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215ci V8

The reason Buick didn't stick with the aluminum engines were that the cons outwieghed the pros , and it shouldn't of gone out into production .

Hence the fact the design and tooling were sold off . And yes Rovers ended up ultimately getting that V8 design , and it lasted into the 21st century by a hair IIRC .

Took awhile for GM to get it right , and its the norm now to use aluminum .
 
Yes, that is where the Land Rover derived from. That 215 was used in the Buicks back in the 60's and 70's.
 
4X4HIGH said:
Yes, that is where the Land Rover derived from. That 215 was used in the Buicks back in the 60's and 70's.
Click to expand...
And cousin Olds F85.
There's a guy in Seattle or there abouts that converts the old GM motor into an airplane engine.
Otherwise, you won't get any torque out of that one.:haha:
 
Mickey Thompson raced an Indy car in '61, '62, & I think '63 with one of those engines. Was called the Harvey Aluminum Special after the primary sponsor, Harvey Aluminum which later became Murietta Aluminum (& the Harvey boys got stupid rich). It was poked & stroked to 250ci and ran a two speed Franklin qwik-change rear axle as it's only transmission.
 
Lightweight and fairly powerful...

We had about 6 of those old buick specials in the boneyard I worked at--only two didn't sell!---those 215 V8 motors were highly prized as a "hot rod" motor for a T bucket or similar old body,because they only weighed about 300 pounds or so,and had decent power,with the potential for much more with the right cam and intake...I had a friend who had a '63 Olds F-85 with a 215 and a 4 speed Muncie in it...it was a nice car,fast,and good on gas too..

I find it weird that those motors ended up in Land Rovers overseas,yet here they didn't always have a great reputation..we didn't have the good anti-freeze back then that we do now,and many of those motors litterally corroded away..kind of like the Vega motors,they got a bad rap too--once they were bored out and sleeved, they ran forever..:crazy:
 
215s are still a pretty popular sand rail motor around here. I know a couple guys running turbocharged motors and making close to 400 horse on an otherwise stock motor with no serious failures. I'd say the 215 "poor design" was somewhat exaggerated, in fact Buick kept the same basic design with the 300 only with a cast iron block.
 
Buick and Olds both made HI-PO versions. The Buick had a 4 barrel and higher CR. Olds went with a turbo. BTW, the heads are not the same between Olds and Buick. I believe there is an outfit called Huffaker in GB that sells hot rod parts for the Rover version.
 
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