Gone through a full search on these items, and just wanted to get a few more thoughts. Haven't had the truck very long but want to do a little work on the engine. Typical mid-70's smog motor. PO yanked most of the smog and where I live it don't matter.

First, it’s a 2WD w/C-4 trannie, don’t know the diff gear ratio. Located on the Gulf coast. I don’t drive to or for work and don’t plan on towing with it. Really just a cruiser/Home Depot runner with a limited amount of highway miles that I want to have good offline performance and throttle response between stoplights, quick accel to highway speed. Never going to race it and it will seldom get above 4500 RPM. If it sees 4000 miles a year it will be a lot so mileage is of limited concern.

Not burning any oil but has some oil/coolant leaks that need to be addressed and the dual exhaust is rotting out and needs replacing. Transmission has to be pulled and new seals installed. While I'm fixing those I thought I'd work on the following and would like your thoughts. Sorry for the multiple items but they’re related so I want to ask them together.

Top end work:

1. I ran into a ’96 5.0 Explorer at Pull-a-part and grabbed the GT40 3-bar heads (didn’t want to fiddle with a full engine swap). Keeping the flat-tappet block, any suggestions on what I need to do to the heads before install and any tips? I’ll be researching how to do this (first head swap for me) but any guidance is welcome.

2. Anyone care to guess the compression ratio with these heads on a stock '77 302?

3. Want to add a mild (non-lopey) cam, dual plane intake and 500 CFM or so 4-bbl carb. Suggestions on components? What would work well with the GT40s for what I want to do?

Exhaust:

4. Going to stick with the duals (cat is already gone) but maybe add an H or X-pipe. Has rotted glass packs – I’d prefer mufflers and want it to be quiet – I’m too old to be blasting my neighbors. To be clear, it will probably need a complete new exhaust system. Suggestions on the exhaust configuration and mufflers?

5. Looked around for some Tri-Y headers and can’t find any for this gen truck with a 302. They’re available for FE motors but not the SBF. Don’t feel I need long-tube 4:1 headers which are available. Shorties perhaps or just stick with the stock manifolds? Thoughts?

Have some other stuff to do – new radiator, fix some electrical stuff, little interior work. Other than that it’s straight and decent looking. Just want to get a little more get up and go around town. Thanks in advance for any wisdom.

 

Hope this helps,

 

Should have grabbed the whole Explorer motor then you would have the heads and the cam you want in a low friction roller format, swapping it would be dumb simple too it's a 5.0 so it would just bolt right in no other parts necessary besides a different flexplate or flywheel.

The Crane 444232 is a great flat tappet cam with a smooth idle.

Shorties are always better than manifolds and are usually a direct swap.

 

Thanks for the responses guys. Do appreciate your opinions.

I probably should have got the full motor, but the swap looked more difficult to me than it probably does to you. It won't be the last 96 5.0 Explorer that hits the junkyard here, so I'll keep my eye out.

In any case you've both helped and if anyone else has any suggestions or comments I'd love to hear those as well.

 

Went back and dug into headers. I'd love long tubes but frankly need this to be a low stress install so I'm leaning toward shorties. The JBA ceramic coated from Summit look good, but with the GT40 heads which year/model application should I look for? I know/think that there isn't any difference in bolting them on compared to any other 302W head (except for the GT40P), but there has to be some fitment difference between 5.0 Mustang vs. F-150 vs. ??? headers in a dentside.

 

There are no headers issues with 3-bar GT heads, but you do need F150 headers.. do not buy mustang headers.

 

Thanks for that quick response. You guys are great at helping us newbies out.

 

As for the whole Explorer 5.0 swap: I'm assuming you were thinking about the "whole hog" i.e.: EFI ? No need to do that, only the long block was needed, the Explorer cam runs fantastic with a carb sitting on top of the engine. Only thing special needed is a steel geared distributor, which is a snap for a 77. You've already got a Duraspark ignition, you just would need a new reman 85 Mustang 5.0 HO distributor (one spec'd for manual transmission) to do the roller motor swap. I ran this combo in my 89 Ranger, Explorer 5.0, Ford Racing A321 intake (same as the old Shelby "Cobra" intake) Holley 570 Street Avenger carb, 1.7 Cobra roller rockers (Crane made these for Ford and now sells em as their "Energizer" line. This motor ran like it had EFI, cold starts down to 25*F without a choke, ran fantastic around town backed by a Toploader 4 speed and 3.73 rear. Pulled from idle to 5500 rpms and got great mileage (18 mpg highway) Find a cam spec'd close to the F4TE roller and go for it. The F4TE specs were: 256/266 (advertised duration), lift with 1.7 rockers is .445/.473 with a 116.5 LSA.

 

Thanks, I was thinking about the EFI issue. I'll keep an eye out for another '96 5.0 Explorer. The block I took the heads from may still be there as well.

 

The only other thing you'd need to decide is whether to run the Explorer accessories or keep your 77 setup. To Keep the 77 stuff, you'll need a harmonic balancer from a mid 80's to 97 .0 from a pickup,van, Crown Vic, Marquis, or Lincoln Town car, plus a 50 oz/in flexplate that matches your C-4's bellhousing.

 

I ended up going with "p" heads, when researching about them almost every thread I read(mostly mustang sites) recommended to upgrade the valve springs as the factory ones were just barely good enough for the factory set up. I am just throwing this out there as a heads up and figure Conanski, or baddad will chime in on it. Good luck with your build!

 

I was going to upgrade the springs on the GT40's I'm putting on the 351 in my 96 van but decided to leave the stock springs as is. I bought the Ford Racing set for them, along with the retainers and locks, but after trying to get one spring on the first head and breaking one lock, changed my mind about the upgrade, this motor's not going to see any high rpms anyway to need new springs. I guess I'll sell em or send em back to Summit as I have no other project that needs em on the burner.

 

I bought the same "mileage" type parts for my '78 F100 talked about here and this type daily driver/mileage setup was also recommended by Conanski.

570 Holley Carb

LTI-55113LUN Lunati 55113LUN Ford 221-302, 351W (1969-1993) EFI Retro-Fit Hydraulic Roller Cams (1-3-7-2-6-5-4-8 Firing order) Hydraulic Camshaft, Duration 270/279, Lift .445"/.477', LSA/ICL 112/108 - $292.58

LTI-72335LUN Lunati 72335LUN Street Performance Hydraulic Roller Lifters - Ford Small Block - $332.29

Just need the intake now.