04Turbo4v MS3X 1st Start & Tune Thread

04Turbo4v

Member
Apr 24, 2019
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Michigan
Hey guys, figured I would start a thread to chronicle my up coming 1st start and the tuning process of a fresh combo I put together along with an MS3X I installed.

It's an 04 Mustang GT. Put together a built 4.6 4v DOHC engine and swapped it in place of the factory 4.6 2v. I bought the car and had it around 3 days, when I put it in the garage and yanked the 2v out to begin the project. It's punched 20 thou over with forged JE pistons, forged 03 cobra crank, K1 h beam rods, updated 04 aviator C-heads, 04 mach1 upper and lower intakes, stock TB. 5 speed tr-3650 trans, Mcleod clutch.

Added a CG fabrication twin turbo kit (hot side and cold side w/intercooler). Pair of borg warner s366 turbo's, twin 38mm wastegates.

Got a MS3X, and built a custom harness for it. Going to run it with seq fuel and spark. Running the factory ford 2 wire pencil coils driven by a injector driver box I made with 8 BIP373 Bosch driver transistors, with the MS3x 5v logic circuits driving them.

SCT BA5000 MAF sensor (blow through). Running dual 3 inch downpipes running to dual electronic cutout and then into a pair of mufflers(unknown on which ones yet)

Fuel cell in the trunk, and dual 385 lph fuel pumps. Going to be running E85 from the pump. Deuchworks 95lb fuel injectors.

35 spline Strange spool and 35 spline axles. 3.27 ford motorsports gears. Will be running 26" slicks on 15x10 wheels in the rear and some skinnies in the front with a radial tire,.

I'm sure I am missing some stuff, but overall that is the base I am working with. Going to mostly be a track car, with a small amount of street time as well.

Steve has agreed to help get me tuned ( awesome dude btw), hope to get this thing started within the next couple weeks, so stay tuned for some vids. I will add a couple pictures to the thread here soon.
 
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Also forgot to say this has ARP head studs and Main studs. Going to be targeting 15-18 initially on the boost, ending up around 25 once the tune is all ironed out. Eventually i'll go in with fire rings or o-rings if the head lifting becomes a problem at that boost level.
 
Getting closer to the 1st start. Here are some random picture I found on my phone of some of the build.

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She is Alive!!! With the help of A91what (Steve), we were able to get her fired up for the 1st time today. 100psi cold oil pressure 60psi hot, 18" vacuum. Had a small coolant leak from a coolant tube on the back of the passenger side head that feeds the heater core. It's off a 96-98 cobra and no longer produced, so had to buy used, and well it was leaking at the seam where the 5/8" pipe is pressed into the larger 2" opening. Cleaned it up and brazed it back together. pic below for reference.
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I've got the cooling system bled now and 1 heat cycle complete. tomorrow I will give it a once over and steve is making some adjustments on the tune, and i'll run her through another 2 heat cycles. I do have some short video clips that i'll put together and load onto youtube soon. I will link it here when I do.
Special thanks to A91what for all the help he has given, Great dude! Stay tuned everyone, it's going to get fun
 
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Awesome video!

I bet you are super happy to hear it running. Are you going to run the stock gauges as I saw the cluster opened up?

only the speedo and volt/charging gauge. It's hard to see but I have 2 small 2" pod gauges in the trim around the cluster for fuel level and coolant temp, which is why I have the trim and cluster out.

Yes super excited. Steve has got this thing puuuurrrring at idle and rock solid. I had to order some more 1/0 cable to run my ground from the trunk mounted batt directly to the block as right now I have it going from batt to frame in the back and then frame to engine in the front, and when everything gets heat soaked it either crank real slow or not at all, until it cools off and then cranks fine again. I figured I might have an issue with my ground like that, but wanted to save a couple $$ on another 10-15 feet of 1/0 and it bit me in the butt and I still have to spend the $$ anyhow lol.

That should be here today, so i'll get that installed.

I also ran into an issue with the cooling fan. I am using the stock 04 4.6 2v cooling fan on this (single fan 2 speed) as I wired it in with a high amp relay to just the high speed side of the fan, and when it kicks the fan on it's drawing upwards of 75 amps on the initial inrush, which is playing heck on the idle from the load on the alternator.

So Steve (a91what) and I have decided to add a 5pin bosch type relay and wire it in with my other 4pin relay(using programmable inputs/outputs in tunerstudio) to get the low speed fan to come on first and then as the temps get a little higher or the a/c is commanded, it will shutoff the low speed and turn on the high speed.

That way I only get 20-25 amps from the low speed fan, and the idle should be able to compensate for that better then the 75+ amps I am seeing when the high speed comes on now.
 
We got quite a bit of idle tuning done and started to figure out what it wanted for startup fuel... we were thwarted by a hot slow/no crank so once that gets fixed up [and a rearend under the car] hopefully He will have sweet 2step turbo action happening.
 
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We got quite a bit of idle tuning done and started to figure out what it wanted for startup fuel... we were thwarted by a hot slow/no crank so once that gets fixed up [and a rearend under the car] hopefully He will have sweet 2step turbo action happening.

Thanks again Steve, you are the man! My 1/0 welding cable and 5pin relay supposed to be here today via UPS. Still waiting for the iat and connector to show up. I'll hopefully get them on today and have them ready to go. Still waiting on the strange rear end stuff. Have the gear set and setup kit with new bearings and shims ect, but I decided to go 35 spline and Strange has to make a set of axles for it, hopefully they will be here soon!
 
Got my 5pin relay wired in and now have control of low & high speed fan :taco: . Also ran a new 1/0 ground from battery to block which hopefully will cure my hot crank issue (haven't ran her up to temp yet to verify). Got my new GM iat installed as well.

After a few heat cycles, I gave the engine bay a once over, and noticed 1 of my AN lines for my crankcase breather setup was starting to melt from the drivers exhaust manifold. Further inspection revealed I had left the o2 sensor plug out on that side (my hotside has o2 bungs pre turbo on both sides for use with the factory narrowband stuff) I put the plug in and no longer have a exhaust leak pre turbo on drivers side :bang: and I also rerouted the lines further away from the manifold to eliminate any issues.

Once Strange get's my axle stuff to me, I will be back on the tuning game with Steve. Cannot wait.
 
FINALLY, axles have shown up and it's time to put the rear end together. Once complete, I'll finally drive/tune this thing on the road for the 1st time in about 2 years. It has been a long journey with this car, but time and $$$ have played a large role in that 2yr time frame.

Once road ready, I'll get on the horn with A91what aka Steve, figure out a time that works for both of us to get some street tuning done. If all goes well on the street, we will be heading to the track for some shakedown passes to get some additional data on the tune ect. If all seems good we will run her out the back door and see what she's got.
 
So I finally get some time to install some shiny new Strange axle parts after waiting the better part of 3 months for the last few pieces from strange to show up. I open the box to find this :bang: . Luckily it's only damage to 1 of the c-clip eliminator brackets and if they didn't have a replacement in stock to ship out today, I would of repaired it myself and accepted some form of reimbursement on the damaged part.

But as it may, they have one dropped in the mail for me today, and hope to see it by Friday.

No damage to the box (UPS did good this time), so not sure how this made it pass QC.
 

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Wanted to update this and give Steve @a91what a huge shoutout and thank you for all the help he has given me with tuning my hotrod., tune wise it has been absolutely awesome and ran a personal best of 10.48 @ 139 mph on a peak of 19lbs in 4th gear falling to 16lbs. If you need any tuning related help on your ride, I would 100% contact a91what on here, guy knows his stuff.

We are heading back out today for the final track day of the year, and then over winter we are doing some upgrades to hopefully get this thing deep in the 9's
 
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