360 gas mileage

[zentar]

As does almost everyone I know my 72 with a 360 gets about 9 mpg. Is there any way to improve that just a little?

[19FORD67]

Drive it less??

sorry,..

[ok68crewcab]

Hey, how are you getting 9 mpg? Around town I don't get that but I have a F-350 crewcab with auto and 4:10 gears. I'm also make good use of my size 13 on the gas pedal which doesn't help. Haven't had a straight highway run to see what the best I could get might be. A lot of people say improving the exhaust is the first step along with driving sensibly.

[Jarred Hodges]

if the motor is bone stock I would say headers and dual exhaust then a aluminum intake and vs 4 bbl carb.

[cmoore]

I have a vacuum gauge that shows the "power" vs. "economy" range as you accelerate. I try to get up to speed and then level-off when I can to reduce consumption....

[zentar]

Duel exhaust will come soon just not sure about the headers. Carb needs to be rebuilt Iam sure cause It cuts out till it gets warmed up then after it runs a while its kinda hard to start with a little bit of smoke.

[sideoilerfe]

As does almost everyone I know my 72 with a 360 gets about 9 mpg. Is there any way to improve that just a little?

No. 360's are fuel eaters. 390's are a little better but not much. new exhaust on your stock engine won't increase your mileage.

[ToughOldFord]

Don't ever expect mileage from an FE. I'm the Guinna pig on this. If you go over my history of posts you'll see five years of trying to climb into the double digits since I bought my '69. Here's the Reader's Digest version:

Truck: 1969 F250, 360, dual exhaust with glass packs, 2V, C6, 4:10 rear. Severely neglected truck, PO had had it for 15 years and I don't think he did a thing to it except drive it all of those years. I'll skip all the stuff I did to make it drivable and, ahem, stoppable, and cut to the fuel issue. I'll make the point in advance that I have no brake drag.

Was getting 6mpg when I got it.

Rebuilt pukey, leaky Motorcraft carburetor. Installed new points and condenser. Old points were burnt to where there was almost no contacts left. Reset timing to factory 6 degrees. Was set at 0' TDC.

Mileage went to 8mpg.

Checked and discovered #4 wasn't firing at all. Pulled the plug and found it gummed up with years of AT fluid that it sucked down through the vacuum feed for the blown tranny modulator. (Had to shift this thing on the column to get most of the way into third.) I thought I had it now, surely running on seven cylinders and a malfunctioning transmission had to be why I was only getting 8mpg. Replaced all plugs and transmission modulator. Truck ran MUCH better.

8mpg. Arrrgggg.....

New quality cap and rotor, wires, and protonix ignition and flamethrower coil.

8mpg

Replaced the 4:10 rear with 3:75's, dropped 200 RPMs cruising speed.

8mpg

Replaced the 360 with a 390 that I put a few things on, Dana timing set, Crane cam and lifters, and a 4V H*lley carb.

8mpg

Tried playing with timing, 8 degrees, 12 degrees, and back to 8 after no change in performance or mileage.

Installed a fan clutch.

8.5mpg

Later installed my A/C compressor and had to remove the fan clutch due to clearance issues.

8mpg

Upgraded to a manual transmission, NP 4 speed.

9 to 9.5mpg

You can see trying to get any mileage out of this thing while maintaining it's 'work truck' status has been a giant tail chase. If I had to do it over again I'd probably just go with the 300 I6, but until then I'm living with it while I drive it.

[junkyardjeff]

Adding a electronic ignition improved the mileage on the 390 in my 65 country squire,it was getting about 12 to 13 and after I put in the duraspark ignition it jumped up some plus I jetted the carb down a couple jet sizes and now gets 16.5 on the highway.

[64squire]

Adding a electronic ignition improved the mileage on the 390 in my 65 country squire,it was getting about 12 to 13 and after I put in the duraspark ignition it jumped up some plus I jetted the carb down a couple jet sizes and now gets 16.5 on the highway.

Did you re-curve the distributer? I have a Duraspark to use in my 64 Country Squire once the 352 (bored and stroked with 390 crank/rods) is back from machining. I can't wait to put it all back together. Which carb are you running?

[trukcrazy]

All of my trucks would get 9-10 mpg intown, on the highway, rolling down a hill, it didn't matter. Until I got my 68 F100 with the 360-AT. It would get 14 mpg. I couldn't believe it. Stock engine with headers, dual exhaust and Pertronix ignition conversion with a good tune-up. I think the FE just needs to breathe better with the exhaust upgrade helping alot. Good luck

[junkyardjeff]

I did not recurve the distributor and I have a holley 750 carb,I got two durasparks for smallblocks and they both need to be recurved due to they are advancing too much and pinging but the FE distributor worked just fine. What is strange is before I done the carb rejet and added the duraspark I could only put in premium gas or the motor pinged but now I can use regular and I also put in a hotter thermostat so I could get some heat.

Adding a electronic ignition improved the mileage on the 390 in my 65 country squire,it was getting about 12 to 13 and after I put in the duraspark ignition it jumped up some plus I jetted the carb down a couple jet sizes and now gets 16.5 on the highway.

Did you re-curve the distributer? I have a Duraspark to use in my 64 Country Squire once the 352 (bored and stroked with 390 crank/rods) is back from machining. I can't wait to put it all back together. Which carb are you running?

[Steve75]

I must have been luck then. When I was driving my 68 F-100 I was getting 11 miles to the gallon with the tailgate up and 10 miles to the gallon with the tailgate down. Truck went back and forth between Holly two barrel and stock Ford two barrel with breaker point ignition. The truck has a 360 and C-6 in it. The only performance upgrades on it were the Holly two barrel and headers with dual exhaust and a shift kit, otherwise bone stock.

[70_F100]

The only way to get better mileage is to replace the fuel line with a smaller line.

The gas mileage on a 360 would be worse than it is, but that's all of the gas that can flow through the line.

I'm like trukcrazy, 9.5, uphill, downhill, towing, headwind, tailwind...

Heck, I think I got 9.5 one time without ever moving it out of the driveway...

[zack]

I bet if we could raise the compression on our 360s they would get much better gas milage, something like 10-1, it would make much more efficiant use of the fuel, especially at high way speeds, ....360 compression is absolutly horrible..........