Talk:Ford MEL engine

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The 410 'so called' Mel engine

I posted a revision to the 'Ford MEL Engine' Wikipedia page correcting the statement on that page, that the Edsel 410ci E-475 is a MEL engine when it can be proved that it is not.

My correction has been removed when I believe that it should not have been.

We all want the information on Wikipedia to be absolutely correct.

Here are the facts:

The Edsel 410ci E-475 was unique engine designed solely for and only used in the 1958 year Citation and Corsair models of the Edsel.

The Edsel 401ci E-475 engine was designed by the Ford Engine Division in Dearborn Michigan during 1956, over a year before the MEL Division was formed. It was produced at Ford's new Lima Ohio engine plant throughout 1957.

The Mel Division wasn't formed until long after the decision to close down the failed Edsel Division had been taken, so how could the Edsel 410ci E-475 be a MEL engine?

When it was known that the Edsel was a failure, a decision was taken to fold the failed Edsel Division into a new division called the MEL Division (Mercury, Edsel and Lincoln). This division commenced on the 14th of January 1958.

The MEL Division engines incorporated a lot of the features of the earlier Ford Dearborn designed Edsel 410ci E-475 engine, into their later large block MEL engine designs.

Proof that the Edsel 410ci E-475 engine was produced long before the MEL Division was formed is that Ford held a ceremony at their Lima, Ohio engine plant, for the 25th millionth Ford engine, on the 15th of February 1957. That 25 millionth Ford engine was an Edsel 410ci E-475 engine. This ceremony was held long before the MEL Division was formed, on the 15th of January 1958.

My correction stated that The Edsel 410ci E-475 is clearly is not a Ford MEL engine because it was designed in 1956, it was manufactured in 1957 and had largely ceased production by the end of 1957, before the MEL division even came into existence.

How do I go about getting this correction onto the Wikipedia Edsel pages which now state wrongly that the Edsel 410ci E-475 is a MEL engine?

Many thanks, Denise Daniels, proud owner of a 1958 Edsel Corsair with a Edsel 410ci E-475 engine. (An Edsel engine, not a MEL engine)

Denise Daniels (talk) 02:15, 19 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about an engine design and has nothing to do with Ford's corporate structure, so the "MEL Division" is a red herring and largely irrelevant here. Do you have evidence showing that the 410 is unrelated to the 383 and 430 introduced at the same time? --Sable232 (talk) 00:31, 20 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is about accuracy, engine design or not, the names of the engines or anything else in Wikipedia should be accurate.

There is no such thing as a MEL 410 engine.

Ford made an Edsel E-475 which was 410ci. It was called the Ford 410 or the E car (experimental) 410 engine while it was under development at Ford Dearborn in 1955 and 1956. When the Edsel name was announced at the end of 1956, the Edsel Senior Series 410ci engine was called the Edsel E-475 engine.

The Ford 410 was being developed long before the name Edsel had ever been thought of as a Ford car brand. So how could this engine be called a MEL (Mercury/Edsel/Lincoln) engine, when the name Edsel hadn't even been decided on?

The Edsel E-475 engine had largely ceased production by the end of 1957 before the MEL Division was formed. Only a few units were produced at Lima in early 1958. The MEL division was formed to include the Edsel with Mercury and Lincoln for the purpose of the orderly discontinuation of the failed Edsel brand. This occurred on the 14th of January 1958

The MEL Division took over responsibility for the provision of Edsel E-475 and E-400 engine spare parts after the 14th of January 1958.

The Ford 430 used the same block and architecture as the Edsel E-475 but with a slightly bigger bore. It was called a Ford 430 until the formation of the Mel Division on the 14th of January 1958.

The Ford 430 was used in 1958 Lincolns and that engine became a MEL 430 only after the MEL Division was formed on the 14th of January 1958. Production of the MEL 430 started at Lima, early in 1958.

Long before the Edsel was released on the 4th of September 1957 as well as after, Ford was downplaying any connection between Ford and Edsel. The name Ford never appeared in any advertising material at that time. The last thing Ford wanted, was any obvious connection between the Edsel and Ford and especially Mercury and Lincoln, so there was no use of the word MEL in relation to the Edsel engine or anything else to do with the Edsel.

Edsel even created their own dealership network, with 1187 dealers across the US and those dealers could not sell other Ford group cars or display anything Ford related at their dealerships. The reason for the complete public separation between Edsel and Ford, was so that people would think that Edsel was a new car manufacturer and that would help them take sales away from GM and Chrysler.

So as I said, there were no MEL engines before the 14th of January 1958. There were Ford engines and Edsel engines but no MEL and there is still no such thing as a MEL 410 today.

The Ford MEL engine listing in Wikipedia should have the 'MEL 410' entry deleted and entry for the Edsel E-475 added saying that the 1958 Edsel Citation and Corsair had an engine called the Edsel E-475 which was 410ci and was the forerunner of MEL engines. The Edsel E-475 uses a block and architecture that were later adopted for use in MEL engines. These MEL engines had different bore sizes.

Denise Daniels Denise Daniels (talk) 09:59, 22 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Numerous engine articles on Wikipedia encompass engines with different bore sizes. We do not separate out specific engines because the bore size differs.

I don't understand your fixation on the MEL Division. That has nothing to do with this engine design. Ford designed an engine. They designed it in different displacements. One was used only in Mercurys, one only in Edsels, and one in several models but namely Lincolns. "FE" stands for "Ford-Edsel" despite there being no such division, so why must "MEL" correlate to that short-lived division and not simply the three brands it was predominantly used in?

"MEL" is the generally-accepted common name for this engine architecture as a whole, irrespective of how it was marketed in a specific vehicle, whether that was "E-475" or "Super Marauder" or anything else. --Sable232 (talk) 22:24, 22 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I was wrong, I thought the name 'MEL' was used by Ford for a type of engine, after the Ford MEL Division was formed in 1958. It appears that the name 'MEL' was never used by Ford for any engine ever. I said the Edsel 410 E-475 engine was always only ever called the Edsel E-475 by the company and that is true. I also said there is no such thing as a MEL 410 engine and that was true officially at Ford.

To check this I looked through my 360 page 1958 Edsel Service Manual and didn't find a single reference to anything about MEL or a MEL engine.

I also looked through my complete set of original Edsel Service Bulletins from 1957 and 1958, these were issued to all Edsel dealers each month, with all the mechanical problems as they were discovered, throughout the life of the Edsel Division. Not a single mention of the word MEL.

And to further check, I asked Google's AI Gemini system this.....

"Is there any reference anywhere in any official Ford document of the MEL engine name?"

Here is Gemini's answer.....

• • • • While the name "MEL" is widely used by automotive historians, enthusiasts, and in reference guides, it's not a formal designation that was used in official Ford documentation in the same way modern engine families are. This is because the name was never an official engineering designation.

Instead, Ford's official documentation and part-numbering systems of the time referred to the engines by their specific displacement and a part-numbering code. For example:

Part Numbers: The engines were identified by a casting number on the block. These codes followed a specific format. A code like "EDG" for example, as found in some parts references, would indicate a specific engine block that was part of the "Mercury-Edsel-Lincoln" group, but the code itself is a system for parts, not a family name.

Marketing Names: In sales literature, Ford used marketing-friendly names rather than technical designations. For instance, the 383 cubic-inch MEL engine was known as the "Marauder" in Mercury brochures, while the 410 was called the "E-475" in the Edsel. The 430 was often marketed as the "Lincoln V8" or the "Thunderbird 430 Special."

The name "MEL" emerged as a convenient and unofficial shorthand used by engineers, mechanics, and later, by the automotive press and enthusiasts, to group these engines together. It was a practical term to distinguish them from the other new V8 families introduced at the same time, such as the FE (Ford-Edsel) and the SD (Super Duty) truck engines.

The search results confirm this. They consistently refer to the "MEL" name as a popular, unofficial designation while showing that official documents used different terminology (like "430 V8") or the vehicle-specific marketing names. *****

I think for accuracy the 'Ford MEL engine' Wikipedia entry should say at the top of the page, that the name 'MEL' was never used officially by Ford anywhere and it is only an unofficial name or nickname that was used later on for these engines. Denise Daniels (talk) 11:04, 27 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]