Decided to rebuild the 351M I have laying around vice a 460 or diesel swap. Financially and ease of installation, this is my best option.


Going with a tmeyer 400 kit, mildly ported 351C 2Vs, eddy AVS 600, fenderwell headers and a tweaked distributor with the DS2 box.


Not sure what cam will work best for maximum torque for such a mild build.


Suggestions?

 

Mild RV cam or call a cam outfit that will grind you or recommend one based on weight, gears, compression etc.

All the cam outfits give a write up on their sticks. I think you probably want one that works idle to 5500 or maybe idle to 4500.

Usually with a low compression motor you want higher lift and lower duration to try to avoid bleeding off cylinder pressure. Thus the need to adjust based on your compression, which I would guess would be closer to 9.5 than the original 8ish squeeze.

 

With all the knowledge Tmeyer has on these engines l would go with what he recommend.
I had been thinking about a swap in mine as well but, l am too cheap

 

Agree... use TM's recommendation for cam and matching springs. There are a number of options but he should know best what will work well with your combo.

 

Make sure to add a double-roller timing set with straight-up timing

 

I have ran a comp high energy 268H and a comp XE 262 with good results. if the budget allows I'd highly recommend a hydraulic roller cam. Howards cams has link bar roller lifters.

 

I have the edelbrock cam for the 400 and I'm not impressed with it. It's got a high advertised duration but a low duration at .050. I think this is done to make it a low RPM torque cam but also bleed off a bit to not ping. I would advoid this cam for sure.


With the $$$ you are putting into this build I'd be looking at a roller cam to get the most out of your high compression aluminum head motor.

 

Really? What cam number is it? I was going to recommend the ed 2172/ summit 5200. It's a popular grind, a few different companies make.

I run one in my 351c and I love it. Tons of torque, and the curve is pretty flat from 2000-4500rpm. I get over 400lb-ft out of my "short stroking" 351, according to the computer dyno.

A 400 engine should be able to make a lot more than that.

Manners are great too. Smooth idle, but with just a hint of lope. You can tell it has a cam, but it's smooth. Pulls high vacuum, gets pretty good fuel economy...

 

That's the same grind as Crane used to sell as a Fireball cam, been using in 351M straight up since 1987 at least, very pleased with it. At least as good mileage as OEM, better breathing. I also hve Perf 400 intake and a 600 carb and quick adv dist setup with 35 degrees max cent adv .... vac for mileage.

 

Roller cam conversions can get very expensive. You can easily dump a grand just in the valve train. You will not gain any really significant power.

On a budget build and off idle power keep the 0.050" duration of the cam around 210 degrees on the lobes. This will give you good low end torque. Comp cams has a great test where they test all their different duration cams on the same engine (Chevy engine but it doesnt matter) and you can see the torque and HP curves.

I have a 408W with AFR 185 heads and a Comp Cams Extreme Energy 262 with a 218/224 0.050" duration and even at that you start losing the off idle power with 33" tires and 4.11 gears. Peak torque even with this cam is going to be somewhere in the 3500-4000 range.

There are more and more studies out there just how much better a tighter lobe separation angle (105-107 degrees) is, but you never see off the shelf cams with this. Especially with a flat tappet cam I don't see why they couldn't machine you a mild duration cam but with a tighter lobe separation angle like 106 degrees. This really helps torque across the entire RPM band and actually makes it sound like a more aggressive cam that it really is.