I recently acquired two separate 429 engines, both complete. The first engine is a 71 with black stampings D1VE6015AA and heads D2V.EAA.
The 69 black stamping is C9VE – 8 (hard to make that last one out could be a B) and heads C8VE – E (another tough last digit to make out).

call both engines down to take in for dip and flux. 71 came apart beautifully 69. Everything was seized up tight. Can’t believe the amount of force I had to use with a hammer to drive the Pistons out. I am working on a project with my son who is 16 so would keep in mind that while I’m looking for some performance modifications, not looking for 500+ horsepower. Not interested in a stroker or transitioning to a 460. So my question is, do I leave the individual block and heads together as they came or am I better off of mixing and matching. I’m reading online different opinions and resources. Some are saying that the D1VE6015 AA Block is a cobra jet Block the next guy says it’s not . Is it possible to take the 71 with the original heads, a nice little cam, aluminum intake, and improved carburetor and put something together that’s not gonna end up essentially being an anchor. Sorry for the long read, appreciate any insight anyone can share

 

C9VE-B – 1969-1978, 429/460 Big-Block Ford, 2-bolt mains
D1VE-AA – 1971-1978, 429/460 Big-Block Ford, 2-bolt mains

Pretty much same block.
The 2-bolt main block alone doesn't make it a CJ, its that parts that go on it, as far as I know anyways.

Measure the stroke to determine 429 or 460.

D2VE heads are not good.
C8VE-E heads are better.

Check if your D1VE block has thick or thin main webbing.
Some are thick, but its irrelevant.

Yup, throw out the intake and the D1VE heads, and home port the C8VE heads.

 

Deck height changed for 429/460 blocks -- no distinction between displacements
68-70 - 10.300
late '70-71 -- 10.310
'72-up -- 10.322

429/460 used the same length rods - 6.605"

429 cranks will have 4U or 4UA casting number
460 cranks will be 2Y, 2YA, 2YAB, or 3Y


Pistons are diffferent
429 - 1.890 compression height
460 68-92 -- 1.760 compression height / dish volume 68-87 22cc, 88-92 8cc
460 93-97 -- 1.772 compression height / dish volume 15cc

Cylinder head volume:
68-71 -- 75.8 -- cast iron non-adjustable 'rail type' rocker arms
72 -- 91.4 -- stamped steel non-adjustable rocker arms
73-92 -- 96.2 "" "" ""
93-97 -- 92.5 "" "" ""

The difference in deck height / dish volume / cylinder head chamber volume will matter to calculating compression ratio and/or piston choices.

I intentionally left out the 70-71 429CJ and 71-72 429 police... Those blocks are 10.300, four bolt main caps, D0OE-B

 

suggestions on home porting guideline/process?

 

Difference in blocks:

 

Difference in blocks:

 

Read the porting guide that's written by Scott Johnston, RHP. He spent a ton of time on the flow bench developing the base style cylinder heads and the techniques he developed really do work to produce great results. What's really amazing is not what he takes out of the exhaust port but what he leaves in.

Thick or thin webbing will make no difference in any normal build under about 900 horsepower.

 

any suggestions where can I find his porting guide?

 

Try this link to an overview page:

https://reincarnation-automotive.com...ide-index.html

I was able to find this page on his website and it looks like the porting guide is subscription based:

https://parklandautomachine.com/bbf_...ng_information

One thing to remember is that there are many people who put too much emphasis on the exhaust side of the head. While the exhaust port is bad the intake port also needs work and for the time invested will offer the greatest gains in power. Getting the bowls sized correctly, the right valve job including back cutting of the intake valves and the short side radius shaped up really helps a lot.

 

Scotty's porting guide is well worth the money. Time consuming but not terribly difficult with the right equipment. Stick the C8 heads on the D1 block (with stock type pistons) and you will have compression you can live with. Adjustable rockers are an easy add on with the C8s.

 

any idea on the overall gains from porting? ? Return on time invested?? Thanks much! Oh and would you then porch match your intake?

 

I've seen port matching help and I've also seen it make no difference all depending on the manifold and head combination.

The thing that people have to always keep in mind when working on the ports is that the airflow responds to the shape and very little to none at all to the surface finish so porting for flow not for show can result in very good gains for the amount of time invested. Time spent getting the shapes more correct and not on shining up the surfaces. Now how much this helps horsepower can be debated but if the mean port velocity is increased it probably will help cylinder filling at most rpm levels. What I mean by this is that with these techniques the port might gain 3-5% in volume but increase in flow by 15-20% so the overall velocity in the port is increased greatly, the available area is used more efficiently.

With most porting what happens within about 1 inch of the valve seat is what is most important. Valve job is critical and can really make a difference. On the D3 heads that I prepared for a build that I did for my truck a couple of years ago I used a 3 angle cutter to push the valve job out as large as possible on the valve and to give it something like a 70, 45 and 37 degree valve job.

The heads really responded to a back cut. I lapped the valve onto the finished seat and then ground a 30 degree back cut up to the lapped face and this is what it did to the flow:

Non Back cut
.100 61
.200 124
.300 196
.400 251
.500 275
.600 287
.700 297

Adding a 30 degree back cut with no other changes:

.100 65
.200 149
.300 223
.400 258
.500 279
.600 291
.700 308

This took about 10 minutes to do and then to check and it really helped especially at mid lift. My cam only has around .500 lift but the reason I went above that was to check and see if the port had any problems with getting turbulent above .25D lift, it seemed to hang in there just fine.

 

update: the shop gave me the green light on mag/pressure testing the 71 block, D2VE heads and the C8VE heads. the matching block for the C8 heads (68) is still in the oven. both blocks have the thicker webbing for the main bolts, but not sure that makes much difference after reading above. ive decided to proceed with the 71 block and 68 heads so i can get the ball rolling on this build. shop said the block needs to be punched .30 at a minimum, and he was going to do that tomorrow. question then is how does that impact compression? what should be the cut off for the build to still run on regular pump gas? the stock pistons are flat (double eye brow) but assume i will want a dished piston to help with high compression? weird because back in the day (for me thats 30 years ago) we all wanted engines with higher compression........ now im asking how i can lower it lol.

thanks for any input you can share. summit/jegs the best place for pistons?

 

will your shop zero deck the block ,then adjust static compression with the head gasket ? you have to figure out your dynamic compression .static compression is volume ,dynamic compression is pressures .look at the timing events of the cams that best meets your goals ,give those cam event numbers to your engine machine shop and they can figure out your dynamic compressions before you buy pistons or cams or head gaskets.I found some forged .030 over 429 pistons ,L2366 on Ebay for $400 ,+ $50 shipping

 

Your static compression ratio only takes into account actual swept volume, what it is with added head/piston/gasket volume/deck clearance.

Dynamic compression takes valve timing into the equation - when valves start opening opening/closing completely is not at BTC or TDC of crankshaft rotation, therefore some compression ratio is 'lost' Wilder camshafts with more overalp and shorter LSAs will lower the actual compression ratio a bit over stock-type or milder camshafts.

Sooooo..... it is a balancing act. The milder cams generally give more low rpm torque, while wilder cams generally give horsepower gains at higher RPMS.

My '95 EFI-friendly 87-octane-friendly build necessitated a mild cam to keep the engine manifold vacuum within Ford PCM specs. As such, I didn't want to go anything over 9.5:1 compression, and a mild duration cam.

If you're going carburetor, you can go higher with static C/R. Heck, back in the late '60s/early '70s, cars had stock C/Rs of nearly 11:1, but those were also the days of leaded fuel with 98 Octane! Wife's '70 Mach 1 is bone-stock 351C-4V, and 11:1 from the factory. For just normal driving around, we have to run the highest test unleaded we can find and have necessarily backed off on the timing a bit so it doesn't run into detonation. We'll sometimes mix in a few gallons of 110 octane Racing fuel if we want to drive it with a bit more 'spirit'.