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- I agree with everyone who said new ignition components from the correct plugs back to distributor. You may find the dist almost impossible to get out as they often corrode in place. New wires are almost surely needed and you should get the ignition harness rubbers from a Macs or a T- Bird parts vendor. These will keep the wires off the manifolds and out of harms way.
- Pull the rocker arm shaft assemblies and clean completely. punch the plugs out of the shafts and be sure there is no gunk in them. Be sure that the shafts are not warn. Also check the surfaces of the rockers that contact the valve stem. These surfaces often become warn and this makes the valves very difficult to adjust. Resurface the rocker surfaces with a fine grit angle grinder if needed.
- Clear the oil drain back holes at the back of the heads. Reinstall the rockers and be sure that oil is getting to all the rockers. These are solid lifter engines and you must set the valve lash to about .018"
- The cheapest dual exhaust setup is the right side pass car ex manifold installed on the left head. There is enough room to sweep a U Bend down and then back to the rear. It is much much better than that stupid crossover!
- If the engine has a 4 bolt 2 bbl carb I say fix it for the time being.
- Valve stem seals are often hardened and broken in old engines. This is a fairly easy thing to correct and pretty cheap.
The small valve heads and the likely worn timing chain with a very mild cam means you will not be burdened with an overabundunce of power but if everything else is up to snuff it will run nice and be better than you would think possible. And you might want to put your next post in the technical section, we want to see how it goes.
Doug T The Highlands, Louisville, Ky. 
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wellcraft17 (1/24/2012) What gas mileage are you lookin for and what do you get now? I have a 56 F100, stock 292 with a 2bbl Holly 2100 #53 main jets, 57 distributor with Pertronix that was set up on a Sun machine, cross over exhaust, 3 speed with O/D and a 3:73 rearend. Took a 200 mile road trip last week and got 14.84 MPG. My 2010 Ford explorer 6cyl. averages about 16.3 MPG.I honestly don't know what the truck gets for milage, It hasn't moved in the 2 months that I have had it. At this time I am just looking to maximize every dollar I put into it. Mark
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In addition to what has been suggested so far, tall, skinny radial tires will improve your mileage as well as comfort, safety and handling. Also, check the "toe" and set to as close to 0 as you can get. You can do this for free with some careful measuring. Misalignment will kill fuel economy as bad as any mechanical issue.
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Thanks for all of your replies, after a few have suggested I move this discussion to technical and since most of my questions will be more specific I have continued this thread there. Thanks, mark
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