going to look at a 460 soon, how can I be sure that it is a 460? not a 462, 370 or whatever other kind of oddball. Also can someone explain DOVE heads? I know the D is for 70's the 0 is for 70 so its a 1970 only casting, but what about the rest of it? other 1970 castings that don't end in VE arn't as good?
Thank you, seth

 

well the 370 and 429 truck engines have a steel timing cover so that should be a give away for the 390 part (plus the 370 would have D9TE-BB casting number on the block or should anyway)
AS to your head question the D0VE heads were used in 1970-71 and for all intents and purposes are identical to the earlier castings C8VE and C9VE. They are standard passenger car casting just like on grandma's tbird or linclon from that time frame. Biggest advantage to them is higher compression (which can and will get you into trouble for fuel if you don't watch which pistons you use). The only heads you want to stay away from are D2VE actually, all the rest of the heads ending in VE will all yeild about the same power potential when matched with the pistons etc to get you the correct compression ratio.
Now as to your question about them being better then heads NOT ending in VE, basically any of the 429 heads with some other ending used in the 60 or 70s that have any designation besides VE are actually BETTER. CJ SCJ heads are casting D0OE-R and PI heads are D2OE. The only other choice is later model stuff and it has TE at the end and those are Fuel injection heads.

 

well this is good to know, how bad are the D2VE heads? I don't plan on rebuilding it for a while, for now i'm just going to replace my weasing 351m with it.

 

The D2VE heads are open chamber design ford used to reduce compression ratio for emissions purposes, they are 100+CC open chamber (so really drop compression) and are very prone to detonation. Basically with those heads you can forget running 9:1 compression on premium and maybe have problems running it on pump gas even in the mid 8:1 range without some detonation issues, I have heard of buys having to run pump premium at 8.5:1 compression (a range that should allow you to use low grade of gas without issues)

 

wow, that is poor, In stock form will it make power to save its life? or should I just rebuild my 351m if this 460 has D2VE heads?

 

the later model D3VE heads aren't that hard to come by I would just find some and replace them if it has the D2 heads.

 

hmm, not what I wanted to hear... I'm just going to hope its got good heads on it haha. I should be able to go look at this thing in the next couple days, I plan on just buying it, good heads or not. I'll post back. Thanks for your help.

 

I wouldnt worry so much about the D2 heads. They were made for one year so there arent that many of them. Look for the C8, C9 or D0 heads if all you can find is D3's then dont worry those can be ported and made into some pretty good heads. You can just get pistons to bump up the compression. There are many different combos for the 460 so parts are plentiful. No matter what you do any 460 is better than messing with your 351M. It might cost a little more to get all the parts to swap it in to your truck but you wont regret it.

 

well its in my garage, I don't what castings the heads are yet but I got a deal enough it doesn't much matter. the manifold is a D6 the water pump said D5, its got a motorcraft holley on it complete with all bracketry manifolds etc. to fit my truck. I plan on doin the swap this weekend, I will let you know how it goes. I am exited as heck haha

 

where on earth do you find the castings numbers on the heads? I cleaned off the sticker on the valve cover and it is a 76 motor.

 

casting number should be above the third from the left exhaust port or it MAY be under one of the intake ports (would mostly likely be a swapped head if thats the case) but being a 76 IF it's still all the original stuff they would be D3VE heads which will work fine for you and if you decide to rebuild it just pick pistons that will up the compression ratio a slight amount (raised compression is the ONLY power advantage of D0VE heads so don't let someone convince you to waste your money on early castings the D3VE heads flow identical numbers to the D0VEs)
If you have the time and money I would look into changing the timing chain to a straight up unit though (either go with one for a 68-71 motor or just buy a decent after market double roller chain) this will get teh cam timing back straight up and will improve the power noticably for very little money and if the timing chain is original it probably needs replaced anyway and while the engine is out now is the time to do it.

 

if I do switch the timing straight up it will still be happy on regular gas? also will my ignition box work with the 460? the plugs on the distributers are the same.

 

Yes to both questions, infact you can actually use the dist out of the 351M in the 460 as they use the same one.

 

I thought those distributers looked the same. the 460 one had the female style cap, I was surprised to not find points under it haha, that was before I knew the motor was a 76.

Also, where do the heater hoses belong, there are two open spots on the block but then there is a hose nipple on the water pump also, clearly one of these needs to be blocked off.

 

never mind I went to put the water pump on this morning and figures out what one of the nipples on the block was for haha