A unit of measurement used by hot rodders and engine builders to describe engine displacement in cubic inches. The term is most commonly used in the plural to boast about the internal volume and resulting torque of a large V8 engine.
Heard on the job
There's no replacement for displacement, and this big block has 502 cubes ready to tear up the track.
Also heard as
- CID
Related terms
Big block
A physically massive V8 engine designed for high displacement and torque.
CID
Cubic inch displacement is the total volume swept by all the pistons inside the cylinders of an internal combustion engine.
There is no replacement for displacement
This classic hot-rodding maxim asserts that increasing an engine's internal volume is the most reliable way to make power.