I recently aquired a 351W from a local machine shop that was going out of business. Its a motor that they had rebuilt for a customer that had never came to pick it up, so I got it for the cost of their labor. Anyway, it has .040 over stock replacement pistons in it that I figure will give me 8.0-8.5:1 compression ratio with late model heads and 9.0:1 with early model (DO castings) heads. I have put a mild cam in it 204/214 .448/.472 and I have a cast iron 4bbl manifold off of a late model HO motor that I am going to use. My dilema is that I have 2 sets of cylinder heads. The first set is a late model set of heads that came off the same HO motor the manifold did ( I belive out of an 86 F150) I had them rebuilt for an early project I was working on but they did not get used. The second set are the early DO castings with the larger runners and bigger 1.84 vavles, but they are going to need rebuilt. I know the DO's will make more power but I would like some guesses on how much. I will probably be putting an aftermarket manifold on it at a latter date.
Thanks
Bob

 

Some claim 40 more hp over a lesser stock head, switching to the D0OE heads.

 

JW
Would that be a stock DO casting or a Ported DO casting?

 

Stock.....is that a performer plus camshaft or paw? Later

 

PAW I sure hope the price difference does'nt reflect on the quality Several guys around here have used them with no problems. But their are a few guys round here that have had problems with wiping out the lobes. Upon further investigation I found out that they were using "way" to heavy of a spring.

 

I am thinking about getting that camshaft, I just purchased and returned the comp XE268 which would have been a great cam, according to many who have used it, but I decided to go with a cheaper cam and try and spread the "budget" thinner.

Which brings me to the first three of four that paw offers, that I think would work okay in my mild 351w. The first one is a knock off of a crane torque cam, the second is a knock off of the edelbrock performer (plus) the one you have, and the third is a knock off of the ford racing A332 camshaft, the fourth one is a knock off of one of the crane blue racer cams. I have been throwing e-mails back and forth with a cam grinder so what ever he says should be accurate. I hope. Can't beat the price thats for sure. I am not positive but I get the idea the cams all come from the same manufacturer, I am probably wrong but I get the feeling they are. As you mentioned seems many have had sucess. Good luck with your build, lemme know how the build goes and how it runs, later



Well for what its worth the fella e-mailed me back, I mentioned a combo similar to yours with performer intake and 600 cfm carb, and that the vehicle would do no towing, street only and operate at 55-60 mph or 2500 rpm +/- the most and he recommended the smallest cam for the 351w from paw, he stated it had a very low rpm range but was the closest to the combo. I did not expect that.

 

JW
It's my understanding that the PAW,Summit,Edelbrock and many other generic cams are all ground by crane. If you take a look at the Blue Racer or the Wolverine lines of Crane you'll notice that alot of these cams (most of them) are identical to the generics. I have the PAW cam in my 300 six and haven't had any problems with it to date. Like you said can't beat the price. Now to find a good deal on a manifold.