02-22-06 - About 1.5 weeks ago Dennis and I got just about everything finished and assembled and ready to fire up. Right now all that is left are little things; a throttle cable bracket, the blow off valve bung, cleaning up the wiring and vacuum lines, etc. Nothing that has to be done to fire it up and get it to idle. I have been working a lot on getting Megasquirt, my aftermarket PCM working correctly. It is a pretty cool stand alone EFI system, but takes a bit of configuring to get it working right. I should have built it instead of buying it preassembled. That way I would have learned how the circuits work and I could have also set it up correctly for my car. Right now I am dealing with the ignition input circuit. MS is not getting an RPM signal, so something isn't setup right for the VR distributor. MS was originally setup for a hall/optical distributor, but I am using a VR, so I am trying to change over the correct components on the circuit board to make my distributor work. Starting to get frustrated with it, but I'll eventually figure it out. All part of the project, I guess. Anyway, check out the final assembly pictures.

01-24-06 - I've done a lot of fabricating in the past 2 weeks. The main project was the exhaust log manifolds. I took a pair of 1 5/8ths shorty headers and turned them into step tube log manifolds for the twin turbo setup. It was a long but fun project. The nice thing about doing it custom was I could place the turbos exactly where I needed them for my setup and my space requirements. Felt strange not to have to make compromises on other areas of the setup to compensate for improper turbo placement. I have also started to make some of the intercooler piping. The Y pipe that joins the cross over pipe into the driver's side turbo and intercooler came out great! I am pretty excited about. Should look really nice once I TIG it. Ran out of pipe yesterday, so I ordered more and I also ordered all the hoses and fittings I need for the oil lines to and from the turbo.

01-11-06 - I am currently working on getting the turbos on the car. Yesterday I did some initial mockups and planning. Wow, it's tight in there! Its going to be a challenge getting all the pipes, etc, in the car and to fit under the hood. After a few hours of holding things in place and thinking, I came up with an idea that I think will work. Today I'm ordering the mandrel bends I need and hopefully by this weekend I can start modifying the headers for the turbos. Today I am making the fuel injector harness, working on making an oddball brake line that I need, and other misc stuff. Over Christmas break I pulled the engine and tranny. The oil pan was still hitting the K-member, so I had to modify the pan again. This time I chopped off the corner of the pan that was in the way, and TIG welded on a piece of sheet metal. One reason the car felt so sluggish with the carb is because I discovered a pretty big internal hydraulic leak in the transmission. Apparently, there are two different bore sizes of rings that seal off the high/reverse clutch pack. Would have been nice if they hadn't labelled all the rings with the same color paint! Anyway, I now have that clutch pack all sealed up tight now, so it should apply properly as well as provide proper main line pressure throughout the transmission. I'm pretty certain all clutch packs were slipping on my very short previous test drive. Two days ago I put the engine and tranny back in the car. Went in pretty smoothly and now the oil pan fits just about perfectly. Also over the holidays I made the fuel rails that I will be using. I couldn't find any aftermarket rails that were cheap and that were at the angle I wanted, so I just made what I needed. I cut the injector bungs off the stock fuel rails, ground them down to all the same height (+/- 0.003"), and then TIG welded them on to 1" bar stock. I then welded -10 AN fittings on the ends of the rails, and made some hold down brackets. I spend a pretty good amount of time on them, but I am happy with the end product. I hope they work well.. I think they will. Hopefully I'll be able to get some new pictures up soon, but we'll see.

12-20-05 - We got the engine and transmission in the car about 2 weeks ago. I have since been making the front accessory brackets, wiring in the MSD box, running cooler lines, vacuum lines, etc, etc. Middle of last week we fired it up on a Holley 4150 750cfm carb. It runs, but not too great. This carb has been modified by the previous owner, and we are having trouble tuning it. Its probably something simple, but we can't find what it is. It idles very rich, and we can't lean it enough. Not a big deal because I am converting to fuel injection, but I do want to figure this carb out just so I can pick up some more knowlege/experience along the way in this project. I did drive it about a 1/4 mile down to the landing and back the other night. Its pretty sluggish, but that's because the carb isn't setup correctly. On the bright side, the transmission shifts.. 1 to 2 shift is pretty quick, exactly what I wanted. I think it is still a little low on fluid, but its getting there. I won't be adding the turbos on this engine before I have to move to Glendale Heights, IL at the end of January for my Volkswagen training program. I am hoping to get it converted to fuel injection before I leave, but we'll see, I'm running out of time.

11-28-05 - The twin turbo 351w project is coming along slower than I had hoped, but the swap is getting closer. Just finished rebuilding the C4 automatic transmission. It was easier than I had expected, but I had a fairly good understanding of automatics before I started. While I was at it, I upgraded the planetary gearset and modified the valve body quite a bit. :) Should be pretty fun to drive with the mods and the B&M Pro Ratchet shifter. The 351w engine is mostly assembled. There's just a few minor things left to do. Once I get a torque converter and flex plate, the engine and transmission will be ready to drop in the car. Once that assembly is in the car, I will be ready to begin the large project of fabricating the whole exhaust system for the intercooled twin turbo setup. That's going to be interesting, but I do have a plan of attack. I can't wait to drive this car.. should be a screamer with the twin Holset HY-35 turbos, aluminum heads, MSD ignition, modded C4 transmission, MegaSquirt 3, etc.

09-18-05 - The 2.3 turbo project has come to an end. I have decided to part out the engine and move on to a much bigger and better project. Last weekend I blew the head gasket again. Lasted a whole 155 miles since the rebuild. I'm selling all of my 2.3 parts. On a positive note, before it blew up, I had the engine pulling hard all the way to my programmed fuel cutoff of 6900 rpms. I retarded the cam 8 degrees and it was a totally different animal. This engine screamed from 3900 to 6900. Based on similar setups and my calculations, it should have been putting down around 325hp at the wheels. I was running right at 20psi when it blew up this time. Also had my 46lb injectors in and I never heard any detonation. Still could have had some detonation, but if so, it wasn't major, I don't think. Sounded very strong, smooth, and normal; then it had a misfire at a stop light. Took it home, pulled the plugs, turned it over and watched the coolant shower. :(

09-03-05 - After a few complications, the Mustang is back on the road as of this weekend. While the engine was out getting another set of rods, I changed a few things. I bought the supplies from Tech Line coatings to ceramic coat my pistons, combustion chambers, intake and exhaust valve faces, intake and exhaust runners in the head, exhaust header, and turbine housing. I might coat the downpipe eventually once I get it setup correctly. Also while the engine was out, I put on a ported oval port Pinto head, Stinger header, and a Turbonetics T04B Super H trim Stage III 0.63 hybrid turbo. I'm still trying to get my tune straightened out and other small things taken care of. Over all, it pulls pretty well, but feels a lot different from my old setup. It doesn't feel as fast as the old stock T3, but I'm pretty sure it is faster. Speedometer climbs faster, anyway.. might have lost some torque and picked up some horse power. I need to figure out why my top end power is still falling off around 5500 like my last setup. I'm pretty sure it is either the cam or the VAM. The really odd thing is that with this big hybrid at 20psi, I still have enough fuel according to my wideband. I would have thought I'd be out of fuel with the stock injectors somewhere around 16 or 17psi.

06-26-05 - Found out a few days ago that the headgasket is blown. Coolant is leaking into the #3 cylinder. I'm going to pull the engine to fix the oil pan/front cover gaskets. I also have a new head going on. I'm not sure when it will be back on the road.

06-13-05 - I have worked on the Mustang a lot since the last update here, but I have been to busy to post here. Between work and school, I don't have much time left over. I sold my EEC-Tuner back in the winter because I was having some intermittent problems. The problems went away every time I removed the tuner from the computer. Could have been a problem with my car, I'm not sure; never was able to figure it out. Right now I am tuning my engine with a J3 adapter from Moates.net. So far, that is working out very well. It is easy to use and I haven't had any problems with it at all. Pretty affordable, too. A few weeks ago I put on a 65mm throttle body from a Thunderbird SuperCoupe. It made the car more responsive and more fun to drive. Didn't really add any power as I expected, however, the turbo seems to spool a little bit faster. I keep coming back to the word responsive when talking about it. Yesterday I made some lower radiator mounts to space the radiator back towards the engine and away from the intercooler. It was not getting enough air where I previously had it mounted. So far, it cools much better and doesn't overheat as quickly. I think with a small fan, I will be set. Right now I am working with my timing tables trying to squeeze a bit more out of the engine. It is a bit of a long trial and error process, but I am starting to narrow it down a bit.

01-02-05 - I have made a few changes on the Mustang since the last posted update, but at the moment, the Mustang is dead in its tracks. Last week my tuner started messing up. I was in the process of removing the tuner from the computer, and the computer's circuit board accidently fell on some bare metal and shorted it out. I should have a replacement LA3 here sometime around the end of this week or first of next. In the meantime, I have a new toy.. hehe I picked up a 99 Ford F-250 Super Duty with the Power Stroke turbo diesel engine. It's pretty sweet. Back to the Mustang.... I got Bob's center mount log installed. Didn't feel a huge difference, but the turbo definitley spools more readily. I got my tuner and LM-1 wideband O2 sensor installed. That stock fuel curve is pretty bad for a modified engine with a blow-thru VAM! I have been working with Stinger from the forums to create a modified VAM transfer table to trick the EEC into providing the correct part-throttle air/fuel ratio.

11-04-04 - I'm finally home from all the bike tours that I worked on, so now work resumes on the Mustang! I have lots of new parts on the way; some are already here. Last night I got my Schneider roller cam installed, but I haven't taken it out yet since it has been raining. It's pretty similar to the Engle 111 cam, but this is a hydraulic roller instead of a slider. I got a decent deal on a hybrid turbo on TurboFord.org, and I'm also waiting on a big log center mount header from Bob. The turbo and header should be here about any day now. I also have gotten an EEC Tuner installed, and I have an LM-1 Wideband O2 setup ready to install once I redo my exhaust and downpipe for the new header and turbo. I also have some Mopar Super 60 +40 injectors on the way. More later.

5-16-04 - I finally created a page for all the videos of my Mustang. The front page here was getting pretty cluttered. Check out all the videos here.

5-25-04 - Just got back from the dyno a little bit ago. It was a Mustang brand dyno, so the numbers might be a bit low. They sound low to me for what all I'm running. All runs were at 22psi boost and 50psi base fuel pressure. Run 1 - 212 rwhp @ 4100 / 319 ft/tq @ 3300 - Nice flat HP curve; cam retarded 2 degrees. Run 2 - 215 rwhp @ 4000 / 325 @ ft/tq @ 3000 - Curves are more "peaky" than run 1; cam was retarded 4 degrees. Run 3 - 212 rwhp @ 4100 / 317 @ ft/tq @ 2500 - Cam was advanced 2 degrees. Seems like having the RR cam retarded 2 degrees provided the most usable power band. I got to drive the car on the dyno, so that was pretty cool! I noticed that once I hit about 4800-5000 it was pretty much done (running in 4th gear here). The RPMs climbed very slowly at this point. Run 1 pulled the best in the upper RPMs. I am thinking that my cam is really holding me back right now with this setup. Unfortunately, there was no A/F monitoring, so I still don't know too much about my ratio.

5-17-04 - I just got my Holset HX30w turbo on the Mustang. This turbo is supposedly from a Cummins 4BT engine. This turbo is a huge improvement over the old T3. I get 4psi of boost at only 1900 rpms but is efficient up to around 30psi! It should be able to support around 400 rwhp. The stock wastegate actuator is set at 22psi from the factory, which is what I'm running right now. I can't turn it up much at all until I can get my alcohol injection system installed. The boost comes on nice and smooth. The only problem is that this turbo swap has greatly increased my valve float problem in 2nd gear. Every single time I rev 2nd over 4200, I get float. I'm not quite sure what's causing the float, but hopefully I can look into it soon. This should be a great turbo for autocross; I can't wait to try that. However, due to my upcoming job, it will probably be November or December before I will be able to get to another autocross race. I can't drive my car very much at the moment because I don't have the correct adapter for the oil feed line. That should be here in 3 to 4 days. Once I get the feedline fixed, I am hoping to get my car on a dyno.

5-11-04 - I have 3 videos of last week's night series autocross. I came in 3rd out of 8 cars in my class (SM)! You can see the results here. The car handled great; it hasn't felt that neutral in a long time.

• 1st run
• 2nd run
• 3rd run - got a little bit loose in 1st coming out of the 360*

4-11-04 - Last Thursday night I went to test 'n tune night at the strip. Here's my time slips. I also have 2 videos: the first run and my best run.

4-3-04 - I finally got some in-car videos of my Mustang in action! Check them out:

• 0 to ?? Acceleration - 3.0mb - 3 runs
• Playing on Cullowhee Moutain Road - 15.6mb - Lots of twisties!
• Walnut Creek Road - 3.3mb - More twisties!

3-21-04 - Just installed the boxed upper controls arms, blow through VAM setup, and the correct speedometer drive gear this weekend. The control arms made a noticeable difference in handling (the bushings in the old arms were shot). I replaced the UCAs with stock arms, but I welded 1/8th" steel plate to the bottom side of the arms to make them into a box. It's a lot stiffer now, that's for sure. The blow through VAM setup went pretty smoothly. The hardest part was getting the mandrel bent pipe angles cut correctly so that everything would line up. There's not much room between the IC outlet and the TB. It took a while to get the VAM tuned right. I tried many different tension settings on the VAM door spring. In the end, I tightened the spring by about 1/3rd of the wheel's diameter, and so far with 17psi of boost, the A/F ratio seems to be pretty good. It's a little rich at idle, but nothing that I can't live with. Moving the VAM close to the TB made a huge difference. Engine cranks faster, idles better, much more responsive at any given point or load, no more bucking when slowly getting out of boost, and the turbo sounds cooler. :) It feels like a different car! 17psi with the blow through setup feels noticeably stronger than 17psi with the stock draw through setup. I wish I had done this months ago. I should be able to get 19 or maybe 20psi out of it before I have to start worrying about or adjusting for sufficient fuel. I can turn up the fuel pressure, but I am already on the rich side at idle. I might just have to deal with an overly-rich idle in order to get enough fuel at WOT. That is a small problem compared to the issues that the blow through VAM setup solved.

3-17-04 - Last week I cranked the boost and fuel pressure up again.. I'm up to 22psi now and still no detonation. Going home this weekend to install some new rear upper control arms and attempt to convert to a blow-through VAM.

2-22-04 - Last week I bought the Proform Pinion Depth tool so that I could properly setup my rear end without guessing! Found out that the pinion gear was 0.010" too shallow, so I'm glad I got that correct. Just got the 3.73 ring and pinion back in the 8.8. Boost comes in smoother than it did with the 3.55 gears, but it doesn't seem to hit as hard. Car does seem to be faster, but feels like it has a bit less torque. Kinda funny, a shorter gear ratio actually improved traction! Now full boost in 2nd in a turn does not result in an oversteer condition. Not quite what I was expecting, but I do like the change. This past weekend I also reworked the exhaust. Finally got the muffler hung correctly and high enough. No more scraping on speed bumps! The new Motorcraft wires and the AWSF22C plugs seemed to smooth out the engine some. I tightened the VAM door spring one notch - now it doesn't stall as often when coming to a stop. Still not quite right, but it's much better.

1-11-04 - I got a lot done on the Stang in the past few weeks over Christmas break. The turbo started blowing oil through the intake, so I replaced the center section with a rebuilt unit. I did a compression test.. results were a bit lower than I expected, but they are still good. Cylinder 1 held 140psi, 2 held 135psi, 3 held 135psi, and 4 held 150psi. I built some end caps to clamp onto my intercooler pipes and the intercooler so I could pressure test them with the air compressor. Glad I did - I found 7 non-visable pinhole leaks. I welded those shut and now it's building boost 300 RPM sooner for full boost at 3300. I also moved the intercooler back in the car about 1.5" or so (with the help of the sawzall and a big hammer), so now I can use my stock turn signals and I have parking lights again! After reading a lot on the TurboFord.org archives, I realized I had not unplugged the vacuum line to the MAP sensor! The old N/A computer uses a MAP system for fuel control, but the turbo engine's computer uses a BP sensor. It's amazing how much more fuel I'm getting now at full boost WOT! Now that I'm getting sufficient fuel, I cranked the boost up to 20psi. However, I need to mod the spring in the boost controller because I think it's close to it's limit. It can't control the pressure, so 2nd gear is actually at 22psi right now. Next main issue to resolve is the idle (or lack of).

12-07-03 - Yesterday was the first autocross race on the new turbo engine! It was a lot better, but the course was too tight for me to get full boost in 2nd gear. Still had a nice amount of power, though. Now I am running 17psi - so much fun! It seems that I am not getting enough fuel in the higher RPMs with anything over 17psi. The fuel system shouldn't have a problem supporting at least 21psi, so I'm going to spend some time over Christmas break to try to locate the problem. Hopefully soon I can turn it up even more!

11-04-03 - This past weekend I turned the boost up to 14psi. It pulls really nice. I still have an oil leak even though I have found and fixed a few. Once I get some time off work I'm going to spend a while hunting down the new leak. I have a few ideas, but I haven't had time yet to look into it. I also think my injectors are leaking a bit, so I need to make sure the fuel rail and all the O-rings are seated properly. This past weekend I had some extra time, so I finally got rid of the PVC IC pipe and welded up a 3" mandrel pipe. It turned out great - much better than I expected. I also got a 2" to 3" silicone hose adapter for the turbo compressor to IC pipe connection, so no more boost leaks and blowing the pipe off.

10-12-03 - After many weekends of work, the engine is finally running! Initially I had some timing issues, but it didn't take too long to solve that. Once I started driving it around the block, I quickly became familiar with the sound associated with blowing an intercooler pipe off the turbo compressor housing. A little work with the air grinder took care of that problem, or least while I'm still running 10psi to break it in. I was hoping to drive it back to school, but there is a small oil leak that is misting oil somewhere around the distributor. I spent a couple hours trying to find it with no luck, and then I was out of time. Maybe in 2 weeks when I can return home I will find the leak. Even at 10psi, it feels pretty good. That turbo and Bailey BOV are much louder than I expected, but I'm not complaining, I like the way it sounds. The Dynomax muffler has a nice, deep, loud tone to it. The exhaust needs more work; it's hanging a bit too low right now. Yes, I am going to replace the PVC intercooler pipe on the throttle body side. I just haven't had time yet to figure out the mandrel bends, test fit it, and weld it.