First vintage six buildup

[Anonymous]

Hello everybody, new to the forum and wanted to say hi. Just started a build on a 223 for my 58 custom 300. I'll be running it on my engine dyno and I'll keep you all updated with the numbers. Pretty mild deal, milled and ported head, milled block deck, 2 carbs etc. Was gonna stuff a 390 in the old girl but thought I'd try to make it easy on gas and see how I like it. The stock 223 is so slow it's actually a pain to drive so hopefully this peps it up enough I won't be scared to pull out in traffic. Later, Greg

 

[manglass]

As the price of gas approaches "ludicrous" I'm thinking the same thing myself for my 58 F-100. What kind of dyno do you have? Did you take a baseline run before any work? How much did you mill the head and block? Keep us posted, please.

Thanks,
Lou Manglass

 

[Fred]

A lot of the what makes the larger cars easier to drive is gearing them correctly. For your car I would recommend either a 4.10 rear axle with a manual transmission with a .7 overdrive (such as the original optional overdrive or a well selected T5) or a 3.73 rear axle with an AOD automatic overdrive.

Personally I prefer the column shift overdrive setup, but I like manual transmissions and I don't mind the non-synchronized first gear.

 

[fmartin_gila]

I run a 62 F100 with a stock 223. It has a 3.70 diff. I installed a 96 Mustang T5 in it. It gives me 17 MPG in town and 23 MPG on the highway. 1st gear gives me decent off-the-line, and the overdrive keeps the engine happy.
Fred

 

[Anonymous]

You didn't say anything in your post, did you switch to electronic ignition?Plenty of info in old threads on how to do it, should give more pep w/out using more gas. Jim

 

[LaGrasta]

Sounds like a great project and it will be interesting as you can dyno the progress. I chose the six for economy as well, among other reasons. It is slow, but with very little money and as already suggested, gearing; it is more than respectable out on the road.
Welcome to the forum.

 

[Anonymous]

Nice to see some interest in this. I didn't get the chance to dyno it before I pulled the head. I've been driving it for a couple of years and the unleaded gas finally caught up with me. The exhaust valves were sunk so far it would barely run. The car only has around 40K on it so the shortblock is in fine shape. No smoke and it doesn't use an oil so I'll be leaving it alone aside from decking the block. When I pulled the head and saw the closed chambers I got to thinking about what would happen if the quench was optimized and the compression bumped up a bit to make the combustion chamber a little more efficient. Running a stock steel head gasket and setting the deck height at .015(stock is .035) will give me a quench of .040 which is perfect and removing around 11cc from the combustion chambers will give me 9.4 to 1 (I think, I'd have to do the math again to remember) Should run fine on pump gas and this modification alone should give it a kick in the pants. Porting the head wont be worth much. You'll NEVER get any velocity out of those siamese ports. But we'll do it anyway cause ported heads are pretty and it won't hurt anything. I'll bolt the head on and dyno it with all the stock stuff. Then when the budget allows I'm gonna throw some vintage speed stuff at it and dyno it some more. It's a three on the tree with 3.50 gears already. I run a synchronized trans out of a 63 galaxie. I'll leave the gears alone for now. It got 18mpg stock when everything was in good shape. I've got a land and sea engine dyno and hot rods are what we do for a living. http://www.ncperformanceinc.com/indexx.htm
Later, Greg

 

[277 I6]

my 223 is in a 59 ranch wagen t5 3.89 gear never check milage I put a 300 dist. in it had to put the gear from the 223 on it then make a drive shaft 1/4 for oil punp 5/16 for the dist. i have a 262 b&s to 280 cdi to put in some day the 64 oil pump used a 5/16 drive