Making Room For Speed Humps.

Having fitted the engine in the chassis and doing the usual checks, I noticed the oil pan protruded roughly 35mm below the chassis floor. If I was cruising up and down the freeway this would not be a problem but in the area where I live there are a lot of speed humps and just getting into my Court has created some gymnastics for the odd Cobra and custom cars that visit so this was not acceptable at all.

In my previous research I had come across several articles of Cobras having ground clearance problems so I did expect to have some issues but decided on the "wait and see" what we needed.

I came across a few low profile pans but decided on the Canton 15-736 pan with a 15-737 oil pick up pipe. I ordered the pan with the starter motor and after four days they were in my hands.

A good thing about the Canton pan is the fact that they made provision for the original OE oil level sender so it is a swap out of the stock pan to the Canton.

Once the old pan was removed,

I bolted the new oil pick up pipe into place.

I did a trial fit of the Canton pan which seemed to sprag up on something. Having a closer look, there is a moulded plastic tray with the sump gasket impregnated into it and forms a complete cover underneath the crank. This cover had four tabs moulded into it as a guide to fit the original pan and as the Canton pan was wider, the tabs had to be removed. I did this with tin snips and a sharp wood chisel and tried the Canton pan again. Bingo, straight into position. A bit of jigling around and all the holes lined up and it was just a matter of torqing the bolts (10Nm + 45°) and the job was done.

One thing that I did not anticipate was the oil level sender. While provision had been made in the Canton pan, it was not in the same position as the original and the wiring connection missed by 50mm. Tell me, what bozo did this. I thought that maybe some internal interference in the pan but I checked it when I fitted it and their was plenty of clearance. This is not a big deal as I know an auto elec with a pair of side cutters that will fix this.

I have to add regardless of this minor criticism, the Canton pan really is an impressive piece of kit.

The Quick Time Bell Housing protrudes below the floor level by 12mm which I don't think will be a problem but if it is, my trusty angle grinder and some black paint will fix this problem quickly.

I am expecting to get the radiator overflow tanks this week and if that is the case, I can hook up the cooling system so apart from headers and tail shaft, the drive train is almost complete. When I say almost complete, I am learning as much as I can about cold air boxes and Mass Air Flow (MAF) connections etc, this is all foreign to me and I have reached the point of my own incompetence being an old carby and extractors type of guy. Fortunately, I happen to have some good friends that know a bit about this stuff so I reckon a few phone calls should fix the problem.

Until next time

Cheers

Russell

Do Cobras Really Need a Starter Motor

As mentioned at the end of my last post, the started motor has proved to be quite troublesome.

Prior to installing the engine I fitted the starter motor and then tried to lower the engine into the chassis and it became quite obvious that the starter was going to foul up on the foot box so we lifted the engine and removed the starter. Once we went through all the drama of getting the engine to sit right, I tried to reinstall the starter motor again and noticed that there was at least 20mm interference between the solenoid and the foot box. it would not even come close to lining up with the mounting holes.

At this point I new that another solution needed to be found so I jumped on the web and started to search for starter motors and googling clearance problems until I came upon a forum discussing rotating starters which I had heard of before. There were a few to choose from and I came across a starter specifically designed for the Coyote engine when it is being used in hot rods and areas where clearance is a problem so, doing some research and checking dimensions I reckoned this is the unit for me. The starter is a Power Master 9532 and has the added benefit of not being effected by heat which I was concerned about and that it has the capacity to crank engines up to 18:1 compression ratio. With the Coyote being 11:1 which is quite high, this starter should have no problems cranking over so I ordered one through Car Shop Inc in Illinois USA.

Once I received the starter motor I worked out how it works and started to set it in the correct orientation for my situation. From the moment I tried to mount it I new I was in trouble. To get the right orientation, the body of the starter had to be rotated to the bottom which in turn fouled up on webbing on the engine block and to rotate it upwards fouled on the foot box just like the previous one I had.

After quite a bit of jiggling about, I could see the point on the block where the starter was hitting so with the help of a mates reciprocating saw, I cut a portion of the webbing out and the starter slide right in. The black lines are the cut lines in the pics below and you can see the lack of clearance

The next issue I faced was the lack of clearance to get a socket on the bolts as the orientation of the starter had the wiring connections in line with one of the bolts and the solonoid in line with another but we got one right, at least that was 33% correct. There was v ery little clearance between the body of the motor and the bolt head and getting a socket on was almost impossible so I ground down a cheap socket but still needed more clearance. After a bit of thought, I just went and got in hex bolts and made up a hex drive with 40cm of extensions and the job was dome.

When the engine was first fitted I noticed that the oil pan sat 35mm below the floor level of the car and this was to be expected as the standard Coyote oil pan is quite deep. When I ordered the new starter, I also ordered a Canton Low Profile Oil Pan to fix this issue.

My next post will have the fitting of the Canton pan so until then, see you next time.

Cheers

Russell

Continuing to Move Forward

I had previously fitted all the braided stainless fuel lines right through out the car including the return lines into the fuel tank. As the lines into the tank are quite exposed, an aluminium skid plate was made to provide protection for the lines and tank against spraging up on kerbing or speed humps etc. The last thing I would want is to rip the lines out of the tank, not that it would happen but a skid plate is a handy precaution in any case.

To keep things relative cool and to have fresh air flowing around the cock pit, I fitted

fresh air vents that fit above the foot well and have a slide arrangement for opening and closing the vent. These were very easy to fit but a problem is pending as the alignment between the holes for the 70mm fresh air hose in the chassis and the vent holes misalign by 20mm or more. I can see how to rectify this but will require a little bit of surgery to the vent hole. My die grinder and an aluminium cut rotary bit will fix this.(pic to come)

With the Coyote engine, I brought in the complete Ford Racing wiring harness and ECU which also had a drive by wire accelerator pedal and electronics. This is where I come to the point of my incompetence, I know nothing about electronics or electrical issues for that matter. Changing the battery in a smoke alarm tests my electrical knowledge. Anyway, I have this plastic accelerator pedal that I have been looking at for a long time wondering how to fit it. I have seen the LS Chev stuff using a series of push rods and bell cranks and wondered how to make this work in my situation. It's funny that having seen the Chev set up and trying to work around this system that I couldn't see what was before me. This was one of those situations where I had a mid night epiphany and the solution fell into place...why use push rods and bell cranks to fit the unit where it shouldn't be, why not just bolt it to the fire wall and modify the pedal to hide behind the Tilton pedal I wanted to use...so I did. I cut the pedal off the Ford unit and made a crank to operate from the Tilton pedal to the Ford Racing pedal.

Once the Ford pedal was cut down, I did a trial fit and decided to cut the bosses from the back of the mount to allow more clearance.

When I had established the correct location for the pedal, I set about making a pedal extension and push rod to connect the Tilton pedal to the Ford pedal. I have made provision to include bronze self lubricating bushes to avoid friction between the metal on metal push rod clevises and extension. The pedal extension had to veer back toward the fire wall to almost a vertical position to give the required clearance and to allow the correct amount of movement to ensure that the Ford pedal maintained full operation and also tweeked to maintain vertical alignment with the Tilton pedal.

Once I was satisfied that the pedal would work ok, I drilled all the holes and bolted every thing together. A real bonus was the Tilton pedal had a series of 5 holes which allowed adjustment for my push rod so the optimum arc was achieved with out much drama, almost as if they new someone would do this.

Once fully installed, the Ford drive by wire mechanism is well hidden and can't be seen unless someone wants to make a point of finding it.

Well, that's all for tonight. I really enjoy solving all the little issues associated with building hot rods and speciality cars. In the next episode I have a real conundrum,the starter motor doesn't come anywhere close to fitting.

Cheers

Russell

Life Is Not Meant To Be Easy.

Once the engine was fully fitted and the tranny mounts in place, The clearance issue with the bell housing came into play. The bell housing starter opening was resting on the stainless steel heat shield which is not an ideal situation but as I could depress the heat shield I opted to just put an insulator between the bell housing and the shield as removing the engine is such a major task. The trouble is, the more I thought about this solution the less I liked it so on Saturday,the engine came out again and the bell housing ground 6mm to provide clearance.

One of the things I had not thought about prior to removing the engine was the solid stainless fuel line that exited low down in the transmission tunnel and as it turns out, was totally inaccessible with the engine in place. With the engine out of the chassis I attached a stainless fuel line and clamped in position so I can fit it to the fuel rails.Thank goodness I thought of this as the engine would have to come out again when we try to fit the fuel lines, you have to have a win occasionaly

We then attempted to refit the engine which with all the knowledge we now had, it fitted with a minimal of fuss as far as this thing would allow or maybe we just expect the unexpected. We had learned to balance the engine dead level on the hoist as it would sit in it's final position, we had a lever to twist the engine as it was lowered and we knew to bolt the chassis mounts to the block mounts and lever the mounts into place, as a matter of fact, we were getting pretty good at this.

With the engine in place I proceeded to fit the Boss Alternator Kit which came with all the brackets, belt and tensioner. The tensioner had me beat for a while as when I went to draw the tensioner in to fit the serpentine belt it would not move, ok, what now. After looking at it for a while and posting on the Cobra Forums about the problem and getting plenty of replies about the orientation of the belt which I knew, I grabbed a breaker bar and socket and gave it an almighty heave to which it responded with a bit of a jolt and came forward so smoothly and with plenty of tension The problem turned out to be that during the tensioner assembly process the nylon membrane had got wedged between the moving parts and caused resistence and me not wanting to heavy hand it didn't overcome the resistence, however a breaker bar did and it now works a treat.

To get the gear lever in the right position, I got a Pro-5.0 center shifter and after cutting an inspection hole in the trans tunnel I fitted the shifter and grabbed all gears immediately which surprised me with a stationary engine. The center shifter came with shift locks to prevent over shifting on those ham fisted gear shifts but this provision was so bulky and would not allow the rubber boot to go over it so I consulted Mr Google and he informed me that the TKO-600 transmission had built in shift locks and recommended not using the after market type so half an hour in the lathe and they were gone.

and this is the finishes item.

Another job that was done was to fit the fuel level sensor into the fuel tank which presented it's own set of issues, namely, how do you drill a 25mm hole in the fuel tank and not get the ingress of aluminium shavings in the tank, No big deal, just tape an extension to a vacume cleaner, position it under the cut line and go for it. Thanks to Guy Elliott for this little tip.

I was able to run the vacuum extension around the base of the tank and am satisfied that all shavings have been vacuumed up.

That's all for today

See you next time

Cheers Russell.