Building a 400m

My buddy has a 78 ford f-150, that is 4x4 and rusty. He bought it for $500 for a beater, trail riding, play in the mud, screw around with truck. Well it has a 400m in it and it got the imfamous main knock. So I tore it down. Well I don't want this to happen again, we are going to put a crank kit in it and have it bored put badger pistons in it, cleveland heads, and it has a summit cam that I had put in it about a month ago, along with a edelbrock streetmaster intake. He never plans to rev it over 5,000 rpm, so will the multi-groove valves be alright for this? Also what oiling mods should I do, I'm running a hydro cam, so should I use any restrictors? ALso, I plan to run the external oil line from the front to the back. Anything else I should know before I put this beast back together? This is my first 335 series engine.
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You won't need the external oil line. The 400's don't rev to 7000 (well.....most of 'em dont) and don't need to. Just a good RV/towing camshaft with around a 220 duration and .525" or thereabouts lift will get you a great running 400. Add a 650 carb or even a 750 if you want better top end HP and a good intake and you're well on the way to a 400 HP/450-500 lb-ft 400 Ford. Oh, get rid of the multi-groove valves & keepers. They're junk and will drop valves (that is, if the 2 piece valve doesn't lose its head while running) at even an idle speed. I can't count how many times I've seen broken valves on Clevelands (all stock valves).

Great engines...too bad they all have a bad reputation.

This one shouldn't rev that high, but you never know what'll happen when a hill becomes a challenge, and you don't want to loose, or something breaks. So, the oil line won't hurt anything will it, just some added insurance? What would work good for that? would 3/8 steel line work o.k. Another friend runs a hydraulic hose on his cleveland.
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If you have to put on a line, don't make it any bigger than #6. IMHO, it's a waste of effort. Make sure that the clearances are correct and that the lifter bores do not have excessive clearance. That's where a Cleveland will bleed. Measure the pressure at the back of the block. If you run an HV pump, get a big baffled pan to make sure that the pump stays in oil. Deburr an HV pump, run a moly shaft with it and watch your distributor gear. At under 5000, I'd stick with a stock pump.

I don't use a line, have over 700 runs right now and the oil pressure hasn't changed at all. Actually, I have zero mods to the oiling system. Small block Mopar's have a way worse oiling system than any Ford and you almost never hear about people hacking the crap out of them.
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Hot Rod did a build up on a 400 a few years back that you might want to look at, here is a link http://www.geocities.com/styleline58/400.html The 351m-400 heads made after 1974 are almost identical to the Cleveland 2bbl heads except for a more restrictive exhaust port so if yours are in good shape you might consider keeping them.I got my Ferrea single groove valves from AD Performance for a pretty good price or there is a guy on ebay who sells them, but remember that single groove and multiple groove locks also use a different retainer so you have to change that as well.Another option is 351M motors made after about 1979 have single groove valves from the factory.

Will the stock multigroove valves be o.k. or should I have single groove ones?
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no more than single groove valves, keepers, and retainers cost, it'd be cheap insurance[img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_tup.gif[/img]