I got a SBC on my 1983 camaro that came with the car when i purchased it but i dont know where the engine came out of because the car was riginally a v6 but it has a v8 swaped on it. Can any one help me out decoding it, finding out exactly what it is and came out of. I go through quite a hastle getting parts for it at the local autoparts store. I lost contact with the previous owners so thats not an option. The casting numbers found on the block are the following:

Passanger front side ID: V0605TWH might of been a monday car, i cant find "TWH" anywhere, and im certain im reading it right its very clear. it only has the engine ID it doesnt have the Car Vin stamped on it.

Driver Side Rear stamped at the lower part upside down:
010
020
143

Driver Side Rear Flange: GM 35 3970010

Date on passanger side Rear Flange: E165

with the Trans and flywheel removed the casting in the inside is:
H7 010
509 020
freeze plug: Dorman 555 030

Fram PH30 oil filter

Heres a Link to my photobucket with pictures of the motor and the casting numbers : http://s966.photobucket.com/albums/a...4rli3_hxc/SBC/

 

3970010 is the block casting number, which is about the most common 350 block. Usually they're a 2 pc rear main seal, drivers side dipstick, 2 or 4 bolt mains. Nothing really special, but a decent block to work with. The only other code that matters is the one at the front of the passengers side head surface. V0605TWH tells you what plant built the block, a date code, and the three letters tell you the application. However, "TWH" doesn't show up in any of the lists on Google.

Spray that pad with carb cleaner and scrub it with a wire brush. Right below that V0605TWH code you should have a series of numbers, if you can't see the serial number it's probably not clean enough.

Either way, it's just an old 350, getting parts shouldn't be a problem. Treat it like a 76-78 Chevy truck engine and you'll probably get the right parts, but really most of the parts you'll need will be specific to your car rather then to the engine.

Edit: from looking at the pics, the TWH is pretty clear. If you can't find it in a list anywhere, I wouldn't really worry about it. The rest of the TW* codes are 145-165hp 350's from the late 70's, so it probably fits in somewhere in there.

 

Pretty standard casting number, was used in just about every Chevrolet car/truck from 1969-79. Your casting date decodes to May 16, 1975, so I'd assume it's a no-***** 1975 350ci. If Drew is referring to your stamp pad specifically, the final assembly date of the engine is June 6, 1975. Probably around 160hp or so.

 

That stamping code, and the casting number, tell you NOTHING about "the engine" you now have. All they tell you, is what BLOCK you've got.

NOBODY takes a 35-year-old motor in totally original unmolested untouched condition and jsut sticks it into an almost 30-year-old hot-rod car. While certainly "possible", I'd describe the odds of such a thing happening as "quantum mechanical": lots and lots of zeroes to the right of the decimal point before getting to the first non-zero digit.

More likely, that engine has been "rebuilt" somewhere along the line. That means, somebody tore it completely down, put the block in a giant pile of blocks, the rods in a giant pile of rods, the cam in the trash, the heads in a pile of heads, etc.; sent each of those piles of parts through the renewal process appropriate to it, in a mass-production sort of fashion; and at the end, reached into the pile of "renewed" blocks and picked up one, the pile of "renewed" cranks and picked up one, the pile of "renewed" rods and picked up 8, the pile of "renewed" heads and picked up 2, pulled a cam out of a box of probably 24 generic replacement ones, and 8 pistons out of a simialr crate; and assembled it. EVERY SINGLE PIECE could very easily, in fact more likely than not, have come from a different "engine".

I think you can safely de-assume that you're looking at whatever "engine" that "code" refers to, and instead, accept that you only have that BLOCK. You don't have the pistons, cam, heads, or any other parts of it, that actually determine what "engine" it is.

All you know, thus far, is that it's a 4" bore block; meaning, a 302, 327, or 350 (or 383 even), but NOT a 283, 305, 307, or 400 for example.

If you want to know what THE ENGINE is, you need to know what pistons are in it, which you have to VISUALLY INSPECT to get that info if y ou weren't the one that put them there; what cam is in it (see "pistons" for how to tell what it is); what heads are on it, which you can get the head casting number to tell you; and then of course what machine work was, or wasn't, done to it in the process.

None of the rest of those numbers is of the slightest value toward identifying the "engine".

Get that other info and we can tell you more about what you've got.

In the meantime, if all you're trying to do is buy parts for it, very little of any of that matters. You can make up whatever application you want people to think it is just picking from Chevy vehicels (car or truck) with a 350 from about 73 to 79, and tell em you want spark plugs, oil filter, etc. for it; and it won't make any difference to what you get, because they're all pretty much the same.

 

In the late 60's Chevy would stick an H on the end of the engine code if it had a holley and R for a rodchester carb. Check for just the TW code.

 

And that's how you end up way the **** out in western Kansas, changing a fuel pump on a Monte Carlo that your friend parked on his grandparents farm a decade ago, and the fuel pump the counter monkey gave you doesn't have the right hook ups because it's for a 1969 farm truck instead of a 1983 Monte Carlo.

Most of the time it doesn't matter, but there's going to be a mix of parts specific to the car, and specific to the motor. Sometimes neither part will be correct and you'll have to dig to find one that's compatible with both.

 

Agreed...especially when sourcing accessories (alternators, a/c compressors, etc.). There's probably 200 or so different alternators for that one casting number.

Normally I'd say go by the suffix on the stamp pad for a much more exact application...only problem is, I can't find "TWH" on nastyz28.com's directory.

 

That stamping code isn't going to tell you things like that, either. Won't tell what intake you've got, whether your heads have accessory bolt holes in them, what kind of wiring your car has, or any of that.

All it tells you, is what BLOCK you have. Not, what ENGINE. It is ALTOGETHER WORTHLESS if the motor has been rebuilt, and even more WORTHLESS if it's in a different car.

You could for example, take some 1974 block, and stick it in a 1990 car with a serpentine belt system, which bolts right up onto the block as if it belongs there. OK, now which water pump would you buy? I guarantee you, even if you could get the application that the stamping code points to, the water pump would be WRONG.

In fact, I can't think of A SINGLE external part like that, that the stamping code would necessarily be RIGHT for.

It's WORTHLESS. DOUBLE WORTHLESS if the motor has been rebuilt. You need to abandon that line of inquiry because it's a total dead end. The stamping code tells you NOTHING of any value.

 

Beg to differ.

Sure, the casting number doesn't tell you much. But the suffix on the stamp pad, TOGETHER with the casting date AND final assembly date CAN (sometimes) tell you what year/make/model the engine was originally installed in. If it meant NOTHING then I doubt people would have spent countless hours compiling databases like this one http://www.nastyz28.com/gm-chevy-cod...s-suffix-3.php

Now, if you're putting said engine in an application completely different than what it was originally installed in, then yeah, external items that were original to the swapped engine like water pumps and exhaust manifolds are likely NOT going to work in the car that it was swapped into. Neither the stamp pad or the casting number are going to tell you what replacement parts would be right for THAT block in whatever car it's been swapped into. And of course, I doubt the engine has any of its original internals at this point being 30+ years old.

The original poster wanted to know what the engine was originally in. The stamp pad, together with the casting date and final assembly date usually gives you an idea of what year/make/model car it originally came out of. In this case, we have a suffix (TWH) that does not appear in any of the databases. Now, that's not to say that stamp pads don't get tampered with (as in ground down and re-stamped to whatever someone wants it to be 'correct' for), but in this case, with this ultra not-rare casting number and oddball suffix, I'm pretty sure this is an original stamp pad.

So, to answer CjMtzSS's original question (what did it come out of): no way to tell on this one other than a 1975 or early 1976 Chevrolet car or truck.

 

NO IT DOES NOT!!!!!

All it tells you is some stuff about THE BLOCK!!!! It tells you NOTHING about whatever ENGINE you have.

Which is why it's ABSOLUTELY WORTHLESS for any functional purpose whatseover. A block in a Nova is the same as the one in a truck is the same as the one in a Camaro is the same as the one in an Impala is the same as the one in a Corvette. There simply is NO USEABLE, ACTIONABLE information contained in that number, once the engine has been "rebuilt". Whatever facts were conveyed by whatever information it contained, is GONE.

So go ahead and differ all you like; you might just as well "differ" with the idea that the Earth is round instead of flat. Doesn't make you look real smart to "differ" with FACT. And it certainly doesn't change the OUTCOME of any kind of REALITY.

I know about NastyZ28's database.

I also can't figure out even ONE SINGLE use for it, other than as a guide when scouring the boneyards for a block to build a "part number and date correct" replacement for a missing engine in a situation when that need exists, and when dealing with a KNOWN COMPLETE ENGINE that's still INTACT. Applying that stuff to A RANDOM REBUILT BLOCK is nothing but an excursion through fantasy land.

 

I stand corrected...a suffix is not really going to help much at all when trying to source parts for a 35 y/o engine that you have no history on.

CjMtzSS, make sure you keep part numbers for anything that you find that works with your car/engine! You will thank yourself down the road if they ever need to be replaced again while you own it.