Hey everybody, I just purchased two 72 olds 350's bout a week ago for 300 bucks. I plan on selling one and keeping one to drop into my 87 442. Sooo the 307 and th2004r are sitting on a pallet on the garage floor with the Other 350 next to it and the other 350 on a stand. I plan on doing a gasket and rering job as well as the "vin 9" roller cam out of the h/o 307 (.440 int/exh), A4 aluminum intake, unsure of carb, HEI performance distributor, and headers possibly. Does this setup seem respectable? and what are some of your thoughts on running the vin 9 cam in the 350?

 

My thoughts are don't do it. The VIN 9 cams are crap. Even though the 72 350's didn't have much compression, you can still do better than the VIN 9 cam. Either way, I don't think the 307 roller lifters will fit into the 350 anyway, but I'm not certain on that.

 

X2.
Yes, the 307 I believe has the .921 lifter, all the other small blocks have the .842.

 

oh, well that takes that out of the question. does anybody know who makes good (not made in china) roller lifters and cams for the 350?

 

Any Olds vendor will have the goods, but you may want some others thoughts on going to an expensive rollor cam setup in a stock engine you're just doing a rering/regasket job on.

 

rollers are great but the price alone will be a huge chunck of your re ring job.

 

you know, i could probably save the money on the roller stuff and put it into a good valve job. and by the way does anybody in illinois or bordering it want a 350 minus heads or a 307 "h/o"? the 307 runs good but the 350 definitely needs rebuild i just dont wanna scrap it
cuz their not makin any more of em

 

If you are near illinois I have a stout short block needing freshening up. I might part ways with it. It has .030 forged probe pistons.

 

Uhh did you see my signature

 

Another option is to find a set of 14cc pistons on rods. I bet a bunch of guys have a set lying around. Use those, do your re-ring, use a .028 head gasket and the # 7a heads and Cr should be mid-high 8.xx to 1. Balance will probably be off, but enough to notice?? There just is no working around those big friggin dishes on the 71-72 350s.

 

I dont think the balance will be off with stock stuff or atleast off enough to be noticebale . i used a combination of 71 72 and 70 rods all close in wheight with cast flat tops also used that engine ran smooth. That was my experience.

 

Like I implied, probably not enough to notice. The bump in compression is worth it, IMO. Hard to do much with 8 to 1.

 

you dont think i could get the bump in compression from milling the heads a bit? i plan on driving the car on long road trips (about 6-7 hour trips probably 2 a summer) to wisconsin mostly so i really dont want to affect reliability in any way but just want to bump upperformance a bit. i only plan on a new cam and carb with A4 intake (same as performer) an true duals to make the performance of the car respectably and MOST IMPORTANTLY fun to drive and on a small week to week budget

 

By the time you cut the heads enough to make a "bump" in compression, you'll have to mill the bottom of the intake so the ports sit square. Get a set of heads that already have smaller combustion chambers.

 

Don't overkill it. Just get a valve job on the 72 heads, probably #7's. Put new valve springs on them. New timing set, Comp cams .456/456 plus your intake and that will wake it up. In two years you can "drink the cool aid" and the next time go full bogey and thousands of $$. Ken

 

thanks for the helpful info everybody, i think I'm leaning towards what ken said with new timing set and cam but its a work in progress. i do kind of like the piston idea as well and if i can do it without a rebalance thats even better! all good food for thought, time to browse the classifieds and cl to see whats out there

 

Kentucky... How's the 350 block look?

 

71 is #7, 72 is 7a. With the thicker head gasket (stock was a steel shim), cr will be around 8 to 1. Hard to do anything with that, IMHO.

 

No, it isn't.

 

Or, find a 73-76 short block or engine and bolt the older 350 heads on it.

 

it turns over by hand, i was having trouble posting pictures last night but it still has the stock bore size, no previous rebuilds. i would say condition is OK to good but not great

 

and captjim, the A4 doesn't flow the same as performer? Ive read a bunch of stuff online saying it flows just as well but have also heard stuff that says the opposite..

 

They probably flow about the same, but they are different.

There's a guy on the Olds forums that did back to back comparisons between a Performer and a stocker ( on various mild Olds engines ) and he says there was never a difference in ET or MPH between the two but claimed gains with the RPM intake on all the engines he tested.

My opinion is, if you don't want to go with the RPM intake, then just keep the stock A4 as the Performer isn't going to do much if anything at all.

 

Like DoubleV sated, I did not say one was better, just that they are not the same.
" Ive read a bunch of stuff online"