(not sure if this is the right thread) I was just wondering why the ford 5.0 is such a beast (car craft got like 390 hp out of a naturally aspirated ford 5L) and Chevy's 5.0 is a starter V8/paper weight to most?

390 N/A is cake! 305's arent popular because a 350 will bolt right in its place. Best bang for your buck for power. Ford's cant do that.

305's can make good power. Parts that work well with the 305 are harder to find than its larger brother. The ford 5.0 has a short stroke, larger bore. So they make good hp, but less low end torque. They also rev quicker and sound different.

There's just not much point to building up a 305 except for pride. Ford guys always give us **** because we "need" to use a motor 48 ci bigger to be faster. If the 305 was all we had, I can assure you, there would still be a lot of chevy powerhouses.

i actually have a mild built 305

bored.030 over.
a mystery cam. holley street dominator intake, 600 cfm edelbrock 4bbl.

and a timing advance.

i walk 302s all day.
even ones with work done to them.

so its kind of like , if you know what parts work better with each other. nothing is impossible.

i always smile when they say that i need a 350 to beat them.
but then i show them the pic of the casting number on my block that i keep in my phone and then they shut up.

well theres also the chevy 302, which isnt to hard to build and would give a semi equal comparison. it uses the same bore and stroke.

Bore and stroke. The Ford 5.0 has a larger bore than the tiny 305's bore. Bigger bore makes more HP and allows for bigger valves. Now if you compare a Ford 302 with a Chev 302, the Chev will be just as good if not better.

Although I've "HEARD" the Ford 5.0 has more potential, here is how the 5.0 Stang lines up to the 5.0 Camaro Iroc-Z in 1986:

Camaro: 190 HP, 285 TQ
Mustang: 198 HP, 263 TQ

I wouldn't say that the 5.0 is necessarily faster. Obviously these numbers could vary a little bit through out the years they were produced. The funny thing about this, though, is GM offered the much more powerful 350's and the Mustang didn't get those. The displacement difference goes all the way to today. Mustangs, for a long time only offered 4.6 liters, usually around 270 HP. F-Body's offered 5.7 liters, LT1's around that 270ish mark and LS1's up to 310 HP. Now Mustangs come with 5.3 Liters, I think, and the new Camaro's, from what I've heard, are getting 6 liters. There is no replacement for displacement, even if Ford puts a supercharger on everything they make to compete with Chevy's muscle.

Back to the topic at hand, Seeing as how our 5.0 and their 5.0 have that same base displacement, I don't think it is unreasonable to say, once both are completely modded, the results would still be pretty close.

Actually the ford 302 is superior to the chevy 305 due to the facts that stephan stated above, it has a larger bore than the tiny bore of the 305 which allows for larger valves and better fuel atomization which in turn makes more power. Not saying that the 305 can't be built to make a lot of power, it's just easier on the 302 due to the design.

The 305s heads flow better than the 302s. The 305s bore doesn't limit the power more than 5-7 hp, compared to an equal displacement engine. The 305 can make GREAT power with 1.94/1.60 valves installed in its heads. The 305s block can take more power than the 302. Above 400 hp the 302 block is known to crack into two pieces.

Just compare the engines, not the cars. If you try to compare a mustang with a 302 to a camaro with a 305, you're not comparing apples to apples. The cars have different handling characteristics, weight, aerodynamics, etc. You might as well be comparing a F150 with a 5.0 to a C1500 with a 5.0.

good point.

when they compared the z-28 camaro with the 305 tpi, to the 5.0 mustang.
the car itself outhandled the mustang. and performance was pretty close to the both.
but yea. just the engines

who cares its a ford

The Chevy 305 and the Ford 302 have nothing in common, other than both being 5.0 liters (the Ford is actually 4.9L rounded up). The Ford 302 is like a Chevy 350 with a shorter stroke, like a Chevy 302 has.

The Ford 5.0 has 4 head bolts per cylinder, which opens up some space for ports. This allows for more power, but also makes it more prone to head gasket failure.

The other weakness is the block - they are known to split down the middle when power levels go up.