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The Hemi: When, What and Why - Page 2

© Dan Cooper

In the wake of Chrysler's famous 426 Hemi, Ford came out with a hemi to combat the Chrysler behemoth. The Ford hemi was a great engine, too, and was superior to the Chrysler version in many respects. In the European tradition, with its single overhead cam, Ford's hemi "cammer" 427 certainly made more power than Chrysler's engine. Equipped with dual four-barrel carburetors, it produced 657 bhp. But it was so powerful that Ford apparently had trouble selling enough of them to qualify the engine as a normal production option, and NASCAR refused to allow the engine.

Of America's Big Three, General Motors may have had the first and best opportunity to utilize this "revolutionary" concept. When GM was being assembled by Billy Durant, the company was acquiring numerous smaller concerns at a rapid pace. One of those small companies was the Welch Motor Car Company, of Pontiac, Michigan. At the time of their acquisition, Welch had been building hemi-headed engines of an advanced overhead cam design for several years. GM combined the Welch and Ranier brands to produce another marque, the Marquette, which itself lasted for only one year of production. The hemispherical combustion chambers apparently were not a significant enough idea to impress the foggy-minded executives and engineers at GM at the time, and the hemi head in effect vanished with the name, Welch.

The Welch, under another name, Chelsea, had probably been the first to utilize hemispherical heads. The Encyclopedia of American Automobiles [see: Books ] tells us, "The Chelsea Manufacturing Company was a bicycle shop in which the Welch brothers experimented with cars from 1901 to 1903. They showed their Welch Tourist for the first time at the 1903 Chicago show."

Not far behind the Welch brothers, was Charles Knight with his new sleeve valve engine. The 1904 Silent Knight was in fact far quieter than the customary engines of the day. But neither the quietness, nor the revolutionary sleeve valves that produced the quiet-nor, for that matter, the hemispherical combustion chambers employed-made the Silent Knight a success. It was, however, adopted by Daimler and for a while became a significant factor to Daimler's developing success.

By 1908, Franklin had also "introduced" a hemi engine. Since then, many companies have taken credit for "introducing" the "revolutionary" hemispherical combustion chamber. As mentioned, Peugeot established themselves as the racing team to beat in 1912, with their 3-liter version.

By the 1930's BMW was the dominant force in European sports car racing, with its hemi-powered 328 series. In 1948 Jaguar introduced its famous XK engine, complete with hemi heads, not to mention double overhead cams (in street sedans, no less).

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