LouisianaGuy
New Member
First off let me say thank you for allowing me into the community...As a new member I would also like to say hello to all.
Quick intro....Im Mike from Louisiana and I know my way around cars pretty well, so please feel free to put out technical answers to my questions, I will usually understand most of the more detailed technical responses... Have restored a hand full of older cars, and was an ASE tech for many years till I graduated college and became an Engineer. Anyhow down to the nuts and bolts.
This is a bit of a wordy story so please stay with me.
A friend who has this SN 95 I'm working on currently decided for some odd reason he needed his motor rebuilt even tho it had less than 100K and seemed to have run very well for a stock mustang, its a Convertible 5.0....I suggested maybe just simple bolt ons ie....heads, intake, CAI exhaust and gears, along with a clutch to hold up to the abuse and later on rear end and trans upgrades.
He lives in Houston but was working with me in Louisiana at the time...I didnt hear from him for a while then one day he called and said he had the motor rebuilt, and I cringed a bit but was happy for him and asked what they did...He said they put on some aluminum heads and did a cam swap etc...then he proceeded to tell me that it was running a bit odd and the guys at the shop said it needed 30lb injectors, and a larger fuel pump and calibrated MAF and probably a tune, and OH his power brakes were not working that well now....That was a red flag for me...I couldnt offer much help over the phone but just tossed out that maybe he should get a vac can since I have used them in the past with goor results on some of my cars with larger cams...Then I decided to do some reasearch into the SN95 Computer systems and a BIG red flag went up....long story short, his mechanic called me asking what a vac canister was.....I was blown away and explained it to him and said there had to be a place in Houston to get one....hell I have 2 performance shops in Baton rouge I can get them.
a month later my friend is back down in Baton rouge on work, and he asks me could I do the suggested upgrades to his car, and I said sure lets call summit racing and order the suggested parts....Who was I to go against what his engine builder said he needed, so he slapped down the credit card and I ordered what they suggested plus a few things that I knew needed to go along with the crap they suggested....here is the list.
Trick Flow 30lb injectors, Aeromotive in tank Fuel pump with sock...I dont recall but I think it was 155Lph I just recall I made sure it was More than enough to support his needs with out question...Aeromotive adjustable regulator, got a complete CAI kit with Calibrated MAF from C&I, yes I know some have had good results and some bad, but I liked the idea of adjustable air sample tubes, Also got some other things that I dont recall as well but I have a list haha.
Ok here is what I was greeted with.
A friend of his brought the car to my house and dropped it off as the owner had to go back out of town and he trusts me implicitidly with his car.
When they pulled up I could tell it was surging pretty bad, but the guy said hey it runs ok but shimmies going down the road...I said im just here to fix the motor...I didnt bother to go drive it, I just pulled it into the shop to have a look under the hood, and begin installing said parts.
When I opened the hood here is what I was greeted with, and I have pictures.
1. Coolant temp sensor was stuck into a a heater hose as a plug to cap the hose and was not even plugged up
2. Air temp sensor was laying in the fender well and the air box was replaced with a tube and one of the cheap shit spectra air filters hanging loose off the end.
3. EGR valve gone...no big deal.
4. Intake was some knock off brand polished aluminum turd I had never seen.
5. The heater core lines were not aattached to the core and the metal lines on the motor where the CTS is supposed to be were gone.
6. Injector harness was pretty beat up as well as all of the plug locking clips being broken off on almost ALL of the sensors.
7. He told me the fan would not always come on which I attributed to the plug working loose because of the broken tabs...Easy fix.
There were all kinds of different bolts in hte intake and all over the motor, none of which were what they were supposed to be....All in all this thing was in bad shape, and I dont see how it was even running at all.
8. PCV grommet was leaking like mad because it was not a grommet but rather 2 pieces of hose, one crammed inside another...
9. No thermostat
So I thought ok I will install all of these parts, and hook all of the sensors up like they should be and we will be good to go...I could tell the car had a Cam in it and the owner said he thought it was an E-Cam, which is smaller than anything I run in my carburetor equipped cars so I thought no big deal ...Think I was wrong.
So I began tearing into the thing....and I recalled him saying the car was getting aluminum heads and he thought they were supposed to be AFR heads...I looked and didn't see a name on them then turned around to look at my 408 on the stand just to be sure mine said AFR on the front and they did haha, so I thought ok maybe they are OLDER afr heads, because they looked to be cast aluminum....that kind of peaked my curiosity but I thought what the hell lets replace all this stuff and hook up all the sensors and go from there.
I did make notes and take pictures of EVERYTHING I found.
I tore into it and saw that the intake was a square port configuration instead of a round port like the cobra etc...ok no big deal I dont think??
I put a set of calipers on the throttle body which is also some no name brand but it measured out to be a 70mm if I recall and looks pretty decent.
Replaced the injectors, installed the Adj regulator, replaced the Coolant temp sensor, and yes it is the one the computer uses to make adjustments not the one for the gauge...I put the CTS into the thermostat housing which places it behind the thermostat so that the water is sampled as its leaving the intake, then installed a 90 deg fitting into the intake so I could hook up the heater lines, and installed the CAI and calibrated MAF...I didnt replace the stock fuel pump yet because I wanted to see if it was capable of handling the extra needed flow, and it has a full tank of gas so decided to wait till I tested it out.
Also put in new thermostat and fixed all of the above listed items 1-9
Anyhow got it all installed and put together, fixed the leaky Vac hoses and PCV which fixed the power brake issue and decided ok lets fire it up......
Hit the key and voila she started right up and would not idle so I made all the normal adjustments to the IAC, even cleaned it and checked and set the timing which was way off, adjusted the regulator to 39 PSI If i recall with the hose off, checked all the sensors, and finally got it to idle ok, then I saw some smoke from under hood, leaky radiator, big surprise there...installed new radiator, fan working as it should now it has a thermostat and everything hooked up.....So got into the car after checking all was ok didnt make it a block and was like WTF my wife's Nissan Altima running on 4 out of 6 Cyls could blow the doors off this thing, I mean it wouldnt even smoke the tires from a 10mph roll in 1st gear.
and it was bucking and surging.
Took it back to shop, and my curiosity got the better of me....Pulled the upper intake and popped the Valve cover, find 4 stripped out valve cover holes, then I see the valve train & now I'm LOST, I have never seen a rocker configuration like this thing has...I immediately think ok Trick Flow heads because I can see the canted valve set up, but they are Cast aluminum with NO NAME on them and they have a pedestal mount rocker set up with shims under the Cheap shit F1 rockers, so I look closer and find 2 valves that the rockers have worked their way off of on the driver side, and have mushroomed the valve tip, thank god the rockers didn't break "I was blown away by that as I have seen big name rockers snap with less damage to them", then I pull the plugs only to find 2 with stripped out holes and not to mention there are Short reach plugs in the damn heads which means the flame front is not even getting into the combustion chamber, and I know they are not the correct plugs because there is damn near 1" of thread before the chamber.
Ok time to call and give the owner a heads up....He is pissed as he should be his reply was "I trust you mike just do what you think its gonna take" He has seen my rides so he knows he is in good hands, and he is a close friend and i'm not charging him anything for the work because I know I could call him from half way around the world and he would come help me no matter what, or he would send guys to help me...he owns a small trucking business also
So I Pull the heads....OMG Stock reused head bolts with no washers on them so the heads have holes dug into them a little bit, they appear to have just had a slight clean up job on the intake and exhaust, and they are O-ringed, but the block is not. Oh boy.
Took heads to my local trusted shop and they couldnt ID them so took to 2 other shops and no one could ID them so Last resort was a Ford friend of mine who as soon as I pulled htem out of the truck said DAMN where did you get those old ass Trick Flow heads...He had just put a set on a fellows carbureted motor and he said they performed great for older heads....I said well that explains the weird ass fly cut canted valve piston then.
Quick intro....Im Mike from Louisiana and I know my way around cars pretty well, so please feel free to put out technical answers to my questions, I will usually understand most of the more detailed technical responses... Have restored a hand full of older cars, and was an ASE tech for many years till I graduated college and became an Engineer. Anyhow down to the nuts and bolts.
This is a bit of a wordy story so please stay with me.
A friend who has this SN 95 I'm working on currently decided for some odd reason he needed his motor rebuilt even tho it had less than 100K and seemed to have run very well for a stock mustang, its a Convertible 5.0....I suggested maybe just simple bolt ons ie....heads, intake, CAI exhaust and gears, along with a clutch to hold up to the abuse and later on rear end and trans upgrades.
He lives in Houston but was working with me in Louisiana at the time...I didnt hear from him for a while then one day he called and said he had the motor rebuilt, and I cringed a bit but was happy for him and asked what they did...He said they put on some aluminum heads and did a cam swap etc...then he proceeded to tell me that it was running a bit odd and the guys at the shop said it needed 30lb injectors, and a larger fuel pump and calibrated MAF and probably a tune, and OH his power brakes were not working that well now....That was a red flag for me...I couldnt offer much help over the phone but just tossed out that maybe he should get a vac can since I have used them in the past with goor results on some of my cars with larger cams...Then I decided to do some reasearch into the SN95 Computer systems and a BIG red flag went up....long story short, his mechanic called me asking what a vac canister was.....I was blown away and explained it to him and said there had to be a place in Houston to get one....hell I have 2 performance shops in Baton rouge I can get them.
a month later my friend is back down in Baton rouge on work, and he asks me could I do the suggested upgrades to his car, and I said sure lets call summit racing and order the suggested parts....Who was I to go against what his engine builder said he needed, so he slapped down the credit card and I ordered what they suggested plus a few things that I knew needed to go along with the crap they suggested....here is the list.
Trick Flow 30lb injectors, Aeromotive in tank Fuel pump with sock...I dont recall but I think it was 155Lph I just recall I made sure it was More than enough to support his needs with out question...Aeromotive adjustable regulator, got a complete CAI kit with Calibrated MAF from C&I, yes I know some have had good results and some bad, but I liked the idea of adjustable air sample tubes, Also got some other things that I dont recall as well but I have a list haha.
Ok here is what I was greeted with.
A friend of his brought the car to my house and dropped it off as the owner had to go back out of town and he trusts me implicitidly with his car.
When they pulled up I could tell it was surging pretty bad, but the guy said hey it runs ok but shimmies going down the road...I said im just here to fix the motor...I didnt bother to go drive it, I just pulled it into the shop to have a look under the hood, and begin installing said parts.
When I opened the hood here is what I was greeted with, and I have pictures.
1. Coolant temp sensor was stuck into a a heater hose as a plug to cap the hose and was not even plugged up
2. Air temp sensor was laying in the fender well and the air box was replaced with a tube and one of the cheap shit spectra air filters hanging loose off the end.
3. EGR valve gone...no big deal.
4. Intake was some knock off brand polished aluminum turd I had never seen.
5. The heater core lines were not aattached to the core and the metal lines on the motor where the CTS is supposed to be were gone.
6. Injector harness was pretty beat up as well as all of the plug locking clips being broken off on almost ALL of the sensors.
7. He told me the fan would not always come on which I attributed to the plug working loose because of the broken tabs...Easy fix.
There were all kinds of different bolts in hte intake and all over the motor, none of which were what they were supposed to be....All in all this thing was in bad shape, and I dont see how it was even running at all.
8. PCV grommet was leaking like mad because it was not a grommet but rather 2 pieces of hose, one crammed inside another...
9. No thermostat
So I thought ok I will install all of these parts, and hook all of the sensors up like they should be and we will be good to go...I could tell the car had a Cam in it and the owner said he thought it was an E-Cam, which is smaller than anything I run in my carburetor equipped cars so I thought no big deal ...Think I was wrong.
So I began tearing into the thing....and I recalled him saying the car was getting aluminum heads and he thought they were supposed to be AFR heads...I looked and didn't see a name on them then turned around to look at my 408 on the stand just to be sure mine said AFR on the front and they did haha, so I thought ok maybe they are OLDER afr heads, because they looked to be cast aluminum....that kind of peaked my curiosity but I thought what the hell lets replace all this stuff and hook up all the sensors and go from there.
I did make notes and take pictures of EVERYTHING I found.
I tore into it and saw that the intake was a square port configuration instead of a round port like the cobra etc...ok no big deal I dont think??
I put a set of calipers on the throttle body which is also some no name brand but it measured out to be a 70mm if I recall and looks pretty decent.
Replaced the injectors, installed the Adj regulator, replaced the Coolant temp sensor, and yes it is the one the computer uses to make adjustments not the one for the gauge...I put the CTS into the thermostat housing which places it behind the thermostat so that the water is sampled as its leaving the intake, then installed a 90 deg fitting into the intake so I could hook up the heater lines, and installed the CAI and calibrated MAF...I didnt replace the stock fuel pump yet because I wanted to see if it was capable of handling the extra needed flow, and it has a full tank of gas so decided to wait till I tested it out.
Also put in new thermostat and fixed all of the above listed items 1-9
Anyhow got it all installed and put together, fixed the leaky Vac hoses and PCV which fixed the power brake issue and decided ok lets fire it up......
Hit the key and voila she started right up and would not idle so I made all the normal adjustments to the IAC, even cleaned it and checked and set the timing which was way off, adjusted the regulator to 39 PSI If i recall with the hose off, checked all the sensors, and finally got it to idle ok, then I saw some smoke from under hood, leaky radiator, big surprise there...installed new radiator, fan working as it should now it has a thermostat and everything hooked up.....So got into the car after checking all was ok didnt make it a block and was like WTF my wife's Nissan Altima running on 4 out of 6 Cyls could blow the doors off this thing, I mean it wouldnt even smoke the tires from a 10mph roll in 1st gear.
and it was bucking and surging.
Took it back to shop, and my curiosity got the better of me....Pulled the upper intake and popped the Valve cover, find 4 stripped out valve cover holes, then I see the valve train & now I'm LOST, I have never seen a rocker configuration like this thing has...I immediately think ok Trick Flow heads because I can see the canted valve set up, but they are Cast aluminum with NO NAME on them and they have a pedestal mount rocker set up with shims under the Cheap shit F1 rockers, so I look closer and find 2 valves that the rockers have worked their way off of on the driver side, and have mushroomed the valve tip, thank god the rockers didn't break "I was blown away by that as I have seen big name rockers snap with less damage to them", then I pull the plugs only to find 2 with stripped out holes and not to mention there are Short reach plugs in the damn heads which means the flame front is not even getting into the combustion chamber, and I know they are not the correct plugs because there is damn near 1" of thread before the chamber.
Ok time to call and give the owner a heads up....He is pissed as he should be his reply was "I trust you mike just do what you think its gonna take" He has seen my rides so he knows he is in good hands, and he is a close friend and i'm not charging him anything for the work because I know I could call him from half way around the world and he would come help me no matter what, or he would send guys to help me...he owns a small trucking business also
So I Pull the heads....OMG Stock reused head bolts with no washers on them so the heads have holes dug into them a little bit, they appear to have just had a slight clean up job on the intake and exhaust, and they are O-ringed, but the block is not. Oh boy.
Took heads to my local trusted shop and they couldnt ID them so took to 2 other shops and no one could ID them so Last resort was a Ford friend of mine who as soon as I pulled htem out of the truck said DAMN where did you get those old ass Trick Flow heads...He had just put a set on a fellows carbureted motor and he said they performed great for older heads....I said well that explains the weird ass fly cut canted valve piston then.