question for the Cleveland afficionados, and classic car drivers in general

[machinehead]

I'm rebuilding a '70 Valiant Mexicana hardtop, which in tired early 90s custom trim was my everyday drive up till a year ago (family transport is a Volvo V70 wagon). Classic cars like my Valiant, particularly with fat wheels and fat exhaust notes are becoming less practical for everyday use - not so much because they're less driveable (though we are spoilt with our modern cars by comparison) but because they attract the wrong sort of attention. It got to the point I could no longer leave the thing parked at the train station. So when it's all freshened up it will necessarily become a daily garage filler - only a Sunday driver.

I am therefore scouting for something to replace it as my everyday ride to the train station - something a little bit interesting like my hardtop, but nondescript enough that I can leave it in any carpark all day long without worrying if someone has keyed it, busted a mirror or an antenna off it, broken into it repeatedly just to show me they can, or graffiti'd it (all of which has happened to muscular classics I've owned), or worse - if the thing's still going to be there when I return (which thankfully has never happened to me yet).

What I've come across is a '79 Cartier LTD with its original 351 between the shock towers.

One thing that interests me about the later Cleveland powered LTDs are reports that some of them escaped the factory with 4 bolt mains blocks. One legend was that Ford gradually trickled out the motors from the aborted phase IV and often they were trickled into high spec cars like LTDs, which sounds a bit fanciful I know. People say all the 4 bolt mains blocks from the Phase IV were released with RPO 83. And yet reports of 4 bolt mains blocks seem to be real - if not run outs of Phase IV hardware then of the Cleveland race program in general. Only last year I saw a half worn out early 80s LTD advertised on ebay i think it was - and its selling point was that somebody had worked out this luxo-barge was being dragged around by one of these 4 bolt mains engines which i think in the ad was described as a "NASCAR block".

Can anyone illuminate these stories about tougher Clevelands in LTDs, and if they are real what are the chances a late '79 Cartier LTD would have one and - do you know how I would identify it if it had one?

Regards and thank you.
Mark

[blueovalbits]

Only real way to tell is to take off the sump and have a look. I don't know of many of the stories about the 4 bolt mains in LTD's etc but a mate of mine had a XA GS sedan with matching No's 302 Clevo with 4 bolt mains and toploader. He didn't know about the 4 bolt until we pulled it down for a quick freshen up before he sold it.

[grey_esp]

the 4 bolt black motors are a different bunch then was fitted to the XA. The late model are left over from a run of nascar blocks that were cast in Australia to export to the US but where not within tolerence so were rejected by nascar and then randomly fitted to Aussie 351 XD and XE models. They have 4 bolt caps but only 2 bolts fitted. Chances of getting one are slim to none, and If you do they still arent anything special because of the core shift problems. good luck.