Monroe Handler

[feeble]

The lower arms are about the same length as the distance from the axle to the front leaf spring eye, about 21-1/2" long. I could have made them an inch or two longer before running into the subframe connectors.

[Tig]

Amazing build on an amazing car.
As said, great progress and skills with CAD.

Did you make the links?
Thanks

[linkstar69]

Cool little car, and great design work.

[Red67Mustang]

Any updates?
Cool build.

[feeble]

Cool build.

Thanks!

Any updates?

Yup!

It's been a busy summer, my wife and I went to Germany in June to visit our oldest son and his wife. Right after that I was slammed with a work project that kept me from my car and pretty much everything else for a solid month.

In spite of that, did get some things done since the last update. These are not in chronological order.

BODY

Got the rear fender wells cut out, got tired of looking at the tires sitting on the fender lip.





Filled in the factory quarter panel fuel fill hole.


Welded the rear fill in:


Closed up some spots on the interior on either side of the fuel cell:



Fuel cell fill hose and tube pretty much done. Initial roll pan fitting done. Need to get the pan louvers bought yet.








ENGINE:

Most of the parts for the initial engine have been purchased. Nearly everything is at the machine shop.

I had the cam spec'd by a guy that specializes in Cleveland / Clevor builds. Fairly mild on the duration but 0.590I / 0.600E lift with 1.73 rockers.




I switched the Explorer cam position sensor over to a good steel gear to match the billet cam.



Heads have been cut for screw in studs, guide plates, hardened exhaust seats, CC'ed to 58cc.



Crank is done. Genuine 289 hi-po rods with 3/8" bolts are done. Everything still needs to be balanced.

Got the throttle bodies bought but am still waiting on some backordered parts to mount them to the intake.






CHASSIS:

Got the last little piece installed for the horizontal tube that the third link attaches to.



Because I don't have a tube bender and didn't have time because of the work project I mentioned, I decided to hire out the fab of the door bars. Turned out pretty good and it is still reasonably easy to get in and out.




After the car returned home, got some tubes added between the top of the shock mounts and diagonals. Aside from the harness bar, I'm not sure how much else I'm going to do back here.




Factory Mustang II V8 engines are offset to the passenger side 1". I've always thought that looked odd so I am moving the engine over 1" to the driver side (centering it), dropping it 1/2" (with 1/8" clearance between the Moroso oil pan and Fox manual rack) and moving it back ~1-1/8", allowing me to use a Fox aluminum driveshaft as-is. All of this improves the center of gravity to my favor.

I bought some of these engine mounts from Speedway, removed the rubber and added urethane bushings.



Designed some new frame mounts:





and redesigned a transmission crossmember originally designed by another Mustang II owner.




The new engine and frame mounts really open a lot of room for the headers.

Currently working on installing ridetech front lower control arms so that I can eliminate the strut rod to make more room for the headers.

A couple shots of the whole car at various times this summer:





This car is morphing into what I hope will be an interesting mix of vintage 70s fiberglass street machine, pro-touring & street fighter styles.

Stay tuned!

[feeble]

Finally got the Offy IR (supposed to be Individual Runner but isn't quite) adapters I was waiting for so I can start mocking some of this intake up. The adapters turn the carbs (or throttle bodies in this case) sideways so you can tune the carbs without taking the whole thing apart. The recommended Offy linkage (on the left in the picture) for use with the adapters isn't the best so I'll probably be making some changes there.




With the throttle bores wide open, you can almost see the intake valve it is such a straight shot. It looks like it should work pretty good but fingers crossed the EFI will improve the drivability and lower end torque.

[dangina]

somehow, you made these mustangs look cool!

[andrewb70]

Shawn,

This build is excellent. I can't believe that I am just now seeing it. I saw you posted in Blake's Mustang thread and I popped over here, and WOW!

What EFI system do you plan to use? I am doing a "dual quad" tunnel ram intake on my Cougar build, but instead of using cable TBs, I am using GM DBW throttle bodies. This eliminates the need for all mechanical linkages (which are a pain) and gives you some interesting tuning options. Just food for thought.

Andrew

[feeble]

Thanks Andrew!

I'm planning on using Megasquirt 3 Pro. I have the linkage mostly sorted out now for the tunnel ram, it really ended up not being as bad as I thought. Here's a mock up:



Was just getting started on the headers but the weather turned too cold this last week. First time building headers, so I'm sure I will make a lot of mista.... gain a lot of experience. ;-) The biggest issue I have now is getting a 1-7/8" primary tube (largest I can fit without chopping the frame rails) to work in a 351c 4v header flange.




I have a lot of work to do yet and my long block should be done at the machinist's (hopefully) by the end of the year.





Do you have a build thread for the Cougar?

EDIT: Nevermind, found it: https://www.pro-touring.com/threads/...ghlight=cougar

[andrewb70]

Glad you found it. Don't hate me for sticking a LS engine in there...LOL

What MC are you using?

Andrew

[feeble]

No hate, it's your car, you do what you want. ;-) On my car, it will be interesting to see how this faux Boss 302 will do with a hydraulic roller cam, EFI, LS coils, etc. Can't find anyone on the 'net that has done this which means it will be awesome or a disaster. Fingers crossed. Either way though, as you mentioned in your Cougar thread regarding building a Ford, it isn't cheap.

That is a 1986 15/16" Ranger master cylinder. The line lock and proportioning valve are going to have to move as I am most likely switching to a hydraulic throwout bearing to eliminate the clutch cable to make more room for the headers.

[andrewb70]

....

That is a 1986 15/16" Ranger master cylinder. The line lock and proportioning valve are going to have to move as I am most likely switching to a hydraulic throwout bearing to eliminate the clutch cable to make more room for the headers.

Is the MC aluminum? Does it have a deep hole for the pushrod?

Andrew

[bergers59]

Thanks! Hopefully it doesn't disappoint.

I've got the front suspension geometry plotted and here are the camber results. I'd like opinions. Too much? Not enough? I'm thinking I want to shorten the upper arm a little bit to pick up a little more gain on the curve.



Caster is at 4 degrees
Anti-dive at 3 degrees
Roll center height is about 2-3/4" - 3-1/16" depending on how much tire squash I have.

what type of equation did you use to calculate/plot the camber curve? Also for the a-arms I assume you analyzed it like a four bar mechanism? Love the work that's going into the project, hope my camaro goes down this path soon.

[feeble]

what type of equation did you use to calculate/plot the camber curve?

I did it graphically in the CAD program.

[feeble]

Is the MC aluminum? Does it have a deep hole for the pushrod?

Andrew

Yes, it is aluminum. Not sure how you would define deep, but I would define it as deep. A few more pictures here: http://www.mustangiitech.org/gallery...manual_brakes/

[Ripper]

Holy Haleluja Batman!

nice intake!

[XTRMEASURES]

Any updates???
Love the suspension work and over all build of the car. Great work

[Zanie]

Man, this is some kinda cool!

[Peter Mc Mahon]

Yes, updates!

[GrabberGT]

I thought about this when I saw the MII on the optima show a couple weeks ago... Why not stretch the wheel base by moving the front wheels crossmember and all forward. Asthetically thats the only part of the MII I dont like and it would give you a better weight distribution.