CLASSIC CARS
The 409’s time to roar
With “she’s real fine, my 409,” the Beach Boys paid homage to Chevrolet’s groundbreaking big-block engine on the B side of their first Capitol Records single, released a year after the bow tie marque began offering the motor as a fire-breathing option in 1961.
The 409 was Chevy’s first V-8 engine with more than 400 cubic inches of displacement. Over the course of its production run it was tuned to generate a maximum of 425 horsepower in stock form, but racers Bill “Grumpy” Jenkins, “Dyno” Don Nicholson and others modified the motor to its full potential and racing glory over the quarter-mile.
Officially called the W Series,
the big-block Chevy engine was developed as a 348-cubic-inch V-8 first available in 1958. A precursor to the 409, the 348 was refined to produce up to 350 horsepower as a performance option in the new-for-’58, top-of-the line Impala.
The late arrival of the 409
in the 1961 model year made it available for only a small number of cars that year—just 142. It debuted with 360 horsepower with a single four-barrel carb or 380 with dual carbs. But it delivered a big step up over the 348 in torque, the force that powers low-end acceleration.
Chevrolet made 8,909 of the
409s in 1962, but it never had the capability to produce a large number of the engines. Even so, the 409 quickly became a favorite on drag strips. A special factory-produced engine, the Z11, designed for drag racing, enlarged displacement to 427 cubic inches in late 1962.
GM banned factory support
for racing in 1963, but not before Chevy developed its “mystery” motor for NASCAR’s stock-car circuit. It led to the next bigblock engine, the 396, which replaced the 409 in 1965.
After the boost the Beach Boys
gave the 409, Chevy had Paul Revere and the Raiders record “SS 396” in 1966.