Thread: 351 tips

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Does anyone have any cheap tips or tricks to make my windsor perform better?

the short block dosen't know what is written on the valve covers. heads, ign,intake, carb, cam, are what makes hp the basic way. more comp, boost, exotic cams, high dollar intakes and carbs ,or injection go futher.If this is a street driven car, one of the cheapest tricks is change gears. go from a 2.73gear to a 3.50. you will think you are driving a diff car. of course it would help to know what you have.

cheap NOS up till you melt the pistons out of it

assuming you are starting from stock...

underdrive pulleys are a quick way to free up some horses.

electric fan.

good quality air cleaner.

efi or carb'd?

if you are willing to open up the engine, i say have your heads ported, get a mild cam, aluminum intake, and a 600cfm carb.

You didn't mention year of production. As the years went by, the intakes and heads got restrictive in flow. A simple thing as a manifold swap (intake) could wake it up. Exhaust redo could be good as well as other small things. Feed us some more info if you could.

Basic manifold, carb and air filter will help some. Those are the cheapest besides adding headers and dual exhaust. After that it's pretty much internal work such as cam, different heads or porting the ones you have, etc.
The manifold I like best on my 351W is the Weiand Stealth. It makes good power in the RPM range you need it for everyday driving. Holley 650 carb would do good. Maybe get a spreadbore adapter and add that to the Stealth manifold. Thing I like about a spreadbore Holley carb is the smaller primaries and big secondaries. Some may agree, others might not, it's personal preference.
We need more information on your engine if possible such as EFI or carbed, points distributor or electronic, year the motor is, etc etc.
Another thing is change the heads to a earlier model or even put some C9 heads with the bigger valves.... List goes on and on.

Can I stroke a 351w to a 408 and find a fuel system and a computer for it? I dont know ANYTHING about carbuerators.....SEE, I cant even spell it!!! It will be going into a fox bodied Mustang. I am also thinking a 2 bolt main would be better........? This is gonna be my first motor!

I need to find a place that sells clutchs for that kind of power and can handle the T56!

I wouldn't worry about stroking it. Get a nice 351W with some nice heads, good cam, manifold and carb setup and run it. A 351W with stock bottom end can take a lot of power and for a Mustang a 351W in itself is a lot of power. If you want a stroker, computer and fuel injected, etc then you better expect to spend thousands of dollars into this thing. How much are you willing to spend first off?

Originally Posted by hopin4amean351

I need to find a place that sells clutchs for that kind of power and can handle the T56!

Try McCleod, they have some very good clutches. dual discs, soft locks, most anything you want.

i built a 408 with a t-56 for a friends 93 fox body.. we broke 4 t-56 before he gave these guys a call.www.rsgear.com they have a tremac t-56 that will hold 800ftq with all the goodies. as for clutchs the only one we got to stay in the car was a center force. we ran the renagade class and was the only car to run the t-56 and win...

if your gonna build it stroke it to a 393 or 408 and use some AFR heads and a good high rise manifold. a 780 Holley and some full leagth headers an you'll be good to go. as for tranny a D&D Viper spec T-56 6-speed with 4:10 gears out back will get things done with zero drama. as a side note make sure you upgrade to 31 spline axles and get some battleboxes welded in.
then go make camaro,trans-am,charger, etc owner cry

There is a lot of good information here to help you with building a 351W. But with that said, you really haven't given us much to work with. As a suggestion, go to your nearest Borders or Barnes and Noble book store and pick up an HP book titled "Ford Windsor, Small Block Performance" while it is a little bit dated, it does have a wealth of information. While you are there, also look at an SA book "High Performance Ford Engine Parts Interchange", also good as a building block( ) for your ideas. There are others, but these work, at least for me, for general info.