My calendar shows this for today

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Sat 30 Mar 2002 16:16
My calendar shows this for today - colin
The Times, 30 March, 1932.

The 8-cylinder Ford.

Details of the new Ford 8-cylinder motor car- the first of more than four cylinders made by the company- were announced today at Detroit by Mr Edsel Ford. The car has a speed of 75mph and the engines are capable of developing 65hp. Like the improved 4-cylinder car which will develop 50hp and do 65mph, it will be made available in any one of 16 types of body.

(Just thought you'd like to know that).
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Sat 30 Mar 2002 18:16
Re: My calendar shows this for today - ChrisR
Here's an extract from an encyclopedia I'm writing at the moment (a book for kids about 1930s America):

In 1932, [the V8's] extra power was greatly appreciated. Bank robber John Dillinger (1903-1934), on the run from the law, wrote Ford to say: ?I can make any other car take a Ford?s dust.? Outlaw Clyde Barrow (1909-1934) was also impressed. He wrote: ??even if my business hasn?t been strictly legal it don?t hurt anything to tell you what a fine car you got in the V8.?

In 1948 (I think) Cadillac introduced a V8 that gave 160bhp. The company boasted (!) that the car could do 0-60 in thirty seconds. How times have changed.

Chris
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Sat 30 Mar 2002 21:14
Re: My calendar shows this for today - THe Growler
I don't know what it is about V-8's. I've owned a variety and currently have 3. Two of them are from the 60's and one has never had a spanner on it but still runs like a watch. That endless smooth surge of power as the thing girds its loins and proceeds to leave everything in the rear distance may have something to do with it, along with that seductive exhaust note at idle. Nothing else is quite the same.
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