How would you build up a daily driven 390

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Old2New

Member
Hi guys, I have a 1968 galaxie 500 4 door with a 390. It has a 2100 2bbl carb, C8AE-H heads and a C7ME-A block. I plan to do a complete rebuild on this beast. I want this to be a daily driver but want to ditch the 2 barrel carb, new intake, replace the cam and lifters, new rings and pistons, probably new crank. I have 155-160 compression between all the cylinders so I dont think it needs to be bored over. It does have pretty low oil pressure. When hot its about 8 psi at 650 rpm and 2500 at 2000 rpm using Valvoline 20-50 vr1 racing oil.

Basically I have no idea where to start. I have about $3,000 to work with. What would you do and why? I just replaced the head gasket on it. It was the first time doing that and its amazing how much a guy can learn about an engine just by taking it appart like that. Whole new understanding. Describe your dream build with a $3,000 budget.Oh and I will be having a shop do the work which I understand cut into the budget significantly. THANKS ALL
 
Try to find a 428 crank to make it a 410 (used in some Mercurys). I assume it's an automatic with 2.87 or 3.00 gears so go mild on the cam; one rated for power from just off idle to 4500-5000 RPM. A 600 CFM carb, and decide if you want to run regular or premium gas and order pistons accordingly. Big dish for regular and smaller dish for premium. With the right combo it should put you in the back seat by just wiggling your toes on your right foot.
Oh, if you find a 428 crank you also need the balancer and flywheel/ flexplate as a 428 is external balance.
 
Your wish list might be bigger than your wallet, like none of us have ever done that before. :rolleyes:

Double check your oil pressure with another gauge, just to make sure it's really that low.

Find a local car club with other 60's Fords and ask the owners which shop to use, or more importantly, not use, then get some ballpark estimates.
Plan for a machine shop guesstimate of about $2k, plus removing & installing the engine, and at least one box full of misc parts, and a few other 'might as well fix this while it's apart' items.

One of the first things a machine shop will ask is if you want hardened valve seats for the unleaded fuel we're using. It's a great idea for a daily driver but could add as much as $1k to the price tag, or plan on using a lead additive in the fuel.

I'm not familiar with the FE 390's but here's a couple thoughts on rebuilding a daily driver engine on a limited budget.
Think of the engine as a big air pump. Everything from the air cleaner snorkel to the exhaust pipe tips is part of the whole thing. The goal being to make changes that allow you to move more air while not exceeding your budget.
The 'most bang for your buck' changes to do first are the ones that reduce or eliminate the weakest links in the system.

In the case of your 2bbl 390 the more obvious changes would indeed be a 4 bbl carb & intake, and dual exhaust if it has a single, or a less restrictive dual system. Next in line might be a very mild cam, esp if the one in the engine needs replacing anyway. After a few basic changes, more noticeable performance increases get more expensive.

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Rule of thumb on oil pressure is 10 psi per thousand rpm. I did a 64 390 recently and used a aluminum intake (that in itself may prevent a hernia). A 600 vacuum secondary Holley, a Schneider "little big" cam. I punched it because it was worn and turned the crank. Always replace the cam bearings! I reused my heads but you might look for a pair of late '60's truck heads because they used medium riser tricks from the factory on the truck heads. Spend the money for quality parts like hyper pistons from sealed power and Felipe gaskets. Make sure that you use a high volume oil pump. It will never be as cheap as a 350 Chevy to build (nothing is). But good parts, quality machine work and careful assembly will yield lot and lots of years of God service. I also would look for a Duraspark I I distributor and blue strain relief module for ignition. Good luck !
 
Unless you're going to pull a heavy trailer or put the engine in a big truck, you won't need hard seats installed.
 
40 Deluxe said:
Unless you're going to pull a heavy trailer or put the engine in a big truck, you won't need hard seats installed.
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Concur with this post. A Chevy probably needs them, but Ford uses tougher metal in their block and heads. I learned this while racing Chevies and Ford in roundy round for years and doing lots of porting etc. A 4bbl is a great idea. As for new pistons, be very careful that you don't go more than about 8:1 compression or you will end up using high test gas at a premium price. Beyond that, a stock rebuild is all you need.

If you are going for a high lift cam be very careful here. FE motors require a lot of head work to allow the valve springs to accommodate high lift. You are not going to stay within $3000 with everything you are talking about here.

By the way, why are you going to rebuild an engine that show pretty much perfect compression readings. If you are worried about the oil pressure, don't be. As someone said above, 10 psi per 1000 rpm is very good. Put a new 4bbl manifold and carb (more for looks than anything) and enjoy it. If you want a new cam, go for an economy one that might save some bucks at the Shell station. You might want to replace those choker exhaust manifolds with a set of headers that will greatly improve breathing. In any case, be sure to go for a set of copper exhaust gaskets. It is near impossible to permanently seal up an old FE exhaust using stock type gaskets.

My opinion and worth every cent you paid for it.
 
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Rebuilding your engine is like being a kid going to the candy store. You won't know exactly what you'll need until it's torn down and checked. I'd recheck the oil pressure like dmsffr suggested to confirm the low oil pressure first. If it's that low using 20w/50 oil it sounds like it's pretty worn. If it is pretty worn out then you'll be looking at boring it, a reground crankshaft and cam bearings. You will end up with a better engine if you bore it with new piston as opposed to just honing it with new rings. Now as far as the goodies go, a 428 crank would be nice but it cuts into your budget. As mentioned, hard seats aren't necessary unless you put major miles on it yearly. As a compromise you could always just do the exhaust seats. IMO a high volume oil pump is a waste of $$. You'll never reach the hp and rpm to justify the expense. As far as the 4v goes, the Holley and Edelbrock carbs are both good choices, but you could always look into an Autolite 4100. It won't give the performance of the others but it's about the most trouble free carb you can put on a daily driver. Duraspark ignition is a good choice but it requires a bit of wiring to your car. I put a Duraspark system on my 57 Yblock and it's been trouble free. If you don't want to go through that much trouble you can always use a Petronics system. Plenty of guys use them. I'm a Ford guy so I went through all the trouble to go with the Duraspark sys. Last is the camshaft. Just about everybody (including me) goes too big with their camshaft. You can install a camshaft that sounds and performs good but you end up at the gas station every other day. I would contact a cam supplier of your choice and talk to someone who will ask the right questions about your car and what you plan to use it for. That's my take on it. I'm going to go though my 406 soon so I'm looking in the candy store window too.
 
Are we missing the point he wants a DAILY DRIVER. Go back with standard cam, if you go with big time cam you will loose vacuum to operate your power brakes. I had a 429 with cam power brakes were awful. If you are changing pistons it wont cost much more to have it bored. Four barrel is a good idea,
 
Motorhead6 said:
By the way, why are you going to rebuild an engine that show pretty much perfect compression readings.
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LOWRIDER said:
I'd recheck the oil pressure ... to confirm the low oil pressure first.
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Johnnydidd said:
Are we missing the point he wants a DAILY DRIVER. Go back with standard cam, .....
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Some very good points above.
"If it ain't broke don't fix it."

If the engine doesn't actually need rebuilding you can get a bunch of bolt-on upgrade parts.
And, you'll have more of a cushion to pay for other problems you discover along the way.

Old2New said:
Basically I have no idea where to start..... and I will be having a shop do the work...
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Those local shops I suggested you look for earlier... have one (or two) of them do a hands-on inspection of your car in their shop and give you a list of what it needs, their recommendations of what to tackle first, and an estimated cost.
There can be noticeable differences between what repairs a casual observation of the car might lead you to believe, and an inspection done by folks who work on old cars every day and have seen it all before.

.
 
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Ok Im learning a lot guys, thanks. So my compression is good. Thats good to know. So I need a 4bbl intake and a 600 cfm carburetor. It Has a single exhaust so I need headers. I forgot to mention that one of my lifters is wallered out and ticks pretty bad and that rocker for that lifter is pretty worn as well. So new lifters with a mild cam. Should I go adjustable lifters or stock hydraulic non adjustable lifters? I plan to keep my heads. They will need new valves and seats because I do plan to tow a trailer, granted its a small one. I need to upgrade my spark so Duraspark it is. Will I need cooler spark plugs or just widen the gap? Oh and a high volume oil pump. Cool now the fun part of picking out what candy I want. I was looking for a general idea of where I should go and this helped a lot.

THANKS EVERYONE!
 
Sounds like you have a plan. On a daily driver I'd go with the stock lifter set up. The adjustable rocker arm assemblies are expensive also. Regarding the Duraspark I would just increase the gap then check your plugs. I ran a colder plug for awhile and they ended up fouling. The distributor and module should be easy to find. One thing I did when I picked up a donor distributor was getting the wiring looms that came with the system. Makes for a cleaner look when you wire in the components.
 
Old2New said:
... I forgot to mention that one of my lifters is wallered out and ticks pretty bad and that rocker for that lifter is pretty worn as well. ...
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If the engine has enough miles/wear on it to cause this, are you getting back toward engine rebuild territory?
 
I've been reading this with some interest, and haven't had anything to add. But in 1969 I had a 67 390 GT Mustang, automatic, pass thru my hands. It was my daily driver for a couple months, low mileage, stock except for wheels and tires. I know the 'stang was lighter, but those motors are torque monsters. It didn't go past 4800 or so in drive, but it turned the wider tires on both shifts till they smoked. A stock rebuild to the 4 barrel specs, maybe a little less compression in today's world, a modern but similar cam, and that Galaxie will run like hell. They don't make great mileage, but the throttle response will be great. Take a close look at the 4 barrel Autolite carb, the guys that run them seem to love them for the daily driver types.
 
Some people here suggest skipping hard seats. I'm guessing none of them remember that most 2 bbl 390 and 360 engines were valve burners when they were new, on leaded gas. I worked at a dealership in '68, 1 out of 8 never made it out of warranty without a valve issue. You don't need hard seats on the intakes, just the exhaust. Try some local pull and save type wrecking yards and find a 1973 or later pickup with an FE engine, these have D3... series heads, doesn't matter if it's a 360 or 390, same heads. They have flame hardened seats that were designed for non lead gas. As mentioned a 390 GT did run good, but it was a 10 to 1 comp engine with a 428 CJ cam, a stock 600 cfm Holley and slightly better flowing exhaust manifolds than your Galaxie These engines love compression but we don't have the gas for it today. What has worked good for me is to use a stock flycut, dished piston for a 1968-72 2 bbl car engine. With your heads or the D3 heads you will end up very close to 9 to 1 comp. As far as cams go, call up Comp Cams, tell them how you plan to use this vehicle, what it weighs, what trans. and convertor, what axle ratio and what carburation. They will design a cam, recommend the proper valve springs and what height to set them and where to degree it in. I've done this several times and it's worked better than the guessing game and the price isn't that much more than an over the counter fits all cam. You don't need to spend a bunch of money on an aftermarket aluminum manifold. If you can find a 428CJ manifold that would be great, but it'll cost more than a new Edelbrock. A 1966 and up iron 390 4v manifold will work fine, the ports will match your heads or the D3 heads. As far as headers, that would be nice, but probably hard to find for your Galaxie. The original ex manifolds are very restrictive, if you go searching for the D3 heads, check out the ex manifolds on them, by 1976 most pickups had a very similar looking manifold to your originals, but they are larger and have 2 1/2" outlets vs 2" on yours. They are easy to spot, they have ribbing on the sides. I like 4100 Autolite carbs, they are simple, fool proof and reliable. Either the 1.08 venturi, 480 cfm or 1.12 venturi 600 cfm will work. Ford downsized to the 480 cfm on most 390 engines in 1966 to meet emissions. Personally I like it better than the 600 for an everyday driver. As far as ignition, I'm not a fan of DuraSpark, it works... sometimes. Whatever you use, even you original points system, have someone recurve the mechanical advance and adjust the vac advance and make sure if you use points that the breaker plate isn't worn out. These motors don't like over 38 degrees total advance and do like around 10 degrees intial advance
 
If you add up all the posts above it pretty much makes this look like a whole lot better solution,by the time you spend money on machining your poor flowing stock heads and almost 50 year old valve train with a bad cam and lifter issue this would be the better solution as I posted above: https://www.summitracing.com/parts/edl-2044/applications simple distributor fix: http://www.skipwhiteperformance.com/detail.aspx?Item=6508-BK ;) Check out the video here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpD7fpKWpXw
 
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I put 40,000 miles on the 390 in my 69 crew cab with oil pressure like that. You must be a lot more ambitious than me to tear apart an engine with 155/160 compression.
If you are swapping the crank, might as well make it a 410. You are going to need hard seats, probably new valves, springs, guides which is well past halfway to a set of Edelbrock heads, which you can run a full point higher compression with.
So 410 crank, bored 30 to , I believe, 417, aluminum heads, cam something in the Comp 260 range, dual plane intake. Yeah.
 
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