A friend recently purchased a 1979 F-150 4 x 4 that the former owner put a 1989 302 V8 into. He never finished connecting the wiring. The 302 was converted from fuel injection to carburetor. He wants to get the wiring put back together so he can actually DRIVE it. The 302 has a long shaft distributor for electronic ignition that also operates the oil pump. He says the older 302 that use points and can be converted to an "Ignitor" has a short shaft. What might his options be??? Thanks

 

1-I've just swapped the gear on the dist and been fine. Can't remember ever running into a long and short shaft issue. The gears are a few degrees off but if forced hard enough it will go in, however it will strip teeth off within a few tanks of gas.

2- 79 should have been duraspark not points.

3- if using the 89 heads there is a hole on the back of the heads that a tube goes from side to side and down to the exhoust. The 79 does not use this. You can put a flat plate with a bolt on it in or you'll have to beat the firewall back to use stock tube. ( been 06/07 since I did that so things are a little fuzzy)

4- when he did the swap did he swap the timing chain cover out as well so he could use the manual fuel pump? If so did the guy put the eccentric on the end of the cam.

 

Thanks for the reply tude. As far as I know the 89 302 was put directly in with no modifications. His concern is hooking up the harness, ie the 79 duraspark to the 89 whatever it had. I had originally suggested he do what i did with my 77 when the duraspark went out. I got a distributor from the last year that the 240/300 had points and replaced the points with an Ignitor. That went fine. What he has apparently run into is a difference in the distributor in the older 302's that had points. So that is where we are at. Thanks for any further thoughts you might have, or suggestions on how to rephrase the question in a repost. Ron

 

I have never ran in to a 302 that had a longer dist. shaft . The 351W probably has a longer shaft dist. because it has a taller deck. I have an 85 302 that i put a 79 302' Duraspark' in , it had the same shaft size as a points dist that i was using before i found the' Duraspark '.