Hey guys! I've gotten tons I useful information off of this site. I finally decided to join. Now I have some questions. I have an opportunity to buy a 360 engine. Unsure of the year. I know it's from 73-76. I believe 76 was the last year these were produced. Correct me if I'm wrong. Anywho, I currently have a 79 F-100 with a 302 and the C6 tranny. The 360 is coming with a tranny. Don't know what it is. I just know it's automatic. I haven't taken much of a look at it cuz it's a an old wrecked 73-76 model truck and I wanted some info from you guys before I dug deeper into making a deal. What I'm looking to learn is what I would need to do this swap. 79-302 to a 360 once again. Would the 360 bolt up to my C6 in my truck? Or would I have to swap trannys along with the engines? What else is needed? Motor mounts of course I'm guessing. I'm sure radiator and hoses to match. This will be my first project. I have an opportunity to buy a 351W. I know that swap would be much more easier but the 360 has a tranny too and a wrecked truck with some parts I can still use. They're both in the same price range. To me the 360 is a better deal. Is this swap worth the trouble guys? I've never owned a 360. Only the 302 and a 2.3 outta my 85 Stang. So no experience with any other engines.

 

If it was me, I would go with the 351 Windsor motor. It should bolt up to your original trans, there are lots of high performance parts available and they can be built to make lots of reliable power.

The 360 was never much of a performance motor and for the extra trouble to install it, I don't see any real benefit to going that route.

Just my 2 cents....

 

76 was the last year for the FE family of engines.

For simplicity's sake, I'd go with the 351W.. just make sure it is indeed a Windsor and not an 351M or a 351C.

Welcome to FTE.

 

+1 for the 351W. It will bolt up to the trans in your truck. Parts for windsors are cheap and plentiful. FE's not so much.

The Windsor will also be quite a bit better on fuel, and probably make more power to boot, the 360's were prettu sluggish and reallly like their fuel.

 

I suggest the 351 W too . I removed the old 360 from my 73 and replaced it with a 302 . 360 is going to go for scrap .

 

Thanks for the input guys! I've decided that I'm gonna go check out that wrecked truck with the 360. If the motor and tranny do turn out to be good I'm thinking I will buy it. Take out anything from the truck I can use for mine. Then I'm sure I can sell the 360 along with the tranny and scrap the remainder of the truck. Then afterwards buy that 351W. Win-win situation I believe. It'll take more time to get the 351 this way but I work with the current owner of the 351 and he said he's holding the motor for me as long as I need. Would you guys suggest stroking the 351 to a 393 or a 408??

 

If your going to stroke it i say get it to 408. If your going to go through the process of building an engine you can build a nasty FE if you want to for not so much...

 

I do plan on doing a rebuild within a year or two. You think the 360 would be a good one to do, it being an FE? The 302 I have now is fine just looking for more power. So I can do the motor work on which ever motor I buy while still being able to use the truck. My pops has a 71 chevelle with a 350 bored to a 355. Thing is nasty!! Makes most of the local diesels around town look silly. One pulled up next to me at a red light a while back while I was in my truck. Man I never felt so slow in my life in my baby. She runs good but this 302 doesn't have much get up and go in her... I'm looking for some power like that for my truck. I know I can make a pretty viscous engine from the 351W. I just haven't heard what I can do out of a 360. They don't seem to be too popular.

 

The 360 just isn't a performane engine, a 390 on the other hand can be built into quite a beast. You can even build a 410 CI FE with a 360 block and a 428 crank, rods and pistons. I think that's the combo anyway, I may be wrong!

But when you build an FE, it comes with an FE price tag, these things can be expensive to build, and harder to find parts for.

A Windsor on the other hand can be made to go fast much cheaper than an FE. And engines and parts are very plentiful, most wrecking yards around here you could throw a rock in any direction and hit something with a 5.0 (302) or 5.8 (351) in it.

If it were my truck I'd go with a roller 351 from one of the last OBS trucks. I think they were only rollers in '95 and up to when they ceased production.

 

I'm sure I'm just going to purchase the old clunker and salvage the engine n tranny. Sell it for what I can get for it. Only paying about $300 for the 360,tranny and truck (missing the bed and cab is wrecked and missing grille area, interior is pretty gone too) not a bad deal at all! Then once I get rid of it and make a small profit I'll go after that 351W. Make that baby a 408 and hopefully get some real power. My 1979 F-100 has the C6 tranny and the 9 inch rear end. It's just begging for more power than this 302 gives. Pretty weird she came with a C6/302 combo. Only one I've ever seen like that. Usually the C4/302 if it's automatic.

 

My 77 f100 had a 300/c4 d44 combo. If your gonna sell the 360 you might find an old guy that actually knows what to do with one being so old, like my grandpa

 

Hey now... we're not old, we're vintage!

....A 360FE block can be the basis 445 stroker.

 

What would you recommend? The 351W to 408 or the 360 to 445 you mentioned. Both motors are unwanted by anyone else. Actually nobody but me even knows they're up for sale. Lucky for me! So I have plenty of time to think about this

 

Are you sure you can sell the 360 their? The ones on Craig's list here seem to go there to die...
I am building a 351w for my 73 360 truck right now, the biggest reason 360fe is a gas drinking under powered pig. Don't get me wrong it will last forever but it is very under powered.
The nice thing about the 351w is the mustang guys put them in the there cars for more power so Ford performance and the aftermarket guys have lots of performance parts for them. Also you can put an overdrive tranny behind it to.

 

Go with the FE and stroke it to 390 or 410 CID. The FE has a cool factor that the Windsor never will, plus no other Ford power plant sounds as good as a healthy FE breathing through some long tubes.

As far as price is concerned, the Windsor will need a pair of aftermarket heads to make any real power. The factory iron FE heads on the other hand should have no trouble supporting a bit north of 400 HP with a decent valve job. I bet you'd spend about the same on a 351W as you would on a 390FE if your waiting to make 300 HP or more.

The big reason the 360s were so doggy is it uses 390 4v pistons with the 352 crank and rods. This makes the piston sit way down from the deck at TDC and produces a compression ratio that's no even 8:1.