What length are the stock pushrods in a 350? Or are there several differant lengths depending on what cam it came with stock. I don't have any calipers that go over 6 inches. Also they say that you need hardened pushrods with guide plates which is fine, but how is that differant than the heads that just have the slot for the pushrod to go through? Thanks in advance

 

If it has a flat tappet cam, the stock length is 7.790", depending on how you measure it. http://www.compcams.com/catalog/278.html

I hear all this jabbering about how you "have to have" hardened push rods when you have guide plates.... obviously some of these people have spent too much time reading magazines and not enough time working on cars. Big block Chevy motors for example all come with guide plates from the factory, and most of them have about the lamest excuses for push rods that have ever been devised that you can almost bend with your hands, and yet last well into the multiple hundreds of thousands of miles. Now I've only been building motors for a few decades, I have alot to learn, but I fail to see how that "wive's tale" stacks up against real world experience.

Of course, that's not to say that you should slap the cheapest thing you can find in there; only, that using guide plates rather than the slot in the head, doesn't really change the picture.

 

Thanks for the info. Clears up some confusion.