Hey Guys,

As winter is nearly here I plan to build an engine for my truck, I am starting with a low mile 60,000 mile 1978 model 460 big block, before winter I plan on cleaning and degreasing the block and heads and then painting them, giving myself a nice platform to start with, I will be adding a cam but am a little confused on what to use, the engine will be carberauted with an Edelbrock 750 and a real aggressive lope is always a plus in my book so which one should I use? I also have a set of headers that I will be installing along with an edelbrock aluminum intake and all new gaskets throughout and I will be repainting the oil pan and installing new gaskets, so other than the cam,lifters,carb,headers,and paintjob is there anything else you guys can suggest? not looking to spend more than a grand total

 

I would stay away from anything too wild with stock compression. Maybe a good towing/rv cam unless you are just looking for sound then maybe a thumper cam from Comp Cams.

 

Check this thread, same subject and more discussion:
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...l#post10919630

 

Are you building this for mud racing, or for daily driving? You don't want an agressive cam for daily driving, you want a torquey RV type.

And you don't need a 750cfm carb either unless you are racing. A 600-650cfm carb is more than large enough (you can run the #s to prove it) and it will have better driveability and fuel economy than a larger carb will.

I've seen way too many trucks set up the wrong way (for their intended use) to know, I even owned one for awhile - poor idle, couldn't pass emissions or a gas station, weak power brakes due to the poor idle, long warmup period especially in the winter time, etc etc. And hard to drive smoothly due to no low-rpm power, and then all of a sudden you're doing 15 over the limit!

 

one of the best things i done to my sons 87 460 that he pulls in pure stock truck pullswas to install a pre 1972 timing chain set it puts cam timing back to zero instead of it being retarded 4 degrees it got us 30 more feet on the track we also have a set of d0ve heads off a 1970 they have much better exhaust ports and smaller combustion chambers however all we do is pull this truck and run 110 octane gas i dont know how the d0ves wud do on pump gas but they were a huge improvement over the 87 heads as far as the cam just call comp cams or lunati and they can help you

 

The D0VE heads don't run on pump gas unless you retard the heck out of the ignition timing, which kills most of your power and takes all of the fun out of having them in the first place.

That's one of the reasons I got rid of my 1971 429 engine - I was tired of running premium and using additives with every fillup.

Good info on the timing set though!

 

I built a couple of 460s years ago, D0VE heads on a late short block I think gave a nominal 9.5:1 compression ratio, late heads on an early short block gave 9.3:1. I ran both engines on pump gas, and the second one was in a wrecker. Biggest problem the wrecker had was the tiny clutch Ford used, my 58 223 had a bigger one! The first one was in a 1971 Mercury Colony Park with a 2.70 rear, it would burn the tires for a long way and take that roughly 5,000 lb wagon on to the interstate real fast.