Six-cylinder derivatives were also explored, though never built. In addition to the various eight-cylinder engines produced, ten-cylinder engines eventually entered production. This resulted in the creation of an entire family of engines consisting not only of designs utilizing single- or dual-overhead camshaft configurations, different displacements and different block materials, but also different cylinder counts. Perhaps the most significant aspect of the new engine's design was the number of variations of the engine that could be made to suit different needs. This would serve to improve engine efficiency through reduced friction and reduce the engine's oil consumption, while also promoting cleaner emissions. Tight construction tolerances were used in shaping the engine's cylinder bores with narrow piston rings fitted to the engine's pistons. In the interest of reducing overall engine weight, aluminum-alloy heads and pistons would be standard and all major engine accessories would be mounted directly to the block, resulting in a more complex block casting but eliminating the need for heavy mounting brackets. The engine would utilize features such as a chain-driven, single-overhead camshaft valvetrain with roller finger followers, a deep-skirt cast-iron block construction and cross-bolted main bearings, all benefitting long-term durability. This square configuration was chosen primarily for its positive noise, vibration and harshness characteristics. The initial engine design would implement a 90° vee-angle with a bore and a stroke of 3.552 in × 3.543 in (90.2 mm × 90.0 mm), resulting in a 4,601 cc (4.6 L 280.8 cu in) displacement and creating a nearly 1:1 bore-to-stroke ratio. Ĭlarke and his engineers studied engine designs from major European and Japanese automakers and sought to develop a V8 that was technologically advanced and power-dense, yet also dependable with no major service required before 100,000 miles of use. The objective was to develop a new V8 engine that would surpass Ford's earlier V8s in every meaningful way, from power and efficiency to emissions performance and smoothness of operation. In the second half of the 1980s, Petersen, now chief executive officer, sought to update Ford's decades-old V8 architectures, challenging Ford senior engineer Jim Clarke to do for Ford's V8s what Jack Telnack had done for Ford's vehicle design. The result was an abandonment of the boxy styling that had dominated Ford products for years and the adoption of sleeker, more aerodynamic designs like that used for the highly successful Ford Taurus. In the early 1980s, then-Ford Motor Company chief operating officer Donald Petersen challenged Ford's vice-president of design, Jack Telnack, and his staff to come up with new vehicle designs that they could take pride in. The engines were first produced in the Ford Romeo Engine Plant, then additional capacity was added in Windsor, Ontario. Modular engines used in Ford trucks were marketed under the Triton name from 1997–2010 while the InTech name was used for a time at Lincoln and Mercury for vehicles equipped with DOHC versions of the engines. The Modular engines are used in various Ford, Lincoln, and Mercury vehicles. The Modular engine family started with the 4.6L in 1990 for the 1991 model year. Implementing shorter production runs without incurring large shutdown and retooling expenses helped to increase the versatility of those production stations that required tooling or machining setups specific to a certain vehicle platform. This also allowed for the existing engine plants, and their supporting offsite production facilities, to handle shorter production runs. Implementing a "modular approach" allowed for significantly faster changeovers when switching from one engine platform to another among the Modular engine family. Despite popular belief that the Modular engine family received its moniker from the sharing of engine parts across numerous Ford vehicle platforms, in reality, the Modular engine family was named as such by Ford Motor Company for the new "modular approach" to the setup of tooling and casting stations in the Windsor and Romeo engine manufacturing plants. The Ford Modular engine is Ford Motor Company's overhead camshaft (OHC) V8 and V10 gasoline-powered small block engine family. Single or Double OHC with Roller finger followersĮaton M-112 roots-type in DOHC and 5.4 SOHC versions
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