Pierce arrow V12

[Aussi John 1]

Does anyone know how much design Studebaker put into the Pierce 12 cylinder engine, if any?

[alsancle]

We have one of the guys that was on the design team here on the forum. He just hasn’t gotten out of bed yet. Expect him to weigh in soon.

[Dandy Dave]

Is this the same as a Ward La France mid engine V12 fire truck? 

[edinmass]

 

Working from memory, and there is a article by Otto Klusmayer about the development of it somewhere.........

 

Designed by an outside firm and Stude. Obviously they said it was done by "Pierce Arrow engineers" but by the time the late 20's arrived the number of car companies doing their own designs had fallen off a cliff. Hell, the Packard V-12 was an outside job 100 percent.........so short of the "big three" things had evolved. Stude did the castings for the Pierce 12...........different formula for the cast iron and such from what has been reported. The castings were shipped raw and aged outside in Buffalo and machined and finished there. Also, every pierce 12 engine was run at wide open throttle on a dyno for 12 hours, then pulled down, inspected, and reassembled. We have photos of them doing it. Interestingly the Pierce V-12 is probably the most modern and industrial design of the big car engines. Just look to the 1932 24 hour "flight of the arrow" video averaging 117 mph on the salt flats. Proof is the engines pumping Seagrave pumpers for days on end without problems. While not as pretty or highly finished as the other 12's it will run circles around them without question. Nice thing about the Pierce, with a little effort 220 horsepower is easy to achieve and still look, run, and idle like it is stock. My 36 V-12 was tweaked and runs with ANY Model J in the mid and top end. Acceleration is good but not great because of the mass...............torque is over the top. You can drive a V-12 Pierce in third 100 percent of the time if you want too.

 

I actually had a factory 1934 V-12 crate engine in the shop once......we were able to document every small detail from gaskets, finish, and most importantly clearences of all the bearings and pistons. We were flabbergasted how tight the engine was built. They even punch the cylinder banks bore down on the deck down to a tenth of what they were new. When you have had your hands in a bunch of pre war engines you get a feel for the engineering of each company. Also many "popular and high end" brands had engineering that was less than spectacular. Looking at a V-16 Cadillac with a repaired block from the factory wasn't too impressive. 

 

 

 

 

Below is a small 1932 V-12 on a dyne.......fun to watch.

 

https://www.facebook.com/mark.clayton.restorecars/videos/1085344835525236

 

 

Edited April 21, 2023 by edinmass (see edit history)

[Gary_Ash]

While I have heard stories of different cast iron alloys being used by Studebaker for various engines, it’s hard to imagine the foundry shifting alloys from day to day. I suppose the only way to put the rumors to rest is to get pieces of various blocks and have them all analyzed in one lab at the same time. So, Ed, maybe you or John can send me pieces from a P-A block or two and I can dig up some Studebaker pieces, maybe even throw in some GM pieces. I think x-ray fluorescence can analyze quickly and economically. 

[edinmass]

Will do when I go north in late May. Interesting to ponder. I would expect they only cast blocks in batches every 6-12 months. There were a bunch of leftover blocks with Pierce casting numbers on them used till 1942 on the fire trucks.

[Rusty_OToole]

6 hours ago, Gary_Ash said:

While I have heard stories of different cast iron alloys being used by Studebaker for various engines, it’s hard to imagine the foundry shifting alloys from day to day. I suppose the only way to put the rumors to rest is to get pieces of various blocks and have them all analyzed in one lab at the same time. So, Ed, maybe you or John can send me pieces from a P-A block or two and I can dig up some Studebaker pieces, maybe even throw in some GM pieces. I think x-ray fluorescence can analyze quickly and economically. 

According to Maurice Hendry the Pierce and Studebaker castings were made on different days. That is because they required different patterns or molds and the change over was made during the night shift. Different alloys were made by ladle innoculation. Chromium, nickel, graphite, molybdenum etc.  would be added to the molten iron to make the correct mix for engine blocks, exhaust manifolds, flywheels, cylinder heads or whatever they were making that day.

Edited April 22, 2023 by Rusty_OToole (see edit history)

[edinmass]

Unless I’m mistaken, Maurice got his info from Otto, who worked as an engineer at Stude and Pierce while they were the same company. 

[Rusty_OToole]

10 hours ago, edinmass said:

Unless I’m mistaken, Maurice got his info from Otto, who worked as an engineer at Stude and Pierce while they were the same company. 

I know he was quoting someone from Pierce but don't recall the details, it is many years since I read the book. I regard Hendry as a good source of info although I believe he got a couple of things wrong.

[bryankazmer]

On 4/21/2023 at 3:53 PM, Gary_Ash said:

While I have heard stories of different cast iron alloys being used by Studebaker for various engines, it’s hard to imagine the foundry shifting alloys from day to day. I suppose the only way to put the rumors to rest is to get pieces of various blocks and have them all analyzed in one lab at the same time. So, Ed, maybe you or John can send me pieces from a P-A block or two and I can dig up some Studebaker pieces, maybe even throw in some GM pieces. I think x-ray fluorescence can analyze quickly and economically. 

A handheld Xray may be a bit easier than cutting into blocks.  Some scrapyards use them to sort alloys

[Gary_Ash]

@bryankazmer yes, a handheld X-ray analyzer is exactly what I was thinking of.  I suggested having all of the samples together to eliminate differences between analyzers, technique, and calibration differences.  I don't think the percentages of the various elements in the blocks are going to be very different, so being able to say that one block has more of one element, like nickel, than another block is really what we're after.  By the 1930s, metallurgists understood cast iron very well and knew what to mix in for various applications.  The question here is whether the mix was really different for P-A blocks versus Studebaker blocks versus other automakers' foundries.

 

I'm going to call around to some of the local universities to see if they have an X-ray analyzer and an experienced student who could do the analysis for a donation to the department.   

[Rusty_OToole]

If there was a difference it was probably a matter of cost. Studebaker would be in line with the industry in general, balancing the cost of different alloys vs the benefit. Pierce would more likely take a cost is no object view, as they were making a more expensive car.

 

I say this because the Pierce eight had such niceties as an oil cooler/ temperature regulator, 9 main bearing crankshaft, and I think they had hydraulic valve lifters before Studebaker even though their engines were similar. In other words Pierce had their own engineering ideas which they put into practice. This could extend to different alloys for different parts. Studebaker made castings for Pierce the same way any other vendor or subcontractor would, working to the customer's specifications.

[58L-Y8]

Interesting enough, the Studebaker straight eight was five main bearing for the 1928 312 ci - 1928 1/2 through 1930 337 ci.  Then for 1931-1933 it became a nine main bearing engine.   Perhaps that was instituted to simplify the casting processes and have the benefits nine main bearing gave.

[Rusty_OToole]

I believe the Pierce eight was based on the Studebaker eight as modified by Pierce engineering, one of the mods being a change from five to nine main bearings and this change was adopted by Studebaker for their own engines.  There were other changes like a longer stroke crankshaft, oil temp regulator, and probably changes to metallurgy camshaft design etc.

[Gary_Ash]

I haven't found a local college or university with an XRF tester.  The instrument costs about $40,000.  I did find a lab in central Mass. that will do the testing for $75 a sample.  Each test takes about 2 minutes, can measure presence of materials to parts per million range, though probably 0.01% to 0.1 % is more than enough.  We would expect to see iron at 90+%, carbon at 2.5-4%, and silicon at 1 to 3%.  The differences would be in the presence or absence of other metals such as nickel, chromium, vanadium, molybdenum, copper, titanium, zirconium, and manganese, things added to change density, hardness, pour viscosity, or other properties.  I think maybe having them test Rockwell hardness could be another comparative test.

 

Now I just need the samples.  Ideally, they should be 2" x 3" or larger and be mostly flat.  The samples have to be very clean and should be polished to remove surface rust, etc.  The gun-like analyzer is held to the surface for two minutes while an X-ray source in the analyzer illuminates the sample surface.  So, who has some pieces of a broken P-A 8-cylinder block?  I'll also need a sample from a Studebaker 8 block from the same 1930s time period.  I think I have a 1965 Chevy 283 block that I can saw a piece out of for comparison.   

 

With all the data in hand, maybe I could write another PhD thesis...

 

XRF analyzer in use.

[Aussi John 1]

Studebaker had 9 main bearings on the small block engine in 1929.