Take off the heads and intake. Under the intake on a 5.0 block are a couple of bumps that you can drill and tap into to fit the spider bar retainer on to. You will need a set of dog-bones, and a set of lifters. But for a 302 block, I doubt it will have the bumps. You may still be able to do it, but you may need to put a 1/4" spacer under the spider bar. Someone chime in and let me know if the lifter diameters are the same for a 302 and 5.0. I never bothered to check.
the lifter bores in a non roller block are too short for the factory roller lifers. you can get a reduced base circle cam that allows the lifters to sit lower in the block. you can run aftermarket roller lifters that use cross bars of some sort. its not very cheap. you would probly do beter by finding a used 5.0 roller long block for a few hundered bucks and start with that.
a retro roller cam is around $300 the same for the lifters you can buy a good roller core for $100 to $200 it lots cheaper to buy a roller engine than trying to convert a older engine just my brad
Glad you guys chimed in. I got my block for $200. Brand new O'Reilly rebuild. Less than 10 miles on it. Some guy dropped it into his truck and wired it up 302 firing order, couldn't get it to run, and gave it away. I got it, wired it up 5.0 firing order, and the rest is history. Still had 2 silver pistons, never fired upon...
After wiping out 2 cams in my Sprint, I put a roller cam in for the 3rd. You dont have to pull heads. Get everything out of a roller block, drill and tap 2 holes for the spider assembly, have a cam ground on a small base circle, and bolt it all together. All it cost me was the cam and some gaskets.
