About 2 years ago 1994 F150 2wd was ready to become an organ donor. It had 350,000+ miles on it (before the odometer quit). The front end was full of slop, the rear end made terrible sounds and it had a couple busted leaf springs. Who knew that a few dozen 3 ton loads of gravel would hurt a 1/2 ton pickup? Anyways the truck had only about 50K on the rebuilt 351w under the hood, so I decided to look for a good truck that just needed a good heart. I hit the craigslist ads and I found it... a 1988 F350 Crew Cab 2WD, C6 with a locked up 351. The truck was in great condition for its age and had a really nice interior done by a conversion van company. So I picked it up.
At first glance the 88 351w and 94 351w looked pretty much the same and for the most part they were and it was a pretty simple swap. Even thought it was a relatively fresh rebuild on the 1994 I went ahead and replaced the oil pump, all the gaskets and water pump. I had my doubts that the vacuum solenoids near the coil and vacuum canisters on the passenger inner fender were of much importance, so I threw them out. I removed the smog pump and EGR valve and scrapped them. I made a block-off plate for where the EGR should be. I ordered a set of Hedman headers and had plans of eventually running 3" dual exhaust out the back but I needed to get it running so I just put some turndowns on the ends of the headers and scrapped what was left of my exhaust system including the cats. I did not install the o2 sensor. I used the distrbutor, wiring, and computer from the 88.
Even though a lot of my friends were telling me it would run like garbage with out all the emissions-related stuff, I had it fired up and running beautifully for about a week...
and then it stalled suddenly and had no spark. The distributor gear broke. The 88 351 had a cast gear and the 1994 had a machined gear. So I had to get out the cherry picker, lift the engine, drop the oilpan and dump out parts of the broken gear and put a new aftermarket machined gear on the dist and had it going again.
So here I am 2 years and about 18,000 miles later. The heavy 1-ton crew cab will throw you back in your seat every time you put the pedal down. It runs smoothly and reliably all the time. It will pull anything I put behind it. It will bury the needle well past the 85 mph limit by the time I get to the bottom of the interstate on-ramp. And it still averages about 11 mpg (which is not bad for a truck of this size and weight).
I know its not technically street legal without the emissions related junk on it, but I live in a rural area where thats not an issue. The only issue I seem to have is with speeding tickets. I guess I have proof that you dont really need all the extra emissions clutter under the hood for a fuel injected 351w to run great.
At first glance the 88 351w and 94 351w looked pretty much the same and for the most part they were and it was a pretty simple swap. Even thought it was a relatively fresh rebuild on the 1994 I went ahead and replaced the oil pump, all the gaskets and water pump. I had my doubts that the vacuum solenoids near the coil and vacuum canisters on the passenger inner fender were of much importance, so I threw them out. I removed the smog pump and EGR valve and scrapped them. I made a block-off plate for where the EGR should be. I ordered a set of Hedman headers and had plans of eventually running 3" dual exhaust out the back but I needed to get it running so I just put some turndowns on the ends of the headers and scrapped what was left of my exhaust system including the cats. I did not install the o2 sensor. I used the distrbutor, wiring, and computer from the 88.
Even though a lot of my friends were telling me it would run like garbage with out all the emissions-related stuff, I had it fired up and running beautifully for about a week...
and then it stalled suddenly and had no spark. The distributor gear broke. The 88 351 had a cast gear and the 1994 had a machined gear. So I had to get out the cherry picker, lift the engine, drop the oilpan and dump out parts of the broken gear and put a new aftermarket machined gear on the dist and had it going again.
So here I am 2 years and about 18,000 miles later. The heavy 1-ton crew cab will throw you back in your seat every time you put the pedal down. It runs smoothly and reliably all the time. It will pull anything I put behind it. It will bury the needle well past the 85 mph limit by the time I get to the bottom of the interstate on-ramp. And it still averages about 11 mpg (which is not bad for a truck of this size and weight).
I know its not technically street legal without the emissions related junk on it, but I live in a rural area where thats not an issue. The only issue I seem to have is with speeding tickets. I guess I have proof that you dont really need all the extra emissions clutter under the hood for a fuel injected 351w to run great.
