The next step was a factory authorized dedicated drag race car: the Fairlane Thunderbolt. The T-Bolts were assembled at Dearborn Steel Tubing, a Ford contractor. It took the lighter-weight midsized 1964 Fairlane sedan and installed the high-riser 427 engines into about a hundred of them. This was never intended as a street vehicle, and everything was modified to enhance the car’s chances at the drag strip. Ford included major front-end work to accommodate the large engine, lightweight seats, thin glass, aluminum and fiberglass components, and race-only rear suspension. The Thunderbolt became a Ford racing icon, and the combination remains near the top of NHRA Super Stock racing 54 years later.
Ford did not install the 427 in a production Fairlane until 1966. The production 427 Fairlanes from 1966 and 1967 were rare, very cool cars with a solid racing history. But, like the lightweight Galaxie that preceded them, they never received the adulation reserved for the Thunderbolt.
Something about the almost absurd combination of small car and huge engine makes anything else seem normal in comparison. The ultimate expression of small car/huge engine is also FE-powered: the 427 Cobra. The Cobra started out as the well-documented combination of a British sports car and a Ford small-block V-8 for road racing. Competing with well-funded efforts from both domestic and foreign racers, the need for more power was satisfied by grabbing an existing race engine, the 427 FE. What had already been an attractive sports car morphed into a beauty born of necessity, with broadened and flared fenders for larger tires, side exhausts, and a scooped hood. Brutal in both potential and execution, another automotive icon was born. Today there are many, many more inspired iterations of the car than were ever originally made. The 427 Cobra was and is the automotive definition of “badass.”
Carroll Shelby first plucked the 428 Police Interceptor engines off the assembly line for use in the Shelby GT500 Mustangs in 1967. In 1968, the PI engine was replaced mid-year by the 428 Cobra Jet variant, and the car became known as the GT500KR. The 428 CJ continued through to the end of the Shelby production run in 1970. By 1969, the Shelbys were slow sellers, many unsold 1969 models were retagged as 1970 models. The cars are considerably more popular today.
NASCAR racing was the primary development test bed for Ford’s FE race program throughout the 1960s. The 427 was upgraded and altered every year as needed to remain competitive. But while NASCAR served as the engine technology source, the cars themselves were not inspiration for many production performance offerings. Street enthusiasts looked to NASCAR for entertainment, but to the drags for inspiration. So, while we’ll use parts that were designed for the high banks, we don’t often emulate the cars themselves. Street cars have the big tires on the rear, scoops on the hood, but no numbers on the doors, a tradition that holds true today.
Throughout the late 1960s, professional drag race programs evolved, and the cars got further from a production basis. The hard-core drag racers moved into AFX cars, with radical modifications to wheelbases and engines. These in turn evolved into Funny Cars with tube chassis and nitromethane. The SOHC FE engine remained a common powerplant in these, but far removed from the engines available at the local dealer. These cars and engines are certainly worthy of discussion, impressive by any measure, but outside the context of this book.
The most famous of the FE-powered cars were never really sold to the public. Ford made a very public, concerted effort to get an outright win in the 24 Hours of Le Mans race in the mid-1960s. The first cars they produced were powered by the small-block engine. In subsequent years, the need for more power became apparent. In a situation similar to that of the Cobra, Ford looked to the already well-developed 427 FE as a power upgrade to the GT racing program. And the engine delivered, powering the winning cars in 1966 and 1967.
So here we have the FE engine legacy. The engine that was in the most famed Ford racing vehicles of the time in each form of motorsports, NASCAR, the Cobra, the GT40, and the Thunderbolt. This should be the backdrop for comparable fame and dominance on the streets of America. But it never happened. What went wrong?
The Normal Cars: Mustangs, Galaxies, Fairlanes, and Trucks
As a dedicated Ford fan and a Detroit-area FE racer since the 1970s, it hurts to say this, but it needs to be said. What went wrong is that Ford put everything into the low volume racing efforts and comparatively little into the everyday cars that made up the volume of production.
The FE was factory installed or available in numerous car and truck platforms. The full-sized Galaxie (and sister models) was the recipient of most FE production, from the early 1960s right up to the end. Most popular among enthusiasts are the 1963–1967 models.
Ford’s intermediate cars, the Fairlane, Torino, and Mercury variants from 1966 through 1969, also had the FE as a regular production option. Most by far were 390-powered. A very few 1966 and 1967 models had a 427, and the 428 CJ was available beginning in late 1968.
Mustangs and Cougars were often FE-equipped from 1967 through 1970. The 1967 and 1968 big-block models were all 390-equipped. In 1969, there were a few 390s, but the 428 CJ was the engine of choice. The hydraulic lifter version of 427 was installed in a few Cougar GTEs in 1968 (replaced by the 428 CJ midyear), but no 427 Mustang has ever been documented despite 40 years of rumors.
Ford pickup trucks carried the FE as an available option through 1976. There are probably more FE engines in pickups than in any of the cars. The FE can be installed into any of the cars or trucks where it was an option. Any deserving small-block or 6-cylinder-powered candidate can be upgraded to FE power using factory replacement components.
When new, a 390-powered Galaxie of 1964 or earlier was a competitive car on the streets and local tracks. But by the 1970s, it was common knowledge that the average 396-powered Chevelle could pretty much hammer any 390 car at will. A 428 Mustang could hold its own, but most FE owners simply lost enthusiasm. They got tired of getting their butts kicked every Friday night. They moved on to other cars or other hobbies, and the cars were left to sit or used as basic transportation. Interest from the aftermarket never really took off, so the supply of new parts was not there, and the old factory parts were getting used up and worn out.
By the 1980s, the FE engine was considered obsolete by all but a few die-hard enthusiasts and racers. No mainstream magazine coverage, no new aftermarket parts, and no real development outside the private efforts of the dedicated NHRA Super Stock and Stock Eliminator racers. The engine design that had won Daytona, Le Mans, and the Winternationals was considered obsolete and in the same league as the Buick Nailhead, the Chevy 409, the Olds Rocket, and Ford’s MEL and Y block.
The Dinosaur Reawakens
But there was a difference: the cars. The Cobra was still worshiped, the Thunderbolt was still an icon, and the legacy from those early NASCAR, Le Mans, and drag racing wins still hung on. Stock and Super Stock racers running FE power continued to win with no factory support. As people started to repair, reproduce, and emulate those cars, the demand for FE parts began to build.
Specialty suppliers, including Dove, carried the FE flame through the slow years, catering to the dedicated racers and restorers. But when Edelbrock released a replacement FE aluminum cylinder head in the mid-1990s, demand finally began to build. A lot of candidate engines came from the huge truck population. And there were a lot of candidate cars to choose from.
While the 427-ci FE engine was all about dancing around redline on the tachometer, Ford knew that just wasn’t very appropriate for some of the