289 Horsepower gains with cyl. heads?

ARF 165 heads are highly recommended. You would need a modern intake and exhaust to fully realize the benefit.

http://www.carcraft.com/techarticles/1…ldup/index.html

http://airflowresearch.com/

Z. Ray

I agree on the AFR 165 heads. These are high velocity/small port heads that make a ton of power. I am running a set on my 1993 5.0. I had them upgraded at the factory with race valves, springs and titanium retainers. If performance and weight savings are what you want keep the original heads and manifold on the shelf. You can pick up a good Edelbrock F4B intake on Ebay or a newer Edelbrock RPM. A swap here would make a very noticeable gain. Again, those heads are amazing. If you have a rear wheel dyno available, do a before and after.

Get the 58cc version of this head. The actual combustion chamber design is superior to that of the larger chambered head. Also, you do not need the emission head which is designed for an emissions 5.0L engine. The 58cc head is basically an out of the box race head that has its roots in NMRA Pure Street racing. This head makes more power then much larger port heads thanks to its high velocity ports. AFR constantly makes improvements to the design. These heads will really wake up that iron headed 289. Careful though, HP is addictive.

I would stay with the 3 x 2 induction initially. Try it for a while and if you don't like the results then change to something else. No point in incurring more expense until you know how well the 3 x 2 will perform.

Z. Ray

Edited by - zrayrichter on 04/28/2008 21:39:30

I am running the 3x2 setup from Pony Carbs on my 289. It uses a reproduction intake with modified Autolite 2100 carbs with 1.08" venturis. I am running this setup with my 289, Edelbrock RPM 1.90 (got a deal on these otherwise I would have purchased a second set of AFR 165s), Flowtech Induction solid lifter cam, Doug's 4-1 header and yada yada yada. The tripower kit comes with thick paper spacers which I replaced with aluminum spacers that I had machined down to .125" since the spacers included were not quite the same height. With the supplied air breather, there is contact at the front where the hood has the spot welded metal bracing. I machined down the bosses on the bottom of the cleaner so it just clears the top of the ignition wires on the top of the distributor. The factory distributor will work fine as does an MSD small diameter pro billet unit. Their wider version will not fit as it will hit the front carb. MSD also has outstanding online support on their forum. The lid that comes with the

kit also has the cast fins front to back. This adds another .125" to the height, and the fins could be machined down in the front for more space. Instead, I will use the 390/427 lid that does not have the fins running full length. Also, I am running polished Offenhauser valve covers and do not run the PCV valve from them. Instead, I use a tall early version screw in PCV which bolts to the back of the intake where the downdraft tube would go. The early tall PCV uses the narrower tube and I run that to the bottom of the air cleaner. There just isn't enought room for the wider 1/2" PCV and the screw in fitting for the automatic vacuum source. Also, for the center carb, you should purchase the hot air tube kit for the choke and run it back to the header. No electric or manual choke here. Hope this help none of this comes with the installation video.