Engines

Ok... I took a look at these choices and I am thinking that MikeT's recommendation is right about spot on with what I was thinking. The Zombie wagon will NOT be fast or pretty. I want it to be the automotive version of a Kalashnikov rifle. It will be uglier than home made sin on moldy bread. It just needs to LAST a VERY long time and have gobs of torque and get decent mileage and crank every time the switch is hit.
Also it seems that there are a lot of these babies around and the aftermarket parts are pretty cheap, too.
PLUS, it should fit in the truck frame under the car hood pretty well.
What would you think is a reasonable price for a good rebuilder? 350.00? I would want to do a personal rebuild where I improve the oiling system, bearings, valve springs, and cooling.

 

Gotta agree i had a 79 LTDII with 302 and C4 it wasn't bad for the size and weight of the car but sure a heck wasn't 40 mpg or anywhere near it 15=20 MAYBE

 

Mike beat me to the post line

Whowwww Dude..... stop cooking your food in the shop with shop tools, McDonalds would be safer....................

Now it's 40 MPG, in a smog 400.......

 

Hey hey hey...easy up there folks... if he sticks by it ... then thats the facts as he sees them.
As for my wagon... i will be tickled to get 12-15

 

You are being more real mathamatick'ish now

I can only give my 72 400 engine away for scrap, NOBODY, not even the evil demo guys wants anything to do with it, I can have it hauled away for free and thats it.

40 MPG?, in a....what motor are we taliking about now? Dude....Dude....Dude....Duuuuuuude.................DUDE!

 

I want to comment about the 40 MPG claims. Anything is possible. However the only vehicles I got even close were early VW beetles and a 1987 Ford Escort with a special factory installed carburetor. The VW's got somewhere around 30-35 MPG and the Escort an unbelievable 50 MPG.
Other than that any Ford I've owned got more like 12-15 MPG and some Chevys around 16-18 if lucky.
If a 351 Ford got anywhere close to 40 MPG the auto makers wouldn't be pulling their hair out trying to make todays standards.
Caterpillar stopped making diesel road truck engines years ago because they couldn't keep up and that's a large company.
The crap getting high fuel mileage today are streamlined roller skates with lawnmower engines.

These are only my useless comments sent on a home computer from home.

 

DUDE!!
I TOTALLY realize that this is MOST LIKELY not true, but for me, it aint worth arguing over.

 

If any 351 got 40 MPG it would still be in Ford cars. And they would be selling like the proverbial hotcakes.

 

Dude!!
You are more than rite


We all just gata stay in the real world, realality, ( if's i'z speelt dat riet)...... not.....

I'm gona have a 460 done with in a year....... I'll be lucky if I can aford the gas to move it in the drive way let alone drive it, now thats real MPG!......or more like

 

I've got your basic combination sitting in my driveway with the exception of a Holley carb instead of the Edelbrock (dual exhaust with H-Pipe, torque cam, slight bump in compression over stock, AOD trans with lockup converter, and previously 2.73 rear gears). The best I could ever get was 18 maybe 19 on the highway.

 

Yes, Kevin...the car he has pseudo built is a fairly normal performance build and I have seen many engines like that. Most didn't get to the halfway mark of 40 MPG.

 

I think you should be able to find a builder for under $500.00 Buxks I payed 300/00 for mine and it was running in the wreck I got it from. I you get an engine from the junk yard try to find one that been in a wreck. That means it was at least running when it was wrecked and the engines tend to survive those well.
Dave

 

Nora, my 78 Thunderbird, was completely stock, except for much better tires and the dual exhaust. On a regular bases she would do 800 kms on an 80 litre fill up. That is 28 miles to the Imperial gallon, with the 351M and FMX 3 speed transmission. The trick is all in how the carburetor is tuned and how the timing is set. My 89 Grand Marquis had a 70 litre tank, just like all others. Most of the time, I would put 60 litres in on a fill up. That would do, according to the trip odometer, just about 900 kms. That is 7 litres per 100 kms, which is 40 miles to the Imperial gallon.

Those are hard numbers from the real world. I got a LOT more mileage per tank out of the 89 with the 351 than I did out of the 88 Crown Victoria with the 302 and fuel injection. Both cars had the Trailer Tow III package, by the way, so had the 'performance' axle ratio.

 

Good tips above, in a private sale I'd be leary of buying a engine that has been removed from a car just laying there with claims of "ran great when I removed it" to find out after it's full of water, a hair line crack in the block nobody saw etc. Now and then I still se a engine for sale where the seller still has it in the car/truck advertized at "can be seen running, but will be removing in a week" etc scraping, etc.

In my case, the 460 and trans has been removed and sitting for a few years, but I know the seller very well, know it's been sitting inside a heated garage, know it's history. Not going to just drop it in, going to tear it doun and do a few things, what yet I'm not sure but my bud next door whom I got it from builds serious Ford engines...is gona hold my hand through it. The trans, once the engine is in, the car and trans will be towed to a trans shop, they can go through it and make it bullet proof baced on what I've done to the 460 and install the trans that way I'll have a complete warenty, then off to the exhaust shop. Real world figures, I'll be luckey to get 10 MPG

 

Last Saturday we got a break from the rain and my 19 year old nephew was staying the night at my house so he wanted to go crusin' in his paw-paw (my dad) Malibu. We didn't get miles per gallon but plenty of smiles per gallon!

That being said, it turned the clock back for me to my teenage years when I used to cruise that same strip in town in my dad's truck...fast forward 20 something years, I am 40, doing burnouts on the strip with my 19 year old nephew in my dad's car...priceless!My dad laughed when I told him we did a little burnout.He looked at my nephew and said "Uncle Dennis learned how to work on cars because he had to if he didn't want me to know he broke it!"

Sorry about being off subject but I have never worried much about miles per gallons on my projects, hell my DD Toyota Tundra 3.4 V6 only gets 18 or 19.