a friend of mine has this same truck and  people have told me the front tires come off the ground when its in low 1st he has a 350 with nouthing done to it just  flowmaster mufflers and a 650 carb hes got diffrent gears then me there light trucks they just look heavy im putting the 350 in the place of a v6 4.3 these trucks come with 4.3s 305s and 350s  im gunna build this as a project and buy stuff as i go the 350 i just put a new oil pump in and a oil pan and it has bean rebuilt i think the truck had this motor put in when it was my uncles and itsa in the plow truck right now and keeps needing new spark plugs  

I can safely say that this pickup pulling the front wheels is a farse. That much weight transfer in a stock suspension truck with street tires is impossible without the engine over the rear wheels...

Clyde, have you gotten out a micrometer and looked at .030 thousandths of an inch lately? .030" is not the difference between a head cracking and not cracking, .030" is VERY minute.

The cam companies are just an opinion I guess. If you want to stay away from them then by all means do it but I'm still convinced that something else was the culprit. Did you ever get a flat tappet cam to stay in that particular block?

Here's a couple quotes to illustrate my point...

"Polished chamber have never proven to be better in any of my testing. I use a 120 grit finish, they carbon up a little and make good power. There is no magic there from what I have seen. I have mirror polished pistons and chambers and never saw a dang thing in it.

I do radius everything in sight. there are no sharp edges anywhere on my pistons. Flame travel is paramount in importance!"

From Darin Morgan


"In 1969, we spent a month at Holman & Moody doing dyno development work on our drag racing Boss 429 engine. One of the experiments included the removal of the heads followed by a thorough cleaning of the light carbon deposits in the chambers and on the pistons. After installing the heads again, the engine was down on power from where we'd been previously. As we accrued more run time on the engine, the power came back....as did the carbon-dusting on the pistons.
In the mid-70's we did some work with a laboratory here in Texas that was formulating additives that removed carbon from intake ports and combustion chambers. After over a year of testing, it was rather conclusive that "clean" chambers and pistons were less efficient than those with a base-layer of carbon. Less efficient, meaning higher BCSF's and less power.
I've never highly polished pistons or chambers since....."

From Larry Widmer

-I have never polished pistons other than maybe a set or two when I was young.
"-I actually prefer to have the top of the piston precisionally roughed up with a 50grit sanding roll where the lines act as precise edges to rip up any liquid fuel particularly near the shroud wall of the intake.
-I sweep these striations from the intake eyebrow over towards the sparkplug and make gentle curvatures back in towards the exhaust pocket. "

From Bill Jones

This is no secret, Richie Zul had this phenomenon figured out way back in the 70's when he was racing NHRA Pro Stock!  

First ,I agree with the truck thing,somebody is telling some"FISH" storys on a Chev truck pullin the wheels with only a carb and flowmasters.One of my race buds had a 377,(400 block with 350crank)the heads were worked severely and with a 3500 stall 488 spool 14bolt rear and a 2bill shot still couldnt get that heavy mother to pull maybe the driver front a inch or so on a PERFECT run!!! thats a 4,000 lbs truck,aint happnin on a stock 350 without so much spray as to blow the crank out the bottom befor the end of the track.You need to carry a BIG *** filter when talkin to guys like that,friend.As for the head coversation,Gib,I cannot contest these quotes,and I havent had the chance to get hold of Ken bout it,hes a busy man.This much I do know,all the shops and head"GRINDERS" Ive talked to have HIGHLY rec'd chamber polishing,and MY first exp. with it GREATLY reduced my own det. prob.I cannot say any other gain or loss occured,just rid me of the need to run 4.00 a gal. fuel cause of detonation.OBVIOUSLY there is a crucial level of science involved and from my own exp. and conversations prior to this,only one true outcome.For each engine,pending the circumstances,is the choice to or not.I see no engine specs listed for for these tests,with which I plan to read more of for my own research.I am talking about det. control only,nothing more gain or loss,to utalise 305 heads on a cheap built 350 bottom end.Detonation is real fine line science in any case.And to go to the mill,one of my friends has been a machinist and BIG (diesel tractor pulls)engine builder since the 50's.He wont mill chev heads that far.Hes prob seen a few thousand or so through his shop,and hates them cause they are so crack prone between chambers, as the old"camelhumps" did so often when milled that far.It makes risk factors such as pumping glycol through the bottom end,which crystalizes under friction and heat,and destroys the crank,pistons and anything with a toleranced fit.No thanks.Id run the 305's till I could get a set of REAL heads from World or Brodix or the likes.If a guy wants these risks,power to him.I took that BAD advice on my first Chev and learned my lesson the hard way after warned,and it WAS suggested to run the 305's.I wanted more comp and top end.It bit me.So I decided then it was a big risk.Went through it,Put the 305's on,and t'was a strong engine after 1500.00 in repair.Shoulda listened to the O'boy to start.Its a safety window if on a budget,unable to aford the risks.  

I am running a 400 small block with 305 heads, tq-cam, performer intake, 750 carb, headers and duel exhaust in a '86 long bed. It does just fine, yes I did port work on the heads. If you try to jack the timing too high it will ping but it also has a faster flame travel so it does not need as much timing. Using an adjustable vacuum advance is a plus along with playing with mechanical advance. The truck will smoke the tires (32x10.50s) as far as you want to stay in it. 305 heads have good velocity intake ports and bigger is not always better. The biggest work in my heads is in the bowl area under the valve to open up that choke point. Put a modern cam profile, TOP of the line lifters(the real reason cams fail) and the 305 heads on the 350 and have a good time. The things you learn by building and tuning it will serve you on your next motor. Plus supreme gas is only .20 cents more any way, whats the big deal?  

ya I just got a 1995 chevy 350 vortec from a g20 van so im gunna use that I only paid 100$ and it runs good I pulled it out myself  

ok im buliding a 350 with 305 heads that had bigger valves put in them, then intake is 184 i cant rember the exhaust but the cam im running is 292duration and 488 int and 510 exh . will this motor put out power or am i just wasting my time  

If I may say something.  You guys seem to have quite a debate going on here.  If there's an engine to be built on a budget, I'd say he needs to stick with the parts he has and make the best of them.  I, personally, would use 350 heads and spend a couple hundred bucks having them shaved slightly and a good valve job done.  As long as you have good valve springs and a decent set of rockers (I always ran 1.6 rollers)and a mild cam, it's not hard to pull 400hp out of a small block.  If the bottom end is put together properly, 400hp is plenty to make his pickup cruise down the road and have fun without having to worry about a whole lot.  Trust me, if there's anything I know, it's how to squeeze power out of a budget small block.  The first thing I'd do is invest $50 in a simple desktop dyno program and play with it for a while and come up with a good combination before you buy a bunch of parts.  

Yeah, we had a good debate here...

In July of last year!  

Oh yeah.  I just signed up for the site recently.  I wasn't even paying attention to the date.  Sorry.