Thanks guys.  I ended up just getting a set of the original style stamped metal parts because they've never failed me and I know they'll fit the ex's properly.

Cheers,
Scott
 

Thanks for all the advice gentlemen. I'll get the ex's machined while they' re off and I'm going to spring for the rocker studs along with a set of roller rockers of course.
Jay, I understand "The itch". I wen't through it with diesel trucks although not as bad as most LOL.
The T-Bird will stay a cruiser but look out if I ever get the wife to agree to a Stang!

Now I need to pull the heads and take a better look at the cylinders. If they're scarred up we'll be digging even deeper

Scott

Hi everybody. Long time lurker here that's finally joining the party. I've gotten a ton of great info from reading your posts and hope you can help me out.
I have a 390 that's in a heavy T-Bird (4400#) and it's looking like I've got some bad valves.  I would like to just bolt on some Edelbrock 60069 72cc  heads and be done with it but I don't know that I've got enough engine for them. My stock heads are C4AE-G's and I'm running an Edelbrock Performer (not RPM) intake, the older "Performer" Cam and here's the killer.. 8.6:1 compression (to keep pinging down). The bottom end has about 20K miles on it.

Considering this car is heavy and has an auto trans (COM) and 3.00:1 gearing,  would I be good with the Aluminum heads and the bigger valves or would I be better off getting my heads rebuilt with all the good stuff and keeping my smaller valves?
I'm not looking to make a drag car out of this but I would like all the low end punch I can get and maybe keep the old girl's performance  respectable on the freeway too 

I welcome all comments.
Scott