Welcome to my 400 Ford engine swap adventure!

I want to start out by saying that this swap requires a fair amount of fabrication and might not be suited for everybody. I am going to provide as much detail as I can for anyone else who might be considering the swap.

I also recognize that there might be some who disagree with this particular route to greater cubic inches and I respect your opinions but I also ask that you respect mine in going this direction.

My motivation for taking on this project started when my 351C short block in my Pantera turned out to be done. It was .040 over with out of round cylinders and had the deck o-ringed but was used with a standard head gasket that had blown.

My original goal was to build a nice mild 300-350 hp 351C and build a fancy stroker later after I was driving and enjoying the car. That changed when I discovered the engine to be bad.
I found a great deal on a 78 400 complete air cleaner to pan for $200. The block is cast in the Cleveland foundry and is STD bore. The machine shop I use gave me a junk block to use for mock up so I decided to park a 400 short block under my 4V heads and intake. I will be building a mild engine as originally planned... only bigger. It is my $200 stroker kit.

A lot of people might not be familiar with the 400 Ford or have been misinformed about it so here are some links to help out with a basic knowledge.
I look at the relationship between the 351C and 400 as similar to a 302 and 351W.The engines are of similar design and architecture with some interchangability.
More information is available than what is listed here but I thought this would be a good start to give everyone some familiarity with the 400. Check em out.

http://www.projectbronco.com/T...lling_the_rumors.htm

http://www.off-road.com/trucks...Detail.jsp?id=198751

http://www.fordmuscle.com/arch...02/Ford400/index.php

http://www.tmeyerinc.com/400Ford.htm


The topic has been discussed here on the PIBB previously.
Comp2 is also doing a 400 conversion and has done a lot of the ground work for this. Here are some links to previous postings on his progress.

Ford 400
http://pantera.infopop.cc/eve/...562/m/8400056672/p/1

Ford 400 Build
http://pantera.infopop.cc/eve/...562/m/3250071743/p/2

1905 Part Duex
http://pantera.infopop.cc/eve/...562/m/7990085544/p/1

With that out of the way let’s get started!

As you should know by now the bell housing pattern on the standard 400 block is the same as a 429-460. I say standard because there were a very small number of 400 blocks cast with the small block bolt pattern.

I looked at my options for the adaptation and found three sources:

1. I contacted Precision Proformance as they had done 460 swaps in Panteras to see if I could buy the required bell housing. I was told that they do not sell any of the parts for this conversion and the car would have to be brought to them for the work.

2. I looked at using an adapter plate made by this company:

http://www.transmissionadapters.com/Ford%20429-460.htm

My concerns with this part were its effect on the input shaft to clutch and pilot bushing distance. I could make a custom pilot bushing and use a thicker billet flywheel as possible solutions. The price at $795.00 was also pretty high for what it is.

3. I found that Quick time had released their 351M, 400,429,460 to ZF bell housing.
http://www.quicktimeinc.com/products.html#ford

This is a SFI approved bell housing and comes in a kit.
This is the route I chose to go I purchased pn. 8012. At $415.00 I could buy it and the intake adapter for less than the plate style conversion. I did run into a problem as the bell housing is drilled to be used in a GT40 application which is 180 degrees rotated from a Pantera. My solution to this problem was having a machine shop re drill the pattern rotated correctly. Here is the bell housing after drilling.

The next adapter required is to bolt a 351C intake on to the 400 with the taller deck. I researched and found out that Weiand at one time made a adapter but as far as I found out it is discontinued.

I decided to go with this company
http://www.pricemotorsport.com/

This will allow me to use one of the 4V manifolds I already have. Here is a pic from their web site.

To start with I re installed my bare 351C block and ZF. I had to do some repair to the ZF mounts and it is covered in the ZF forum here.

http://pantera.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/9550045562/m/6730095465

After that I tightened down the factory mounts and built a jig that mounted on the front of the block and located its height as well as centering it. It is made out of a couple of pieces of angle and some square tubing. The front of the block is the same between the 351C and 400 in this regard. Here is the jig mounted on the front of the 351C block.

I bolted the Quick Time bell to the ZF and my mock up 400 block and installed it in the car with the jig bolted to the front of it.
Then I started on the mounts. The design I created made it possible to access the top of the mount for installing the rubber cushions as well as access to the mount nuts.
The lower plate of the mount is ¼ thick steel and the rest of the pieces are 3/16 steel.
The original cast aluminum upper mount was 3/8 thick. When tightened, the rubber cushion was preloaded against a spacer inside the rubber. I machined 1/8 off of the internal spacer to compensate for the thinner steel I am using to maintain the correct preload.
Here are the pieces to the Right side mount cut out before welding.The Left hand mount is the same as this one. I just didn't photograph the pieces to both.

I know its going to be a good design because my supervisor took the time to approve final mock up despite her busy schedule of popping bubble wrap.

Here is the mount fully welded. I spotted it with a Mig while it was bolted in the car then removed it and did the final welding with a Tig.

Here it is bolted on and installed in the car.

Here is the project as it presently sits.
I have a old set of 4V heads sitting on it for header fabrication.

I will start out using a set of New GTS ANSA mufflers and will tie the headers to them.
I have another set of ANSA's that I will modify for better performance in the future.

The short list of things I will soon address include:
Swirl and over flow tank mounting. The brackets had been cut out of my car when I bought it so I had to deal with this anyway.
Throttle cable length in regards to the taller engine.
Engine screen fab and mounting.

I have a hectic schedule so these things will take me a while. The bell housing and engine mounts took about a month to complete.

I hope people find this thread informative and helpful.
If it gets too boring I will have Cowboy from hell post pics of hot girls to keep interest.
If anyone wants more pics of something posted let me know.

Great stuff Brooke. Nice welds. Keep it coming.

I like your supervisor. Why is it that no matter what expensive toys we buy them, the bubble wrap is always the most fun?