Spooks 5 window Ford project.
- Thread starter Spook
- Start date
Not to start with mate. Keeping the budget tight to get it on the road and then go from there. I'd be happy with a working engine actually attached to the chassis to be honest at the minute. Just cage it and thrash it round the field
Tiny little update. Having asked to have space in the barn to work on the '32 and the guy filling it with vehicles and leaving for Easter break, I was forced to start work on the chassis and engine outside.
The ultimate goal is to get the engine as low as possible inside the frame without the sump protruding underneath. It also had to be as far back as possible. This would keep the weight, and centre of gravity as low as possible and the weight as central as it could be.
I managed to get the body off and on a trailer out the way so I could see what was going on. I managed to get the crane over the frame and hoist the engine up to take the wooden cross member out.
After it was free floating I managed to get it as far back as possible. Where the end of the driveshaft leaves the gearbox there is a built in reinforcement member. That mean to had to take off the rubber coupling so it would drop in the slot.
The rear end was as it should be so I lowered the front into place. Unfortunately the next thing to foul the frame was the exhaust manifolds so off they came!
The only other thing keeping the engine from dropping right down was the old engine mounts on the frame rails.
I left it there for the day so I can pick it up tomorrow and finalise the mounting points. The plan is to take off the old mounts and fabricate some solid ones. The frame rails will need some captive nuts or bosses welded in to pick them up but that's straightforward.
More updates tomorrow hopefully.
The ultimate goal is to get the engine as low as possible inside the frame without the sump protruding underneath. It also had to be as far back as possible. This would keep the weight, and centre of gravity as low as possible and the weight as central as it could be.
I managed to get the body off and on a trailer out the way so I could see what was going on. I managed to get the crane over the frame and hoist the engine up to take the wooden cross member out.
After it was free floating I managed to get it as far back as possible. Where the end of the driveshaft leaves the gearbox there is a built in reinforcement member. That mean to had to take off the rubber coupling so it would drop in the slot.
The rear end was as it should be so I lowered the front into place. Unfortunately the next thing to foul the frame was the exhaust manifolds so off they came!
The only other thing keeping the engine from dropping right down was the old engine mounts on the frame rails.
I left it there for the day so I can pick it up tomorrow and finalise the mounting points. The plan is to take off the old mounts and fabricate some solid ones. The frame rails will need some captive nuts or bosses welded in to pick them up but that's straightforward.
More updates tomorrow hopefully.
I'll just knock up some tubular ones. The cast manifolds that are on it as standard are notoriously restrictive anyway. If I lengthen the primaries they'll clear the rails and I can run them alongside. It buys me about 3 inches in overall engine height so well worth doing. It will let me drop the body down that bit more too.
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Another half day spent fettling and lining up today. As it stands now I need to fabricate two mounts for the sides and one for the rear of the gearbox. Everything is level, square and straight so As long as I don't move it whilst welding the mounts on it should be straightforward from here 
.
I started by getting the engine hoisted well clear of the frame so I could work on getting the old mounts cut off. Once it was clear I mounted up a cutting disk on the grinder and began hacking away.
This is the mount shortly before it was liberated from the chassis:
You can see the annoying little tab at the bottom of the shot as well. Surprising how much trouble a little bit like that can be. Anyway that all got chopped and chiselled away to leave some nice clean frame rails to work from.
The next step was to remove some more bits from the engine, namely the old motor mounts. It was pretty difficult to do this while the thing was swinging on a strap so I set it down on the frame again to work on
it. In hindsight I didn't really need these off but I needed to take some measurements anyway so it wasn't a complete waste of time.
A slight change of plan from my previous update at this point. I did intend to get the engine as low as possible in the chassis without the sump protruding underneath. Now if I had stuck to that height at the front and had the engine level the flange on the back of the gearbox would have been far too high to mate with the rear diff. That being the case I adjusted the rear of the gearbox up to the maximum height it could be without jeopardising the driveshaft angle and then levelled the whole engine from that fixed point. Luckily the rear gearbox mount is still on the motor so I can use the OEM rubber mounts to reduce vibration and noise.
It's a bit hard to see in this pic as it's bot properly side-on but the engine is sitting level with the frame:
In the end I had to plant the engine on the ground with block of wood and then move the chassis around it to line it all up. The chassis is considerably more manageable than the engine is.
This is hopefully the final position of the power plant:
The rear of the gearbox has a cross member running underneath it but it is fractionally too far back in the frame. The remedy for this is to make an extension piece to pick up on the old cross member and then bolt the original mounts to that.
Here's a view from behind. It shows how wide the V actually is compared to the frame:
And a cheeky birds-eye view from the lifting frame.
As you can see the weight is entirely inside the wheelbase and track. This should improve the handling quite a bit. It's a tight squeeze in there but I think I should be able to get the body a lot lower now. The chassis will also be dropped with some coilovers. The frame sits over 9" off the ground anyway so It's got plenty of scope for lowering. The coils it has already are too far gone so I though I may as well upgrade while I have an excuse
If I get some normal shorter versions of what it has then it should work out cheaper and better than the long run. Once the engine is firmly fixed to the frame I can then slide the body into place and mock up where the floor needs to go in. That will then dictate the final look of the car. I'm hoping to have the engine mounted by this weekend and maybe the body mounts mocked up. I will keep this thread updated anyway.
.I started by getting the engine hoisted well clear of the frame so I could work on getting the old mounts cut off. Once it was clear I mounted up a cutting disk on the grinder and began hacking away.
This is the mount shortly before it was liberated from the chassis:
You can see the annoying little tab at the bottom of the shot as well. Surprising how much trouble a little bit like that can be. Anyway that all got chopped and chiselled away to leave some nice clean frame rails to work from.
The next step was to remove some more bits from the engine, namely the old motor mounts. It was pretty difficult to do this while the thing was swinging on a strap so I set it down on the frame again to work on
it. In hindsight I didn't really need these off but I needed to take some measurements anyway so it wasn't a complete waste of time.
A slight change of plan from my previous update at this point. I did intend to get the engine as low as possible in the chassis without the sump protruding underneath. Now if I had stuck to that height at the front and had the engine level the flange on the back of the gearbox would have been far too high to mate with the rear diff. That being the case I adjusted the rear of the gearbox up to the maximum height it could be without jeopardising the driveshaft angle and then levelled the whole engine from that fixed point. Luckily the rear gearbox mount is still on the motor so I can use the OEM rubber mounts to reduce vibration and noise.
It's a bit hard to see in this pic as it's bot properly side-on but the engine is sitting level with the frame:
In the end I had to plant the engine on the ground with block of wood and then move the chassis around it to line it all up. The chassis is considerably more manageable than the engine is.
This is hopefully the final position of the power plant:
The rear of the gearbox has a cross member running underneath it but it is fractionally too far back in the frame. The remedy for this is to make an extension piece to pick up on the old cross member and then bolt the original mounts to that.
Here's a view from behind. It shows how wide the V actually is compared to the frame:
And a cheeky birds-eye view from the lifting frame.
As you can see the weight is entirely inside the wheelbase and track. This should improve the handling quite a bit. It's a tight squeeze in there but I think I should be able to get the body a lot lower now. The chassis will also be dropped with some coilovers. The frame sits over 9" off the ground anyway so It's got plenty of scope for lowering. The coils it has already are too far gone so I though I may as well upgrade while I have an excuse
If I get some normal shorter versions of what it has then it should work out cheaper and better than the long run. Once the engine is firmly fixed to the frame I can then slide the body into place and mock up where the floor needs to go in. That will then dictate the final look of the car. I'm hoping to have the engine mounted by this weekend and maybe the body mounts mocked up. I will keep this thread updated anyway.
Definitely good progress. This is the foundation for the rest of the build so it's worth taking some time over and doing properly.
That's the main reason I want to get it bolted down. It's like 5 wires to get it started so I can hear the noises! Not sure about turbo yet. It would have to be 2 though. I was thinking of picking up another T3 and having one for each bank. I need an AEM F/IC - 8 first though really. Just waiting on one to come in cheap online.
What engine did you go for in the end? BMW?