Converting My 1967 Convertible C4 To Manual

120mm

Active Member
Sep 5, 2014
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Newton, Iowa
So I have this sweet little 1967 convertible that I've owned since 1976, and I really want to put a manual in it.
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I converted it from an I-6 to a '95 5.0L a few years ago, and after driving it a bit, one of the bolts holding the bellhousing worked loose and trashed the bellhousing. I'm assuming, based on the long crack running along the bell that it had been over-torqued at sometime in its life.
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It was a cheap, $100 interim transmission, so I'm not out much, but I need to put something sportier in it. I was thinking a 4 speed Toploader, since that is what I grew up with, plus I'm not going to spend the money for a new third member to really take advantage of the T5. It's currently running a 1970 3.00 8" third member.

So, if research serves, I need a 50oz flywheel, a 10.5 inch clutch, a set of clutch pedals off a junkyard Mustang/Falcon, as well as a linkage set like this:

https://www.cjponyparts.com/clutch-equalizer-bar-kit-289-302-1967-1968/p/CEBK4/

Do I need something like this?

https://www.cjponyparts.com/scott-d...or-late-model-302-engines-1965-1973/p/CEBBF5/

Of course, I need a Toploader transmission and a 6 bolt bell; assuming anything with a transmission code for a Mustang from 1965 to 1970 with a 10 input and 28 output will work.

Am I on the right sheet of music, here?
 
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I did all of that to my '68 in 2004.

Yes, you're going to need:
- the linkage kit
- the adapter bracket for your 5.0 block. The one you linked doesn't show the post and pivot ball...you'll need those too. I got mine complete from NPD.
- a set of '67 pedals
- a 50oz flywheel with 157 teeth which will match the 10.5" clutch.
- a "smallblock" toploader with 10 spline input and 28 spline output.

It looks like something got punched through your C4 bellhousing from the inside.
 
I did all of that to my '68 in 2004.

Yes, you're going to need:
- the linkage kit
- the adapter bracket for your 5.0 block. The one you linked doesn't show the post and pivot ball...you'll need those too. I got mine complete from NPD.
- a set of '67 pedals
- a 50oz flywheel with 157 teeth which will match the 10.5" clutch.
- a "smallblock" toploader with 10 spline input and 28 spline output.

Just picked up the pedals and the correct toploader and bell. Wallet lightened, but my wife is excited about Daisy living again.

It looks like something got punched through your C4 bellhousing from the inside.

Yep. If you follow the cracks up and left from the hole, you'll see they concentrate around that missing bell housing to transmission bolt. When I took the tranny off, I was unable to break any of the other bolts loose using in excess of 100 ft/lbs. The correct torque on those is 25 ft/lbs. Some jackanape used an air tool to put those on, cracked the aluminum bell housing which released the clamping force on that bolt. It worked it's way loose, and when it met the torque converter at highway speed, the results were predictable.

But, hey, it's a $100 used transmission and I wanted a four speed anyway.
 
@120mm " I can't find this "stud" that it says is needed."
I bought a '65 "K" brand new. Hot little set-up, had semi-centrifugal clutch from factory. The bracket mentioned above bolts to the frame, supports the "equalizer" assembly, as Ford called it, steel tube about 7, 8 inches long, thick wall, two arms welded to it, longer one connects to clutch pedal, short one to link which pushes against the throw-out fork.

Look very carefully at the welds securing those arms to the cross-tube. Mine broke at the weld on the long arm, pedal went to floor, clutch did not release, at about 5000 rpm. Maybe add weld strength. Ya don't need to experience what I did.

The equalizer arm is supported at either end by a ball about 3/4" diameter machined with a stud welded or peened into the frame bracket, other end had a bracket with ball attached which bolted to the block, as I recall. I think it was the FE engines which came with a threaded hole in the block, which received a ball with threaded stud. Thick felt washers were supposed to keep lube in on those balls. I drilled & threaded my tube for a Zerk fitting; maybe yours will have one!
imp
 
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@120mm " I can't find this "stud" that it says is needed."
I bought a '65 "K" brand new. Hot little set-up, had semi-centrifugal clutch from factory. The bracket mentioned above bolts to the frame, supports the "equalizer" assembly, as Ford called it, steel tube about 7, 8 inches long, thick wall, two arms welded to it, longer one connects to clutch pedal, short one to link which pushes against the throw-out fork.

Look very carefully at the welds securing those arms to the cross-tube. Mine broke at the weld on the long arm, pedal went to floor, clutch did not release, at about 5000 rpm. Maybe add weld strength. Ya don't need to experience what I did.

The equalizer arm is supported at either end by a ball about 3/4" diameter machined with a stud welded or peened into the frame bracket, other end had a bracket with ball attached which bolted to the block, as I recall. I think it was the FE engines which came with a threaded hole in the block, which received a ball with threaded stud. Thick felt washers were supposed to keep lube in on those balls. I drilled & threaded my tube for a Zerk fitting; maybe yours will have one!
imp

Thanks for the info! I had an earlier Hipo Mustang as well, and somehow avoided killing myself in it, as a 17 year old.

I will be sure to examine the equalizer bar thoroughly when it arrives. I can weld, and will "fix" it if necessary. According to the picture on the website, it appears to have a zerk fitting.

My '95 HO engine doesn't have the proper place to bolt the bracket, thus the need to put the adapter bracket on the bell housing, or whatever alternate place it goes. Will figure that out once I'm able to order from NPD.

Part of my problem is that I'm currently in Afghanistan, and due to rotate back in 10 days, and the NPD order system kicked me out and locked my account, because I probably look like a scammer to them. Will Skype with them later today to get things moving.

As of right now, the only part left un-ordered besides that bracket is the clutch fork. There are at least two different versions, and I simply don't know what I don't know, and don't want to waste $50 to find out which one I should have. I'm going with a 10.5" clutch, but don't know if I need to order the pre 2/68 or post 2/68 version, or something else, entirely.
 
@120mmThe equalizer arm is supported at either end by a ball about 3/4" diameter machined with a stud welded or peened into the frame bracket, other end had a bracket with ball attached which bolted to the block, as I recall. I think it was the FE engines which came with a threaded hole in the block, which received a ball with threaded stud.
imp

Windsors blocks also had the threaded boss for the pivot, but it was omitted from the casting after Ford started using cable clutches. That's why roller cam blocks like ours need the adapter bracket. (Mine is actually one of the very last service replacement blocks)

And yes, it's held on with the bellhousing bolts. Fun fact: those brackets are made for cast bellhousings and won't fit correctly on the thinner flange of a steel scattershield. I made some spacers out of round stock and used two old 289 head bolts. This is a really old photo looking down on it:
z-bar-jpg.110933.jpg
 
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Because there is so little information online about this aspect of Mustang engine/transmission conversions, and I write training curriculum for a living, I think I will document how I do mine and post it somewhere.

It's like people who wrench on cars talk about the engine, and the transmission, but then kind of neglect the bits and linkages in between.
 
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@120mm " As of right now, the only part left un-ordered besides that bracket is the clutch fork."

One thing to be aware of (amongst maybe two dozen others) is that I believe the old, '60s style fork was made to attach (be retained) to it's pivot, which consisted of a right-angled bracket riveted to the inside of the bell housing, having a nice rounded edge bearing against the inside of the fork, by two different means. That may be the only difference between early and late. The one I remember was a slightly curved spring wire bent with hooks at it's ends.

Another tidbit: 5.0 equipped Mustangs with T-5 manuals beginning in '94 had a deeper bell housing by almost 3/4-inch. Use of that bell with early transmissions meant the input shaft pilot did not reach into the crankshaft pilot bearing, leaving the splined end of the shaft unsupported. '94- & up T-5s had a longer input shaft.

Yet another: Mechanical clutch linkage, such as yours, required the pivot point of the fork to be central between throwout bearing end, and the other end extending outside the bell housing. This applied to "juice mechanisms" as well. Enter the cable-release system as found on later Mustangs, which required the fork pivot to be at the far end of the fork, throwout in the center. They used a ball as a pivot. IOW, mechanical pushed the fork, cable pulled it.

One other, IMO the worst beyond doubt, found it's way into F-Series trucks as well as Explorers, used a hydraulic master cylinder and slave cylinder built-into the throwout assembly! The bearing rode ON the front of the cylinder, INSIDE the bell housing! Feature also that the frigging throwout support hub was made of PLASTIC! imp
 
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@120mm
Dang! Yer up on this very well. I go by distant memory, having done it all, but 40 years ago. The first image is as I recall the pivot to look. Remember well, because one broke off on me, posed a kind of difficult diagnosis, excessive pedal free play, incomplete clutch disengage, etc. Cracked and bent, but not clean off.

Sometime, ask me about the 9-inch center section casting broken clean in half! imp
 
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@120mm
Dang! Yer up on this very well. I go by distant memory, having done it all, but 40 years ago. The first image is as I recall the pivot to look. Remember well, because one broke off on me, posed a kind of difficult diagnosis, excessive pedal free play, incomplete clutch disengage, etc. Cracked and bent, but not clean off.

I'm kind of a bulldog when I'm researching something. Which drives some folks crazy, but I really, really like getting to the bottom of things. Hopefully, I can help others by doing this as thoroughly as I can, and posting it online.

Sometime, ask me about the 9-inch center section casting broken clean in half! imp

WTF? I had no idea they could be that bad and still be passed out by the manufacturer.
 
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imp said:
Yet another[tidbit]: Mechanical clutch linkage, such as yours, required the pivot point of the fork to be central between throwout bearing end, and the other end extending outside the bell housing. This applied to "juice mechanisms" as well. Enter the cable-release system as found on later Mustangs, which required the fork pivot to be at the far end of the fork, throwout in the center. They used a ball as a pivot. IOW, mechanical pushed the fork, cable pulled it.

Unless it was a four cylinder T5. They have a hokey bellcrank mechanism that converts the forward pull of the clutch cable to a rearward pull on the fork.
 
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@120mm "WTF? I had no idea they could be that bad and still be passed out by the manufacturer."
They weren't that bad, rather, strong as hell. Early castings were poorer iron than later, the best being called Nodular Iron, late in the 9" game. My friend, a Ford Mechanic, ordered and got one of the early-release 63-1/2 427 Fastbacks. He was ambitiously-driven to beat out the Mopar 413 Plymouths. Out on County Line Rd. west of Chicago one Saturday night, we cheered him on as he took the lagged behind the Plymouth out of the hole, but caught up and was quickly ahead, when his ride crapped out. He had broken the 9" center section clean in half, from top to bottom! A feat I could never have imagined, having by then set and installed gears in dozens of them.

This view of a 9" center bare, imagined cracked in two from top to bottom, was what Grubby Jack had. I could not find appropriate pics. Later, much strengthened castings bore the "N" insignia in the square gussets above the pinion carrier opening, standing for Nodular Iron. Today, the 9" design is recognized as so workable, that many variants are still being produced. imp


th?id=OIP.HAj2T0lYqvLiHSIFLC5OQwEsDh&pid=15.1&rs=1&c=1&qlt=95&w=144&h=108.jpg
 
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Well, I am home at last, and have all the parts to convert my C4 into a toploader, except... A Hurst shifter.

I found a nice looking one on Ebay, and Ebay automatically shipped it to Herat, Afghanistan. As of right now, it's lost somewhere in the USPS. If I don't get it in a month or so, will end up finding another. When it finally arrives, I will sell it to some other lucky fellow or use it in my next project.

In the meantime, I've been kept busy with Zeke, a 1975 Toyota FJ55 I found in Colorado.

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I drove Zeke to Milwaukee to visit David's 4 Speeds, where I bought a rebuilt Toploader. That's a really cool place, and the people who work there really appear to be knowledgeable and love Toploaders. The owner and his technician walked me through the shop, and then let me help assemble a transmission, explaining the finer points of function and what they do when they rebuild them. I went away not only with a like new transmission, but with a deeper understanding of how they work and what makes the Toploader such a good transmission.

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I had ordered my transmission awhile back, so they saved a gear that was excessively worn when they rebuilt it and gave it to me as a paperweight as well. Since the owner of the shop, as well as my wife and myself love the color purple, I painted the tranny purple and ordered a purple shift knob in commemoration.

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I took Daisy for one last drive with the C4; hopefully, I'll be able to tear into it soon and start replacing "Ho-hum" with "Hot Dog!"
 
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Well, finally back on the project. I took a couple months to travel to Germany, where I worked for the VA on a temp project.

What I've learned: I have purchased the parts equivalent of 3 Mustangs, trying to make a '67 six cylinder Mustang with a C4 into a 1995 5.0L engined, toploader transmissioned performance machine.

Specifically; In 1986, Ford went from 5/16 x 18 flywheel bolts, to 8mm x 1.25 flywheel bolts

CJPony sells a separator plate/starter locator plate for the SBF that fits nothing.

The D1TA 6394 AA bell housings fit early 70s 351W engines and NOTHING ELSE

Putting a Hurst Competition Plus shifter on a toploader makes every single other Ford transmission part non-applicable

CJPony's website sucks donkey balls. You have to know the EXACT link to the part you want to get it.

The amount of online information on converting a 1967 Mustang to a 1995 5.0L to a toploader could be written on the head of a pin, in 60 font calligraphy.
 
I received what has to be the cheapest C5DA-6394-A in America today. It was $160, shipped. BTW, if you want to do more than one engine/transmission swap in a vintage Ford, David Kee has the references you need to save money.

Bellhousing ID Chart

For that price, I expected one major issue, and only hoped I could deal with it.

Well, I got all the issue I could deal with. Some numbskull decided that when their C5 series throwout arm pivot point broke, that welding it back to the base was the "right answer". While it was still in place on an aluminum bellhousing.

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It was on there, alright, but getting it off ended with the destruction of a bunch of cheap Chinese tools, an angle grinder wheel and some serious ugly to the beautiful two stage silver paint the seller put on the bell to look good. And swear words. Lots of swear words.

After about 2 hours of this fun, both rivets holding in the remainder of the broken pivot popped loose easily, as if they were laughing at me. Putting the post 2/68 pivot on took an additional 30 seconds and I am ready to roll.

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A note: Putting an iron bell on a Mustang without a lift is a task for someone who benches 300 pounds. Putting an aluminum bell on the same Mustang can be one handed by an 8 year old girl.
 
Yesterday and today I went full out on getting this thing done.

As of now, I am able to sit in the driver seat and make motor noises, while running clutch and shifting.

First impression: The Competition Plus shifter is crisp, short throw and precise. My old race car was running a worn out Super T-10, and my Land Cruiser is, well, a Land Cruiser, so the precise short throws were kind of a surprise.

If I were to do it again: I'd install the speedometer cable while the pedal quadrant and steering column was out.

The clutch is light by my foot and I can't see why you'd want anything better. But then I workout 1.5 hours a day, 6 days a week.

CJPony's Clutch conversion kit doesn't come with 1 of the bushings, and includes none of the clips. I spent a half hour on the phone with them, and they are going to look at changing the kit, because duh. Who makes a kit but doesn't include all the bushings or clips?

I singled handed this, with 3 ton jacks. I will never do that again. That is what we call "the hard way".

On Monday I interviewed with a company that wants to make brand new 1967 Mustangs and sell them as turnkey "kit" cars. Working on Daisy has inspired me to want to work on 1967 Mustangs until the day I retire.
 

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