Hey fellas,

I have a tired old 84 F-150, with a 302 (carburated). I've bought a 302 roller out of an 86 Lincoln to rebuild. Will convert it to carburation after the rebuild. Am planning on adding a moderate roller cam, new intake, new carb and headers. Was thinking along the lines of a crane roller, edelrock performer, and an edelbrock or holley carb. I am in Texas and we don't have emmissions testing (yet). I am in a funk trying to decide weather to go with an EGR system or not. Also having an AOD tranny complicates matters somewhat. Any comments or ideas will be appreciated.

torp

84-XCAB-2X4-302
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I got my 86 302 I used in my 1980 f150 from a lincoln too. I put flat top pistons in it, but I wish I hadn't used the 86 heads. I found out they were odd for that year, and the next year they used "truck" heads in the ho mustangs which are supposed to flow better. So I would find out, you may be better off using your 84 heads on the 86 block. The 86 heads use an oddball sparkplug too. One thing that I did that saved me some money, is I used older style flat top pistons that take the older type rings. The 86 you have uses thinner rings on the pistons, which by now may be cheap enough, but back when I did mine, were about twice the price for pistons and rings. I ran mine for 8 years, and never had a problem with the 80 distributor with the 86 factory roller cam. I don't know what all the hubub is about dist gears and roller cams not being compatible, though I did use the factory roller cam. I also remember I had to take the 1980 timing cover (to use the fuel pump) and drill out the dowel pin alignment holes. The 86 block had 1/2" holes and the earlier cover had smaller holes. If you do get an aftermarket cam, you will probably have to change the sparkplug wires around, since your engine is a non-ho with regular 302 firing order, whereas most aftermarket cams are made for mustangs with 351w firing order.

 

i dont know that you can change the firing order since the pistons are made to accept a certain firing order, they are going to be at certain distances from top dead center. you'd have to change to a different crank for a 302 ho.

 

The cam is what determines the firing order. So if you run a 351 cam in your 302, then you need to switch to the 351 firing order (not a big deal and it has nothing to do with the crank position). I would go with the complete matched Edelbrock setup including the cam. Also, make sure that you go with 4V heads as most of the truck heads in those years were 2V and have smaller ports. Once you get the intake setup, don't forget to treat the exhaust to some nice headers and flow through components (cats and mufflers). Try to go with true duals if at all possible.

Slik

 

Oh, put in a nice 1" torque swirl spacer between the manifold and carb and drop the idea of the EGR system. If you ever need to put in an EGR valve, it is easy to do. I would run as few smog items as I could get by with. Especially remove the air pump and probably the carb can. The carb can is more than likely saturated by now anyway.

Slik

 

So what does the swirl spacer do for me? I can get away with out any of the "smog stuff". Out here in the country (south Texas) they just want to make sure all the lights work and the horn honks. I had planned on an edelbrock intake/carb combo, but I don't think they offer the roller cam. I was looking at the crane "compucam". The 86' 302 I am building was an EFI engine I am converting to carb. Will I still need to change the heads?

>Oh, put in a nice 1" torque swirl spacer between the
>manifold and carb and drop the idea of the EGR system. If
>you ever need to put in an EGR valve, it is easy to do. I
>would run as few smog items as I could get by with.
>Especially remove the air pump and probably the carb can.
>The carb can is more than likely saturated by now anyway.
>
>Slik

 

You can use the original 86 heads. Just thought you might want to change in the interest of a small performance gain.