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While rummaging through some of my dad and I stuff, I found an old streetmaster 289 intake. I was wondering if anyone knew anything about these intakes, are they a decent intake? I am currently running a 289 in my 83 ranger with a factory ford 1983 4 bbl intake on it. I would like to switch them out if the edelbrock is any better.

I've always heard good stuff about the Edelbrock Torquer/TorquerII intakes that I don't believe are made anymore and were replaced by the Performer series back in the 90s. But that one, I know nothing about. And as I think about it, the recommendations on Torquers were for SBCs. I don't even know if they make Torquers for Ford Windsors (289/302). There's gotta be something that'll show up for you on a Google search to give you an idea how worthy it is.

My gut feeling is if it is aluminum and it is replacing a cast iron intake or even a stock aluminum intake, it's worth the swap. Now if you are comparing it to some other aftermarket aluminum intake, I have no clue. I'd expect you'd need port dimension info to determine.

It is an aluminum intake, and the intake it would be replacing is also aluminum. The edelbrock is a single plane and I'm not quite smart enough to know the pros and cons as far as single plane versus dual plane.

Ahh, single vs dual plane.

First off in a V8, you have a unique condition where at any given point in the crank rotation, there's an intake valve open somewhere. As that valve closes, another is opening so there are times when you have 2 valves open for a very brief time period. On stock and mild aftermarket cams, this doesn't pose much problem. However on wide duration aftermarket cams with standard single plane intakes, this causes significant intake inversion. This is what causes the lope-lope sound. The more radical the cam, the more it lopes and usually the higher in the RPM range it lopes thus often forcing you to run a higher idle RPM than a stock cam. On EFI systems, this isn't that big of a problem. But on carbed setups, this poses a much more important issue. As one piston is dropping in its bore producing vaccum, you've got another cylinder rising in the bore with its intake valve still open. And as you might imagine, it's literally shoving some of the intake charge back up into the intake. This lowers the vacuum in the intake. And as you know, carbs require a certain amount of vacuum to get the fuel to aspirate into the air. The more radical the cam is, the longer the time period when 2 valves are open at the same time, and the lower the vacuum gets at idle conditions creating idle fueling issues.

What a dual plane does is separate out sequentially firing cylinders. On a 4bbl carb, you'll have 2 bbls on one plenum, and 2 bbls on the other plenum. With this setup, as aspirating cylinder (piston dropping on the intake stroke) is pulling from a plenum is physically separated from the cylinder that aspirated immediately before it (on the compression stroke with an intake valve still open). This prevents inversion from affecting fueling thus allowing more radical cams to run saner idle RPMs and take off at idle without conking themselves out as soon as you touch the gas.

Now in a stock cam, you are likely to never notice the difference between single or dual plane. It is theoretically possible a single plane will get a stock/mild cam a little more power due to less complication and routing. But any engine running a stock cam probably isn't going to be limited by slight inefficiencies of a dual plane intake. Although the engine with the radical cam will be. So choosing to use a dual plane intake with a "built" engine can be a sacrifice to performance in the effort to tame the engine for streetability.

Does that help with regard to the difference between single and dual plane?

Now which intake will actually make you more power with a given setup is specific to the intakes being compared and the engines they'd be placed on. You can't make a generality that will make that decision for you.

That really does clear up that issue for me, thank you very much! the 289 is completely stock, I may go ahead and slap the streetmaster on it and see how much it helps/hinders. I never was thrilled with the way it ran with an automatic in it, just seemed really doggy till about 3,000 RPM then it opened up, almost like a 2 stroke. I have yet to drive it with the 5 speed in it, but I am sure that will make a difference all in itself. Thank you again for sharing your knowledge.

289s like high RPMs. They are short stroked so the pistons have less distance to travel. Thus how they can be spun up really high. The downside is obviously less CID and thus less torque at lower RPM than an engine with a larger CID and/or longer stroke. So it's no surprise that you have to rev it a little higher. Add to it that it is 100% stock, it's got some things holding it back. If it had AFR165s, a better cam, better compression, and all that, you'd find the 289 easily doing better across the RPM range.

I think too that the carb is too big, I know nothing about it other than its a holley with no choke. I found it and stuck it on there! This build was on a pretty slim budget. I've got a few more carbs, I'll try another one when I get tranny back in it.

Yeah, carb selection and cam selection are the 2 places where people tend to go overboard. A carb supports an engine, it doesn't make the engine. So oversizing a carb often doesn't get you anything but headaches. You'll find MUCH better response, fuel economy, and all around performance with a smaller carb. I can't tell you how many people slap a Holley 750 on top of a stock engine just because the cost difference at the store between a 750 and 650 wasn't much if anything when quite often the 650 would've been oversized, but at least usable. For stock engines and most mildly build small blocks, a 500 cfm carb is plenty without choking the engine.

Since you say you have a few carbs to choose from, your best throttle response and fuel economy is going to be gotten from "progressive" 4bbl carbs with vacuum secondaries...the ones where the primaries are visibly smaller than the secondaries. With this type carb, you've got a carb that acts small with all the responsiveness and fuel economy of a tiny 2bbl. But when you need it to be big, it can be that too with the larger secondaries. The preference for mechanical secondaries on strip-only engines is they are simpler so there's less to go wrong and they don't choke the engine at any point. Generally at WOT, you have little to no vacuum to speak of. But vacuum secondaries requires a tiny bit before they will open. That something you don't what on a strip engine, but it isn't as bad as it sounds for applications built to run on the street any amount of time. It is true, the presence of vacuum indicates the engine is capable of more but the carb isn't delivering thus holding the engine back and this is exactly what a vacuum secondary carb would do. On the street, the compromise is worth it to ensure the secondaries don't open until the engine is in an RPM range it can tolerate the secondaries. So with a properly sized vacuum secondary equipped engine, you can punch the throttle right off idle without fear of conking the engine out because only the primaries open. Engine begins to rev up, and once the engine has built up enough RPM that it's producing a slight vacuum with just the primaries, then it's at a point where opening up the secondaries isn't going to bog it. Obviously the stronger the build, the quicker that point is reached in the RPM range. So once vacuum has built, the secondary lock is released, the secondaries open, and you get everything your combo can offer.

Now why do I say vacuum advance is OK even on built street/strip applications? Well 1st off, in a dedicated strip applications, you don't care about driveability. You set the idle way up to whatever keeps the engine running just to get it to the staging area. And when you get to the line, you stage the engine in the RPM range you want to launch so when the load and throttle hit the engine, it doesn't stall. That's not how you drive even the most built of street applications.

On the street, you need it to be able to idle at a sane RPM while waiting on a traffic light and not overheat the engine with an idle that's high. And when the traffic begins to creep, you need to be able to take off and control your acceleration with more resolution than a throttle-feathered creep & barking the tires. Or lets say you are at a yield, you need confidence that if a break in traffic comes up, you can get moderate/brisk acceleration to lunge into traffic without conking the engine or barking the tires uncontrollably. Throttle response needs to be responsive and consistent from closed throttle right up to WOT at any RPM. So I think it is acceptable to make some minor power compromises to gain better driveability unless the only street time the car will ever see is getting itself to the strip.

But that's just me...

Wow! I am astonished at your level of knowledege! I need you around all the time! I thought I was really sharp on my Ford stuff but you blow me out of the water! Give me anything from the early 70s down and i can all but quote Fords blue prints, I've seen your replies on other folks posts as well and it seems you have all the answers, how do you do that?

I used to work in my company's Tech Support and Training dept. When you've heard enough questions asked over the years, you get a feel for how to answer them. One of the things I always got dinged on with peer and customer reviews is giving too much information to people that didn't want/need my level of detail. And I guess that's fair, but my attitude has always been & still is, I don't know what info is important to you when you ask me a question. The best I can do is give everything I know (or think I know) on the subject, explain it as I know it, and then let you decide if the info is BS, useful, or just simply not relevant.

And BTW, sometimes I am wrong. But when I'm wrong and someone corrects me, I'm not insulted. I'm relieved...so I won't ever be wrong on that subject again. The lost pride of being wrong is irrelevant. Last time I checked, I'm not 2012 years old, I have a father, my mother's name is not Mary, and my birthday is no where near Dec 25th...point being, I'm not perfect but I'm OK with that.

But ultimately, where do I learn what I share? From others on forums like this and various info websites where informed people that I either talk to directly or that take the time to write their thoughts, experiences, and explanations down for others to learn from.