Mark M. 587-607 is a custom camshaft that used to be a mass produced one. It's a great mid range stroker motor camshaft. I have cheated using it and can spin to 6,200 rpms. Also my heads have a stage 2 valve job done. My last motor will be a 496-498 motor with stage 3 head job. They are maxed out to the limits for an old set of EDELbrock heads. New BT will flow in the 400 cfm range. I am going to a 630" lift camshaft. Have to remember that the specs are with 1.76" rockers. Most rockers now are 1.75". It's a small change but gives a little extra safety limit between valves and pistons and valve spring bind. I run beehive spring and they need a little different clearance setup to not fail. I like .100" clearance on these springs. You can run them in the .050" clearance but at high rpms over 6,500 rpms they are know to break from the coils hitting each other.
Lets get back to your car, What compression are we looking at? Here's the thing, your motor is a little bigger than what the catalog list. Biggest FE is 428 cubes. You are 445. This is down size they camshaft. If I was running a 445 motor, depending on compression, either hr 214/319-25-12 which is 561/584 with low compression of 8.0-9.5. Other camshaft is hr 226/3201-25-12 with compression of 10.0-11.5 WITH some head work of stage 2 or stage 3. Are we doing head work and intake manifold work???
Here's the other bite in the butt, 2.87 first gear with a 3.50 gearing is great. What sucks is in 5th gear the motor is going to lug with a .64 ratio. 4th gear is 1-1. The drop in gear will kill the motor unless you are driving at 75 mph. Even the torque your motor will produce is boarder line. You might be better with a .87 5th gear. If you search through the threads on trannies you will find other guys that have tryed this and found out the same problem. This is why most small block cars run a 3.73 -4.10 gears to get useage of all 5 or 6 spds.
Clutch, single or twin disc? twins are not cheap but can take alot more abuse. I like basic organic or mix disc clutches. Not a fan of kevlar or carbon. takes aton of heat to get them to work right. Hydro TOB is the way to go. Only down side is feed back from the clutch. You are not racing 100% of the time so it's not important. Brent sells a great street setup from Mcleod. I have been running one for 3 years, works great, good feel, no slipping, It does put a little extra strain on the drivetrain, but I over built it for abuse. I try and keep this to a min. IMO a single disc system needs too much clamping force to prevent slipping. Old days pressure plates where done by weight of pressure applied to clutch disc. 2,400-3,200 pound pressure plates. I found out the heavier clutches bent the fork or broke it on some setups. This is before the better hydro TOB got alot better. I run one today. Mcleod.
Last note. Brent builds motors for a living. I build them for friends and a meal. here's my opinion on camshaft plates or bearings. The steel plate works good. I think that it working on a iron motor will be fine without and wear to the camshaft or timing gears. I would still try to remove any camshaft end play. I like between .002-.004" I want it dead still and not sliding around. This is an iron block. It's hard to get the correct shims sometimes for the correct setup. This also helps prevent distributor gears wearing out or shaving on the camshaft. Also need to match camshaft gear to distributor gear or you will have a quick failure. Damage from this can be from minor to major with the metal shaving ending up in the motor. Some of the guys here running 351 strokers have had there motors have failures of this problem.
Aluminum motors, I have 2, and built others. This motor expands more than iron. I like torrington bearings on them because there is no wear on the face of the camshaft, controlling movement of the cam shaft, no dragging as it spins. bearing does the same as the plate with a little more forgiveness, IMO. It's all about choice and money in your pocket and where you want to spend it.I respect Brents ideas, and we both have alot of miles on motors we have built. This way has always worked for me. I also believe in high oil pressure, others here said it's not needed. I know that high pressure is rough on the distributor gear and camshaft. I run a tooled steel drive. This is another reason for tight specs. I have 35-38 psi at idle of 800 rpms. I like oil pressure in the 70-85 range for an FE motor. Others say 60 psi is fine and is for a street motor. Mine is 95% track and abuse. Going to dry sump on 498 motor. Again this is my opinion and 16 years of playing with a shelby block FE motor. This motor is different from an Ford FE motor. Last note. Goggle FE motor oil modifications and follow them. IF you can't fine them, try the FE forumn or FE power. It's a 6 page article. Good luck, stay in touch. Rick L.
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