Thread: SB 350 - Need some advice

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Hi everyone !

Wow ! Thanks alot for all our replys and welcomes greeting

Let me start with some more details.
I'm looking to buy my first small block car (Chevy Impala 73)
I though the different between the 350 engine was small things like carbs and heads.
I have read "how to build max performance chevy small blocks on a budget" and now it's all about combination. But yesterday i saw this:

I really see no reason to go as far as swapping the whole top end. We're skipping a few basic steps people. If you're planning on incremental upgrades, the order should ALWAYS be:
1. free flowing 2.5" mandrel bent dual exhaust and mufflers
2. exhaust headers

(Some people will stop here, having been surprised at the difference in performance.)

3. aftermarket dual plane intake manifold (with the factory cam, I would recommend the old standby Edelbrock 2101 Performer or generic Summit/Jeg's equivalent, or step up to the 7101 Performer RPM type if a cam/head swap is in your future)
4. cam swap... you can do the cam now, and swap the heads later. Something along the lines of the Comp Cams 268H will wake up the engine quite a bit.
5. cylinder heads. This part gets dicey, as some people will tell you to buy nothing less than AFR 210s or some such thing, while others will fly the Vortec head banner until the day they die. Car Craft magazine recently did a head to head shootout of budget aftermarket heads and found that even the Jeg's house brand heads do quite well at a much lower price.

If you do these steps in order, you will still get to enjoy your car, as it's not usually apart for more than a weekend or so at a time. You will also get to find out first hand what each modification does for the feel of the car. By the time you get past step 5, you are ready to tackle the bottom end of the engine if need be, as you are very familiar with how it's all put together.


But i do also now, that everyone can write everything on the internet, so i want to check that

The car is gonna be my daily driver, and run on unleaded 95, so i dont need a 500+ hp engine. I have a 250-300 hp engine in mind?

But ! The car is original born with a 454" engine. Would i be better of just buy one of those ? in Denmark they cost around 3.700 $ (renovated one - 350 hp) And i could sell the old 350" for around 1.300 - 1.400 $

I hope your understand