05-16-10 Accthethories & Exhautht

Accthethories & Exhautht installed

Didn't get updated last weekend...since most of the build time was spent installing headers. That's pretty much it. First, I had to chase all over town to find someone who had the right size Felpro gaskets in stock...pretty good size ports on these heads and the ones that came with set I had blocked off too much of it. Then, with the larger passenger footbox and the wider 351 motor, there is very little space. Since I had a problem with header bolts loosening up and disappearing out on the highway somewhere I got a set of 12-point locking head bolts. With not much room to tighten bolts or to get a wrench in there it was a very slow process. The two rear tubes on each side bend sharply right after leaving the head, so the only way to even put them on is to tighten the bolts a tiny bit a time, working from front to back. If I tried just attaching a couple of bolts, tightening them down to hold the header in position, there was no way to get the other bolts in place and/or get a wrench on to turn them. Then the locking tabs wouldn't fit in place properly, so I had to grind them down to fit.

So it was a rather tedious process of turning one of the eight bolts on each side a few degrees at a time, then the next one, then the next, etc. etc. letting them gradually pull the header in place. Painstaking, but at least they're not going anywhere. In fact if I ever have to pull the heads, the headers are coming out with them!

Then this weekend I bolted the sidepipes on after tearing the driver's side pipe a new bunghole. Actually I had the guys at Art's muffler shop carefully drill into the collector on the driver's side and weld in a bung for the wide-band O2 sensor which will work with the fuel injection system.

Driver's side...the bung is on the side facing in so the sensor can attach as high off the ground as possible. Seems kinda vulnerable to damage from road debris but there's no other place to pull an average from the entire bank of cylinders.

And here's the passenger side:

Then I noticed a little alignment problem..the driver's side hangs a tad low...

And the passenger's side a tad high... I'll need to double-check the motor mounts. I thought they were sitting as low as they could go in the frame. I should be able to even things out with some very minor tweaking at the mounts. I didn't look that closely before tearing the car down to see how they sat before, but with a different motor and headers it's not surprising they don't sit the same.

Attached the steering wheel to check on the gauge visibility for the three most crucial ones. No problemo.

Then started installing accessories...that turned into another parts-chasing adventure. The older steering pump I had cleaned up to reuse had the threads inside the shaft pretty corroded and stripped out when I had the pulley pressed about halfway on. So I tried the puller tool to remove the pulley so I could go get a new pump, and found out the hard way that the puller jaws that wrap around the pulley flange have a front and back and even though they'll fit and start pulling normally with one backwards, it soon stresses the flange unevenly and then breaks it clean off. It took some really creative application of leverage and cursing to get the pulley off. Then I had to wait for a new pulley to arrive so I could get the new pump installed this weekend. It's probably not healthy to get this pissed at inanimate objects. Nothing some adult beverages couldn't fix, fortunately.

Finally got the front suspension buttoned up after double-checking all the clearances with the SAI mod and grinding some spots on the upper control arm flange to ensure the brake caliper bolts don't get broken off at an inopportune time. From the looks of things I shouldn't have much if any bumpsteer...can't wait to get it on the road and try it out.

And the driver's side...

Then installed the throttle body portion of the Powerjection III EFI system. Looks for the most part like an old Holley carb, but hidden inside the fuel 'bowls' are four 65-lb (I think) fuel injectors. This model is rated at 750cfm, which should be plenty for this motor. Quickly found out that the air cleaner wasn't going to clear, so I had to go find a half-inch spacer. The computer for the system is inside the silver box with the label on it. Also had to get some carb studs...couldn't get a bolt in on a couple of them.

Standard carb-style throttle cable setup. Besides the O2 sensor, it also reads off of the coolant temp sensor next to the distributor. I'll need to get a T-fitting for that, though so I can mount the sender for the coolant temp gauge, since that's usually what goes there. Went with a dual-plane RPM Air Gap intake based on the recommendation of Wayne Presley at VeryCoolParts.com....should get much better driveability than with the single-plane Torker II intake I had before. The throttle blades open evenly, not one then the other progressively like most carbs.

Did the research a while back on fan/shroud setups. Someone at FFCobra (now called FFCars.com BTW, they renamed the forum recently due to a settlement with the Chickenf@#%r). Anyway, someone found that the fairly inexpensive and fairly common fan/shroud assembly on late-90's Thunderbirds and Cougars fit nicely on most Mustang radiators and could flow plenty of air as well. Got a nice aluminum 3-row radiator... Between both of these I should be fine. I also got a thermostatic fan switch from Breeze so I won't have to worry about flipping it on.

Got it installed. The bottom aluminum piece was hiding underneath the sidepipes up on a high shelf, so I missed it when I had all the other panels powdercoated black...it'll go in for coating this week. The original builder did a nice swirl polish on it but it will look out of place when I'm done. The aluminum radiators look nice, but they're pretty fragile...I've found that the little flanges will bend if you even look at them sideways. I may have to rig up some kind of grill or wire mesh over the front of it before I get on the road to start collecting bugs in it.

An overall shot from yesterday, standing on my tippy-toes and holding the camera as high as I can reach...

And from today. The worst part of the build so far is the constant running to the parts and/or hardware store for miscellaneous bolts and other parts you forgot you were going to need. Every time I make a list of stuff to get, I still realize later I need something else too...gets to be a pain. The local hardware shop clerks probably think I'm pretty weird coming in to get a few bolts or a fitting or two at a time. I think they're right.

I was hoping to get far enough to fire up the motor this weekend, but no such luck. Shouldn't be too long now though. Should hear from the painter soon that he's ready to get started...we'll see.