Ford 460 Engine Build Part 2

Hey, you know how some people just can't leave well enough alone.

I gotta say that applies to us when it comes to these engine projects. Yeah, especially when it comes to making horsepower. And this time it's back to our friend, the Ford 460 remember

delivery horsepower.

Our low low budget build all started with a junkyard motor. We disassembled for some basic machining on the block heads and crank shaft.

Then we loaded it with stock replacement pistons hanging on refurbished stock rods.

We replaced the springs for taller stiffer ones from comp

and installed one of their hydraulic flat tappet cams.

Now, after a basic timing chain set up, we dropped in the rest of our valve chain components

and buttoned up the top end with a new aluminum intake.

Then to save a few bucks, we upgraded the stock distributor.

We build it up a part store placement, oil pump and pick up

and to keep our budget in the $2000 range, we even did a refurb job on some of the other parts.

The old big block liked a lot of timing on the

dyno

and eventually pumped out 493 ft pounds of torque

and 378 horsepower.

So mission accomplished still in the budget bill. But guess what?

We're tearing it down now to take this thing to the next power level,

the stock cast iron crank and rods and replacement pistons are gonna be stout enough to handle the upgrades we got in store, but

we can definitely help it out with this. It's a trick flow stud girdle that really is gonna beef up those two volt main caps

comes with a RP bolts.

And as you can see right here, it's got a provision for an oil pump and pick up and

wait until you see what we got in store for that.

Since Mike put Molly loop on the threads. Tor expects our 88 ft pounds

on top. The valve covers come off as well as the dual plane intake we installed during our budget bill. That's because we're replacing it with this. A quick flow track heat, single plane intake

designed for mid block Fords operating in the 3500 to 8000 RPM range.

This thing makes more power and torque. Thanks to this one piece spider design with extended runners for better flow. Plus it has a raised plenum and that's good for better velocity and fuel atomization.

Oh, and check this out boss is here. So we can add nitrous later on

for more power and better valve chain geometry. We're getting rid of the stamp steel rocker arms for a set of these new trick flows that have a 1.73 rocker ratio. They also have needle bearing, full crumbs and a relief cut in the front. For more valve spring clearance,

we'll use them on heads that are a vast improvement over the stock cast iron boat anchors.

In fact, our head swap is gonna make the biggest power difference

trick flows. Aluminum power ports are a perfect match for our new intake. Now, these things have 290 cc intake runners and 74 cc combustion chambers. And that's compared to 90 ones in the factory head. So we are gonna have a higher compression ratio

for the exhaust ports, check this out. These things are a night and day difference over the factories. Take a look over here

on these, the air has to flow up and around and then down to escape.

Now the trek flow ports are raised from the stock location to allow a lot better air flow.

We're using new

fro gaskets for our heads and orientation is a no brainer says front right there

to keep our heads in place. We're replacing the head bolts with a RP studs.

It's very important to only install them finger tight.

That way the studs only stretch on their vertical axis.

We are reusing the entire front end assembly on this 460 but we got to remove everything. Now to make way for a cam swap.

This hydraulic flat tap at cam shaft was a good choice for a budget minded performance set up

but not for our new power plant. In fact, in this place is going this comp hydraulic roller that was specked out for us by engine builder John Coy.

Now the gross valve lift of this flat tap, it's 494 compared to 685 here. And you can see the different shapes of the lobes and why this one is gonna hold the valves open. Longer

duration of 50 thousand's lift is 256 on the intake, 264 on the exhaust side.

Now, here's a special cozy touch. She double pins the cam for added strength during heavy loads

and it's all held in place with this brass retaining plate.

Gosse, he also drills out an extra hole in the timing gear. So it makes up with cab shaft.

Now it's time to reassemble the front just the way it came off.

But unless you mark your boat, you get to play that game. Hey, where do the big ones and little ones go?

I

like

to finish up the bottom end. We're gonna make a major improvement to our four sixties oiling system. Now, in stock OEM pumps, the mounting foot has a tendency to crack or even break completely off under high RPM. S

So Coy

sent us one of his CNC machine pumps that has a bulletproof mounting pad. Now this thing will promote better oiling at higher RPM and even down at idle

with the supplied gasket studs and shaft,

it's that easy. We'll finish the bottom end with this upgraded seven core capacity moroso pan with trapdoor baffling

here

and a scraper to help the crank spin freely. Now, next time we're gonna show you how to measure for the push rods, finish the build and bring this thing up from 389 to well over 500 horsepower. Of course, we couldn't dyno

it today. Anyway, we got a motor in there getting ready for a unique horsepower TV test,

no matter what brand you use. Spark plugs all do the same job. They force an electrical arc, create combustion and well, that's it.

But could one plug make more horsepower and improve emissions and fuel economy.

We answered the first question last year when we tested several premium plugs in our shop.

In fact, we matched up ere

spark plugs with a leading competitor in our

dyno

using a 383 small block for a power plant.

After three runs with each set, we got more horsepower with E three S 5.5.

But at the same time, saw less brake specific fuel consumption

this time.

Eres bet in the farm that their diamond fire plugs produce less harmful emissions than the other brands.

So we brought in these guys from sensors inc for some high tech help.

We stick this on the side of the, of the vehicles that we're testing,

so we can get uh relative humidity and temperature.

Uh your max numbers will change

according to how much Rh is being pulled into the, into the intake.

This is uh an exhaust flow meter.

And what this enables us to do

is actually measure the amount of exhaust flow.

The test engine we're using this time is our fuel injected LS Mule motor

emissions and fuel economy go hand in hand.

So if E

threes produce cleaner exhaust than the competitor, that could be a major milestone,

we have a lot of confidence in what our product can do in the combustion efficiencies that it produces.

And with the new simtech system that you know is now available, uh we feel like it's one more effort to go improve the technology and to uh to show the results and the better combustion,

this could have far reaching benefits when other emissions minded manufacturers want to back up their products claims

the OEM have been using it, the EPA has been using it for their own test on the road.

And I think it behooves the the manufacturers specialty parts to be looking into this technology

as ways of evaluating their products

for emissions and fuel economy. Because as you say, they do go hand in hand,

we'll get data from the competitors plugs first.

Since this test is all about real world driving conditions, we'll run the engine at 2000 RPM for two minutes, then 2500 for another two minutes

and finally 3000 for two minutes.

Not as exciting as power pools. But again, our mission is all about emissions.

Now, we install the

eres to duplicate the first run

water temperature, oil pressure. Everything's got to be exactly the same.

We're looking at the CO2 from the first set of plugs

and you can see that we're a little over 7% on the CO2, which is basically an equation of uh fuel economy.

And when we look over at the E

three plugs,

we're at 68, pretty consistently across all the runs

about two or 3%. The co is what we're gonna look at next, very similar readings.

Uh There's not much change from the one co to the next. Now we're gonna go to the one of the main comput

uh Knox

and we can actually see a, a pretty significant change,

uh,

750 on the, the, the standard

plugs

where the

Eres are, are running 650

P PM.

I'd say overall, the uh

Eres came out pretty well. Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Very good.

More horsepower,

fuel economy.

That's a winner. That's a winner.

Ever since people started tinkering with their cars. Hot rodding has been a fixture on the American landscape,

whether it's burning rubber on the strip, moonshiners, outrun the law or just cruising the street in style. Hot rotting has a very colorful history,

but it wouldn't be quite the same without the presence of one guy

Charlie card.

You probably know him best. As honest, Charlie.

He was the real deal, honest, uh, honest, loved automotive. Uh, he loved uh, racing. He loved going to Indy. He loved people that were interested in these kind of things. He liked horsepower, he liked speed. He had cars of his own

honest, Charlie opened his speed shop in 1948 in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

And it quickly grew into a coast to coast distributor of hot rod parts.

Mike Goodman, a long time friend and employee of Charlie's now runs the day to day operations. This traditional hot rod thing really plays to my pulse and the heart of what we're about and honest is Charlie that was through his early catalogs and his relaxed manner of doing business

that I got my early automotive education.

Those catalogs really made the speed shot stand out.

Charlie was all about the customers. So he gave them something. They couldn't get anywhere else. Pictures of the parts they were ordering

his daughter, Ann would hand draw the engines, mufflers, headers and so forth.

They also featured whimsical photos of honest himself as Charlie put it

and were written in Southern English.

It was that combination of humor and love for the hobby that endeared honest Charlie to hot rodders everywhere.

The catalog was free. So kids would snatch them up by the thousands, bringing a whole new generation of car lovers into the fold.

Charlie always loved cars and started out racing his model t back in the twenties.

Over the years, he got behind the wheel of Meteor

Rochester and flathead powered Ford.

He set records flying up lookout in Mountain in Tennessee

and on the beach in Daytona.

Honest got his nickname before he ever got into the speed business. He owned a restaurant, but on busy days he would stick the cash register out in the street to make more room for customers. A

head letter sign on the register. Read, how honest are you.

And pretty soon the customers were calling him honest.

He decided to open a speed shop after a customer asked if he could pay for his bill with a manifold,

the business took off. Thanks and far to the local moonshiners who needed fast cars to transport their white lightning.

Well, today, honest, Charlie is the oldest mail order speed shop in the country

and it's still headquartered in Chattanooga

just a few blocks away from the original store

from the beginning. Honest, Charlie prided itself in the vast inventory of hot rod parts

and that still remains true.

32 Ford High Boys are their specialty

and no one knows them better than they do.

You can build an entire hot ride out of here. We've got chassis, we've got suspension, we've literally got every component

that it takes to assemble a vehicle and get out on the road and, and, and enjoy yourself safely.

Uh, do the miles, do the smiles.

Anyone who's ever built a hot rod can tell you it can be very frustrating. Tracking down all the parts you need.

So, having them all under one roof is a big plus, our inventory knowledge is skewed real hard to model. A's

32 fours, 3330 fours,

all aspects of traditional riding. We keep a wide variety of uh I beam, front suspensions, cozy springs, quick change, rear ends.

Uh A lot of moon is

a

lot often house are a lot of these icon distributors. So whether guys are just tinkering with an old ride or building a 32 Ford from the ground up,

Mike will tell you there's still one name you can always trust honest Charlie. The company is like honest Charlie himself and we live and strive to live up to that heritage today.

Horsepower will be right back. Honestly,

build on a budget horsepower projects that save you time and money.

We're always looking for cool stuff that'll save time and money in the shop. And recently I found something while searching summit racing's website that I had to try. Now, if it works, it's gonna save time and money. And hey, it's even than to avoid some fuel spills. It's an adjusted jet metering block kit from Percy's high performance that allows you to adjust the jets on your Haley carb without removing the fuel bowls and we're gonna try it on a 4150

first. You remove the float bowl from the carb,

the adjusted jet goes in between the metering block and the fuel bowl and because it spaces the fuel bowl out farther, the accelerator arm isn't gonna reach, well, they've got that covered from the kit.

I'm gonna use a roll pin punch to drag the pin out from the bottom.

Now, move your pin on top

and lock in the new arm.

Now, as strange as this may sound, remove your jets for good.

Now, we can drop on the supplied gasket onto the metering block.

Next up is the foam insert that goes in between the metering block and the adjuster jet.

Now, some of you may be wondering what that's for. Well, it's gonna prevent fuel slosh in between the two.

Now, the easiest way to put together the rest of the assembly is to start two bolts in the top of the fuel bowl and sandwich everything else together, making sure the actuator arm is in the right position.

Next, we can place the metering needle into the adjuster jet and carefully turn until it's in the fully closed position.

Make sure not to over tighten it or you'll damage the tip of the needle and throw off your adjustments,

slip on the o

ring

and drop on the jam nut.

Now, after repeating all that on the other bowl, you're ready to play. Now to get to the initial setting. The kit also comes with an equivalency chart that set up an eight inch increments. So as you turn the metering needle out, that raises the jet size. In our case, we're going to 70 square. So we're gonna go two and an eight.

The chart didn't account for engine mods like our heads and big intake. This thing's starving for fuel. So we'll open the metering needle up two jet sizes.

All right, the air fuel ratios look pretty good to about 4300 RPM. Now, the motors using most of the air wide open throttle and it leans out from that point on. So we're gonna make another adjustment on the metering needle and dial this thing in a little better.

We're almost dialed in, but I'm gonna make one more small adjustment on the front bowl,

one jet size

and see where that gets us. We should be right in the ballpark.

That's much better. What a cool way to tune. Take a look at this.

The lines on this graph represent the air fuel ratios. Now, the first one was way too lean. The second one, we were able to get it a little richer. The third one, we were getting really close. And on the fourth, hey, that put us right in the ball

park.

Now, that would have been four jets and four jet changes. But all we had to do was a simple twist of the screwdriver Now, in case you were wondering this set up also comes for dominators, whether you're running gasoline or alcohol. Now, that's all the time we have for today. Do us a favor. Go tune yourself.