Questions and Answers

Ford F-250 302 To 351 Q. My question is concerning my Dad's 1988 Ford F-250 LD 4x4 automatic transmission and around 117,000 miles. It has a 302 engine in it right now and it is in desperate need of a new engine. My question then is he would like to know if it is possible of putting a 351 in instead of the same 302 size?

He had many problems with his 302, such as not much power and around 70,000 it started throwing oil from a bad rear seal, that more than mechanic told him was a common problem on these motor. The whole engine had to be pulled in order to fix it, so instead they did temporary fixes by putting gasket compound on.

This would work for a while and even made the loss less. They felt Ford should of had a recall on these engines, but that was not so. He had one motor tech from a rebuild shop tell him it should and one from another say it wouldn't because of the wiring and that he would have to have this all rewired? It is on it's final leg it is knocking real bad. Any help you could give us would be nice.

Thanks...

A. The good news is that the 351 will drop right in. The bad news is you will need the harness and PCM for the 351. Since the PCM for the 351 is different for manual and automatic, so be sure you get the correct one.

A junk yard should be able to supply you with an engine, harness and PCM in one package.

Just a thought, you can also put a 7.3 liter diesel in it. That would be a drop in as well.