I have a 94 f-250 with a 460 at 255,000 miles im planning to pull the engine and rebuild it in the near future and being the power hungry speed demon I am im not ok with doing a stock rebuild so my question is this what performance upgrades can I make to the engine that wont freak out the electronics of the truck I have the E4OD transmission so going to a carb is out of the question so ill be stuck using the stock intake but im mostly curious of how much work can I do to the engine performance wise and it still function with the stock electronics and I aint even gonna lie and say im not considering a stroker build

 

You can do headers, full exhaust, a mild EFI-friendly cam, V10 or BBK throttle body, intake-horn removal and a few other things without much issue.

 

Go carb or Fitch with a trans controller and not have to worry about the stock pcm!

 

There was a guy on here who ported his heads for some really Good gains

He even had dyno and flow charts to prove it

 

stroke it. you'll never regret it....550 cubes for small block prices. ported or aftermarket heads (will require new intake with aftermarket heads), cam, long tubes, smile.

 

would a 550ci even get 3-4 mpg though? what could you possibly be up to,on the street with so much engine? im all about fun but.....seems just a bit excessive.

you seem to be right at affordability to stroke one though.so i guess it's more of feeding it fuel than building it.
http://www.speedwaymotors.com/429-46...-Kit,5530.html

well,then you need to mod the vehicle so that you can actually get the power to the ground and hook up cus a 429 will already roast the tires.that will cost much more than stroking the engine.then there's building up the trans and the rear to handle it........your into many thousands before it's over to make use of the affordable stroke lol.

 

Actually, NO. Porting will NOT require an intake

 

Who makes aftermarket EFI heads?

 

Check out this guy here, he seems to be really up on efi 460's and how to make the most power out of them. Ported intakes, custom cam grinds, efi heads.

Re in"Car"nation High Performance - Special Deals

 

But actually YES aftermarket heads WILL require an intake, just like I said.

 

No one, but the alternative is rather simple. You need carb heads with an efi conversion manifold, with an adapter to mate a ford throttle body.

 

Have you ever built a stroker? Gone from one displacement to another via increased stroke?

Increasing stroke increases thermal efficiency at low rpm. It is true, more displacement has the potential to burn more fuel (in turn making more power), but more stroke does not mean less mpg, because the engine itself is more thermal efficient. If fuel were either 0% (99--> af/r) or 100% (13:1 af/r) with the push of the throttle, you'd be right. Luckily, it's not. 550 cubes doesn't have to be for drag racing everywhere you go, 550 cubes would be an effortless joy to drive especially with increased compression.

You can build a 550 with 3/4 running gear and literally do nothing to the rest of the truck. At 250k miles, the op is already in "rebuild territory" for his trans and rear if they haven't been done already.

 

Those heads are a bit pricey but if his claims are right that is a cheap 100hp

 

A longer stroke with higher compression can increase thermal efficiency at a given displacement. However, you're adding almost 100 cubes more displacement. That is going to drastically increase pumping losses, increase friction and overall dramatically decrease your fuel economy.

Not to mention without extremely ported (or aftermarket heads) and a good cam, the stroker is pointless. If you stroke out an engine without increasing the air flow, the only thing you do is shift the power it makes down, without actually making that much more power.

...and then if you do go all out with aftermarket heads, intake, cam, etc... you're way, way beyond the scope of what the stock EFI system can handle. Add an aftermarket EFI system and trans controller, and you've just added ~1500 to the cost of the build.

The OP needs to decide if he wants a 460 with a bit of a kick, or a screaming monster. A screaming monster is out of the scope of the stock EFI system, as well as what the E4OD can handle. However, basic mods to the 460 suck has headers, larger valves in the head + minor porting, V10 throttlebody and a mild EFI cam can really wake the engine up.

 

By that logic, a 302 should yield unfathomable greater mpg than a 460....I've never seen a 302 get anything north of 10-11 mpg with 3/4 ton running gear. With over 50% more cubic inches, that's about what a 460 gets, such a shocker to everyone who doesn't know anything about physics and thermal dynamics...I know. At 550 cubes, a 21% increase in displacement, daily driving mpg will not suffer at all. Wanna rip around all day? It's always going to be bad with either config.

I needn't a lesson on what it takes to take advantage of a particular engine build for any purpose, or what the power band looks like with a particular configuration. yes, the stock engine configs of this era are bad enough to increase hp off idle with airflow mods...which is why I suggested specific mods in my original response.