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I'm going to build a 1958 430 to put in my 58 custom 4-door.
I want 400 - 450 horsepower.

The plans are for 9.5 custom pistons.

Modified big block chevy headers (shorty).

Complete electronic ignition.

Reground high performance cam, with fe roller rockers

Ported and polished heads.

My question invovles intake manifolds. I want to run a single four barrel intake. Which year of 430/462 manifold would be best for performance. I know it will have to be ported and I mighy even consider having it extrude-honed. My other idea was to get a tri-power intake and block off the outer two carb mounting surfaces and remachine the center to accept a 4 barrel.

Any opinions?

Will most likely be from a 58/59 MERC 430.

I haven't gotten the parts lists to compare between LINC-MERC but the best route will be MERC in my opinion. It will be cast iron as no alum. 4V intake was available for this series engine as far as I know.

Converting a tri power to accept a 4 brl? Are you jokin'?

No I am no jokeing!! I've heard of it being done for other engines.

Whats the problem!!

Why modify a fairly rare intake (OEM or EDELBROCK).
If you found one, it would be better to build yourself a tri-power for it.

I would rather just run one single carb since I'm inexpericed with a tri-power setup. I think even a modified tri-power intake would be worth more performance than a modifed cast iron factory intake. Any thoughts?

I recently ran across someone who modified a offenhauser 394 olds tri-power to a single 4-v because it was the only new intake manifold he could find.

Any thoughts on modifying a factory cast iron intake? My engine did not come with an intake so I will need to obtain one. What type of porting and machine work will have to be done to get it to flow to match highly modified heads? I know it will probably need a large carb spacer.

Can you provide us w. more details on your HP application? It's always better to get the whole picture.
Cam events, axle ratio, wheel diam. weight of vehicle, trans / converter and intendet usage.
Any sort of modification has to start from data like this.

I think you are going to find that a 430 is not going to be a high winding engine. Even the Holman-Moody engines of the late fifties were limited to 6000rpm before they came apart. True, technology has come a long way since then, but it will cost a fortune to lighten up the bottom end and valvetrain. Then there is this continuing annoying problem of no cam blanks available and having to rely on a regrind.

If it is going to be a street engine, the torque alone will carry the weight of a 58 FORD easily. MEL never made an aluminum 4V intake available (to my knowledge) so you will have to rely on an early cast iron for induction. A carb spacer should only be used as a heat shield as varying spacer height in this instance is not going to get you much due to higher RPM restrictions. Even port maching the intake and manifold is questionable due to the low RPM potential of the engine. Porting the runners on the head will most likely not net a return on the investment either. You would need a flowbench to see if the effort is worth the time/expense.

The 58 MERC engine breathed fairly easily, but the earliest ones had valvetrain problems. There is TSB info available to identify these early engines and I need to get off my lazy butt and find a set.

Listen to Theo as he has one of those desktop dyno things and one can save you a lot of time amd money.

I second Kultulz view of point. Unless you have a hotter camshaft, working out a reasonable concept will be much air for questionable results.
Good luck and have fun w. your MEL though

I also agree with Kultulz. You're going to have much bigger problems with the valve train and oiling system. I knew where some excellent tips and tricks for hopping up a MEL are...but it's on another forum

Beep authored it and REALLY knows his stuff, I've had a few conversations with him and next time I'll see if he'd be willing to repost his guide here.

BTW, I've got a cast iron 4v intake you can have if you want.