H.O. Upper stuff swap on LoPo - Does this produce noticable gains?

[gadget73]

If you're pulling motors, you want the Explorer. Better heads and intake than any HO motor produced. Swap the valve springs and use a cam that will spin over 4500 and you're ready to roll. Might need to do a mass air conversion though, they tend to run whacky on speed density.

[DerekTheGreat]

Those are EEC IV right? Perhaps you could harvest the computer and harness or will you still have other issues like no cruise?

[DerekTheGreat]

What about this bad mammer jammer?
http://detroit.craigslist.org/wyn/pts/5131171003.html

[88Vic]

If you're going to upgrade, don't want time with E7 heads and HO intake. If you're gonna replace it all, go with Explorer GT40 heads/intakes. Only time I'd say go with a HO intake is if you're leaving the long block alone.

[gadget73]

The Explorer top end is way better than the Mustang stuff ever was. There are no cruise-capable Mustang mass air ECM's though. Not a huge matter to wire up the older stand-alone cruise stuff though. Early 90s cars had it too. Parts should not be hard to obtain. Basically it has power, input from the VSS, brake, and steering controls, and the outputs to the cruise servo. you have to pull the wheel and servo wires from the ECM connector when going mass air anyway. Not a big deal to extend them, tap in the VSS and BOO and feed it power. If cruise is even that big an issue. Frankly I don't use it much. Nobody else does, which makes it difficult and frustrating to use most of the time. Mine does work, but if it fucked off in a difficult to fix way I may not bother to repair it.

[DerekTheGreat]

"..if it fucked off..." Now when something breaks I won't say its broken, I'll say it has "fucked off." LoL

I hardly use cruise either but when I do, it's nice. That trip to Virginia Ash and I took earlier this year solidified that for me. The other thing is, if the car came with it then it has to work. Lets say for some reason I grew major mechanical skills and started shitting all these tools that I need and decided to swap an entire Exploader engine over. Couple of questions: 1) None of them were SD? 2) Would it be possible to just swap the necessary harnesses & computer from the 'sploader? 3) If #2 is feasible do you happen to know how cruise worked in those things? Maybe it's possible to retrofit that garbage in place of my old stuff??

Honestly it's looking like I'm going to hit the yards next weekend in search of a clean sploader upper & lower. Please excuse my stupidity here with the next questions: Why wouldn't the Explorer fuel rails fit? Why can't I use the Explorer injectors? Would swapping to Mustang injectors be worth while or should I keep the LoPo stuff in there?

Thanks for the advice, I like learning stuff.

[gadget73]

1) no
2) fairly difficult. You'd be doing an OBD2 conversion, which is no small amount of wiring, and it would want the electronic trans to go with it all. 90s 3.8 Tbird would be the source for that. On your own for working out driveshaft particulars. You'll also need to spend a fair bit of time working out how to interface a 96+ Explorer harness into a box, needing both EVTM's and no small amount of time to figure out how to marry the two.
3) NFC

it would be much easier to modify the stock harness to mass air, stuff in a Mustang ECM, and wire in the stand-alone cruise controller with it's 8 or so wires.

Do not change injectors without changing the ECM and camshaft. Functionally Explorer and Mustang are equivalent injectors, but the Explorer ones are a more modern and more efficient design.

Fuel inlets and outlets on the Explorer rail are in the wrong places. It won't connect to the stock fuel lines without a bunch of work, and theres no point doing all that work for a fuel rail that isn't going to do anything better than the stock one does. Its not that the stock one is amazing, but it does fit.

[knucklehead0202]

Being that my car is already mass air, is there a chance the cruise control setup is NOT built in, like the mustang computers? Just spitballing really, but this shit confuses me. Once I know what direction to head, i'll snatch up a computer right quick, then it's just a matter of a few more bits before the whole top end comes off this fucker. I don't want a little improvement at this point, I want +50hp, which I don't think is unreasonable with a compression bump, much better flowing heads, intake, intake tract, and cam, plus the full exhaust I've already got. With a gear swap it'd really wake up I reckon. Best part is that it'll pretty much still look factory with the sd mustang zip tube and '04PI airbox. Getting so close I can feel it.

[sly]

yours is the unicorn system that only Cali got. There is little to no knowledge about it. The chance that the mass air is already wired and compatible with a mustang ECM is high. Looks like there's only one difference. The vic MAF ECM uses one pin for data that the mustang MAF ECM uses for HEGO GND. Obviously this pin would have to be pulled. The vic MAF seems to use one pin for both HEGO GND. The cruise looks to be built into the vic ECM as well. so wiring the stand-alone cruise module in would definitely be less work than trying to convert to OBDII. http://www.grandmarq.net/oldfuelinje...0Lpinouts.html

[DerekTheGreat]

Mr. KHead, you've been nominated to try this for the rest of us!

Thanks for the info gadget, forgot about the trans stuff. Yuck. Maybe you can get away with an entire drivetrain swap? LoL. Way out of my league. This small fry will just swap the manifolds over. Stock fuel rail fits so that good, I think I'll replace all the infectors anyway.

Anybody know why they went mass air for California? Emissions???

[knucklehead0202]

California mustangs got it first too, '87 I believe, where it was '88 or '89 elsewhere. We just make shit more complicated quicker here near as I can tell. I'd be honored to be the test gerbil on this, assuming nobody beats me to it. Probably going to take me a little longer than I hoped but I'm gathering stuff up, just keep remembering other shit I need to change in the process. Going to do all lifters and likely pushrods, as well as timing chain, cover, water pump, etc. Is any one A9 computer better than others? A9M/P/L, etc? They're not hard to come by so i'll snag one real soon. Hopefully get the bitch under the knife soon and make some progress!!!! Doing brakes tomorrow Was hoping to get all the shit together for the BB swap but it's about to spit a pad and the rotors are warped, so just factory replacement crap for now. Gotta get it done in the morning before we melt. Supposed to be triple-digits here tomorrow, yuck!

[sly]

hell... if someone is willing to tune that bitch... you might be able to just tune for HO firing order and use the stock computer. You'd have to get the program code off the ECM though to be able to talk to tuners about it and if they'd be willing to do it. It is mass air after all. Just swap on a better MAF and tune with that. Then you can swap in whatever you want in a 302 form and just plug stuff in and go tune it. Since you're in the land of epic emission controls... you might also have tuners there that know of that bastard and can deal with it.

[knucklehead0202]

Good point sly. I do already have a c&l 76mm maf with a 24# sampling tube, as well as 24# injectors. I'll talk to my buddy at the auto-electric place and see if it's something they could do, or if I have to go to one of the tuners and have a chip done for it. Don't see why the firing order couldn't be changed in a tune, or maybe even something to be done on the ECM. I know a very good auto-electric guy. Hmmm....

[DerekTheGreat]

It's with a heavy head that I report my LoPo to GT40 swap will not happen. Of course I suck mechanically and farmed it out because I knew there would be unforeseen issues I was hoping a shop could deal with. Shop I have trusted for years initially was apprehensive about my wishes but took the car & my parts and began the swap. This morning though he said he won't go forward with the swap due to vacuum routing issues and issues with the GT40 lower manifold not having ports for the coolant lines for the throttle body & heater hoses (I guess ATC cars have a port in the back of the lower manifold) The coolant things were his biggest concerns and he didn't want to flat out not run the ones for the TB. I'm a hostage in this situation really so long story short, the stuff is for sale. I'll post pics and make a thread in the forsale section when that happens but what I've got is: GT40 Lower & Upper (From Explorer with EGR provisions & IAT is already tapped) with nice silver paint, HO plate & black accent paint and a 65mm Lightening TB & EGR spacer modified to work with panther linkage. I'll have to figure out pricing but at this point I just want the stuff gone I'm so miffed.

[knucklehead0202]

Dibs on the throttle body and spacer! I have one one but it's in VERY rough shape and is going to require some serious love to be in any kind of shape to put on a car.

That said, sorry to hear about your bad luck, although I'm sure a few of the guys here could offer you some insight into what needs to be overcome to install your stuff. I can't imagine this is anything insurmountable Derek, as we both well know that others here have done probably every variation on this swap. I've yet to dig out my manifold and actually compare and map what's going to need "customization", but I'm sure none of it is all that difficult. Meanwhile, i'll see what I can figure out and perhaps collectively, we can make this happen for you. If I wasn't a million miles away I'd drop by after work, lol.