Lead I'm sure that car was before the small neck fuel filler so it burned real regular with lead. I'd use a lead additive or have the valves and seats redone. if not you soon will have to from my experiences with Chevy engines running cheap (expensive) new gas.:confused: ---------When a wee lad Mom and Dad moved to Portland to work in the ship yards. (40's.) Sure glad they weren't boat builders and returned to Illinois. I remember it rains there!
Long debated argument... Only small high performance engines are need for concern, so I've been told. Putting hardened valve seats will do the trick, but in my opinion, not necessary for your ride. Just my 2cents!
Valves and Seats Not necessary? Tell that to three of my old small block Chevy engines! That water we burn today with corn juice in it will not protect the valves or seats. On the other hand, if you have to tear the engine down to do the head work you may as well wait till it needs repaired. In other words if it still works don't fix it! But in time you will.
1 of about several hundred articles on the subject you may want to read... http://www.chevron.com/products/prodserv/fuels/technical_safety_bulletins/use_unleaded_gas.aspx
If I remember right the 72 V8 Hornet owners manual suggested every other tank of gas should be of lead fuel.
Get the Lead IN! I'll bet you read right. And should we really believe what the big oil companies tell us anyway? They tell us we are out of oil and there are billions of gallons right here in the USA! But, to get back to the question, yes, add a lead substitute! My 72 Torino used regular and so did my 75 Ford 1/2 ton. I believe around 72 or so they made the switch with cars.
From Jim Hand's High Performance Pontiac articles. http://www.fortunecity.com/silverstone/pontiac/101/build/comp.htm
Cars & Parts & Valves Great car magazine, Cars & Parts. Got it from the early days when it was published in Sesser, Ill. Another great Illinois mag, Hemmings, first published Quincey,Ill. Got it as a mimeographed few pages printed in Ernie Hemming's one car garage.:confused: About no-lead, all I know is I had several early small block Chevy's with bad valve seats after using no-lead for a few years. No trouble with any engines before that. As the article states, replace them when they do go bad. Why would they even mention this if there were no problem? Ya think Oil Companies are gonna admit there is a problem? BP never has any problems! For safety, in those old engines, add a lead substitute.
Its the Oil Companies saying that. I'm sure they want to keep the big gas guzzlers on the road. Now, if it was the car manufacturers saying that, I would find it highly suspect.
Gas Guzzlers I am not sure about anything that has to do with oil companies or politicians. I'll just keep driving our gas guzzlers till they outlaw them, stop making fuel that we can burn, or parts are no longer available. And when I drive an old car needing leaded fuel, I'll add a lead additive because it is needed. That's why it was added to the fuel before. Took the lead out and raised the price. Who ya gonna trust?
I know this is an old thread but I have two pennies burning a hole in my pocket. I spoke with a trusted machine shop owner when I purchased a 1970 Torino wagon and had some issues with "pining". I tried timing and lead substitute but still the detonation would return. The machine shop owner told me that he wouldn't worry as that engine saw how many years of leaded gas, which had impregnated itself into to the "soft seats" seats. As for my continued pinging problem, higher octane fuel and a lead substitute seem to help the most. Next I am going to check the carb tune and possibly use a bore scope to see if there is a lot of carbon build up in the cylinders.
Several years after I was forced to use no-lead regular I had two older SBC engines with valve problems. They both had around 50,000 miles on them so were impregnated enough, I would think. Personally I believe it is us, the fuel buyers being impregnated. Just think about it, they no longer add the lead but charge more for no-lead fuel because it costs more to make than leaded fuel.??????? Diesel fuel is a bi-product of making gasoline and was around 19 cents a gallon for years. Now it costs more than unleaded fuel because trucks need it.:banghead3: This topic has been explained by chemists much smarter than I am who say this watered down low octain cow pee with corn juice added passed off as fuel will not harm older engines. Perhaps they are correct. i just go by what happens in the real world, not some laboratory.
For 1972, the U.S. DOT mandated that all engines had to be able to handle no-lead and low-lead fuels, so the valve seats were hardened at the factory. On the same note, there were 2 reasons that the published 1972 horsepower ratings were so far down from the 1971 ratings. The first was the switch from gross to net ratings. The second was that most engines had a lower compression to accommodate the lower octane rating of the no- and low-lead fuels. For a 72 car, I'd run mid-grade and run it until the valve seats give problems, which may be a LONG time.
I've been told, and I've read on the internet (which should give you an estimate of how much salt to throw at your computer screen as you read my paraphrasing of it) that it is only in high stress, high load, high rpm where the valve seats will cause problems. Things like high altitude driving up and down hills, towing, and I mean heavy towing like at the limits of your frame and receiver, and racing. The engine in my Gran Torino is a 1972 351C. The previous owner does not know anything about hardened seats and he believes the heads were left alone during the rebuild. So honestly, decades from now, I might come across a problem. That's fine by me, I'll replace it with a 5.0L Coyote engine. No skin off my nose. That's another idea, if you want to upgrade your Hornet, one of those fuel injected 4.0L Jeep Cherokee engines would be a sweet addition!!!
