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46 ford 2 door

3K views 21 replies 5 participants last post by  scheetz_21 
#1 ·
ok my dad has a 46 ford 2 door sedan? and he has a 350 chvy motor he wants to put in it and i wanna do it for him for christmas.. well me and my friends and brothers do.. we have plenty of time to do it. we just need to know what adapter to get, where to get it? how do we know what tranny it has? it had a flat head v8 in it he wants to rebuild in the mean time of driving it with the 350 in it... so any advice!? im a 4x4 guy so dont know much about these old cars. thanks for any info! butch
 
#2 ·
ford trans ?

Those old ford transmissions aren't very strong. They were designed to handle 85 horses. There were thousands of swaps done using them in the old days, you could buy an aluminum adaptor bellhousing, a new pilot bearing, a hurst front mount motormount crossmember , just not push it too hard, today the most popular thing is to match the engine up with an automatic, then convert the rear end to an open drive line type. and there are kits that use 2 parallel rear springs , and kits to add modern disc brakes to the front.
 
#4 · (Edited)
speedway time ?

speedway motors has the bell and bushing, $ 300, then it takes a 50's chevy starter I think, then Your radiator had 4 hoses, two outlets will have to be capped , then build the exhaust The front motor mounts also at speedway. $ 50 . google chevy to ford transmission and then motor mounts or just do the on line speedway catalog. They have lots of the old hot rod speed parts back in production . When he gets the flathead rebuilt the rat rodders will buy the chevy pieces not used.
 
#6 ·
stock ?

most likely still the old side cover crash box. a synchro on 2 and 3 rd gear, a grinder first gear, the trans has the partial bell housing as part of the case. for racing lincoln zepher gears were swapped in, they had a higher speed 1 st and second gear. to beef one up more roller bearings added inside the cluster gear bore.
 
#7 ·
clutch ?

speedway says to redrill a stock chevy flywheel but I think a 10 1/2 early corvette pressure plate with a ford truck disc 10 1/2 with 1 -3/8 shaft. It's been a lot of years. I last had a clutch rebuilder match the pressure plate with the disc I was using, size of disc and thickness must match for best results.
 
#9 ·
speedway part numbers

the speeddway part no for the engine to trans 7200392
the speeddway part no for the engine to frame motor mount 91618005. read their instructions. it tells which chevy flywheel to use , and speedwway has a whole assortment of clutches. you will probably need some new cushions and mabe more frame brackets..
since he plans on running with the flathead eventually I would put in a the chevy engine with T 5 5 speed transmission with the S 10 shifter, convert to an open drive line or newer rear end, then when the flathead is ready, adapt the flathead to the T 5, It's a newer all synchro trans stronger than the old fords, amd the T 5 has the overdrive gear ratios.
 
#13 ·
mounts, speedway 916180005

My computer (actually my wife's desk top ) did not like the link , mabe popup's blocked..Good point about the motor mounts. the speedway front mounts or the old Hurst type, they work ok for hooking up the chevy to the flat head trans or for using the 50's chevy short transmissions that had mounts on the bell housings, The T 5 has the mount near the rear of the trans and with that transmission the engine should use the later mount location near the center of the chevy block. streatching out with a mount at the front of the engine and the trans at the back is not good, Rod and Custom and or Streetrodder magazines had several page articles about putting a T 5 behind a flat head, last year, I don't know what they recommended for motor-trans mounts, My old 46 ford truck has a Lincoln Y block and a truck trans that bolts up with stock ford parts. I just skimmed thru the articles I think there are motor mount kits for the chevy that use the center locations for motor mounts. bolt ons could be removed if they would cause interference when the flathead goes back in.
 
#15 ·
more rambling

I don't know what 40's ford pickups with the open drive line used for motor mounts , when a stick trans with open drivelines were installed in a car you could get some clutch chatter because of the engine moving foreward and backward, the stock torque tube drive shaft bolted to the back of the transmission, keeping it from moving. In the old days there was a fix . There were U shaped brackets with a bolt in the bottom of the U that you slipped over the ctock ford front motor mount rubber "biscuits". You could tighten the bolt to preload the mount. I don't know how good they worked. I don't think my son used any when he had a flat head Merc in his 50 ford pickup.
 
#18 ·
That particular swap has been done for many years now..did one about 35 years ago and as I remember if my memory does not fail me we used the flywheel and pressure plate from a chev and a Ford clutch disk..as far as i can remember the clutch disk was sourced at the local parts store by just looking through the pile and finding one that was the correct diameter and that fit..Seemed to work OK until we blew the trans several times. Grrrrr.. much better to go with the open drive line and it so happens the Ford ranger rear springs and all will go in just fine..A 302 with a C-4 goes in with only a small relief in the trans tunnel area and makes a nice cruiser..

Sam
 
#19 ·
48 ford transmission..........FORGET IT,first time you put the go pedal to the metal,you will be trying to find another trans,if youre going to go with a SBC Chevy,go with either a 350,400 or 700R4 trans (all are automatic) keep in mind that the X member that holds the trans mount,will have to be modified,OR,you will not be able to pull the trans without pulling the engine,cause the chevy trans,will fit partially into that X member..I have a 48 Ford coupe,and i had to modify mine...good luck...
 
#20 ·
Haha that's half the fun! Idk it's my dads idea I'm going with bought the parts to do the conversion and hopefully have it done before Christmas w/out him knowing so if it does blow up the tranny we will deal with it then hahaha! I've don't that with built up Vw bug motors in our sand rails... Haha bug granny's don't like that much power ;) and swapped it to a bus when u blew it..
 
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