I hope to get honest answers, but I know you guys will be a little partial!

What is the general feeling about the FE series engines? Are they overweight hunks or strong running beasts? I am looking for opinions on the 390 in particular. Thanks!

 

Strong running overwieght beasts, that'll haul.
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John

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In the cool still quiet of night, you can hear chevies rusting away.

 

I'm betting my 390 weighs just a frog hair more than a 351W with iron heads and intake. Once you dump the iron FE intake and heads and go with aluminum they get a lot lighter. The bottom end is one of the strongest out there. I am partial to the FE but not bias. The 390 is the most expensive engine to soup up and has the most limited selection of Hi Po parts. For what it takes to build a 450HP 390 you could build a 650HP 460. The stock oiling system sucks but can be easily changed to work very well. Doing a stock rebuild isn't much more expensive than any other rebuild and will last a very long time if taken care of of course. If I had a vehicle with a non FE engine I wouldn't change to a 390 but I would never convert over to another engine from an FE. I don't know of any other engine that sounds as good though.

 

So you guys think that if I have good components to start with that rebuilding is a good idea, but if they're not factory performance type parts I'd be better off with a 429 or 460?

Heres another question: In the Ford Engine Parts Interchange book it lists the C6ME block as being used in 360s, 410s, and 428s. These engines have different bores, though, so is this a misprint? Did Ford just use the same casting and bore it out to 4.13 for the 428? Thanks again.

 

If ypu are rebuilding a 390 or above the stock bottom end parts are good for over 500 horse and 6,500rpm if you use ARP bolts in the rods. Never use a casting number to identify an FE. There were many 390's with the C6ME-A number and many 428s with this number. The C6ME-A 390 will seldom if ever bore to 4.13". If you have a good selection of 390 parts you are good to go. Install CJ valves in your heads and put a decent cam in with some 9.5:1 pistons and you will be making some decent power.

 

I have 3 390's, a 1970 2v smogger clogger,stump pulling
power, ran 16flat in 1/4 mile.Built high comp 390 4v,passes
everything but a gas station.the basement 390... It'll
be my car motor which lays a 20 foot patch when I down
shift to pass the 3-5 cars in front of me. I not biased
I just got access to all the 390's I can handle, There
a good motor ask anyone...they'll just go mmm 390, then
youll here all the storys about back in the day. A
fairly durable motor,the harder I beat on my 390 2v the
better it ran, never quits.

Fe power

 

Where I should say the 390 lacks is on the top end. Stock heads flow like crap and stock intakes are heavy and restrictive. Headers are a great improvement on a performance 390. Anything to help the exhaust out is going to make more power. If you want to make power cheap talk to econodrag. His engine was a joke on paper but ran mid 8's in the 1/8th mile. His setup seemed to work great and he didn't put too much money into it.

 

Wow, Thanks for all the replies. I've got to say that the bunch of people that visit this board are the friendliest and most knowledgeable (?) of any I've encountered on any other site.

So to positively ID this motor it seems like I should pull the pan to look at the crank, huh? Damn, I thought I had things figured out when I got that book.... I guess there are a lot of things you can't fit in a 150 page book.

 

If you start with a good motor, I feel they are generally problem free and low cost for 200,000+ miles while using/abusing them. One reason I bought mine.

 

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 24-Oct-02 AT 11:48 PM (EST)]Glad I found this thread, wife is going to probably buy a '69 Mercury Monterey tomorrow...
:-staun

May not keep it around for long tho...

 

Ok, you want honest impartial answeres, here goes.
1. Stupid design, you have to remove the valve train to remove the intake manifold and then you need an engine lift to lift the intake manifold because it is so heavy. Try replacing the intake gaskets without two or three strong guys or an engine lift.
2. Stupid design. But hey after the idiotic design of the ports on the 292/312 Y block (the intake ports were stacked vertically on top of each other) the FE half/head must have seemed "high-tech". Lousy exhaust ports on all fe heads.
3. Stupid design but hey in those days "GALAXIE" meant galaxie. Put those FE's in other cars and working on them is a nightmare.
4. Lousy oiling system. Never let your FE run low on oil or you will have that famous FE lifter clatter.
5. Silly ideas. Wow, we don't have anything to compete with the Hemi Belveder so lets put the 427 in a Fairlane. Only, there are no exhaust manifolds that will fit so we will have to cast up some special ones, (the 66-67 427 Ball Glove manifold), then the tall 427 valve covers don't clear the brake master cylinder so we will have to tool up some special slighlty taller stock FE valve covers, then after we have spent $500K tooling up all of these special parts lets don't really build any of these cars!!!!
6. SILLY IDEAS lets take our 390 and de-stroke it, giving it LESS low end torque and then designate those engines for TRUCK use!!!!

But with all of that said, the Ford FE
The only production based engine is history to win Daytona, LeMans, and AA/FD in the same year, 1967. The only production engine to EVER win NASCAR, FAI, USAC, LeMans, Sebring, Nurmbergring, AA/FD, AA/FC titles. The FE was the most successful racing engine ever produced by any manufacturer. Amazing what was done with those stupid designs and silly ideas.

David

 

Wow thank you David. I really appreciate he answer. That kind of confirms the vibe I have gotten from what little I knew. It seems like a 429 or 460 would be a better alternative than an FE in a swap, but if an FE is original it isn't too bad of an engine. Just quirky I guess.

 

The 429/460 was a very good engine. I am not a Chevy fan, but Ford used the BB Chvey heads as a starting point when designing the 385 series. The 429 with its 4.36 bore is more square which means higher RPM with less piston ring speed which = less engine wear, better fuel milage, etc.

The FE, though some may think I slammed it was Ford's staple for over 20 years, a good run.

I personally would rebuild an FE if it were the original engine in a car. If I were looking for a lot of depepndable HP, I would go with the 385 as you can get lots of HP with very little effort. Rated at only 360 HP in its original initial offering in the T-Bird in 1968, that 10:7 to 1 4 bbl 429 put out closer to 460 hp in stock hydraulic lifter form.

David

 

 

Dude I have had 2 of these motors the absolute worst I own several cars and have owned over 30 the fe platform is garbage hard to work hard to seal and is just not user friendly ok the 427 blah blah but the rest especially 352 and 360s are straight trash