Questions regarding intakes & ecm upgrades for an 86 vic

[Sirus]

I have an 86 Crown Vic ltd, and I'm planning to do the HO mod to it in the future. Only thing is i wanted to go with a gt 40 cobra intake & some gt40x heads instead of the normal HO intake & E7 heads.

So i had a couple of questions that i was hoping you guys could help me with.

Can you use a modified crown vic egr spacer with a gt40 intake and a HO throttle body? Or do you absolutely have to use the 1st gen lightning spacer.

Can i just bolt on a cobra throttle body instead of a normal HO throttle body or do i have to modify things beyond the linkage arms? What kind of spacer would i have to use then?

When it comes to the ecm, since it's an auto car i'd assume i have to use an auto ecm for everything to work fine right?

Also i've heard the auto computers past 89-93 are a good upgrade, can i use one on my 86 vic? Or am i stuck with an ecm from 87-88?

Sorry if these questions seem stupid, i'm pretty new to all this.

[87gtVIC]

I have an 86 Crown Vic ltd, and I'm planning to do the HO mod to it in the future. Only thing is i wanted to go with a gt 40 cobra intake & some gt40x heads instead of the normal HO intake & E7 heads.

So i had a couple of questions that i was hoping you guys could help me with.

Can you use a modified crown vic egr spacer with a gt40 intake and a HO throttle body? Or do you absolutely have to use the 1st gen lightning spacer.

Cannot use a bored panther spacer. It will not seal properly. You do not have to use a lightening spacer either as you can modify a Mustang EGR spacer to work..I say modify because the provisions for mounting the tv cable/accelerator cable bracket wont be there. Also If you are using a true cobra intake the egr spacer is built into the plenum...I know you probably arent but you did mention that in the beginning

Can i just bolt on a cobra throttle body instead of a normal HO throttle body or do i have to modify things beyond the linkage arms? What kind of spacer would i have to use then?

You should use a spacer that is close in size to the throttle body so everything will seal. You need to swap the arm off of your one year only 86 stock tb to whatever tb you are using

When it comes to the ecm, since it's an auto car i'd assume i have to use an auto ecm for everything to work fine right?

Makes sense

Also i've heard the auto computers past 89-93 are a good upgrade, can i use one on my 86 vic? Or am i stuck with an ecm from 87-88?

Sorry if these questions seem stupid, i'm pretty new to all this.

I answered what I was fairly certain on in bold and italics...

[Sirus]

Thank you for responding.

I was thinking of grabbing this intake. Will it have the built in spacer?

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/FMS-M-9424-Z51/

[87gtVIC]

Yes those have the built in spacers which will make things difficult for you to figure out a way to hook up your tv cable/gas cable bracket.

[johnunit]

skip the GT40X and go to something like an AFR 165 or Trick Flow 170 head. Far better value for money by all accounts. D'Souza Racing is fairly local to you and has good prices on Trick Flow stuff.

[86VickyLX]

In response to your spacer, unless you want to mod the crap out of linkages, get either a Lightning 351 EGR spacer, or Bore out a Mustang spacer and fabricate a bracket to attach your stock bracket to the Mustang spacer.
I'm not sure about the Cobra intake, I don't think anyone has ever tried it, but it would be cool if someone made it work.

[88grandmarq]

I am not sure that intake would flip correctly.... But, if you wanted to get creative, you could use a throttle and TV cable from a Mark 7 and mount it.

[Sirus]

skip the GT40X and go to something like an AFR 165 or Trick Flow 170 head. Far better value for money by all accounts. D'Souza Racing is fairly local to you and has good prices on Trick Flow stuff.

Thanks for the tip, i'll give them a look.

86VickyLX "I'm not sure about the Cobra intake, I don't think anyone has ever tried it, but it would be cool if someone made it work. "

Looks like i picked the wrong intake to start with then. Do most aftermarket intakes work with the vic?

[pantera77]

Unless you want to go aftermarket, just use Explorer intakes.

[87_crown_vic]

could always do what Scottmang did to a lincoln... the owner of said Lincoln Town Car wanted engine put in with the Exploder accessories all intact like under the hood of a Exploder... i think it was all set up with the upper and stuff reversed from what we see under hood of our cars... a/c and throttle cables and stuff for accelerator and all that was swapped out to make the mod work since the throttlebody pointed to the passenger side compared to ours facing driver side

[gadget73]

The intake still faced the stock direction on that car in order to clear the AC plumbing and to not force a relocation of the battery. It was quite a messy job TBH. To do that again, I think relocating the battery and totally rethinking the AC plumbing would be required in order to not have it be so messy.

[86VickyLX]

The cobra intake will reverse just fine. The only issue I see is the bracket. I would think if you just fab up a bracket to allow you to use the stock bracket you should have no problem.

[Sirus]

The cobra intake will reverse just fine. The only issue I see is the bracket. I would think if you just fab up a bracket to allow you to use the stock bracket you should have no problem.

Hmm, i'll look into it, but the idea of running the top end kit from trick flow is looking more & more appealing.

[86VickyLX]

The trick flow one sucks is kinda meh, it's big and it's a real tight fit against the distributor.

[Sirus]

Well the problem i have is that at the end of all the aftermarket parts & tuning, i want to see 350-375 horse and a decent gain in torque from this Vic. Being as inexperienced as i am, i don't quite know what parts will get me there.