slyfox62 said:
14-16mpg, how do I get there I have a 74 F-150 with a 360 2V in it as well as haveing owned a 71 with 351W the best I ever got was 9-10mpg
The FE/FT never was too good at the gas mileage trick. Every trick Ford did with this engine to make at less powerful also reduced its efficiency. But most everybody followed this path thru the 1970's and early 80s, its just that the FE/FT ceased production in this period so there are no modern versions to compare it with such as exists with the 350 Chevy which went from good to crap to great as it passed thru the preSMOG era into the SMOG era into the fuel injected era.
There are things you can do that will substantially improve the FE/FT which are essentially the same things hot rodders and later the Chevy factory did to the SBC.
- Improve combustion efficiency, while you can't get to Fast Burn heads with the FE/FT you can make substantial improvements with Silvolite, K&B hyper eutectic pistons that utilize a "D" dish crown. The Ford circular crown like everybody else's circular dish completely kills chamber turbulence. This reduces power and increases fuel consumption and sensitivity to detonation. The "D" dish piston such as P/N KB150 for 390s restores a lot of turbulence, thus improves combustion efficiency, power and detonation resistance.
- Ford lost its way on head design for this engine both at the 427 juncture and into the SMOG era. Frankly there are no engineering correct heads for this engine, they all suffer from low turbulence chambers with excessive open area on the spark plug side of the valves, insufficient chamber obstruction of the exhaust valve on the short turn side, as well as an inadequate amount of squish/quench step, the machined chamber heads being the worst in this regard. On top of these problems, most intake tracks are too large resulting in insufficient mixture velocity and inadequate swirl into the chamber. Look for older 352/390/406 heads with smaller ports and a noticeable step from the valve pocket to the squish/quench deck. Stay away from anything 427 or 428. These have there place and a street driven truck engine ain't it.
If you're tempted to port FE heads, moderate or lose the temptation. There is probably no head easier to mess up than this one. It isn't that it's so good to start with, it's just easy to wipe it out. It is not forgiving of small mistakes and most of what makes an improvement of Chevy or Chrysler ports makes for a disaster on the FE/FT. You may blend the pocket to the seat on the intake and exhaust. You may streamline the intake guide and open it on the port wall of cylinder wall side of the guide. Under no circumstances change the shape or size of the intake port, there is a wobble in the port wall don't ever take it out. There is a boss on the top of one port that provides a little support for the bolt that secures the stand that flows oil to the rocker shaft, you may remove this but it requires that the bolt both be ground flat with the runner surface and that it be installed with sealer to prevent an oil leak into the intake, not worth the effort in anything but a full effort engine.
On the exhaust side, where the guide presents a flat surface around the stem, the edges may be relieved. The seat may be blended into the pocket wall. But under no circumstances should the angle of the back wall be changed, the short side turn also shouldn't be touched.
- The intake on this engine is mighty heavy, I highly recommend shopping for an aluminum part. The ports of the intake where they mate to those of the heads should always be slightly smaller and overhang the head ports on all sides. The reverse situation raises havoc with flow and the FE/FT doesn't deal well with this since it's induction is weird and sensitive anyway. I haven't seen a spread-bore carb intake for these things in a long, long time. I prefer a 4 barrel and Edlebrock sells one for square bore carbs. If I was building it, I'd modify it for a Q-jet, but a small Holley 4 barrel would be acceptable. The FE doesn't care for 2 barrels, they eliminate anything like upper mid range to top end performance and show no improvement in fuel economy. This is a result of always running the 2 barrel with too much throttle opening which causes the power enrichment system to activate. A 4 barrel will allow more throttle area to be opened with the cruise circuits before the power system is activated.
- Exhaust, this engine must have headers and duals. Ford exhaust especially that of the FE/FT leaves a lot to be desired. The FE/FT easily looses 50 horsepower in those boxes FoMoCo thinks of as manifolds. And that's on top of the lousy ports which don't allow any solution on the FE/FT, unlike the Cleveland and the 385 series engines. This isn't just an issue of lost 50 hp, it's an issue that this engine is using that equivalent energy to forcibly pump the exhaust out. You pay everywhere in the power band for this effort with greater fuel consumption. The header flange must always be slightly larger than the exhaust port. This allows the existing gases a slight expansion as they transition into the header which is more efficient that forcing them roughly into a smaller passage. It is also useful as a means of reducing reversion flow back into the port.
- Lubrication: If you're going to twist a center oiler FE/FT even for towing, you have got to drill out the passage from the pump to the filter and the filter back to the center galley as well as the center galley to 1/2 or 9/16s inch. There is a restriction to the rear main which also needs to be drilled out.
The FE/FT is an iffy oiler at best, given that its oiling system looks like a copy of the SBC, one can hardly understand why the SBC doesn't have problems and the FE/FT does. Well understanding this difference is understanding the differences in design execution make to reliability and function. For a street engine, I highly recommend that you position the upper main bearings to determine the position of their oil feed holes to those of the block. Then where necessary modify the bearing's oil hole to insure that all the exposure to hole in the block is taken advantage of. Do not modify the hole in the block. This will leave an exposure on the back side of the bearing shell to system oil pressure, this is something you don't need nor want behind the bearing shell. Always keep in mind that with Ford's forward sump, hard acceleration will result in the oil climbing the back wall and escaping away from the pick up toward the rear of the engine. You should weld a baffle into the sump an inch or so above the pickup to help contain oil around the pickup.
- Cam and rockers. I'll start with the rockers, expect that the rocker bushes and the shafts are shot so replace or rebuild accordingly. Do not follow the hot rod practice of restricting oil to the upper end on this engine. This practice exacerbates the rocker shaft wear problem and causes the valve springs to overheat with predictable results. The cam in these engines is almost useless, go shopping for something that has about .45 to .48 inch lift and 215 to 220 some degrees of duration measured from .050 inch lift. Try to keep the LSA around 110 to 115 degrees.
- Balance, I'd spend the money to do this, it's always a good practice and makes for a smooth running engine that minimizes unnecessary loads on the bearings, crank, and block.
- Use the so called Ford High Flow water pump, not that you need more flow, it has a bigger bearing and has a lot better life span as a result.
Bogie
. For me, considering driveabilty,reliability and out of the box performance...read my avatar..I'd say 428CJ.. the SCJ was nice, but I like the straight CJ myself.
