Guy Drummond wrote a very interesting article in the Boc bulletin number 37 headed "How special are our Chryslers? (or Plymouths?), the bracketed question related to the fact that in Canada and the US the smaller engines tended to be reserved for the Dodge and Plymouth lines rather than Chrysler despite the fact that the companies were all part of the same family. Guy was a Q.C. who if I remember correctly lived in Canada and at the time owned a 410 and before that a 408. The following extract may be of some help.
" The trouble is that the word 'special' admits of too many shades of meaning and allows too many misconceptions to be inferred. I say this because it's my contention that there is absolutely nothing special or unique to Bristol about the version of the 313/318 used by them -- nothing whatever !
The 'standard' engine had a 2 bbl carburettor and a 9:1 compression ratio giving 240 hp. SAE (note , not 250 ). Through the model years 1960-1962 (possibly before probably not afterwards) certain Plymouths and Dodges were available from the factory fitted with a 'Power Pack' engine.
The only changes were (1) a 4 bbl carburettor and appropriate inlet manifold (2) slight changes in the ignition advance curve (3) a camshaft giving a little longer opening period, a little more overlap and 20 thou more lift. Incidentally, I've compared the valve timing figures given by Chrysler for this Power Pack engine with those given by Bristol --- they are identical. This Power Pack engine is exactly what we have in the Types 407--410 with no alteration that in any way affects its output or adjustment.
Someone may point out that the Bristol version is really special --on my own admission-- because it wasn't offered by the factory after the 1962 model year. But all this only goes to illustrate how confusing that word can be!
One further notion seems to be that Bristol had the engine specially fitted with mechanical instead of hydraulic tappets. The fact is that the Canadian engine standard or Power Pack -- was never available with hydraulic tappets until about 1967, when the engine was completely re-designed and the polyspherical head scrapped"
Certainly some years ago when I had a major engine rebuild undertaken on the 313 in my 408 nearly all the parts for the rebuild were obtained off the shelf from Competition Cars of Hainault, only exception was a new crank and shells bought directly from Bristol Cars. There was no indication at all at that time that the engine had in any way been modified by Bristol's the only issue was that compared to the 318 the 313 was a rare engine over here but thankfully the parts were mainly interchangeable except for the crankshaft.
Geoff.
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