I commented earlier this week on another thread concerning burnout. Now that I'm at the end of the week, I gotta say that if anybody should be burned out, it has to be me.
To demonstrate my point,Lets just talk about the oil system.
When the engine was outside of the car I built a bracket to mount the dual filtration system, and mounted the thing to the side of the engine.
Lets call this....exibit A
While this all looked like it was gonna work, that changed the minute I started bolting things on the engine, after I installed the motor.
See, in it's original configuration, the filters were too far forward, and possibly just too low. It looked like I'd have a problem getting the filters off after the steering shaft was installed.
So I moved the mount point back 1/2", and I re-installed the thing.
It still looked like there'd be a problem w/ interference. I moved it back another 1/2".
Here is bracket v 1.1, and 1.2
Stepping the holes back 1/2" at a time had me running outta room on the original bracket, so in a frugal attempt at saving the original bracket, I built "Extendo-Bracket". EB V 1.3 was too far back now as I had gotten too liberal in my judgement of how far back I could go, so I had to move it forward..............twice.
Here is extendo bracket V 1.4, and 1.5 ( This would now be Exibit B) V 1.3 is actually cut off, as it was now full of holes, and I wanted to try and clean the thing up a little.
It was at this time that I determined that the entire bracket was too low, and I decided to scrap it, and build another one that would place the filters much higher.
This bracket went though two more versions, w/ me moving the filters further back from the original mount plan. The problem ended up being still the same, the filters were hitting something. This time it was those two hose barb fittings were almost ramming into the bracket that held the water pump under the intake.
I bailed on the stupid dual filtration system yesterday.
I had a single remote filter in a drawer, so I built a bracket to mount that dude to the side of the external oil pump.
It hit the water lines.
I built another bracket that lowered the filter so low that it didn't hit nothing.
Now it was so low, I wasn't concerned what it hit, but what would hit it.
This is bracket V 1.9, Bracket 1.8 is in the trash.
Finally, I get it figured out I ended up putting the single filter behind the remote pump, perpendicular to the mount surface.
It took me 10 TIMES to finally get an oil filter mounted on this engine.
This version clears, but it barely clears. If you were looking at it, you'd swear the front sway bar was gonna hit the filter itself. But that's an optical illusion. it clears w/ ample space between it, and said bar.
You may be wondering why I went out, and bought another filter though, given that I have two brand new Fram filters w/ no place to go.
I ended up finding a place for them alright.
I was in O'reillys last week, and they had a cut open filter display where there was about 8 filters open so you could see build construction, and what internals were actually inside the cannisters. The fram, (despite advertising to the contrary) was the worst of the bunch. 40 pleats as compared to the 60 that comes in a Motorcraft, cardboard end caps as compared to stamped metal, and the thing just looked like ass. Even a WIX filter ( which looked remarkably like the Motorcraft) was better built. Matter of fact, nothing was as bad as the Fram.
I didn't even feel one bit of remorse for throwing the pieces of junk in the trash.
The down pipe coming off the turbo was another fiasco. There simply wasn't enough room to get the completed pipe down between the firewall, and the bellhousing w/ all of the bends that it ended up having. I managed to ding the firewall several times wrestling the stupid thing in, and back out of a passage that it simply wouldn't go through.
Inevitably, I ended up grinding the bellhousing just enough to get the damn thing by. But picture trying to get a 4.5" angle grinder between the bellhousing, and your newly painted engine compartment.
It was a disaster.
But it's in there, I can now build the exhaust from there.
You can see some of the carnage that the frame rail had to endure as well. I'm gonna have to paint that:grumble:. ( In retrospect, I shoulda just spray bombed the entire engine compartment. What w/ me cramming charge tubes, down pipes, dropping bolts and tools onto it, I have literally trashed the engine compartment):no:
I have been waiting on putting the front drive of the engine back together, because I had to build the bracketry, and the mount for the crank position sensor. This took up most of the day. As it is in this pic, the crank sensor is sitting .060 above the 6th tooth in advance of the missing tooth on my 36-1 trigger wheel.
That block the sensor is mounted is 1" aluminum square bar. The hole that needed to be drilled was .680, the biggest bit I had was .625 (5/8"). The rest of the hole had to be hand filed to fit. Additionally, the block is held on by two 10-24 ss button head screws. There is a plate that floats behind the mount bracket that has two corresponding holes drilled, and tapped in it, so I don't have to get back there w/ a wrench to tighten the thing up. I can just screw the screws down tight. That little plate took an hour to build.
Shoulda been about 10 minutes,....cut to size, drill two holes, do a little finish grinding to round the ends off, tap both holes, break a tap off in the last of the holes............spend the next 50 minutes trying to get broken tap out of the hole, all while telling your self to just make a new one,.....(which I couldn't do, the only tap I had was now broken off in one of the holes)
If you look, you can see the top corner of my newly made crank trigger bracket had had the top corner butchered off, and ground on. You'll also notice an aluminum bar to the left that replaces the shorter painted steel piece that used to be there. The bracket interfered w/ the mount point of the alternator. The brand new serpentine belt I had was only so long, so I had to make it fit.
*** "Adapted" from Pinnochio,.... Jiminey Cricket singing**
"Hey Diddly Dee,..an Idiot's life for me"
I installed 6 Autolite 64 spark plugs, gapped at .035, and installed the plug wires that I bought. The set doesn't allow you to cut them to length, so you gotta take what you get. I still need to find a way to structure them to a rigid mount point to keep them off of the headers.
I got a little panicky at first trying to install the plugs,..it seemed like they wouldn't thread in. But after dicking w/ the angle for awhile, I managed. They actually install at a very steep angle. I had a hell of a time getting the plug boots on them.
The engine is now 90% complete. I added the intake tube and filter. It is getting so busy under the hood now several other things have to come off before other things can be removed. I tried to finagle the charge tube off of the turbo, and ended up scratching the hell out of it. Guess I'm gonna have to do a whole bunch of touch up/repainting before I get this thing done.
The other cooler came in. One will be for the trans, and one is for the engine. They are identical 16 row plate and fin coolers. I plan to hang them beneath the bumper, and build a cowl/shroud to house them in.
The engine is getting really close to being complete. I still have fuel lines to run to the front fuel rail, I have to make the lower radiator hose (Yes, even the damn hoses are custom), and the power steering pump needs to be plumbed. I'm gonna use soft hose and adapters on those lines, I still gotta buy those fittings. I have to decide on a dipstick for the oil pan (right now the hole is plugged w/ a 1/4NPT pipe plug. I have the complete brake system to plumb still as well.
That about catches you up. I'll start on the exhaust tomorrow.