"A 350 is a 350 is a 350"—NOT! And Other Misconceptions About GM V8 Engines Debunked

With the Crate Engine, the Chevy 350 lives today.
Photo: GM media website.

With GM's rightful reputation for badge engineering—slapping the brands of their different divisions on essentially lookalike bodies—it isn't at all unreasonable that many people think that the same idea applied to powertrains in the glory days of the storied GM V8 engines like the Chevrolet 350.

Plus, there is the ubiquitous cliche uttered by many gearheads—or wannabe gearheads—when talking about the hot-rodder projects they dream of: "put a 350 in it."

It's easy to have the misconception that, if you look at a Chevrolet, a Buick, and a Pontiac from the 70s, each with a 350 ci V8, you're looking at the same engine three times.

But there's a problem: it isn't true.

Here's a quick history lesson—if you want more detail, you'll find copious amounts of research fodder on the Interwebs. In a nutshell, over the decades, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Chevrolet, and Buick each had separate and very innovative powertrain engineering and manufacturing operations. And each, at some point, arrived at the magic number of 350 cubic inches of displacement that, for its time, packed a lot of horsepower and torque into a reasonably compact footprint.