I already tried posting this tread and Internet went down so hopefully it will only show up one time.

My parts truck has a 360 in it. I have heard that a 360 just needs to be thrown out as junk and replaced with a 390. Is this true? Can I build the 360 into anything or stroke it to a larger engine. What can be done with a 360? I have heard different things. Anybody have some knowledge in this area?

 

The 360 and 390 share the same block and are part of the FE family. If you so desire, you can use your existing block, pick up a crank/rods/pistons for a 390 and drop 'em in. Check out the gang on the FE engine forum, plenty of folks there will spend you money wisely

--Mike

 

I do not know who you have been talking too, but they could not be more wrong. Anything you can do to a 390 you can do to a 360 and, like Mike said, it is easy to make one into a 390 - the stroke is 3.5" for the 360, 3.78 or so for the 390. Everything else is the same.

Frankly, I have owned both and it is hard to tell the differance between the two if all you do is daily driving.

But, as Mike said, see the FE forum for an endless discussion of these engines.

 

Thanks for the info. I checked out the FE forum and those guys are a wealth of info. I think I will go ahead and build a 390 and have it on the engine stand ready to go either in my truck or have it for sale. Who Knows.

 

Did it to Bubba (the engine thing, I mean). Had to have the motor rebuilt anyway and the additional cost for the upgrade was minimal. Still set off car alarms!

 

I have heard the same thing (its a bad motor) and can't figure it out. I just rebuilt a 360 and dropped into my 69 and love the thing. It has loads of low end torque. It doesn't have the big horsepower of the 390 but for day to day stuff it is fine.

 

Moved to proper forum.

 

My 2 cent observation on the 360.

Almost all 360s are low compression truck motors. A torquey and very dependable truck motor.

Whereas, other FEs come in a variety of configurations and compressions rations to get more performance. There are high perofrmace 352s, 390s, and the 427s and 428s are considered high performance. But, I don;ty know of any factory 360s that were built up.

So, that is why I think the 360 has a bad reputation as a performance motor.

The truth, the 360 is just another variant of the great FE engine family. With a boost in compresion ratio and other performance add ons, it's can be a nice performance motor just like it's siblings.