as far as the 425's acutal power... I am not sure... I know the factory rating was a little on the low side.... tho keep in mind, it is bogged down.... atleast she dosn't have an AIR pump, that was good.

its hard to say without ever putting it on a dyno..... it wasn't about the HP tho, it was all torque. When my father had his '79 Coupe DeVille, he towed the boat with that..... 18' Sea Ray, Ford 302, 5,000lbs w/ trailer.... and that car would tow the boat and drive down the road like there was nothing even there.... until getting it was time to get it out of the water.... open rear end and no 4WD... and trying to pull a good sized boat out of the water means the boat ramp became a burnout pit.... I remember the days when he was messing around (knew the owners well) and would go to pull it out... he would just floor it and both tires would spin ( ramp was wet) and the speedo would get burried at 85.... ahhh good times....

But, that car would pull the boat a whole lot better (on the roads and stuff) then the '85 Bronco 351HO 4bbl, towing package.

When I had the complete Northstar in the trunk, full tank of gas and 3 other friends in the car... it still drove around like nothing was going on (rode a little low tho)

Quote:
Originally Posted by SadEyes
Lets keep in mind shes got 8.2:1 compression, is almost the smallest, least powerful big block Cad.... in a time when the industry was moving from gas guzzling beasts to smaller more fuel efficent engines.... meaning, the enigne had alot of smog control devices, all very early systems so it wasn't really made to work with it well...

The 425 isn't some magical engine in itself... but it holds its own, and its got lots and lots of potential as well. Personally, IMO, the big block Cads are the best gasoline V8's made.... thats just how I feel, I personally never gave much thought into the Chevy enignes.... you just see them all over... how many 350's can you look at, at a car show before one becomes like the last? For that reason I am always looking at the oddbals... Caddy V8's if there are any... Olds etc... even the stright 6's, slant 6's etc.... I get tired of seeing the same thing. I also don't think a SBC should be in a fullsize Cad... the only exception being the '93-'96 Fleet, with the LT1... and even then, it was the only engine at the time worty of being used in that configuration...

Gotta realize that the 425 and the 350 were serving 2 different purposes... the 425 was downsied, de-powered and made more fuel efficent and emmission happy then compared to the 500 that came form before it... so performance was on a steady path down.... by 1990, performance started to pick back up, so they used the 305 and 350..... so on one side you have a car with an engine that has a steady performance drop, and on the otherside, and engine with a steady performance boost..... really, if more power wan'ts the issue, then I am sure GM would have stuck with the Olds 307 for 2 more years.... the the fact that despite all that, the 425 was on a trend to decrease performance while the 350 was on a trend to increase performance speaks about its power as well.

Would I never own a '90-'92 350 brougham? of course not, I think they are very nice cars, and given the era, it was a fitting engine. If I had a 350 Brougham, would I swap a 500 in? honestly... probably not, I would just work with the 350.... but idealy, yeah, I'd want a 500..... there is something about big block Cads that are so different then any other engine.... from the way they look, their made, how they run, what they can do, how to build one up and everything.
I certainly can't disagree with you on thinking that any other engine than a Cadillac belongs in a Cadillac, whether it be Chevy or Olds. However, since there wasn't much Cadillac was doing engine-wise before the N* arrived, I took the best thing I could get, and I'm happy to have it. I'm a big Chevy guy, because I've seen alot of them, I learned everything I know about engines from them, and I think they're easy to work on, easy to fix, and very easy to modify.

I think it's pretty cool to have an interest in big block Caddies, I just haven't caught the bug yet because a motor swap is quite a bit more work than a cam swap. However, the big block Caddies really are works of art; all that nickel in the block, the massive stroke and bore, the ability to run forever, etc.

Quote:
Originally Posted by crackpot12
I certainly can't disagree with you on thinking that any other engine than a Cadillac belongs in a Cadillac, whether it be Chevy or Olds. However, since there wasn't much Cadillac was doing engine-wise before the N* arrived, I took the best thing I could get, and I'm happy to have it. I'm a big Chevy guy, because I've seen alot of them, I learned everything I know about engines from them, and I think they're easy to work on, easy to fix, and very easy to modify.

I think it's pretty cool to have an interest in big block Caddies, I just haven't caught the bug yet because a motor swap is quite a bit more work than a cam swap. However, the big block Caddies really are works of art; all that nickel in the block, the massive stroke and bore, the ability to run forever, etc.
I agree, given what your options were, you picked the best one.

Cadillac was doing alot before the Northstar... they had the 4.x series... except for the HT4100 tho, they were FWD-only.... with the Brougham being the only RWD Caddy left.... GM was sticking whatever was in the parts in in them. I think the 350/LT1 combo was a good exit plan for the RWD chassis... plus, it was just natural as it followed the other cars it shared chassis with.

They were doing alot, but they were definately suffering from \"Roger Smith\" syndrome. The 4.5 and 4.9 are pretty darn good motors, good torque and decent HP, but it's engines like the N* that a luxury brand like Cadillac should have been building since the end of the big block. Hell, the fact you could still get a carbureted engine in a 5.0 '90 Brougham is pretty sad, considering what BMW, MB, and the like were doing at the time.

Shit, i mean as long as they were throwing in Chevy engines, why not the 454?? Give it some power not seen since about 1971!

Well, the Brougham was marketed to a much different community then a BMW.... I personally like the carburator....

But, the Brougham, while the top luxury model for Cadillac, wasn't the top performance or tech model.

The 4.x series *was* a leap in advancement.... HT means High Technology... and IMO, they were great powerplants for Cadillac in the 80's.... it did exactly what it was made to do and performed quite well... back in 1991 when the 4.9 came out, they were one of the fastest FWD cars on the market.... then the Northstar picked up in the 90's and carried on until today...

Really, Cadillac has always been either leading, or just as good as the competation in the power/performance department... I would say the only real drop would be 1980-1987.... the gap between the 425 and the 4.5.... the 425 in the '79 chassis held its own for what it was, as did the FWD 4.5 (even TBI) Once the 4.9 came along, it brought new life into the older chassis... then when the Northstar came along in 1993, it put Cadillac nearly at the top ITO performance.

Then with the RWD cars... the 350 did its share in keeping them competing with the Town Car and.... well, that was it... then when the LT1 came along.... it was all over there.

Actually in 1994/1995, Cadillac had a very neat lineup.... the 4.9, the Northstar in both the LD8 and L37 versions, and the LT1...... thats a pretty nice engine lineup if you ask me .