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HEI Upgrade

smfulle

smfulle

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Ogden, Utah
I'm thinking about upgrading my ignition from points to HEI. My truck is a 59 with a 327 engine that the previous owner got out of a car. The motor is mounted on the original front engine mounts and the bell housing mounts. I am wondering if the larger HEI distributor will have any clearance problems on my 59? What's in there now looks pretty close. I haven't really gotten in there with the tape measure or anything, but it looks like that if it does fit it will be pretty tight.

Stan
 
on my 57 a HEI won't fit but I did the pionts dizzy with the crane xfi modual it coverts it over so thier is no more pionts and it also has a adjustable rev limiter
 
space

if there is not enough room the easily slide your hand ( that the thickness part) between the distributor cap and the firewall, then there is not enough room for and HEI.
 
Hey ,

Just get a points eleminator kit and use the stock dist.The large HEI dist's will not fit unless you move the motor up.The accel ones are $65 at kragen part number is #2010.
 
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If you are Still using the Factory Cantilever motor mounts, the HEI will fit nicely. but the rear mounts must be fresh.
 
I'm kind of in limbo right now with my truck. I don't have a garage and it's a little cool to be climbing around the thing right now here in Northern Utah. It's not subzero like some of you see, but it didn't get above 20 Fahrenheit for a few days in a row. And I've been busy keeping my snow blower running.

I am driving the thing to work every day though. I'm actually thinking of changing the whole engine out this summer. The 327 that is in there right now is pretty tired. I lose a lot of oil pressure when the thing is warmed up and I think it leaks out of every gasket on the thing. I though of rebuilding it myself, but I'm leaning towards a 350 crate engine. Since I'm just looking to have a truck that's fun to drive I think I can get by fairly cheap with the basic 350.

One reason that I wanted to go with the GM style HEI ignition, besides the obvious performance improvement, was to get rid of the external coil. When I bought this truck the coil was just laying loose on top of the intake manifold, and I still have not come up with a place to tie it down that I really like. That's probably a silly reason to change my whole ignition system, but that's how I think sometimes.

Not working on it does give me more time to ponder things that I want to do to it. It's probably not a good thing though. My budget doesn't come even close to matching my wants list.

Thanks for the interest and all the tips.

Stan
 
Stan,

You will be happy with the 350 but they are a dime a dozen.That 327 is a nice motor and would make you very happy as well.I have a 327 in my 59 green fleet side and it runs great.I did a stock rebuild with a little cam and a carter 600 and it will smoke the tires all day long.Plus the 327 is a very sought after motor .If you don't rebuild the 327 i might want it.




Cliff
 
Took the plunge

I finally decided to take Cliff's advice and went down to my local Checker Auto and bought Accel Points Eliminator. This was still in Feb. so it was still too cold for me to work outside much (no garage). I waited until my wife was going to be gone for the evening then pulled the distributor out brought it in the house on the kitchen table to do the conversion. Couldn't of gotten away with that if she were home.

Once I got the distributor put back together and installed back in the truck it made a big difference in starts and idle, especially cold idle. Bumped my mpg up a mile or two as well. Definitely worth it!

Thanks for the recommendation.

Still planning on converting to the 350 engine this summer. I am also considering making the switch to a 5 speed overdrive transmission.

Stan
 
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