V8's are boring, No imagination or inventiveness there. Been there done that, had fun at the time...

But got sick of keeping up with the Jones' (someone is always faster), so now I just diverge. Way more fun and way less money. (and w/ the turbo, I'm keeping up ok despite my best efforts). If you build a V8 car, there is always another V8 car that is faster, better, and cooler that someone will compare it to. With the 6, you are the king of your castle... very rarely is there someone around with a 6 that you can compare to, and if there is - it's usually someone from this forum and you know them already.

So it takes the &^&* measuring out of the car hobby. No one will try to compare you to the multitude of better funded cars out there 'cause you're "just a six". - That's fine by me... and then when people see that you have done some unique, inspirational, and EFFECTIVE things to your six, they really get stoked, and really are willing to dish out the praise - It let's you run in your own class as opposed to trying to run w/ the herd.

My car is way cooler than some gay bellybutton V8 muscle car anyway's. At least I think so - and that's all that matters. Instead of sitting here browsing through summit trying to decide which cookie-cutter bolt-on to add next (which of these 5000 different intake manifolds should I use?), I am constantly using my brain (and this forum) to devise solutions to the problems the car gives me, because the off-the-shelf solution to those problems doesn't exist. If I had a V8 car right now, I would just throw dollars at it and have it working perfect. No thinking needed. Where is the fun in that? I've done that before, but it was more fun 'cause I had less dollars, and that dictated more thinking. Now that I am fortunate enough to have a little more money for the hobby, having a bastard-child of a motor forces me to use my brain, and not just my wallet.

(back to "Answers")

It's the same old saying, " swap that chitty 6 for a V8!" I got tired of hearing "You won't make any power with that!" Well you can figure how far their jaws dropped when I had beaten 12 V8 broncos in the sand drags and won the competition for standard tranny class. Enough said.

(back to "Answers")

I picked "other". It came with the car. I had never seen one before, but thought that since I had a fox-body I could buy a 302. But after realizing how basic and easy and cheap to work on and maintain it was love. "I" can work on this car without having to go to a mechanic to change the spark plugs. I'm new to the "car" hobby so it's been a great learning platform.

Kind of like you found a stray dog, and it wants to be your best friend. And if you don't take care of it, it's going to the pound. Yes, it's almost like a responsibility now. However, if I had not found a site like this it would be extremely difficult. This site was probably the most compelling reason for me to pursue this obsession. Without this place there would be a deep void in the access to information.

(back to "Answers")

I voted for "others" because I could have said "yes" to all of the above. It might be interesting for you to do a poll on uses. Like; street driven only, daily driver, sunny day driver, track only, street and occasional track, and maybe some other uses. The point being that I believe there are more of us who get great pleasure out of driving our cars/engines. I also believe that most of us were drawn to the six because we are on a limited budget.

There are several other things that drew me to our six.
*Required ingenuity and problem solving skills- there is no cookie cutter solution to blindly follow. Our engines require some thought and problem solving skills partly because we are rare, and partly because commercial solutions are scarce.
*Satisfaction- Take a grungy, lowly six and make it look good and run better than when it left Henry's garage. Aw, that feels good!
*Reasonably economical- not only in mileage, but in building and maintaining. By that I mean swapping and upgrading parts, scrounging parts, modifying parts. Our projects are comparable to a 10,000 piece jig-saw puzzle. You don't have to do it all at once. You can do some now, and some more later. With a plan, you can add parts or modify as your time and budget will allow. Progress and satisfaction can come a little at a time.

Well, as usual, I've gone on too long. You shouldn't get me started. Sorry. I did enjoy it though. Oh, did I mention "enjoyment and pride" in marching to a different drummer?

(back to "Answers")

Misty came with a six. I hated it at first. I wanted a 427 but brought that down to a 289. Dad liked the idea of a 289, mom said no. I even tried a 221 w/a 1v carb to limit the performance. Mom wouldn't budge. So I kept the six. At first there were plans of swapping it to a V8 after I turned 18 which was the only way mom would allow a V8. But the six started to grow on me. With the 40 Series it sounds similar to a small block V8 but it gets more looks at shows because it's different. For a crate motor, I'd like something that could run with the small blocks and still get decent economy.

(back to "Answers")

I want performance and economy and its totally different than a cookie cutter V8. With gas probably going to hit $4.00 a gallon here soon I want a car that has good performance but gets significantly better gas mileage than a 5.L V8.

People pop the hood of a Fox body expecting to see a V8. They see a long valve cover and assume its a inline 4cyl 2.3L turbo. Then they realize its too long to be a 4cyl and then the realization its a I6 sets in. The look on their face at that moment is priceless. While the BMW M3 Coupe has been my role model I do understand I'm not likely to get anywhere near that level of performance, but I think I can get close on handling and power to weight ratio.

(back to "Answers")

Well, since we're all confessing here...... I owned a '65 Mustang with a six back in '87 or so and I hated it. To slow. So I sold it. Never owned another one until we picked up Kelly's car. The only reason we kept the six in her Falcon was that we "tried" to race it with the 170 and the crowds that came by the pits were unreal. So being different was the reason we kept it a six. Had we swapped it with a V8, it would've never been in two magazines. If Kelly's Falcon would've been powered with a 260, then you would've never heard of "Does10s".

(back to "Answers")

Why did I stay with the six? Well, to be completely honest I almost didn't. My original plan for the 6 cylinder was to rip it out and drop a V-8 into the convertible. I had been hanging out on VMF. My first post was how to go about pulling the 6 out and putting in an 8. The best laid plans.

What convinced me to stay six was one day, after I had owned the car for about 2 months, I went to a local show and shine. At the time, my engine bay was stock. Nothing fancy, in fact I was kind of ashamed. When I pulled into the parking lot, I kept the hood closed. Then people started asking what I had under the hood and I kept answering "Just a Six". Out of the 40 cars there, I was the only car with less then 8 cylinders. Finally, a few of them convinced me to pop the hood. I had more people coming to check out my 200 then any of the other engine bays.... and that's with it looking like crap. That's when I realized that people were tired of seeing V-8s.

This is also about the time I found fordsix.com. Finally I was convinced to stay six. This was only compounded when I installed and showed my Offy set up.

(back to "Answers")