Thursday, May 18, 2006

Cooling System


The cooling system was probably the easiest system to change. All I had to do was drop the radiator at a radiator shop and have them change the lower outlet from the right side to the left. I've seen other guys buy brand new aluminum radiators, but that's $300-500 versus my $50. The upper and lower hoses had to be changed as well. I just went to autozone and spent about 45 minutes playing around with their flex-hoses until I found the right ones. (Note: if putting in a new aluminum radiator, just use a '90 Bronco upper hose, fits perfect)

The stock 65 heater hoses were squeezed onto the 5.0's aluminum pipes within a few minutes.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

High Pressure Fuel System


A fuel injected engine requires a high-pressure fuel system. No such thing in 1965. To further complicate things, the old mustang gas tank has no baffles, stalling out the engine at sharp turns, depriving the high pressure system of fuel!

The solution requires the installation of a Low Pressure (LP) pump, an LP filter, a High Pressure (HP) pump, an HP filter, and a header or slosh tank. The green slosh tank allows the HP pump a constant amount of gas despite the vehicle's acceleration.

The system works pretty simply: Fuel is sucked out of the tank (1) to the LP filter and the LP pump and then into the slosh tank. Then the HP pump (2)sucks fuel out of there (3) into the HP filter (4) and to the engine. The engine then returns unused fuel (via the fuel pressure regulator) back to the slosh tank (5) and into the gas tank (6).

I mounted all the pumps and filters in the space above the wheel axle. High pressure fuel hoses with special high pressure clamps must be used on the HP side. I used the old LP lines for the return side. I heard suggestions of drilling a hole in the sending unit for the return. Whatever. Just change out the gas tank drain plug for a brass fitting and connect it to the return line. It's a 1/2" fitting.

I used 3/8" steel brake line hoses up the car connecteing them via HP hoses and three (3) clamps it to the fuel rails, making sure of a tight seal...we'll see soon enough.

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

Throttle Cable


The old mustang has a mechanically linked throttle pedal to the carburator. By adding a throttle body, I needed to change to a throttle cable. I heard there were two methods to do this. The first entailed using a 1970 mustang pedal and somehow attaching it to a cable. The other way was to use an 88-93 pedal and cable. I used the latter method. Unknown to me, the latter is not the easier method, of course.

I first had to drill three holes, two for the mounting bolts and one for the cable bracket on the firewall. Wasn't easy. Anyway, I soon realized that I needed to space out the throttle pedal at least an inch toward the driver (since the floor is at a different angle than a late model mustang). That required rigging, or fabricating (as is the latest nomenclature) a spacer for the two mounting bolts.

After that was finished, I tried to mount the cable unto the throttle body. Didn't happen. Turns out that by eliminating the EGR spacer earlier, I now have caused a spacing problem between the throttle cable mounting bracket and the heater hoses. To fix that, I simply cut a large chunck off the mounting bracket, and tada! fit like a glove.