pulling engine from my 76. Was going to try and get by with shorblock rebuild.. First thing I notice is that all steel lines had been cut and had hose clamped to them for splice. Next.. All the vacume lines running all over the engine..10 lines only 2 were in use.. the others were plugged off. Cover to bellhousing to access the flywheel was missing and think there was some type of nest in there. Motor mounts had chunks of tire in them to replace the rubber mounts. The good news with the engine removal was that all the bolts came out easy and motor out quickly.
After engine out I removed the oil pan. Ech! almost 3 inches of sludge in the bottom. The sludge closer to the bottom was solid. My pickup was stopped up also. The crank and everything else was completly dry. The Major wear in the lower end. Removed the Valve cover. about 1 - 2 inches of some black and white swirl Whipped cream type substance lining the pan. Head worn badly. Doing work at my job. the parts cleaner tank had just been changed out. Hope boss not too pived at me when he gets back :P After cleaning parts for 3 hours I decided forget it and went and got a rebuilt longblock. Going to take my time with reinstall.. blasting parts and putting some High temp boiler paint (close to ford blue).Engine I turned in had some type of steel tubing coming out of heads that had a hose just kinda hanging there. Rebuilt I got did not have those holes.. Thinking I had some type of smog friendly head.
Anyone have any tips that might make this reinstall go bit easier?

 

The biggest/best piece of advice I can offer is to just take your time and do things right w/o cobbling anything up, sounds to me like you've got a keen eye and you'll do just fine if you keep your cool! Good luck, and great idea to get rid of that other motor, sounds like it was a real winner!

 

If you have a manual tranny, I would go ahead and replace the old clutch with a Complete new setup from Centerforce clutch and a throwout bearing and check your clutch fork as well....besure to have your flywheel resurfaced and might even replace the Starter ring as well........good luck...fd

 

BigRed, I have one of those "PROJECTS" going on right now. I've managed to cram a two week project into three Years so far.

You dont say what engine you are working with. But if it's like my 460, I had to remove some Soft plugs from the ends of the Heads.
I Tap'd the holes with 1/4" Pipe threads, and screwed in four 1/4" pipe plugs.
If you guys haven't done that yet, let me tell you this from experience... one day as your driving along, you'll hear some exhaust noise, like a leaking exhaust gasket, and as you go along ignoring it, pretty soon you'll smell something hot!
Maybe you wife will complain about her feet getting warm. But when you stop, if you stop in time, you'll discover the Hot exhaust, just an inch away from your firewall has "Torched" and I mean burned! your firewall. It's a wonder I didn't have an engine compartment fire!

At night it's spectacular. A white hot flame shooting out the back of the Head, right into the Firewall.
My front left went about the same time and was shooting up against the AC Bracket.

You can fix it all without pulling the Engine or taking the Heads off.
I took the Steering column out to fix the left rear, and cut a hole in the Fire wall for the right rear. I put a larger piece of metal back over the hole and Drive riveted it in place.

 

I'm working with a 300. I did have problem with my exhaust.. The solid flange gasket in there was cracked and had a piece missing. it had burnt one of the vacume lines (that were going no where) in half. Had a friend from work helping me pull engine.. When we pulled the plugs.. he couldn't belive that they were getting fire.. I think i'm going to try and post a picture of them later. With my exhaust I am going to try and find headers or later modle exhaust manifold before I put engine back in.

 

I was going to plug the holes in head also if they gave me same type of head. Lucky they didn't.

 

 

Any parts that will be reused such as manifolds ETC. hot tank the intake and if using the good Ford exhaust manifolds have them machined. Do a rebuild on your Carb. It is all the little things that help in the long run. Also ensure that you torque correctly.

Stock 360, 73 f100