Quote Originally Posted by dorin48
I'm going the american v8 route soon and I'm laying out the plan for the engine build and drivetrain in the intrest of budgeting. This will be a long term project that will involve several stages and the final product should be pretty fierce. My gramps is giving up his 77' f100 to me. Currently it sports a rebuilt 351m in all its factory 163hp. I honestly think its making more like 80 to the wheels. Ive never driven anything that slow. ever. >_>

So the engine build list is already done. I know what route im going. With that said I am going to have serious traction issues. I want this thing to hook as well as possible.

1. It will have a 9" wide wheel in the back for rubber. Its gonna sport street tires. (compromise, its not going to be a track machine, its a truck for crying out loud)
2. Limited slip is on the list.
3. Its going to have 4" of stroke so a whole lot of torque at very low engine speeds.

Questions:
1. What gear should I use for this torque monkey to not spin on the line all day?
2. Is it very expensive or necessary to move away from a leaf spring rear-end in this situation? I dont want wheel hop owning my ass when I punch it.

Reps for good info. thanks for reading mah storiez
1.) Depends on your trans gearing really. I'd go with something midrange to start out with, someling like a 3.5-3.8 range I guess? Without knowing your gearbox I couldn't give you a better starting point than that.

2.) If you're talking about seriously tracking the machine, buy a second set of tires and run bias ply competition tires on them. The rear-end suspension of a truck is, if in good condition, very stiff compared to the rear end of a car. You're simply going to have a very different weight transfer than something like a Mustang.