Thanks TKO, for that story.  As a guy who at one time was on the fringes of building 1932 Ford Model "B" 4-Bangers I can really relate to figuring out what OEM parts will do the job.  We used everything from Hercules lifters (center ground with the bottom hand ground to fit the "B" cam) to early Chevy rockers (on various full overhead heads) and '37 Pontiac six cyl. rods.  We also used various pistons including '56 Olds and Ford 332 (hard to find).  My old friend was the first guy to use dip-oiling with insert bearings (he found some Volvo shells that would work with the "B" rods and mains after a little boring.  He even found a two-piece neoprene rear main seal that pretty much solved the leak problems and Kong came up with a revers oil-screw that he turned into the front crank pully so these old engines were actually pretty dry.

BB

Lots O' fun....I miss it.

BB

red351 wrote:

It just the end of the good times by the early 70's when the first clevelands appeared. Ford had plans that the clever was lighter and cheaper to build than a true B block. We were all sitting in gas lines for hours for $2 limit and paying over an unthinkable 50 cents a gal. Ford had Windsor 351 and big V8's didn't have much market left anymore. 400 shared the same BB bell pattern and motor mounts as 429/460 but did not fit well in smaller early mustangs till 71/73 models. Believe me I tried dropping a 400 in Bonnie's 67 butt I had to do things like leave the valve covers and exhaust manifolds off and cut a hole in the hood just for the carb to stick up through . The after market just wasn't interested in the bigger clevers. The only one I know of, that offered a stroker performance kit was T Myers. The 400 crank does have the same main bearings size as 351W, but just cost too much for custom rods and pistons to make it all work. Our friend down yonder never seen the 400, so it just died here in the states when ford was done with it by the early 80's. The Cleveland gets a bad reputation because most people just repeat what they always here, such as bad oiling system and to costly to get any kind of performance. NOT to sound like bragging, but the red car could be driven as a daily driver and has been across country several times and has somewhere over 30t miles. The only thing that been upgraded is a mild Lunate street cam and shorty headers. 389hp 480 tq. to tires and by 6 grand it fell flat on its face. The perfect street for me...

Anyone who though the Clevelands didn't make power never had any experience with one.  I would agree that the 4V stuff was too big for street use.  It made great power once wound up, but lacked the low end grunt, and often still wasn't cammed right for the heads and intake from the factory.  The 2V engines had maybe more potential for a street car, but you had to figure out how to get a four barrel carb on them. I think they were a lot like the FE series.  Barry Rabotnick in his book on building the FE talks about why the FE stopped being considered a performance engine once the 385 series came out, despite the FE's stellar record in racing.  It boils down to the fact that aftermarket support was never very good.  All the performance goodies were factory offerings, that dried up as demand waned.  For the average guy to try to build an FE that made big power he had to hunt down used up factory performance parts, pay an arm & a leg for them, and hope they could be reworked.  That made the Windsors and the 385 engines much more attractive, and the FE was relegated to either guys with big checkbooks, or restoration guys.  I think the situation was the same for the Cleveland, except the factory support was never anywhere near as strong as for the FE.  It was released into the worst time for performance.  '70 was the last year for all out engines.  By '71 emissions standards strangled everything, and all the good engines were effectively neutered with low compression and peanut cams. 

I knew a guy in college who had a small shop, D&D Performance I think it was, outside Allentown, PA.  He sold mostly mail order stuff to the Fox and SN95 crowd.  He had an early '80s Fox car with a 351 Cleveland in it he built because guys kept saying Clevelands didn't run.  It was a 4V engine with a custom cam, headers, and these exhaust port things that put a finger into the ports to effectively raise the port floor.  He had to repeatedly take power out of the car, because it ran too fast for his class (not enough safety gear).  Detuned it was running consistent 9s in the 1/4.  I learned a lot from that guy.  His name escapes me at the moment.  He had a Boss 429 too that he bought for next to nothing during the gas crunch.  I asked him how it ran, he said stock it was a total dog.  It took a good bit of work to get it to run where it should have, but Ford didn't care about its performance, they just wanted the engine homologated to race it in the Torino in NASCAR.  So as is often the case the common lore is wrong.  Guys revere the Boss 429 and revile the Cleveland, when it maybe should be the other way around. 
 

Yes, the mythical Australian heads!  I too remember hearing about them.  I'm sure they are real, the Aussies loved the Cleveland as I recall, and I'm sure you could still find them, but at this point with demand very low I'm guessing you'd have to scour the web, beg one of our Aussie members here, or take a trip to the land down unda.

The Edelbrock heads used in the article were $909/ea. in '07.  Looks like they are more like $1,100/ea. now through Summit.  Still, $2,200 for a set of ready to run heads for an engine that isn't an SBC or SBF is pretty hard to heat.  The aluminum is also going to save you about 80lbs. on the front end I would guess. 

I can't say flow wise, and I suppose its possible that Hot Rod simply used the heads because Edelbrock offered them to them for testing, or it could have been cost based.  I can say that from past experience Edlebrock heads have worked very well on everything I've ever put them on.  They aren't AFRs, but for typically $500 less are you really going to notice that difference anywhere other than a dyno and possibly a racetrack?

Also typically getting a set of old iron heads ready to run often eclipses the cost of new Edelbrock heads, especially when the cast heads are expensive to start with and you don't already have a serviceable set.  The costs just start to pile up, hot tank, Magnaflux, replace exhaust seats with hardened seats, maybe replace the guides, valve job, springs, maybe valves, etc.  You toss port work into it and its even worse.  In the interest of fairness you could port the Edelbrock heads too.  They respond really well to that from what I've seen.

No doubt the Cleveland head design was a giant leap forward in port design and valve placement.  For Fords they were without doubt the best factory small block design ever offered.  So in the end it likely comes down to what's more cost effective and weight.  Oh, and cam profile!  Had to toss that in there for 6sally6!