I have recently come accrost a 427 block with heads and cam the moter needs to be reworked but i was wondering what is the main differece between the two (so i can posibly use the crank and rods from a 390 or 428).

 

The 390 and the 427 share all the same bolt patterns and outside physical dimensions. If you want to use a 390 or a 428 crank in a 427, you can without any problems. The 427 and the 390 have the same stroke, and some 427s have a very nice forged crank that you may want to keep. What heads does the 427 have now ? Is it a car engine or a boat engine or an industrial mocel ? Tell us more. DF

 

Sell the 427 block and heads, and you will have enough money left over to build a very very nice 390 or 428. Check your numbers real good, because your mentioned parts are hard to come by, and generally costly.
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Here are the differences. The stroke of the 390 and 427 are the same so their cranks, rods, and pistons, are interchangeable. The 428 crank can be used but THERE ARE PROBLEMS. The 428 was balanced differently than the 427 so you will have to use a 428 flywheel as well. The 428 cranks are easy to find, 428 flywheels are a little harder to find. In addition, special stroker pistons will have to be used which are shorter. In some cases, stock 427 pistons can be cut down.100 and used with the 428 crank. The good thing about this is this will result in a 452 cubic inch engine. The bore of the 427 was 4.23 inches. The 427 was built as a racing engine and Ford did not factor in engine rebuilds. As a result, the 427 Ford cannot be overbored very much, if any at all. That is why finding a standard bore 427 block is so important. If you have a block that can be over bored .020, you get a 4.25 bore and you can use BB chevy pistons which are very common.
ALL 427's came with crossbolted main bearing. Nothing needs to be changed here if using a different crank. circa 63-64 427 were top/center oiler engines and can easily be ID'd as they will have crossbolts with press in freeze plugs. The sidoilers can be esily ID'd as they ALL have three little hex plugs in line with each cross bolt on the left hand (drivers side) of the engine just above the crossbolts. The side oilers all had screw in freeze plugs. The 427 marine engines were Cast as side oilers but never machined as such. These engines usually have the 66-427 numbers on the rear of the block. They will have Screw in freeze plugs, they will have the side oiler bulge on the left hand side to the block but there will not be any little hex plugs above the crossbolts.

hope this helps

 

Geez David, you're gonna scare the guy. There are NO PROBLEMS running a 428 crank in a 427 block. By that I mean it fits just fine. Yes, the cranks and rods are dimensionally the same between a 390 and a 427, but the balance is not always the same. I'll figure throwing the pistons in there was a typo......Now, whats this about 428 cranks being easy to find ? Where ? I know lots of guys who are looking and can't find one at any price. Thankfully Scat is making new ones now (7-800$). As to flywheels....why would one spend any time looking for one ? Just use or order the regular 390 flywheel, you'll have to re-balance it, but you need to do the whole engine anyway, right ? And what is this about no side oiler blocks in boats.....We rebuilt 2 427 side oilers from a late 60s chriscraft. Owner swears they are the origianl engines. He thought they were 390s, till we showed him the bore. We were mighty tempted to keep those blocks and send him a pair of 390s back. Sometimes being honest is tougher than others. Anyway, the the mix appears to be about 7 of 10 boats have top oilers, and 3 of 10 have the sideoiler. If there is any ryme or reason as to which one you got, I haven't been able to tell. Maybe I should retitle this reponse 'semantics'. What you are calling a problem, I would consider attention to detail. DF

 

The motor has the casting # of a 427 that came out of a 64 ford galaxie (C4AE) it also has 3M27 and 015-A in it but it has standard main caps on it. I got the info from FoMoCo.com FE Casting Numbers
I dont know any thing about the block, I found it W/O any guts or past history. If it is a 427 how much is it worth fulley remachined? Thank you for the info so far please send more.

 

Measure the bore and tell us what you find.......A 390 will be a little over 4, a 427 will be just under 4 1/4 th. If you have a C4AE block with regular style main caps ( not crossbolted )then you most likely have a normal 390 block. DF

 

The bore is about 4 3/16 of an inch or so. do you have anymore advice?

 

The measurement says to me a bored 428. as 3/16 is .1875 possibly making it a .050 over 428. An odd over bore in my opinion. I could be slightly off in my calculations though. I also am skeptical to say that as the casting code of C4AE. If there is no other number following then it is either a 352, 427, or 359 361 389 391 FT block. That is according to my info I have in front of me. A 64 c4ae 427 is a center or top (preference of wording) oiler. and I don't think it had screw in freeze plugs. SO, we have not made much progress.

A more accurate way of measuring is needed I think. Maybe a cheap set of calipers? Or see if you can borrow some from somebody?? A NON bored 427 should work out to 4 15/64" if I calculated right. that is a little bigger than the number you posted which breaks down to 4 12/64". Hope this helps. The more I think about it I would almost say you have 427 block.

I took some time before posting did some reading, and refiguring. I realize that on a ruler or Tape measure 4 3/16 is pretty much 4.23". I would almost for sure say it is a 427 block. Because of #'s measruements and so on. If it is a fair price. I would buy it up. 427's are harder and harder to come by. least til Genesis gets going good.


Scotty

 

If the engine you have found has the standard two bolt main caps, my best guess is that you have found a bored out 390 block. 427s will all have the crossbolted caps. Almost all of the 406 blocks have them as well, however there are some early 406 blocks that were made without them, but they would have been from 1961 or early 1962. A 427 is worth 3000$ or more if it is usable. Don't see many of them for sale, however....DF

 

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 10-Nov-02 AT 12:18 PM (EST)]The block doesn't have screw in freeze plugs but the code states that the block is a 427 if it doesn't have any other markings after it. I will take the block to my course at the colledge on tuesday and get back to you.Oh is thare any other markings on a set of heads than the castings between the center plugs?

427 block casting #
c3ae-m c3ae-ab c3ae-z (c4ae) c4ae-a c5ae-a c5ae-e c5ae-d c5ae-h c6ae-b c5je-d c6je-b c6ae-c c6ae-d c7ae-a c7je-a c8ae-a c8ae-b c8ae-h

 

Hey i found some # on the heads by the rocker arm studs 0G27 do theese # mean any thing?

 

Those #'s are casting dates I beleive. I am still leaning toward the 427. I have no proof that "ALL" 427's got cross bolted mains. That is just a give away if it does have them. Well I stand corrected. The Christ book does stat that ALL 427 passenger blocks got cross bolted mains. I still feel there almost has to be some out there w/o cross bolted mains. JMHO.

If the block you have has cross bolted main caps then you have a 427. If not then the likelyhood just dropped about 99.99999%. Hope this helps.

Scotty

 

Does any one know if thare is a difference in a passinger block or if they threw a 427 in a grain truck or any thing like that? Or maybe it is an industrial block with the same casting #?

 

Casting numbers mean very little most of the time with FE blocks, measure the bore if you have access to sonic checking use it as well for cylinder wall thickness, you can also check and see if it has the oil passages for the lifters drilled, all 427's before 68 were solid lifter engines, and there were non crossbolted 427's


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