I have a 1970 Ford F250 with a 300CID inline six and a 4 speed manual transmission (NP435). The truck has a Dana 60 rear differential.

I would like to change this workhorse combination to a 351 Cleveland 2V and FMX street cruiser combination. Now, there is a lot of "nay-sayers", who might rubbish this. But consider that a limited budget and availability of motors and transmissions in a remote South Africa has placed me in this position.

Would this be a feasible swap? Would this set-up give me an easy street cruiser, without the mill screaming its heart out and no relative forward motion?

Any feedback would be welcome, as the seller of the 351 Cleveland and FMX has offered it to me at a very reasonable price and has another buyer itching to ****** it up. Don't want to miss out on this oppurtunity.

 

I don't see how the end result couldn't be better in every way except perhaps in terms of fuel consumption.

 

The FMX and the 4 speed have the same 1:1 high gear, so your new 351C will turn the same revs as the 300 does now.

Do you know your axle ratio?

That might work, but fuel economy is a question.

 

The tag on the Dana 60 has long since been absent. However, after cross referencing the the casting codes and stamp numbers, I would place the axle ratio somewhere in the 3.54 region, as my truck is a 2X4 F250.

I got this from Fordification.com:
http://www.fordification.com/tech/dana-rear-01.htm

The old 300 runs ok and without fail, but doesn't do much for fuel economy and previous owners abused it with a plethora of uninformed modifications:
An undersize Weber 32/36 carburetor, that I suspect burnt the valves and certainly affected performance.
An electric fuel pump, but...
Badly fabricated headers...
A damaged intake manifold, that is functioning by the skin of its teeth.
A mismatched starter motor, that mutilated the ring gear.

In the interim I remedied all those things, but for the price of a rebuild I might as well replace it with a freshly rebuilt 351C.

 

Go for it, I see no drawbacks. It would do better in an F100, but that's beside the point.