement possibly. Maybe the same block but different heads. At the very least the valve covers are the Buick 215 style on this Cutlass while the correct Olds 215s also had stamped steel covers but the had ribs stamped in them the full length of the cover. Take a look at the engine in the cute little 63 Cutlass convertable and you will see what I mean.........Bill S

[Bill Pritchard]

I am not familiar enough with those to know if the Buick & Olds motors were different or not

One thing I noticed is the mention of the 0-60 time of 14.5 seconds.....if that isn't a misprint, I don't think I'd be bragging about it

[442w30]

I don't know what carb was in that road-tested car, but eve the turbo Jetfire was not that fast. I suspect turbo lag was a probem.

Also, wasn't it water-injected?

[PeteLeathersac]

I always thought it was the same block w/ different heads/intake too and basically the engine that ended up in cars like the TR8...wasn't it the same one in the low production original MG-GT V8 too?.

~ Pete

[olredalert]

------Those engines were even in Range Rovers for quite awhile. Man,,,were they slugs! Probably 5000lbs and only 215 cubes??? I went back and looked at the convertable and there are a bunch of differences between the two engine compartments. I think this car lost its original engine and someone dropped a Buick in it. The little convert is a very cool car by the way.........Bill S

[StriperSS]

I could be mistaken, but I believe it was an alcohol solution, and that you could get it from GM in a container with a part number. My Cutlass parts books are 64 + up so I can't look it up.

John

[olredalert]

-------Yup, John,,,That stuff used to be referred to as "moose-milk". I had a low mile 1963 Jetfire a long time ago and an older longtime Olds mechanic referred to that stuff that way. I dont know the makeup of it but know it did contain alcohol along with other stuff........Bill S

[StriperSS]

Here's what one of those V8's is potentially good for.

http://www.speedsportlife.com/photop...offeetable.jpg

John