Oops I'm doing it again....I lost my head...

Alright, back to it! Spent the last couple of days side tracked on a 68 Shelby tilt column rebuild...was a small challenge....make one good column out of two bad ones please! It is packed and ready to ship....back to the engine!

I just looked at the date I took these pictures and it was almost exactly 25 months ago. I started on the rebuild way before I started dissassembly. Of course never anticipating a one year side track! Should have known...it's a Goose!

Follow along, this is "almost a long block" in around 20 pictures...and 10 minutes!

My core block, from a 92 T-bird IIRC.
 

Bought a complete engine and pretty much discarded everything but the block....sold off the EFI intake etc, heads....

I had it bored +.030 and it needed a slight amount of decking on the top of the bores to align the decks properly. (Found this when I was checking installed piston height!) Here the crank is already in as well as the new E303 Ford roller cam.
 

Nice machine work on the crank oiling holes!
 

Here is a crank spinning tool I made from an old Ford 352/390/410/427/428 harmonic balancer spacer. Drilled a cross hole in it large enuf for my big screwdriver or a lug wrench and voila! New tool! ...for cheap! Slips right on and off!
 

Closeup of a piston. Had to really dig to get a flat top piston with only two valve reliefs! Four would have cut down my compression ratio. I am aiming for about a 10.3:1 if my calculator did the calculations I wanted it to do.....correctly!
 
I polished or smoothed the edges of the reliefs to lessen chance of detonation on a sharp edge! Used a machinist's deburring tool followed up with some 320 or 400 wet/dry sand paper, maybe followed up with some 600....can't quite recall.

New I-beam rods with 12pt cap screws. I would have liked H-beams like I have already, but in this case, they would only be effective for bragging rights! (6500 absolute max RPM self imposed limit due to jackshaft...)
 

Spirolocks....hmmmm. First time messing with these little buggers!!! Two on each side of the pin.....
 

In goes a piston.
 

Slight mixture of molylube and oil for the bearings before tapping the piston into position.
 

New ARP or so, HD oil pump driveshaft.
 

New Ford double roller adjustable timing set and high volume oil pump. (NOT high pressure)
 

Lubed up the new roller lifters with more of the same mixture of moly and oil.
 

Checking piston to valve clearance. Running 1.7 rockers to get a tad more lift than the stock 1.6's.
 

New heads, Motorsports Y303 heads. Tall intake port, no longer available, replaced by X and Z series heads. These have a little more sealing materials around the tops of the intake ports....when the Motorsports tech guy said that he'd seen some cases of intake gaskets failing at the tops of the ports, it helped me with my decision! Mo' meat please!
 
I also smoothed the sharp edges on the chambers too. These are fairly large chambers...64-65cc IIRC. Will see what I find in my notes.....

Since these are Motorsports heads, they are cut for a 1/2" head bolt (351), so spacers are required to install them on the 302 blocks.
 

Close up of the chamber and valve work.
 
NB: Need to install spark plug indexing washers and mark plugs yet!

This is about where it sits right now, with heads on with only a couple of bolts, so until I can get intake manifold fitting sorted out....
 
5.0L oil pan is just to keep it clean. Also stored inside a large plastic bag!

Some shots while checking out the Performer RPM for air cleaner height.

First some checks (to deck, front and rear) for comparison against a regular Performer 289 that I had specially modified for the tall port Y303 heads. (I'm leaning towards the RPM now that my chassis engine mounts are now at the correct height!!! ....but the Performer would allow me to raise the engine back up a tad.....ugh!)
 

 

Now with carb and air cleaner (no carb spacers or gaskets)
 

 

That's about where I am.

Tonight I spent comparing and measuring for the jackshaft bracket and the two idler pulley mounting brackets.

I have all three in NOS form, and none of them fit properly. While the idler brackets are flat on the front side, where they attach to the water pump, they have gaps or are machined crooked!!! I also need to lower the main jackshaft bracket about .200" to get it to line up with the holes in the front support properly!

I'm making my list to take to the machinist....

* also need to cut a new pilot bushing for the trans....or ream the one I have out ever so slightly.

Next? More of the same...lots of staring, putting on a part, taking it off. Put on a different part or two....take them back off......

I guess I can say that it is hand built without lying!

Cheers!
Steve

Tonight I was determined to start porting on the new intake manifold...but which intake??? Dug back into my pile of notes, and found my measurements with various intakes and stock air cleaner, measured from the front and rear deck surfaces of the block to a line thru the top center surface of the air cleaner (center is taller than the edges by a bit due to the shape).

I have a choice of the Performer or the Performer RPM. Last night, I determined that the taller (+5/8") carb flange of the RPM would be desired as less cutting on the center bearing support of the jackshaft bracket would be needed to allow me to run an automatic choke! Something I have been sorely missing! If I had to run the shorter Performer, I would be required to run a manual choke and a cable...not too big a deal....but I like automatic....! Have grown fond of the feature you may say....

From my old notes, I determined that the RPM will fit, as it is within 1/4" of the height when using the original cast iron intake manifold and stock 1" spacer! I reasoned that I have dropped my engine mounts (chassis side) by 1 5/8"), increased my rubber mount thickness by about 3/4", so it should leave me in the neighborhood of 7/8" to allow a 1/4" phenolic carb spacer and proper gaskets. AND, I may even get REAL lucky and be able to put in 1/2" shims to raise the engine back up a tad to give my expensive oil pan some room to get out of the driveway!! Hey, at this point, if I can get away with 3/8" shims, I will still be a happy man!

Previously, I had already scribed marks on the intake ports to use as a guide.
 

These marks are out to the extreme of the gaskets, which were made to fit a number of Ford small block aluminum heads. They are Felpro gaskets, but nothing you can buy over the counter...go figure! OEM (Ford Motorsports) only! So, I've been buying up a few sets when they pop up on ebay when dealers are closing them out! There are other gaskets made that will now work, Edelbrock and others have similar that will do the trick. In my case, I do not want to take out all the material to the lines. I need to leave about 3/32-1/8" as the ports are almost right...but the tops and bottoms of the ports can use some work, and then straightening on the sides a bit.

SO, out to the garage to start porting....dug out the porting kit I bought from Standard Abrasives, and scanned the directions.... "go easy on aluminum" seems to be the mantra....AND you need a 1/4" die-grinder, air or electric..........something I failed to purchase! Hmm, too late to hit Home Depot tools....so on to something else....

Here are some other manifold mods....did most of the measuring last night but didn't mention it.
Last year or so I was checking this all out and I removed some casting material from the first and second bolt holes on the RH side to allow the jackshaft bracket to sit properly. I will be lowering the bracket by .200" also..more in a few! Will probably now need to remove even more material!
 

At the rear of the stock intake, there was a boss about 3" in from the RH side of the intake. The original jackshaft bracket bolted to a hole here for additional support. I hope to make up a piece and have it heliarced in place to allow this support to be utilized.
 

My jackshaft bracket is a new unit that I picked up in Italy on a business trip that allowed me the opportunity to visit the factory! This was back in about 96. So far, very few of my NOS pieces that I picked up from the factory have actually fit with out some sort of needed tweeking or major difference from the old part! Testament to the fact that these cars are "moving targets" when you are trying to get parts to fit properly, from the vendors!!! ...or anywhere else!

In comparing my original bracket to the new one, the new stands are aprox .200" too tall.
 

Lowering it this much will allow the front support bolt holes to line up properly. The front surface of the jackshaft bracket was originally fly cut straight across where the front bracket attaches. The new one has been spot faced...and now has material in the way of the two pieces mating properly.....so that will need to be addressed also.

In addition to these differences, the size of the rear shaft bearing is also larger!!! Already purchased new bearing in the proper size...now have extras of the old ones!

I also bought both idler pulley brackets new from DeTomaso. The original RH unit I have looks like someone went after it with a hammer, shattered it in three pieces, and someone welded it all back together with large pieces of gum! Makes me wonder if I shouldn't have this new one reinforced too!

 
While the jackshaft bracket machining seemed straight, the work on this piece was anything but! These two nearest bosses are not flat and are not at the same height relationship to fit properly on the water pump bosses to allow it to sit properly to meet up with the jackshaft bracket front two support bolts. It's totally a Goose thing, if you are a Pantera owner scratching your head....

I will have .070" taken off of the small boss, and the long one "flattened" or made parallel to the front bosses....all of which appear to be level with each other when placed on a super flat surface!

My original LH idler bracket is in great shape for some reason, so I will re-use it. The new one I picked up seems like it will do the job as well but could need some machining.... I will test everything with the Edelbrock water pump that I swap off of my old engine before passing final judgement. I am using a 1973 water pump (D3TE Ford casting)for mockup, and found some slight fitment issues when I dug out an original 1968-69 Ford pump casting! The idler bracket fits that older casting very well!!! The early pump was still on a family car driving around.....last time I worked on all of this, so wasn't readily available for test fits!!!

Now I know it is a good part to have around! I had been wondering what to do with it...scrap pile or.....?

Maybe that will be a good thing for this weekend.....swap remaining parts off of the old engine....pulleys, install fuel pump and water pump, align at least the LH idler pulley properly. RH will need to be done after the machining is complete.

It probably took me longer to describe all of this than it took for me to get to the point this evening where I needed more power tools to go further. In order to move the entire project forward, I dug out the halfshafts and got them ready to roll!

 

I installed a new cork seal in each and greased up the splines. I also lubed the u-joints. They took a rather disturbing amount of grease....which makes me wonder if they were ever greased ?! I must have given them a few shots the first time this was all apart, as I remember shooting grease out the air hole of the splined inner half shaft...and having to clean it off of everything after a drive..... The splined slip joint portion of the shaft does not hold much grease to keep the splines happy!!! As for the u-joints...maybe I missed it! All 4 of them??????

Tomorrow: shop for new air tool and grind away!

Out!
Steve

This last weekend was a good weekend of small progresses....

Buddy had a die grinder, so just borrowed it instead of buying one.....

With about 2-3 hours, I ended up with this:
 

But what you really want to see is this!

 

Remember, I never intended to take the grinding out to the scribe marks. They are the gasket size, but not the port size of the head....

While the heads were still loose, I installed spark plugs and "indexed" them, so that the electrode is not shrouding the spark. I used indexing washers, which are various thicknesses, to cause the electrode to land in a different spot when tightened down.

Installed and torqued down the heads. Whoo hoo!
These Y303 heads are made for 351's and have the large 1/2" head bolt holes. Since the 302 takes smaller bolts, I had to purchase special shimmed washers to take up the space. (Ford used to have special stepped bolts....but no longer....you get washers!)

Received my new Swage-lock fitting and installed it today after bending the line to clear the motor mount properly.
 

Removed many components off of the old motor. All that remains is to claim the oil pan! Need to eat my wheaties.....and get the long block up on an engine stand to do so...then give it a quick bath in parts solvent. Maybe later this week after it rains...big storm a comin'!

Spent a LOT of time on the jackshaft brackets and alignment. Ran my (new)brackets down to a local Mustang shop which has a small machine shop and the guy to run them...!!! In just short of two hours, I had a .200" shorter jackshaft bracket as we cut down the 4 mounting towers, spotfaced the front mounting surface so that it will mate properly with the front support bracket, a support bracket that was altered very slightly as well to fit better.

I played around with various shims and washers and got the belts to align to the point where they shouldn't go flying off at high RPM's! I have yet to mount the actual jackshaft and it's bearings etc, so will probably need to do some more work to line the front (and rear!) pulley up!!!

I'll need a new small belt (idler only) due to changes in where the idler bracket mounted... and probably a new belt for the jackshaft...we'll see!

Here is a shot with the water pump mounted, fuel pump, oil sender, harmonic balancer is torqued down, and crank pulley is installed. This shows the relationship of the idler pulleys and their mounting brackets nicely.

 

I may need to dredge up on of those spacers that you find for the nose of the water pump. DeTomaso cut a 3/4" hole in the pulley and the shaft is 5/8"....could be mounted off center easily! I think their first motors may have been industrial types....which supposedly use the larger shaft size! I know I saw one of these spacers not that long ago, perhaps last water pump job we did here.....but I have no idea what the heck I did with that spacer!!!! AP store will have one..... Didn't need it before, but just in case the bolts don't center it properly, I don't want a vibration....for a $1 cure!

These pulleys, water pump and crank, are special units cast up by a vendor for DeTomaso. Although some of your cars will have a stock Ford Crank pulley, found on some early Mustangs (1965-1966), it will most likely have a DeTomaso version of a water pump pulley on it, as Ford never produced a two sheave water pump pulley with one small and one large belt (width)....just the crank pulley! I dug through the Ford parts books and could not find a stock pulley which would do the job! Not made by them!!!

Tonight, I spent time aligning the pushrod guide plates. I had a set of Motorsports guide plates, but they seemed a little on the weak side and they really didn't allow fine tuning of the rocker arm position!
Here is a shot with a Motorsports fixed version on the left and the unnamed adjustable units on the right. Once they are in position, you are supposed to tack weld them together so that they don't shift when you torque the studs down! That will be interesting!

 

One thing that I have not yet figured out yet, is the oil dipstick. I would love to use this version here.... from a 91-92 T-Bird and probably a few others!
 

It could go on the RH side in the stock location but I want to bend it back some more to get out of the way of the coil and front hinged cover, so it is easy to get at when filling up with gas.

Something like this, only bent back more...
 

If that isn't going to work, then put it on the LH side but instead of curving towards the front of the engine, swing it 180 degrees towards the rear. Need to figure out if the AC compressor will be in the way there, or perhaps the paper tube for the air cleaner, or even the water tank! We'll see!

 

That's it folks!

Shopping list:
Various bolts, washers, lock washers.
Water pump shaft spacer
Belt(s)
Lower hose for water pump
1/4-3/8" carb spacer. More choke clearance!!! Almost there!

Research:
Colors on distributor gears for roller cams. New gear I have has yellow paint on it. Distributor that is from a roller motor...has orange paint on it.....not sure who is telling the truth! Could be both are good!

Valve cover spacers...did I forget to mention that my whippy dippy late model "powered by Ford" aluminum valve covers will not fit with the adjustable roller rockers installed???? UGh!

Always something!
Ciao!
Steve

Well, here we are mid week, wondering if I went forwards or backwards!!!?

Some updates:
Distributor gears: orange is for a flat tappet cammed 302...ugh. Just what I don't need! Not what I was sold either....this "had been in a roller cam motor..." Yah, may have been in it, but wasn't correct!

It is in great shape, very little use on it, so will go in the spare pile for spare 302 parts...non-5.0L parts!

Yellow paint: AHAH...for a 302...and a 351W....hmmm. This won't fit either....in the early 90's or late 80's.... Ford decided to use the same gear for both engines...seems logical! That made the shaft diameter grow to about .530" from .470 or so.... Another part for the "spares" pile!!! But it will work for the old 351W if I ever get around to that project.....ugh.

Ordered a new gear off of ebay...we'll see what happens.

Tore down the distributor and am working on learning about advance curves etc.

All it really did is make me wonder about "what is the more ideal magic approximation" of a max timing figure? I had always thought 34-36 degrees but that may just be for the Clevelands.....and we're talking 302 here.... What was odd, is that the mechanical advance mechanism under the "breaker plate" had the stop set up in the "21L" slot, allowing it to advance a whopping 42 degrees! (2x the stamped number= advance degrees.) Add in 4 degrees of static or initial timing and you've got a whole lot of timing! I guess the old 80's non-roller, non-efi engines were pigs with low compression.....

Again, will need to do a little more research on timing max value and a curve. I understand that both are a matter of how much compression you have......and of course...fuel quality....

Pulled the old gear off of the distributor tonight and put all the bits away for later reconstruction!

Carb Gasket/spacer: Found an Edelbrock #9266 extra thick gasket (.320") with four longer carb studs in Summit's stuff on ebay. About $20 shipped... Would cost me at least $5 in driving around.....I'll let the UPS or FedEx guy deliver...will give the dog something to get excited about.....

Hoses: Trying to figure out what I bought for a lower water pump hose....I thought I may have borrowed it from my stock of 68 Cougar parts....we'll see!

Worked more on the fitment of the jackshaft bracket to the intake. I want to have a rear support boss welded onto the intake....so cut up a mock piece out of some firewood.... then found a piece of aluminum....but need to shave it down with a mill to .352" thick and then had file it to fit the contour of the intake runner.... It shouldn't take much stress...just act as a support for the jackshaft bracket to keep it from rocking.

Looked at jackshaft bearings and how to get them on and off..... THIS is going to be a real PITA!

I have a puller for getting bearings off..but this really only works well for the end bearings. (I will need to get more threaded rod....for doing the middle bearing!) I believe this is an OTC (Owatonna Tool Co) puller that I got either off of ebay or from Harbor Freight....

 

I had put the new bearings on the shaft earlier.....in anticipation that this would be fairly straightforward and easy! HAH! What was I smoking????

Stopped by Home Depot on the way home from work and snagged a 3ft piece of 3/8" threaded rod, a 5" length of 1" black pipe (only because they didn't have an 18" piece of it!...), and one more can of silver paint to do the trans crossmember in.... (Threaded rod to pull bearings thru bores to make it "not like the first time" when doing final assembly, and the 1" black pipe is for "tapping" the rear bearing on if need be...

Since my jackshaft bracket was new, I did some deburring of the inner bores and around where the snap ring grooves were cut. I then used the threaded rod and any number of round things with a minimum of a 3/8" hole thru them to act as pushing or pulling bits to help move a bearing through a hole! I even put an old throw out bearing to good use!

 

 

I put a small amount of anti-seize in the bores and slowly applied pressure to the nuts on the threaded rod. Starting with the center bore hole I got about 70% thru and it stopped. Since the bracket was not bolted down to anything, I saw that the front section of the bracket was starting to bend under the pressure.

I would need to fabricate long spacers to put in between the bearing bosses at the top, to prevent the bracket from bending towards the un-cast side. I stopped, reversed the pile of adapting parts, and pulled the bearing out. Did a little more deburring, polished it up with some worn 320 wet/dry paper, put in more anti-seize, and this time pulled the bearing through with little opposition! Wiped off the mess I made with the anti-seize and pulled the bearing through again!

Repeated the process with the front bearing and also the rear bearing. I have a pic I'll post later of the polished finish that resulted!

Here is a pic of the rear most bearing area after pulling the new bearing through twice. Nice and polished!

 

A quick check of the parts book to look for bolts (more in a bit) and found that there are three different versions of jackshaft bracket! This is a later version, that has a 52mm rear bearing where previous versions used a 47mm bearing.

As a result, I need to stop at a bearing house and pick up two snap rings for the larger bearing!

While trying to figure out the bearings, I was staring at the bracket mounting bolts(4) wondering how this shaft would best go together, and how are you going to get it all into a press......and then tighten the darned mounting bolts down again..... OR, mount it on the engine then figure out how to press the shaft into place......

With the shaft in place (OK, just barely in place!) I figured out that conventional hex head bolts are not going to be removable. Once in place they stay in place! Cannot get a good wrench on them either....not to do 18-20ft-lbs of torque on them! Socket doesn't fit on straight, and you can get in with an open end wrench...but not so good in the case of the rear most bolt......

 
This one actually looks good compared to the next one and the rear most bolt....which looks darn near impossible....

 

SOOOO, here is where I need your help! Providing you own a Mangusta with an operational jackshaft in place! What sort of bolts are holding your jackshaft down? Hex head? Allen head? studs with special nuts??? (the parts book did not list special bolts to use for the jackshaft mounting....

)

I'm going to see if I can get some 3.5" Allen headed bolts to see if they will work. They take a 1/4" Allen wrench, so would just get a socket attachment that size....to throw in the tool box..... These bolts are graded higher than a grade 8 bolt, so should be up to the task of holding down an intake manifold....

Carb update: I really don't like the RH fuel entry on the carb, as I will need to bend up a perfectly good 1-->2 chrome fuel line....to clear that danged jackshaft bracket again! I tried to use my old one but it had been bent too many times before...and cracked. More for the scrap pile! But I had a new one standing by in another spare parts pile....but I really don't want to bend it up...and run fuel line across the intake manifold.......

If I change the bowls to Dominator type fuel bowls, I can change the feed side from the RH side to the LH side just by changing the fittings. I will need to install an accelerator pump diaphragm in the rear bowl, but I can take the arm off so that it will never pump fuel. (Not that the carb body is drilled anyway....) This and the finish of the bowls...natural "Holley green or brown" vs polished nickel or something.....will be different from the original... I just happened to have three new Dominator bowls hanging around...again, in that other spare parts pile....along with some new reusable gaskets (if this carb doesn't have them already), and an old but good accelerator pump rubber, and cover. I can take the pump arm off to prevent it from pumping or getting bumped and pumping....

Valve covers: figured out that the ones I wanted to use, late model "powered by ford" off of about an 83-86 EFI Mustang, will not clear the rocker lock nuts on the roller rockers. Baffle hits. Can't take the baffles out....good way to oil down the car behind you....!!!

I think I will go with a set of the new "Boss" covers that look like the old Boss 302 with the fins on the top, but they bolt up to the 289-351 type heads! Since I want to run the DeTomaso "pork chop" emblem that was stock on the valve covers, I can place them to cover all the false claims of a Boss 302...and stop the stupid questions before they roll off of a tongue!

Finding someone that can actually tell you what they are selling is a different matter.....some ads say no baffles, no grommets....others say comes with it all! Some say "stock height" (for what????) others say will clear "most" rocker arm combo's..... Of course all of the folks selling these valve covers use the "corporate" press release photo, which really doesn't show you what it looks like because of the poor angle it was taken at.......ugh.

So, you can see where I can't tell if I went forwards or backwards.....!

Ciao! Pictures later....(added 4-29 after PCNC meeting!)

Steve