Hello out there. I have a 1991 f-250 with the 460 fuel injection, 4.10 gears and the e4od tranny. The truck is new to me, and I have not owned a big block or a FORD before. I went from my 1976 IH Scout II to this. What a good difference! Well my question is, can I put a chip in this rig, and will it do any real world difference for me power wise. Also, can I do a mod to the tranny to help line pressure and shifting while towing. I only tow about 6,000 lbs with the truck, but up here at 6000 ft, I know I am not getting the power you flat landers enjoy from your motors on a regular basis. Any help from you more experienced truckers would help me out lots. By the way, I have already done a K&N filter in the stock box and a three inch cat-back performance exhaust, without much seat of the pants feel. The truck only has 90,000 on it, and runs like a a top. Thanks for your help on this guys and gals!!!!

 

Hi allister:

I found this old article interesting about mods on an older 460:

http://performanceunlimited.com/projectmpg/index.html

 

Thanks for the link Mecambello, I will have to contact Four Wheeler and get the back issue for the rest of the story. It seems to me that they tried to think of exterior mods instead of internal hardware, which can be very expensive and time consuming. Thanks for the reply, and keep 'em coming guys.

 

There are a few things you can do. The 460's were a bit of a dog out of the box. They offer a long stroke, great tourque potential, but lacked the finishing touches from the factory. You may want to confer with a couple of engine shops, but a mild RV cam would really wake your engine up, as would a pre-stressed timing chain at your given 90,000 mile mark. May as well do the timing chain and gears, since you'll have it off anyways, and it'll get your timing more accurate again. A stock set-up will be well worn out by this time, regardless of what others say, Ford's noted for having nylong toothed gears, a steel toothed gear replacement with a decent double roller chain that's pre-stressed will show an improvement all by itself over stock, never mind the addition of a cam-shaft designed to live under towing situations.

As for the trans. I drove a 1 ton cube van for work(courier) that had had some flow work done to it(E4OD model) and that really crisped the shift points up, and made it work much better. You'd have to talk to a pro-trans shop, as I did. I'm from Canada, and had some towing performance mods done to mine, as well as the addition of a heavy duty trans cooler to it, to help keep it running smooth. My rig at the time also had an in-line spin off filter I could change with regular oil changes, and then top the trans up again(usually a half liter) to keep the trans fluid changes minimal, but that was an option I chose to add...regular maintenance is good enough for normal use. I drove an average of 2500Km's per week, under heavy load, with lots of highway, and lots of start/stop in-between, so the rig needed to be ready for abuse.

The chip may help you out a bit. It generally involves re-mapping your fuel injection, as well as your shift points in the trans to work in combination.

If you're constantly running at high altitude, it's recommended, but do allow them the variance of you running on lower ground, as it could happen once in a while, which will allow the best of both worlds.

You may want to consider mapping the EFI for regular fuel at high altitude, and it would run fine on premium, if you were to hit lower altitudes for a while, per say. Just a thought. Re-mapping involves everything from timing to fuel to fuel metering to shift points.

You want a truck that can do it all, not one that will only live in one environment, unless you never come down off the mountain.

That being said, choose any mods you do carefully, so that they will work in all environments.

No, you won't maybe always feel the seat of the pants feel up high, but that's the world you live in...coming from a man who lived in that world for many years, I sacrificed a lot to have a good running truck, rather than one that performed in my envornment. I spent to much time pulling over to re-tune for so many things, that I eventually gave up on that and tuned it to work in all the environments I ran in, and it ran well in all, but with a bit of a sacrifice in each.

It really depends on you.

 

RR4E, thankyou for the advice, I certainly do not want a vehicle that cannot go down to lower elevations without a hiccup! I do not want the dog to have to pull it to the next repair point! It sounds as though you are in favor of the power chips, and I was curious if you had any preference to brand? As for the timing set, I will talk with a friend of mine and see what can be placed on the menu. I should point out that last weekend at 3200 ft along side Lake McConanaughy, it sure perked up, and showed me some potential. Again, thanks for the words of wisdom and good advice about all around use points.

 

Here's the other link, the article:

http://performanceunlimited.com/projectmpg/tuneup.html

 

Thanks for the rest of the article. i insulated the intake box, and ordered a Super Chip for my truck. I will run it again from 6000 ft to aropund 10,000 in about a week, so that will be the real test. Thanks for the info guys!!