Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I didn't get much done this week. Most of my time was spent tearing up carpet and putting in new ceramic tile in one of the bedrooms. I put some time in on the alignment jig. I'm making a jig based off of the fourthgen LS1 rear that will bolt to all of the suspension points in addition to the wheel studs. I made some spacers out of square tubing and some washers that will go where the Lower control arms and panhard rod bolt to, I made a torque arm bracket and mounts for the shock absorber location.




I also chamfered the inside of the tubes and cleaned up the outside tubes of the 8.8. I'll probably need to buy a carbide bit with a long shaft because the tubing is ERW and has that small lip along the entire ID of the tube. That would make it more difficult to slide the GM tube in. I would like to be able to put a root pass inside the chamfer and then a second pass over it with a stringer bead. I also need to take a torch to the ends of the tubing to try to burn out any oil that might be in the metal and contaminate a weld.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I took some scrap metal plate and drilled them with the 5 x 4.75 wheel stud configuration and then drilled the big hole for where the rear axle pokes through.



I also had noticed some oil leaking out of the passenger side oil filler so I removed that filler piece and welded on a big ol' 1" NPT aluminum bung and bought the male side in Stainless.



I also made my own hex key for it. I used the bolt heads from four 7/16" bolts. I TIG'd them together in pairs and then welded them to the ends of some 7/16" all thread which I had removed the threads of. I then bent it into the classic "L" shape. So I made this for a few bucks Vs buying one online for $10.

dagwood

iTrader: (5)

I currently have my dad's 1991 Trans Am convertible at our body shop getting prepped for full paint. I took off all of the rear spoiler pieces and then realized how much work you have actually put into your car to get everything to line up the way you did. I cant believe how botched up these things are from ASC. They hide the mess with all that gooey black tar tape crap.....the trunk lid sits WAY above the rear quarters, etc. Hats off to you, man...... great job on this car. I cant even imagine the hours you have invested in this. I sat there looking dads car over and thought of your car right away and my jaw dropped in absolute shock.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Thanks. It really was a lot of work but nothing was complicated.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I finished the alignment jig. My father (welding engineer) has explained to me many times that the temporary jigs that some people to create that are supposed to keep a part from distorting only keep it from distorting while it is clamped in place. As soon as the clamping forces are removed it goes to it's distorted shape from the welds pulling on it. So this is strong enough to support the part(s) while welding.



I started out by making the torque arm mount to locate the housing into the approximate angle



Even thought I drilled the holes only slightly larger than the bolts there was still some slop in the torque arm mount so I created this mount to locate the centerline of the pinion gear. It works pretty good.



Then I took a 6' long bar and welded the brackets for mounting it to the shock absorbers and another tube to connect it to the lower control arm mounting area.



So with what I have above I can locate the center section and tubes but not the axles themselves. I made some slip on axle shaft brackets. The bracket is a U shape and slides on the bar of the jig and then uses a through bolt to secure it in place.



This coming week I'll be cutting the tubes on the GM rear end and cleaning everything up for welding the tubes.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I cut the tubes from the GM 10 bolt about 2" from the center section. The ID of the Ford 8.8 tubes is 2.60" while the OD of the GM 10-bolt tubes are about 2.63-2.64". I say about because it's hard to tell exactly when the tube has very slight surface rust and then a coating of black paint underneath. I decided to take the GM 10-bolt tubes OD down to fit inside the ID of the 8.8 tubes. Since I still have another 10-bolt I will also convert that one and I will bore the ID of the 8.8 tubes to 2.625" (2 5/8") as that might be the faster solution. At any rate, I have the 10-bolt tubes OD at ~2.57" so they slip into the 8.8 and go 4.5" in. I wanted to have substantial overlap to help with alignment purposes and to also be able to drill out some holes in the 8.8 tubes to create some plug welds. I want the tubes' welds to be as strong as possible so I have no worries when I put a jack stand directly underneath one of the tubes below a spring pocket. My free time over the next few weeks will be limited but I'm hoping I can assemble the torque arm mount and weld everything together by August.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Here is the Ford 8.8 center section with the GM 10 bolt tubes slid inside bolted onto my positioning jig. Everything bolted up fine and had very little play.



Just inboard about 2" of the end of the 8.8 tubes I drilled four 1/2" holes 90° apart from each other. I did this to really ensure the tubes wouldn't pull while welding the joint at the end of the 8.8 tubes.



Here is the same tube after making the plug welds and grinding them flush



And here is the tube all welded together and ground down. I used my MIG welder and almost instantly wished I had used my TIG because the weld(s) did not look pretty. I'm sure they were sound but they didn't look great so I made two or three passes total and just ground the entire weld flat. I am not worried about the weld failing on these tubes because of grinding the weld a little bit because of the amount of welded area.



Now I can turn my attention to cleaning up the outside and inside of the housing and rebuilding of the carrier and bearings.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I have the torque arm mount built but not it's not totally finished. I bought the "Hiltsy" torque arm mount that is popular over on LS1tech so this is a slightly modified version of his. I modified it because I wan't impressed with it. With the amount of time I spent assembling the mount I could have made my own mount from about $10 worth of 3/16" steel and saved ~$40. His mount calls for welding it to the housing but once I had the mount assembled I had some gaps between the mount and the housing of about 1/8". If the differential was steel I wouldn't care and I'd weld it up but this is cast steel where I'm not about to try to weld any gaps. So I made a lower portion that wraps around the bottom of the snout and sandwiches the passenger side tab. It uses 6 bolts and is bolted in three different places so it seems very strong to me at this point. I also like that it is removable so if during installation I find that some angle is off I can just remove it and make my own. Also if anything happened to this housing I can just unbolt it and go.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

So with the torque arm mount in place it blocks off the access to the differential oil fill plug so I had to relocate it to the opposite side, the passenger side. The plug is 1/2" NPT so it's not a big deal to relocate it. I moved it to just below the cap structure of the housing.



I thoroughly (that took a little bit) removed all of the exterior surface rust and prepped it for paint. I painted it with regular Rustoleum in one of my inexpensive Harbor Freight "HVLP" (does anybody believe that?) guns. Over the years I've found that thinning it 4:1 with Acetone and a dash of catalyst/hardener from Tractor supply works great for undercarriage stuff. Small chips can be easily repaired in a hurry with a rattle can of rustoleum in the same color or I can mix up another batch in a small gun. I ran a 6' rod through the housing and set it up on some inexpensive wooden sawhorses I made. I think it came out looking nice. The past week was really hot so just letting it sit in the sun for an afternoon (120°) bakes the finish pretty well.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

With the paint finished and dry I moved the housing inside and rebuilt the rear end. All new bearings, seals, shims, spacers and clutches. I started taking pictures of the process but I stopped because nobody on here is going to care about rebuilding a Ford 8.8. One of the interesting things I noticed is that while I was disassembling the rear end I kept thinking that it seemed as if the rearend had been rebuilt pretty recently. While I was rebuilding the carrier I also measured out the old clutches and the clutch pack. I found that the old internals were well within spec and the clutches themselves were only missing 0.001-0.004" of material. So there was really no need to have rebuilt this rearend. I had hit the junkyard jackpot with this rear end and didn't figure it out till it was too late. It wasn't a total waste though because many of the Ford guys recommend setting up the clutches differently. From the Factory the clutches are set up clutch-spacer-spacer-clutch-spacer-spacer-clutch-shim and many Ford enthusiats say to run them clutch-spacer-clutch-spacer-clutch-spacer-clutch-shim. Set up that way the stack measures at 0.664" compared to the stock spec of 0.644-0.655" so their should be less slippage because their is an extra clutch and it's slightly thicker. Time will tell.

I'm also slightly miffed at the way the pinion preload ended up. The spec is 16-28 inch pounds to turn the pinion. I think I found out that my inch pound torque wrench doesn't register until somewhere between 20 and 25. The first crush sleeve I used ended up being 40 inch pounds because I wan't expecting the resistance to come up so quickly. The second crush sleeve I think I had it set perfect by feel but the wrench wasn't registering. So I turned the pinion nut just a few degrees and all of the sudden it was registering at 26-27 inch pounds. I know the preload lessens the more the rear end is broken in but considering the scant amount of miles this car sees per year I wanted to keep the preload on the loose side. O well, still within spec.



The housing oddly enough had one of the short lived productions of the plastic cover. Pretty useless IMO. Very difficult to remove silicone gasket maker from without gouging or chipping the surface! So I ordered a chrome steel cover.

It'll sit here for now till I have time next week to install it under the car.

IROCZman15

iTrader: (25)

very cool. I enjoy following along

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I kept thinking about it and it was annoying me. I bought another crush sleeve and pulled apart the rear end. To make things a little easier on myself I purchased a beam type torque wrench and I also made my own pinion flange holder. Companies sell two varieties, one that is less expensive ($20-30) and bolts to the flange that has the openings to fit a 1/2" wrench and a second ($50+) that is more of a breaker bar design. I went to the recycling yard and paid a dollar or two for an aluminum bar that was 1/2" thick, 2" wide and a little over three feet long. I made a relief cut and drilled it to fit two of the pinion flange bolts. It worked perfect and allowed me to sneak up on the preload I wanted with realative ease. I put a 3' pipe over a breaker bar for the 1 1/16" pinion nut. I ended up at 19 inch/pounds which is on the lower side of the preload recommendation (16-29) so right where I wanted to be.



I also welded on my axle side panhard bar relocation/lowering bracket. Before I had it bolted to the rear which I think was probably fine but in researching many people were advocating welding.

MoJoe

iTrader: (5)

Whose bracket did you buy? Are you happy with it (fit, finish)? Or do recommend a different one?

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I made it last year and I posted about it starting at post #724 here
If fabricating your own isn't the route you want to take you can purchase them from UMI as they make two versions. I have them linked in the above linked posts as well.

MoJoe

iTrader: (5)

Thanks for the link. Fabrication can be fun. But, sometimes it is worth the time to purchase pre-made.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Filled it with 2.5 Quarts of synthetic 75-140 and threw on the added bling. I went back and forth on what viscosity lube to use and weather or not I should use synthetic and no friction modifier or non-synthetic and friction modifier. Ford recommended 75-90 for a long while but then changed the recommendation in the late 90s to 75-140 even though nothing changed inside the 8.8. All the advice Ford guys gave was circumstantial as to what worked best. In the end, my brother is a Master Mechanic and manages a Ford dealership garage and has two Mustangs and two lightnings and I have another friend who has an 800 horsepower SN95 Cobra so I took their advice of Synthetic 75-140 with no friction modifier. Then as to which lubes are better I found a nice paper by Amsoil that was referenced multiple times on bobistheoilguy which you can read here I decided to use Valveoline SynPower, it did pretty well in the paper and ended up being $21 less than Mobil1

Looks like it's ready to go under the car. I'll just transfer the sway bar, brake lines, rotors and calipers over to this rear when it's under the car.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I've spent my time taking two steps forward and one step backwards. Case in point: I already had a fourthgen set of rear hoses for the fourthgen rear that was in there but I wanted to use new brake lines. The Thirdgen rear center brake hose that is attached to the distribution block uses double flares, while the fourthgen center uses ISO bubble flares. I did not know this and I used a thirdgen center brake hose for setting up the lines. So when I went to install the new axle with my new brake lines I had leaks on both rear brake lines. So that led to brake fluid on everything and having to remove the lines and then bench bleed the master cylinder and all four calipers.

I also discovered that my Spohn tubular torque arm, nor it's axle side mounting bracket would work. The Ford 8.8 moves the torque arm mount laterally by an inch and the Spohn torque arm is a very wide mount as it is so it just would not fit under the car. So I had to remake the bracket which also meant that I needed to remake the torque arm. Here is the torque arm I made from 1.25" OD steel tube with a 1/8" wall.



I finished making the torque arm and installed it in the car. Fit perfect except that it's ground clearance was bad. I would have to worry about taller parking lot speed bumps and parking lot entrances. So I abandoned that torque arm and began making another. However I also discovered that the 8.8's rear U-joint connection interfere's with my exhaust. So I have to move the exhaust over an inch now. But at this point I needed a brake from working on the car so I made my new workbench that I had been wanting to do for the last year or two. It's on wheels so it moves easily, its all metal so I can ground it for welding, I mounted a smaller tool chest inside, it has one long shelf and two smaller shelves. I also made a removable light fixture for it. I like it.



I'll start working on the car more this week and post more pictures soon.

IROCZman15

iTrader: (25)

you always have exciting and interesting updates!

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Made the new torque arm. It uses the same 1.25" OD 1/8" wall round tube and a 3/16"plate. Ground clearance is wonderful.
One thing I didnt post is that you have to change the GM rear U joint to a precision #355 joint. It's a conversion U joint.
Got everything buttoned up and double checked (which is much easier said than done) and took it for a spin. No more peg-leg worn out differential, the tail end will once again move sideways and put down two black marks. Also even though I only went from a 3.42 rear gear to a 3.73 there is an appreciable difference in driving RPMs.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Changed the headlights out. These are with the daytime running light portion on. I really like them.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I had to an issue that I discovered while taking this out for a test drive. I was hearing brake noise coming from the driver's rear. I assumed the pads just needed to be reseated because I had spread the caliper open and bleed the system but after a few hard brakes it still made the noise. I drove home thinking that I might have just forgotten to do the final torque on that wheel and it was slightly loose which could cause some play in a rotor. At home I checked the torque and it was spot on. Pulled the wheel and saw this at the top of the driver's rear brake rotor



When I turned the axle by hand you could see that the rotor as it turned was causing the caliper to slide in and out. I had a bent axle flange. This axle was from a junk yard so the prior owner must have been hit by a car there or slid into a curb. Luckily I had a spare set of axles so I was able to swap them out and solve the issue right then and there. And to think my wife complains that I keep some of this stuff around! I'd like to keep the rotor so I'll take it out for another drive to see if there is any modulating or vibrating coming from that rotor while braking. If not I have a spare set of rotors too!

ShiftyCapone

iTrader: (7)

Which lights are these? I like them because they are different but not gaudy like some of the lights they make.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Black-LED-4...72.m2749.l2649

I bought them on eBay but I have seen them on Amazon also. The majority of these lights sold use the red light for the daytime running light but you don't have to hook that up, hence to no red light. You can buy them with the amber lights but they are harder to find, they might not be labeled as amber and they seem to sell out quick. It took me a while to find mine. But again, I like them and think it was worth searching and waiting. It was from a seller out of the Chicago area.

Billgluckman

I’m sure this has been covered but what welding machine are you building the rear end and suspension parts with? My phone doesn’t like back tracking on these pic heavy threads.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

For body work and thin sheet metal I use my Eastwood 110V MIG welder. It's good up to 1/8" as long as you bevel the weld line or leave a gap: https://www.eastwood.com/mig-welder-...5a-output.html

For the thicker metal (over 1/8") or when a TIG torch would be cumbersome or too slow I have the OmniPro 220V from Harbor Freight. I was extremely skeptical of the Harbor Freight welders but after watching enough positive videos by guys I've followed on YouTube (BOLTR thought Harbor Freight might be allowing this to be a loss leader) I bought one that was a return and the manager made me on helluva deal. It's been a great welder. The suggested settings are really close to perfect for me. https://www.harborfreight.com/omnipr...psugg_q=welder

The TIG that I have is AC/DC, its an Apha TIG 200X. It's gotten nothing but great reviews from everyone and I really like it. It gives you lots of control with your settings. I con't have any complaints about any of my welders.

Billgluckman

Ok I remember you having a 110 mig and I wouldn’t think that’s what you were using there.

And a welder I work with has a harbor freight for his personal welder(not sure which model) and he says it’s worked fine for years. I understand the skepticism though

dabomb6608

iTrader: (3)

Took a few hours to read through your thread. Great build and craftsmanship. A true of example of "if there's a will, there's a way".

My heart sank and I had a sick feeling I haven't had in a while when I got to the fire section...about 5 years ago I had a engine fire on my Trans Am. My rear fuel rail crossover developed a leak and caught fire while driving...to this day I don't know how but I was able to pull over and get it put out (without water or a extinguisher) without any significant damage beyond burnt wires near the distributor and some smoke damage to the underside of the hood...in all reality the odds of the whole car going up in flames that day were severely against me and I was beyond lucky.

Seeing the changes converting to distributor less ignition has made for you is encouraging me to possibly go that route on my build. I've always struggled with idle quality. Either I lean it out and it gets choppy with slight exhaust stench, or I send it rich to mellow it out and can't drive the car without having that heavy fuel stench that sticks to your clothing. I feel like sequential fueling/spark would help me tremendously. I also want to inspect my fuel system after seeing the rust/corrosion you found.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I had never experienced a car fire in person until that happened. I have 12' ceilings in the garage and the flames were at least 10' high. I was also really lucky. I keep a hose hooked up in the garage for washing cars and if I hadn't had that who knows what might have happened. Since that day I keep a small extinguisher in the car and large extinguisher on the wall nearby. I'm glad your fire wan't as bad as mine and you got it out.

I went to college not far from you in Carbondale at SIU. That's a beautiful area you live in. I actually lived in Carterville one of those years and I would take lots of scenic routes to SIU. I used to love to take drives on Spillway Road around Crab Orchard Lake.

I didn't think the changes that I made with the ignition system would be as readily observable but they really are. The idle is much more stable, it's dead stable once warmed up. Ignition timing doesn't fluctuate like before. Idle vacuum has improved slightly. According to ignition calculations I've found online the ignition energy above 3,000 RPM should be greatly improved... More power from a better combustion? It's also been problem free. The prior distributor based ignition with it's Ignition control module always had me paranoid (and prepped) for failure.

The only two issues that I have are that it does take a second or two longer to start because the toothed wheel for the crank sensor has to see the missing tooth to know where it is at. Also the weld that I put around the valve cover fill hole/bung has a few small pinholes that seem to be leaking a trace amount of oil. Not sure if I want to be lazy and just use gasket sealer on the underside of that area or attempt to clean it and reweld it. I'm worried that oil residue in a pinhole might ruin any chance I have at making a new weld without porosity.

If you have an aftermarket ECM capable of an LS style ignition and you want a project I would say to go for it.

I had read a few threads about your Camaro in the past. That's a nice car too!. Pretty similar engines too.

dabomb6608

iTrader: (3)

The area is definitely full of great routes to cruise down. Small world for sure with you knowing the area and went to school 20 mins away.

I am running EBL Flash for tuning so would need to go a completely different system if I wanted to run Distributor-less Ignition. This will definitely increase my cost to do the swap. For now I am going to concentrate my time and money on body prep and repainting the car. I have antique plates on it so will be "legally" unable to drive after the end of October until April 1st. Working on some tuning this week before that time comes. Really coming along nicely and drivability is improving greatly.

I will be referencing this thread for tips on painting and might ask a few questions along the way.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Granted it's too cold 1/2 of the year to have fun driving driving these cars in Illinois, why did you go with antique plates? I thought in Illinois Chicago and St Louis area were the only places with emissions and even then they stopped testing anything that wasn't OBD2. Do you have a collector car insurance that mandates it be off the roads at certain times?
Do you want my "old" MSD ignition setup? Make you a heck of a deal.....!

My plan for 2020 is to polish the bejesus out of a Miniram and switch to that with a cold air intake and then repaint and run the stock hood with a pair of functional IROC louvers. I'm on the fence if I want to make my own set out of stainless or pay the big money for a pre-made set.

dabomb6608

iTrader: (3)

I went with antique plates for a couple reasons. First is cost vs usage. I don't really drive the car much. More the last two summers then in the past but still very limited and practically zero usage during late fall/winter. Regular plates/registration have gone up in Illinois to $150 a year. I have a 2001 Yukon as a daily driver. A 1985 K10 Jimmy (first vehicle). The Trans Am. And my 2013 Harley Breakout. I spend way to much already keeping everything registered every year. So it was a easy decision to cut about $100 off registration cost every year. Currently I just use Allstate for insurance. Once the car gets painted it will be receiving some kind of collector insurance to cover it for its full value.

Definitely no emissions down here. I run the SLP Loudmouth exhaust with no cats and Dyno Don headers/Y-Pipe. I have gotten a ticket for excessive exhaust, but it was late at night in Marion in a residential area and a state trooper...was a fairly easy ticket to get out of with a invoice from a local shop saying it got "fixed"

I have a MSD 6AL ignition currently but still using a factory small cap distributor. (Need small cap due to the FIRST intake being so large). For a while I was suspecting my pickup in the distributor was causing ignition issues but I think it was all tune related. I was very close to pulling the trigger on one of their magnetic trigger units to go with the 6AL box this past summer.

I say make your own louvers. You have the skill set plus the tools. And its something you could slowly work on off to the side. I'm stuck in a position right now where I don't have a big enough garage to have the car indoors 24/7 so I don't want to dive into the body work and take a risk of something getting messed up from rain, bird sh*t, tree wax, or anything else. Plus we are planning to move out of state once my soon to be fiance graduates from SIU next winter. So I am thinking that project is going to be held off for a lot longer then I had hoped...especially if we end up renting a place with a small garage the first year before buying our own place.

-=Z28=-

iTrader: (3)

Wow, what a thread. I'm in the process of doing a similar build. Except engine bay. Paint is 90% done, which is a huge relief as I'm sure u can relate. All done in my garage. Many many hours into the body as I wanted it laser straight. Major props for continuing the build after fire and for sticking it to the insurance. I'm also doing a 8.8 build as they are a stout, afford rear to do. Also building torque arm and panhard bar. Lol. Too funny. Just started a thread on my 8.8. Have been waiting to start one on my paint but I'll share a pic.
great job.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

The paint looks great. Looks like it has some real depth to it, like you could go swimming in it. How are you doing your 8.8? And what is that sheet metal bolted on the differential?

My wife and I decided to build a house as opposed to buying so it's going to be a while before I'm doing any Camaro projects.

-=Z28=-

iTrader: (3)

Its a pinion gauge. Found it on Ebay. Company called Leadmine Products. They have them for just about any axle. It has all the crucial measuring points on it. Pretty much hook your tape on it and read it. Haven't gotten to use it yet but seems simple enough.
Thanks for the compliment on the paint. I love it. Dont care for the price tho at 285 a quart. They only have this color in the ppg deltron line. Clear is deltron 2021. Have a couple more things to shoot yet. Planning on next weekend to do that.

D

-=Z28=-

iTrader: (3)

Did the stock height sway bar brackets give enough distance to clear the pumpkin? I'll know I'll need bigger u bolts and bigger brackets to accommodate bigger radius.

Thanks

D

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

I believe that I used the stock rear sway bar mounts from the donor rear-end that I pulled. I'm thinking that UMI makes some mounts for applications like this but they would be easy enough to make on your own. Normally I would pop my head in the garage and look but I have the Camaro in storage while our house is being built.
If you make your own I had considered making a toothed upper and lower clam shell design with a 9/16 bolt fastening them on either side. It would hold better than the factory stuff.

-=Z28=-

iTrader: (3)

That's a great idea. I'll have to think about that some.
How about end links? Thinking the bolt and tube may have to be a tad longer. Maybe no. Guess that's something I can tackle when I get the rear in the car.

Been looking at carriers and gears. Thinking I'm going to use ford ring and pinion. Still haven't decided on carrier. I see summit sells one with carbon fiber clutches. Still reading reviews and stuff. Would love a Detroit or the like but nope, not spending 800 bucks. Lol

Hope the house is coming along good for ya!

D

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Yeah, you're right about the end links. I did use a different set but I no longer know which end link I used. IIRC the LS rear end and thirdgen rear end use different length bolts, so if you need a slightly different length check out one of the auto parts stores.


My good friend that has a 800 hp Cobra along with many of the Ford guys recommend setting up the clutches differently. From the Factory the clutches are set up clutch-spacer-spacer-clutch-spacer-spacer-clutch-shim and many Ford enthusiats say to run them clutch-spacer-clutch-spacer-clutch-spacer-clutch-shim. Set up that way the stack measures at 0.664" compared to the stock spec of 0.644-0.655" so their should be less slippage because their is an extra clutch and it's slightly thicker. I took the car on a ~250 mile trip before it went in storage and I really enjoyed the way the rear end performed. It didn't chirp the inside tire on turns but would still lock together when running straight. Also, look into the Ford Motorsports aluminum 8.8 cover. It has channels cast into the internal side of the cover that routes oil (not as good as the Gale Banks covers though) and it also has a drain valve. Only issue is that if your carrier has the ABS ring you have to grind on the inner most channel to prevent interference.

The garage is going to be wonderful. It is set up as a single tandem with an RV garage. So the garage should measure out to 40' deep, 30' wide and 15' tall. Perfect to do a four post lift in the future.

-=Z28=-

iTrader: (3)

Wow, that sounds very nice. I have a pole barn and I'm thinking I'm going to build a shop in one end. Be roughly 1800sqft. I've way out grown my deep 2 stall garage. Oh, and its attached, which makes me really not like welding, grinding or the like, in it. Got 2 fire extinguishers ready at all times.

Your buddy's cobra, is that the stock ford carrier? That's the route I think I'm going to go. Only thing is they want 100 bucks for the clutches. So for 40 more I can get the summit brand that's all set up. I've also read that about the clutches. Sounds like that's the way to go. For ring and pinion I'm going to go with ford. I gotta start looking at this differently. I'm not building a 10 bolt. The 8.8 is way stronger, which means so are the components if set up right. The car is 1500# lighter than an explorer or something. I just dont want to have to do this again. Not right away. The list is still long.. lol.

D

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

The new house has been framed so it gave me the opportunity to "prep" for some of my future garage plans. I really hate futzing around with stud finders and plotting out the location of the 2x4s behind the drywall so to combat that I ran a tape measure along the bottom of the wall and numbered each 2x4 and took a picture of the numbered 2x4 with the tape measure in front. Then I made an Excel spreadsheet with the measurements. After drywall goes up I will just have to cut out a small piece of drywall in the corner for the tape to slip in and then I can just measure and find my stud.



I also decided to use a 1/8" masonry drill bit to drill a shallow hole in front of the stud so I could also find a stud without measuring.



Next week I'll go back with a plumb bob and my self-leveling laser and find out if the wall 2x4s (and the laser) are truly vertical

RoyalJZ

plz dont tell me this is the end of the thread i just spent three class periods reading this

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

No, I still have a few smaller projects to fix. I still have an oil leak that torments me and I honestly cannot tell where it's coming from. I need to replace the door solenoid for the door poppers, make an aluminum strut tower brace that bolsters the brake master cylinder and I may make a cowl air intake or install those track spec louvers. I may be able to start working on it again late winter.

96SilverRam

iTrader: (1)

Wow, amazing work!

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

Thanks. I've started driving it to work on the tune and I found my oil leak is at my front oil pan seal. When i drive it drips back to the back of the engine looking like it was a rear main seal leak. I also bought all the parts to convert the power steering to the newer type 2 style and a Ford racing differential cover that has ribs for cooling. I decided the muffler is too loud so I bought a Magnaflow to hopefully quiet it down.

Do you have Nitrous on the car with the quarter mile time posted in your signature?

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

EDIT:Flickr no longer hosts more than 50 photos so some of the pics here may disappear. Just like photo bucket they want you to have a paid account now. Trying to get Google photos to embed and it hasn't worked properly yet.


I've finally spent some real time on the car. First on the list was to chase down an oil leak at the back of the pan. I changed the oil pan gasket with the engine in and it still leaked so I pulled the engine and Trans as one assembly. Removed the Trans and found a gap at the back between the oil pan and engine block that you would only notice if you separated the engine and trans.

I dropped the pan and the Felpro gasket and found that on both of the 5/15 studs for oil pan (the very back pair that go into the aluminum RMS housing) there were a pair of stuck spacers from a prior Felpro gasket. The Felpro one piece permadry gaskets use metal spacers to act as torque limiters and that rear pair somehow got stuck on the 5/16 studs. I removed the spacers and put on another new gasket(yes i know they are reusable but i didnt want to take a chance). As you can imagine i had to spend some time on the pan rails with a flat edge and ball pein hammer to get everything flat again. I buttoned everything back together and the pan and RMS are all leak free. No more embarrassing oil drips, I'm happy.

blackgloves

Upload/attach them directly off your phone here. You don't need any other website

IROCZman15

iTrader: (25)

photos wont load

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

One of the projects I also accomplished was converting to GM type 2 power steering. With original power sterring and a V belt i couldnt get enough tension on the belt and i would get squeling when turning the wheels when the car was stopped or barely moving. I found a bracket online to mount it type 2 steering to a sbc.


I had to cut the turnbuckle down a little for my application as well as move the return line to the back of the housing. That's the part that might not work out long term though. What I did was glue on a piece of 1/4" ABS that I drilled and taped. I'm wondering however if the heat will be sufficient to cause the ABS cement or even the ABS to fail. If it does I bought a fabricated aluminum reservoir that should work.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

The stock GM plastic housing wouldn't work for me. It wouldn't work because I needed the return line in a different location which meant I needed to adhere a bung for an AN hose connection. I tried ABS cement and plastic epoxy but both gave way. I ended up using the aluminum housing. The only drawback to the aluminum housing with this bracket is that it just barely, and I mean barely, fits.

Tibo

iTrader: (15)

On thing that has bugged me about the F bodies is the firewall flex, easily seen with hard braking. I rigged up a dial indicator and found that the brake Master cylinder moved about 1/8" up at max brake. So if I understand this correctly the firewall would have to fully flex before the brake pedal would go all the way down which results in a spongy feeling pedal. I remember one thread several years ago wherein a member fabricated a bracket and attached it to the strut tower brace(at least thats what I recall) so that's what I set about doing. I made this guy out of some literal scrap 3/16" steel and a 5/8-11 thread bolt. Welded it onto the STB(found out the STB brace is pretty thin, maybe 14 gauge) and put a slight preload on the master cylinder with the 5/8-11 bolt and then tightened it down with a nut like a set screw. The brake master cylinder movement went from over 1/8" to 0.01"