Ok, I found one BBF with aluminum heads, intake and water pump that claimed 570 lbs and a 351 windsor, all steel block,heads and intake at 530 lbs, that's 40 lbs heaver, lighten up that 351 with some aluminium heads and intake and drop another what 50 lbs? Just off the cuff that's 90 lbs lighter,
Now I'm no expert but I bet a stroke and poke on that windsor and you got all the fun to be had with more room to work on it and it should turn and stop with less pucker factor than the BB
Just my opinion and not based on any real mechanical experience.
But the WOW factor of opening the hood and seeing all that big block largeness can be a factor.
When I built my 408w its actually alot lighter than the stock 351w was ...LOL...
Two of my aluminum heads weigh the same as 1 cast iron head.........LOL
All of my pistons weigh 397 grams each and my stroker crankshaft is a few lbs lighter than stock......
This is just a dinky camshaft w/.477 .493 lift in a 408w on a carb. and Edelbrock E-Street heads w/small S/S valves........
On a rw dyno and EFI tuned on a chip with an intake designed to deliver 40-60ft lbs of extra torque and the same engine is putting out 566ftlbs of torque on a camshaft under .500" lift w/ Comp cams Magnum 1.6 ratio rockers....
Its the same as having bigblock power in whats essentially Fords midblock because it has a higher deck than a 302....
My setup has a TKO 600 trans and so far its holding up pretty well and I powershift it very often too and from some things that happened beyond my control due to a faulty Term X system and being sent 120lb injectors in a 36lb box its now a slightly larger 410w w/1.7 shaft mounted rockers...
When you build an engine where the torque and hp doesnt intersect you've built yourself one stout azz engine and mine is just a high torque low rpm application that will never see valve float......LOL
Even when it was stock it was pretty modified..It had a ported stock intake and throttlebody ,pedestal style stamped steel roller tip 1.7 rockers added ,,19lb injectors upgraded to 24lbers ,,MSD 6 box w/coil and timing adjust knob w/a custom tune burned into the speed density ECU by Kenne Bell done years back through Mustang Magic to reflect the changes and deletions and when dynoed it was putting down some pretty stout power too until blowby reared its ugly head at 565,000 miles..I modified it at 287,000 miles but as you can see the 408w kinda grew in size with that monster intake........LOL