Gentlemen;

Is the 265" engine any longer than the early/later flathead 6 engines??

There all about the same (in lenght) Right??

Thanks.

Engines in mid-1950s Chryslers and heavy Dodge trucks (265 cid) and those in DeSotos and earlier Chryslers (251 cid) are "long-block" engines, as distinct from the 218 cid Plymouth and 230 cid Dodge (passenger and pickups).

Earlier discussion on this forum have included the exact dimensions.

God's Peace to you.

d
Inliner #1450

Thanks Don.

Do you happen to know how much longer it is??

According to a post from "Rusty O'Toole" in this forum on 22 June 2007,

"The small Plymouth/Dodge block is 23 1/4", the big DeSoto/Chrysler block is 25 1/4".

"For your block there were many possible combinations from 201 cu in (Canadian prewar Plymouth) to 265 cu in (52-53-54 Chrysler Windsor).

"Crankshaft stroke length available for your block are 4 1/16", 4 1/4, 4 1/2 and 4 3/4.

"Common bore sizes are 3 3/8 and 3 7/16.

"The same pistons will work with any crankshaft but you must have the connecting rods of the correct length to go with the crankshaft. In other words if you use a different crank you must use the matching rods."

Don Coatney, who is active on this forum, has shown us many pictures of his 251 cid DeSoto "long block" in his 1947 Plymouth. It looks mighty fine in there.

God's Peace to you.

d
Inliner #1450

The easy way to remember it is that the short one is under 2', the long one is over 2'.

I think the difference in length is more like 1.5" than 2".

Canadian-produced engines were all the long block, the thinking at the time being that they could always make a shorter stroke engine out of a long block if they needed to keep the size down.

In other words it was a more flexible unit to be producing if you were only producing the one size at a plant.

For this reason there are small sizes that are very close to sizes for the short block engine.