My '40 coupe had a 390 for a while in the '70s and early '80s. Mostly stock, with a factory aluminum intake, factory dual point ignition and headers. With a C-6 and 3.90 gears it ran in the 13s on street tires. I know that isn't considered fast by current standards, but the tuner was none too clever, and it more than kept up at the time.
they cost but they can be monsters +400hp is a cam intake and carb away in most cases. the fe motors are a bit odd when you compare it to an sbc and the parts are about 75% more expensve and about 300x harder to find but they are power houses
I drag raced a 68-1/2 428 CJ Mustang for almost three years in the early 80's and have helped friends build a couple of 390's. One 390 (we actually built two motors as the first one blew) in a friends 56 Vicky did run 12.90's with slicks and open exhaust @ around 104. The car was around 3300lbs so he had to be pushing 300HP to the rear wheels and probably about 375/380 at the crank. This was a max RPM at 5300rpm. We had the block bored .030 and used Ford factory 10.5to1 compression pistons. On the first motor we didn't really do any blueprinting (which turned out to be a big mistake as we lost a rod through the block) had a Holman & Moody 500 lift by around 270 duration cam, we had a set of full length ******s from a 427, used 427 Q heads (we had to notch the cylinders to get clearance for the valves) with 406 tripower. It really screamed until it blew. The other motor we used a set of 428SCJ rods, did some work to the oiling system so the crank got more oil, line honed, decked, balanced and printed, I think we were using around .0025 clearance on the rods and mains and used the same cam and tripower. This motor was actually a couple of tenths slower and we ended up using a single 4brl (I think an 850cfm) and the car had a best of a 12.7 at around 110 which meant it had to be pushing 400 at the crank and around 340 at the rear wheels. If I were building an FE motor I'd go with a late 428 block or if you can afford it a 427 block with a 428 crank to put you around 450ci........or on the other end you can take the 427 block and use the Ford 360 Steel crank to get a 396ci Ford that will rev higher than the valves will permit. Again, it depends on how much $$$ you want to spend and how fast/HP you want. One reason I got out of drag racing was that it took Mega Bucks to go faster than the next guy and there is always someone out there that has more money than brains..........................and will spend it to make HP. IMHO
Also look on the FE forum for all kinds of info. Search here also for alot of info on 390's 406's & 427's. Search on Ford FE I've posted a couple of times on HAMB with my questions & got really good response.
I know most of what your talking about, but what does decking and line honing mean? Also where is the fe forum? thanks for all the info!
Start with FordForum.com & the go to their FE threads. Otherwise google ford 390 FE & spend some time looking around to find your answers
Cresentwrencher, Decking means making sure the top of the deck (where the heads are bolted on to the block, referred to as the deck) is machined to make sure it is parallel to the centerline of the crank and line honing is making sure the center bores of the main bearing caps are perfectly in line. This is just a part of "blue printing" the block to make sure everything is better than factory specs. This is part of the "secret" to making reliable HP. IMHO
I built a 390 for my 73 F250 Trailer Special.... it flat out humps. Edlebrock intake and carb, stock heads with a little bit of port polish, 9:1 pistons, adjusted oil p***ages to bring the oil pressure up (it can run REAL low in old engines), adjustable valve train, roller rockers, stock headers. A basic build and it still put down lots of power. Go for the adjustable valve train option and roller rockers. This makes the engine much more livable over the long haul. Plus the roller rockers take some of the strain off the valve guides, as in stock form they is quite an angle that the stock rockers have to deal with and can side load the valve stems. Plus is frees up some HP for ya. It aint cheap, ~$600-800 to do, but its worth it in the long run. Even stock these engines breath pretty well. Intake and headers go a long way. Unless you are building a track monster the stock heads are pretty good with good sized valves already in them.
If you want to know more about building a motor for the street/strip get this book...........................it talks about how to "blueprint" a motor the right way............for reliability and HP. http://www.themotorbookstore.com/engine-blueprinting.html
FE = ****ing Expensive! Dave Wood and Ray Paquet build some of the strongest FE's in the country. Dave has built several of the all aluminum units and Rays 64 Thunderbolt has run 9 teens.
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