How many of you hate V-engines?
 

I swear, I'm only buying cars with in-line engines from now on, like my wonderful W123. So easy to work on.

Rant: I had to change the spark plugs on my daughter's Malibu yesterday, with the transverse V6 and front-wheel drive. Bastard offspring of GM and Satan. (the Malibu, not my daughter). Here they have a car that measures about 13 feet long x 5 feet wide and what do they do? Shove the engine, trans, axles, and everything else in a 2ft x 3 ft. area so you can't access anything. It took me 3 hours and I scraped up my hands something awful getting at the rear spark plugs.

Every car I ever owned that had a straight engine was just a joy to work on. A couple of BMW 6's come to mind, plus an Alfa, Fiat, TR-6 going back to the 70's. Plus isn't smoothness one of the supposed advantages of V-engines? All the straight-4 and 6 cars I've owned have run equally smooth in my opinion.

I sure hope some of these new diesels coming out will have in-line engines, and ideally longitudinal, although I guess I could live with transverse if I had to.

I'll chime in before this thread is moved to the open forum -

Replacing plugs on a transverse Chrysler 3.3 or 3.8 is a similar adventure. I don't know what it is with Detroit and sharp edges. I can send my hands behind a 603 IP and worst case I'll get it back a little dirtier than it went in. If I send my hand anywhere around a 3.3 I won't get it back in one piece.

It's odd to see later 'vettes and Camaros with mile long hoods yet half the engine is tucked under the windshield. WTF???

Sixto
87 300D

The Camaro and Firebird have an access panel in the Dash to allow you to get to the distributor....

Wow.

Jim

I liked my 400 ci and 455 ci engines in my 70's era Pontiacs. Lots of room under the hood, like our w123's.

Well I gotta chime in.....
 

Geez you whiners:D. I've been working on my Jag V-12 for years. You want something hard to work on, try that one. It takes a large amount
of Zen concentration to do anything on that car. It takes about 6 hours
to change the plugs. You can't get your hands close to anything without
taking several things off first. If you drop a tool in there, it's gone for good,lol. Everything on that car takes roughly 4x longer to accomplish.

not to hijack, but
 

I had a 1974 Jag XJ12L, last year of the carbureted V12. I dropped a crow's foot wrench in/onto the top of the engine while doing plugs or something and I never, ever found it.

Rgds,
Chris W.

:scholar: In-line aways trumps the heat build up between the V.

I have 10 cars. All inline.

Try working on a BMW 750I V12 there is 0 working space!!!!!

A Jimmy V12 (or 16) 71 series is a nice engine, as is the V12 (or 16) 149 series. Cat made some, IMO, better engines that were medium speed, V engines up to the 399, This is from the view point of running them, they have always, with rare exception, got me home:D I like my Cummins but I have respect for the "V"s.

Instead of hating V engines, perhaps your hatred should go towards their placement in small compartments that aren't very DIY friendly?

A properly designed and packaged V engine is fine. Though, for some reason a few manufacturers are making 90 deg. V6's rather than 60 deg. This makes them sound somewhat gruff as well as deliver power with more vibration due to the firing.

V8's should be 90 deg. and V12's can be either.

For diesels, I'm definately partial to the inline.

I have three inline motors, much easier to work on.

I like my Cat 3208, liked my Olds 455 and don't have fond memories of the 948cc in-line 4 in my MG Midget. I also liked the 250 inline 6 in my Camaro and my 617's. My Fuso inline four 3.9L is beginning to endear itself to me.

Old Buicks had straight 8's
 

If I may be allowed to post in my own thread, I've always wondered how Buick's straight-8's ran. That was Buick's main engine I believe throughout the 1930's and 40's. I bet they had pretty good torque.