Well heres the deal, I have an 87 D150 8' 2WD bed auto non lock up with a fresh 9.25 posi with 391 gears. The truck and engine have a little over 300,000 miles and is starting to use a good bit of oil. I purchesed a 71 225 out of a dart and I wanna freshen it up. Now I work the hell out of this truck, and it always does the job, I just want to get it done a little faster. Looking for some ideas on inexpensive power mods. Should I use the solid or hyd cam set up and what dur., and how can I get a high presure oil pump. The truck also has the lean burn set up that will be gone at time of swap, so what would be a good distributer to use. Now fuel milage is also important.Well thanks for your ideas.I will try to post picks in the near future.

(1) 2 1/4 exhaust all the way back with deleted catalytic converters if your emissions laws will let you

(2) the mechanical camshaft as more options as far as aftermarket camshafts go. Order one of the RV profile cams from Erson cams. Members of this website worked with Erson cams to come up with camshaft profiles that are proven to work with the slant six. Search the site for the "Erson Cam Group Buy" thread. For a work truck, I would recommend the RV10 or RV 15 camshaft.

(3) I will go against common wisdom and say that you should keep a one barrel carb. However, I would recommend switching to a Holley 1920 carburetor (Economaster if you can find one). In a work truck you won't spin the motor fast enough to out-breath the one barrel carb and if fuel economy is a factor then the one barrel is better

(4) Use the factory aluminum one barrel intake manifold

(5) Mill your head or deck your block to achieve about an 8:1 dynamic compression ratio. This will take careful measuring and math, but it is worth it in the end

(6) degree whatever cam you install

(7) high volume oil pumps are not necessary on a slant six. Search this site for Doctor Dodge's instructions on how to rebuild your oil pump

(8 ) the "best" distributor to use would be the "Super Six" distributor. however, you really should tailor your distributor advance curve to your specific engine and vehicle. You will likely end up experimenting with the springs and vacuum advance pod on the distributor anyway to achieve maximum economy and power, so it doesn't really matter which one you start with. Search this site for discussions of "distributor recurving."

(9) Run the stock air cleaner with the cold air intake and heated air intake systems intact and functioning

Doing these things should result in a slant six that at least has more power if not more economy than the stock motor.

If you are on an absolute shoestring budget, I would suggest the following:

(1) use the stock mechanical 225 cam in the 71 motor

(2) use the one barrel carb from the 71 motor (if the 87 motor uses the one piece aluminum intake manifold, keep it)

(3) convert the ignition system to HEI

(4) mill the head or deck the block to get 8:1 dynamic compression

(5) run 2 1/4 inch exhaust all the way back

(6) keep the stock air cleaner with the cold and heated air intake systems intact and functional

(7) degree the cam when it is installed

(8 ) rebuild the stock oil pump as per Doctor Dodge's instructions

(9) verify that the timing mark on the vibration dampener is still correct and hasn't slipped

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.