What did you do with your Thunderbird Today?

The time has come!! Started taking the engine apart to pull. Was thinking of lowering the radiator also, does anybody have pictures of where to cut it??
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Still working my way through the front suspension. Got started on the passenger side. I'm having difficulty separating the knuckle from the lower ball joint connection.

I don't have enough room for a big enough swing with my hammer. My ball joint separator isn't big enough to get around the ball joints body. As I type this, I'm thinking of getting my ball joint separator at the threads and use the nut still.

Otherwise, all my suspension is loose and ready to come off.

Oh, and the driver torsion bar thing (?), I can't get the bushing to come off the inner LCA side. Like the bushing is off, yes, but the metal insert there that's still attached to the torsion bar thing.

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Oh, and California stuffs happened here

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Rodeo Joe said:
Years ago at TSTSNBN

Years ago at TSTSNBN, Gonzalo Duque was making these for the MN-12. He passed away and I'm wondering if a family member picked up making these.

Ok, poked around on the website and his son took over the business. :thumbsup:

Joe
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I didn’t know that he passed away. ☹️Bummer. I remember him. Really nice guy.
 
Pulled the engine today, what a filthy task with 27 year old gaskets GROSSSSS

I noticed the exhaust manifolds have a lil extra lip on the inside that could probably use a lil porting. I’m sure it won’t make huge difference but I’d sleep better at night. Anybody ever do that??



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Chingon1 said:
Pulled the engine today, what a filthy task with 27 year old gaskets GROSSSSS

I noticed the exhaust manifolds have a lil extra lip on the inside that could probably use a lil porting. I’m sure it won’t make huge difference but I’d sleep better at night. Anybody ever do that??



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I feel like I've heard about a shop that used to port these. So it has been done, but not sure how many have done it without the rest of the porting
 
Preston Smith (RIP) used to port them back in the day; I had a set which I sold to @CDsDontBurn after I installed long tubes. It certainly helps with raw flow potential, but remember the best thing you can do with the exhaust is build it for improved scavenging - focus less on flow.
 
@Zep5.0 im not trying to go all crazy, only thinking of hitting the exit side because it looks like it MIGHT get a lil bigger maybe an 1/8 to 1/4 wider. I know it won’t help much but ehh why not.

@1997ThunderbirdLXV6 it’s super easy all you need is a stub to attach it to the column side, I think you can find it on TBSC or maybe @racecougar has one laying around. Again pretty easy, kinda tight but nothing you won’t be able to handle.

@theterminator93 yea I’m pretty sure the scavenging is waaaaaay better with actual headers, unfortunately I’m a broke boii and 1000$ headers are out of the question right now 😬🫠 plus supercoupeperformance didn’t have any in stock til mid year. This will have to do for now.
 
Chingon1 said:
plus supercoupeperformance didn’t have any in stock til mid year. This will have to do for now.
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I bought my Kooks from SCP back in I think December and from my conversation with Bill on phone it sounded like he had a few sets in his inventory. Honestly I don’t really endorse SCP as alot of stuff can be Had more than 50% or more cheaper elsewhere but the Kooks are actually pretty reasonable these days, look up Kooks headers for mustangs, hell look up any headers for Mustangs and they’re all near or above 4 digit items, the 2V hooks are just below 900 before tax/shipping.

I’m a broke boy too, and that purchase hurt (I sold my motorcycle to justify them) but for a bolt on exhaust item they’re unmatched. I ported my stock 2V manifolds when I PI swapped, getting rid of that lip on the passenger side and smoothing that curve on the driver side but I doubt it did anything meaningful.
 
theterminator93 said:
Preston Smith (RIP) used to port them back in the day; I had a set which I sold to @CDsDontBurn after I installed long tubes. It certainly helps with raw flow potential, but remember the best thing you can do with the exhaust is build it for improved scavenging - focus less on flow.
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RIP, Tbirdbrain. Anyone heard from michelle? I have a set on the red cougar.
 
@XR7-4.6 bill said he had 4v headers in stock except the 2v. I really wish I could have got them, maybe put em on my credit card and paid em lil by lil. But he didn’t even have them in stock til later which sucks since I’m sure the only was they go in is by removing the engine huh, sucks. Anyways this will totally have to do for now 😤
 
Chingon1 said:
@XR7-4.6 bill said he had 4v headers in stock except the 2v. I really wish I could have got them, maybe put em on my credit card and paid em lil by lil. But he didn’t even have them in stock til later which sucks since I’m sure the only was they go in is by removing the engine huh, sucks. Anyways this will totally have to do for now 😤
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Ahh, that makes sense he was able to ship my 4V headers out ASAP. You can get them in by dropping the K member too, that’s what I’m doing
 
Just about wrapping up removal of the front suspension and I'm hung up on this one bolt / nut. It's for the UCA on the driver side facing the firewall. What is the best strategy for removal of this one bolt / nut? In removing the bolt from inside the wheel well, I've rounded out the bolt side because of how shallow it is, but I've learned that I can just get at it from the nut side no problem.

Can I remove that sensor / wire thing from the brake booster without causing any issues to the braking system? Removing that would give me the space I need to remove the nut.

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To be fair, we can't see the business end. ;)

I swing below the mount for the hood strut. I find there's enough for 1-2 clicks. It takes a little patience, but it works.
 
@XR7-4.6 thank for the tip! Because pulling the engine YIKES haha, maybe if I ever 4v swap it.



Installs the windage tray/oil pan gasket and fully torqued the heads. Also cleaned the engine bay along with the timing cover and head covers.


Also I got this 4” to 3.5” silicon reducer and 4” pipe that’s going on the vortech, kinda like an Anderson power pipe. My question is I’m trying to connect the PVC hoses to an air oil separator and from there I want to get barbs to drill on this intake pipe. Where can I purchase those?? Home Depot??
 

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theterminator93 said:
To be fair, we can't see the business end. ;)

I swing below the mount for the hood strut. I find there's enough for 1-2 clicks. It takes a little patience, but it works.
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Fair enough. That particular unit is my Tekton ratcheting wrench. I've been using primarily my Gearwrench ratcheting wrenches for this job. My Tekton is a better fit for this particular nut because it doesn't have the curve at the end like my Gearwrench does.

So below up towards the hood strut and it should work is what you're saying?

Zep5.0 said:
You can unplug those for the time being
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Does it twist and pop out?
 
Chingon1 said:
@XR7-4.6 thank for the tip! Because pulling the engine YIKES haha, maybe if I ever 4v swap it.
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A load leveler helps big time with pulling/installing the engine if you don’t have one. I prefer pulling the engine to do stuff like headers or the oil pan gasket etc by far but I don’t own an engine crane, the one I 4V swapped with was borrowed from a friend, and am not interested in buying one(Not for the cost but the garage space they take up!!!). By comparison an engine support bar fits neatly in the rafters
 
Got a new set of Altimax RT45s installed over the weekend; there's a $70 rebate promo I figured I'd take advantage of for the car's last set of new tires. :bawling:

I took a leap of faith and bought them from Wal Mart because they had the cheapest price for installation, which includes lifetime balancing and rotations (though I always rotate myself when I change the oil). I wasn't expecting a lot, but to my surprise (and delight) they did a great job! I've never had a set of tires installed on this car be so perfectly balanced before.

Then on the way home there was a "chugging" sound from the LR tire. Today I took a look and the wheel weight on the inside lip of the rim was rubbing up against the foam wrapping around the e-brake cable. After a couple cable ties came to the rescue, there's no more imitating a locomotive. :cool:
 
Dropped the engine in yesterday and fired her up with the new ported PI heads and she sounds spicy 😬

Today took some time but I installed the vortech head unit, clocked it and pretty much ran ran all the intake tubes all the way up to the throttle body. My pops wired up the new slot maf aswell.

Pretty much the only things left are

Run the PCV hoses
Secure the coil packs
Secure the intercooler
Wire up the gauges

Aaaannnnnddddd tune it. Which is gonna be the hardest part. image.jpg
 

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Zep5.0 said:
I feel like I've heard about a shop that used to port these. So it has been done, but not sure how many have done it without the rest of the porting
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TbirdBrain used to do it. Unfortunately he passed away some time ago. I have a set of his manifolds. But they are installed on my sons "shitbird" so I can't take pictures.
But the point is, you can definitely take some material out of those manifolds.
 
Chingon1 said:
Dropped the engine in yesterday and fired her up with the new ported PI heads and she sounds spicy 😬

Today took some time but I installed the vortech head unit, clocked it and pretty much ran ran all the intake tubes all the way up to the throttle body. My pops wired up the new slot maf aswell.

Pretty much the only things left are

Run the PCV hoses
Secure the coil packs
Secure the intercooler
Wire up the gauges

Aaaannnnnddddd tune it. Which is gonna be the hardest part. View attachment 11084
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That gauge on the steering column is pretty sick. Where’d ya get it?
 
@Kidd-7 the guy I bought the charger off of gave it to me but I believe it’s for a 96-04 mustang. It literally fits right on top steering column, I didn’t have to remove mine just goes right over the original one like a cover

@supergordo caution tho, I literally made a hole in the driver side manifold while porting the inner bend, be veeery careful. Luckily I had a buddy who welded it up for me asap. They both have a step right before the exit that’s about 1/4” all around. Specially the passenger side.
 

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