andrewmp6

Good luck keeping the irs in it together.

67mustang302

lol, yeah. That kind of power in that car is going to need some serious work to not rip it to pieces. But as far as weight reduction....that swap will make the front end much heavier than stock, so I don't know how much front end weight reduction would make a difference. It's gonna be front heavy big time without some SERIOUS changes. That might be getting into the kind of deal where you try to mount the engine as far back as you can, which may require moving the whole dash and seating arrangement.

sethalot

the stock IRS has been proven perfectly capable of handling upwards of 500hp in stock form, and as far as the front end weight is concerned it would be primarily for straight line racing. however this thread was created to ascertain whether or not there are good aluminum heads available for this engine or if stock iron is the way to go, not to debate whether you think this is a good idea. i appreciate the information provided on the CHI heads from you but if you dont have anything else to contribute about 351C cylinder heads please dont post.

THUMPIN455

I like the iron heads, cheap and easy to work with. They also make good power provided you cam them so they make power where you want it. I have had 4V engines with plenty of bottom end torque and absolutely silly top end. It doesnt take much to make them run hard. If you have the money then aluminum heads are quite nice, lighter, easy to repair, easy to modify, good port shapes, good chamber shapes, and they are new. The price is just too high on them for me when I can rebuild two or three sets of iron heads for the same price.

Clevelands arent that heavy, they were just in heavy cars. My Cougar still hasnt sagged the springs and the Cleveland has been sitting in it for two years. Yes its heavier than a 302, but not like a FE or a 460, for the power they make they are a light engine.

A Starion, interesting build. I think it will be pretty damn cool.

67mustang302

500hp at what rpm? Hp doesn't kill parts, torque does, and hp is just an arbitrary number by itself, it's a calculated value of torque at a certain rpm. A 500hp turbo 4 cylinder may not produce the same kind of torque that a 500hp 351C will, one may be fine, the other may break things. It's just something to keep in mind so you don't get everything together and then break something you weren't expecting.

Which gets back to heads....with iron heads you can make good power and in a small car like that it will be fast, but something like CHI heads and you're talking about 600hp easy with a decent build, if you really cam it then you're getting into the 700+hp range with huge amounts of torque, so it's not just spending money on heads, you then have to spend money on other things to get the whole car to work right. Transmission, suspension, chassis strengthening. So there's a lot more money spent then JUST heads....better heads require you to spend money on other better things as well. You're the only one who knows if you have the money to spend on the whole project to do that.

The reason things other than heads are mentioned in a heads thread, is you can't look at vehicle performance in just one area with complete disregard to others. Heads aren't JUST heads, it's how they'll work in an engine that has to work with the rest of the car. Whatever heads you pick have to be picked with regard to how much time/effort/money you're going to spend on the rest of the engine/car.

So your choices are stock iron which will give the least power(but still good power) and the most weight but cost the least. Edelbrock heads which will make better power(but probably not a whole lot more) for less weight but cost more. CHI heads which will make incredible power for low weight, but cost even more and will most likely necessitate spending a bunch of money elsewhere in the suspension and transmission due to the large torque output. And then there's the Brodix Neal heads, which honestly if you have to ask you don't want to mess with....they'll make absolutely insane amounts of power, but are VERY expensive and will require a bunch of modification to both the engine and the rest of the car.

It all boils down to how much money you have and are willing to spend on the whole car.

And while a 351C isn't really heavy, it's heavier than the I4 that car came with, so you also have to give thought to the front suspensions ability to support the additional weight....if you launch on sticky tires at the strip and pull the front end up some, you don't want it slamming back down and hammering the oil pan because the front end is too soft.

sethalot

http://www.turbomagazine.com/feature...vette_z06.html

im not to worried about the rear end, and if it does end up breaking i'll replace it with a ford 9in solid rear
as for the front, the suspension isnt going to be left as is. all said and done this would be a complete tear down and rebuild of the car around whatever engine/trans combo i end up putting together.

Fordication

Mitsui? Time to light a match and get a real car. Man I really despised that series of 4 banger overated cars.If you want to put an engine in it and save you some money drop a generic LS1 into and save a bundle. That car cannot handle much more than 300 HP anyway. It will break in half at anything over that.

69mach1377

What seems to be lacking in this discussion is the flow numbers for various heads, which corresponds to expected HP, depending on the cam mostly.
The Edelbrok ones don't offer much flow over the ported cast iron C heads...the CHIs do. But there may be others to consider also.

67mustang302

There's WAY more to a head making power than flow numbers.

sethalot

http://www.turbomagazine.com/feature...vette_z06.html

nice car btw 69mach