I had a very interesting time this afternoon after my late lunch. After yesterday's 14hour+ work day, I knocked off early and went for a walk by Lake Michigan, in St. Joseph, Michigan. The descent to the lake is a VERY steep 250 or so feet and is a story all it's own (THIS was interesting 'hiking'). Well, it seems there are 100 junk cars down by the lake - back in '54 to '56 there were severe landslides that took out some houses. One lady tried to save her house by buying 100 junk cars and having them thrown over the side as a wave break. It didnt work, the cars are still there, as is part of her home's foundation - but the timbers, etc are all gone.

My question is this: WHAT car, that would have already been in a junk yard in 1955 or so, had a six cylinder, opposed, air cooled engine?

 

A full size picture of an engine, LOL.Try this pic, I downsized it.



From Wiki.
Only a few http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automobile makers, including http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru, currently use horizontally opposed engines. Porsche continues to be the most prominent manufacturer of flat-6 engine luxury sports cars, while Subaru uses it in its http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-wheel_drive cars, where the difficulties of fitting the engine between the front wheels are offset by the efficiency of adding four-wheel drive to the layout. In the past a number of other manufacturers have used them, notably http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preston_Tucker in the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Tucker_Sedan and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet in the 1960s http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Corvair with flat-6 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air-cooled http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Corvair_engine. The http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citroen_DS was originally intended to be fitted with an air-cooled flat-6, but this never materialised.

 

Since I doubt a Porsche would be thrown away, I'll guess a corvair.

Les

 

The Corvair hadn't come out in 1956.

 

Frankly, without using Google I don't know of a single flat six car engine from the 50's. I know of tons of airplane flat 6's but that's not an airplane engine. All my Dad's Porsches from the 50's were flat 4's. All his and Uncle Tom's Corvairs were flat 6's. My guess, not from the 50's.

Les

 

Tucker...... had a flat 6, air cooled engine from a helicopter. I'm thinkin 1948?

Oh, I really do need to read previous posts, before I make my posts.lol

 

Yup - based on this info I have to go with the Tucker as well. But maybe just a motor was thrown over & not a whole car.

 

tucker engine - Yahoo! Search Results

I don't know what the engine looked like with out it's cladding.

 

The tucker engine was based on an air cooled engine but the design was modified to water cooling.

I go for the Corvair, look at the similarities.

 

Well, the story is that this lady literally bought 100 junk cars and had them thrown over the cliff in '55 or 56. It is established by the park service (and history) that the erosion and landslides happened in '55 and '56. But it sure can't be guaranteed that someone didn't throw more junk over after the houses were lost.

180 really does make a good point with that comparison. I'm thinking it's a Corvair engine now - and was not part of the "save my house" act involving the 100 cars.

Seriously, I'm going back tomorrow after work, I've GOT to take a picture of the cars.

 

The '48 Tucker used a version of the Franklin O-335... but the pushrods were parallel,



where the Corvair's were like in the engine on the shore. More and more, I think the engine on the shoreline is from a Corvair.

Gotta tell ya, 180 - you sure can answer any question that comes up on this board.

 

Ok, I'm done editing the above post...

 

The only obvious answer was a Corvair, but not for the years Pizzaguy mentioned.
I love Corvairs, but I only recognize their engines from looking down at them when the hood is up. I've never had the pleasure of climbing under one.
There are several people on this forum who are into Corvairs, and I'm surprised they never chimed in on the conversation .
Thanks for the Tucker info Dave, I always thought they were air cooled, I guess that's what the "cladding" (I mentioned) was for. Water cooling.
Sometimes I really should read some of the data that I post.lol