burlap1 the maverick is in the process of construction soon.i found a 1970 maverick along the road upon further investigation i find this car was being built for drag racing!:bananaman9 inch full spool rear locker 4.56 gears roll bars.what motor head can turn down a machine such as this?i have been a chevy fan most of my lifebut then i bought a built 390 i was going to put in my 76 f-350 uhaul its got hummpy pistons.i just cannot waste this in a one ton.i realize this is not an eeasy project but if i can mount a 327 chevy into an oliver dozer anything is possible.my thoughts are to use a front mount setup from a truck motor to solve the mount probs i am sure there will be welding to be done.i am getting lots of extra parts with this deal.what transmission will work with the 390 i was looking at old threads and there was talk of a three speed with overdrive that was in a 1977 truck will this work with the 390?any help is appreciated
ok, i have researched an FE engine swap (the family of which the 390 belongs to...) in a maverick/comet and i have some suggestions. first off, and most obviously the shock towers will require notching and flat-plating to gain the room. i honestly think that a set of 67-69 390 mustang/cougar exhaust manifolds, (and drilling and tapping the "390 gt" exhaust manifold bolt pattern into your heads) for a mildly cammed street driven vehicle would provide the most clearance but may not be the most free breathing things... as you mentioned uh...ahem, er "humpy" pistons, by which you mean hi-compression popups, those usually follow with "lumpy" cams -meaning long duration, which probably will require tube headers. stay with the 390 gt application headers though. ford powertrain applications makes some nice tri-y headers for FE's as for mounting the engine, use '67-'70 390/428 mustang/cougar frame brackets and insulators. take my advice and do not use the '77-'79 f150 3+1 overdrive trans (the one that's identical to, and is often confused for a toploader) behind a performance engine of any sort. i do have some experience running this trans behind a stone stock 390 in my 78 f150. worked good for 4 years of workhorse duty 'til second gear stripped off the cluster. it is a weak trans... it also has miserable ratios. first gear is like 3.98 or something close to granny like that, 2nd drops the rpm's way below the powerband, even for a big block. oh, and you are stuck with the baseball-bat-in-a-rain-barrel of a shifter that comes on that tranny, because ford swapped 3rd and 4th positions on the mainshaft and cluster and if you try to run a regular toploader shifter with it you will not have a conventional shift pattern anymore. even a regular old 3 speed like the one that came behind 200's and 250's as well as 302 has better ratios and is stronger,.....way stronger. use an f100 352/360/390 bellhousing, clutch and flywheel setup, its cheap and easy to find. you will probably have to take about an inch out of the width of your clutch z-bar remember that if your cam has long duration you will need a 3.55 or better axle ratio. look at other threads here on finding a pinto wagon or mustang II center pig for you 8" axle. it will hold the torque of a big block for a little while anyway
sorry, just read your post again, did not see the part about the 9" and the spool, prolly has some steep gears in her already for draggin'
welcome to the board. are you going to use this for bracket racing or a street driver. if you plan on driving on the street a lot i'd lose the spool and the 4:56's. good to play with but heck on the gas bill. good luck. keep us up to date.
thanks for all the info and welcomes i was over looking my project over this afternoon the fella keeps adding parts which is cool.what about a c-4 automatic does anyone know how well these will work.i was going to get some pics but forgot my camera hopefully i can get her home next weekend if the snow melts.i'm not worried about gas mileage this is just a toy to waste money on.i haven't built anything in a while got the urge from too much tv watching i guess.
