Houston Cars

OHV- Overhead Valve: The OHV engine is often called a pushrod. The name stems from the design, of course. An OHV engine has the camshaft located on the cylinder block itself, instead of on the cylinder head like a SOHC or DOHC design. The camshaft is attached to pushrods ( hence the nickname ), which are hooked up to little rocker arms, which in turn move the valves. Whew.

OHV engines get a lot of bad press - they are seen as very ‘old’ technology by most people. Indeed, the OHV did come before the OHC, but not by much. OHV’s tend to produce better fuel economy ( that’s part of the reason for the oddity that is the Corvette ) when compared to an OHC engine. However, OHC are often smoother than OHV engines. GM is the biggest producer of OHV engines today, with most of their V6 and V8 engines using an OHV design.