KW's 1979 Ford LTD Landau

[DerekTheGreat]

Yep, side exit is a truck thing to me.

[GM_Guy]

Functionally, I prefer side exit. At least you won't plug your exhaust when you back into a snow bank to park.Probably the biggest annoyance I had with the rear exit since I back into parking spots

[Kodachrome Wolf]

Time is a flat circle.


Once again, it's time to do a heater core. Was futzing around under the hood today doing some small adjustments, mainly adding a touch of timing, adjusting the choke, adjusting curb idle and A/C-on idle speeds and got a whiff of antifreeze. Couldn't place it for a second then steam started coming up from the passenger side of the engine bay and it was dripping from the evaporator drain.

Guess it's better it did it now than later since I was planning on driving the car out of town this weekend. Will temporarily bypass the core with a shutoff valve like I have on the '87, and have already ordered a replacement core. It is worth noting I did install a restrictor to the inlet side of the core July 2024, but it's not impossible the core was either weak from age/lack of maintenance prior.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

Ain't too much has happened lately, but I did install the manual heater core shutoff about a month ago. Same type I used in the '87.


Works as expected, so nothing much to talk about there. I do have a replacement heater core, just need to find a weekend where I can get it swapped out with TecNickal. That'll be Box heater core number three, and the sixth so far in any Panther. Familiarity just makes getting the dash down quicker.

Also swapped out the truck sized Mopar rubber mat for a more period correct Ford vinyl mat up front.


Haven't driven it too much, just a few weekend trips around town to run some basic errands and back. Been mostly driving the wagon and truck otherwise.

[87gtVIC]

The new floor mat looks right at home in there.

[TecNickal]

Oh yes, heater core time is eminent especially if you want to drive it when it's "winter" here.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

The deed is done.


Many thanks again to TecNickal for helping with the work. This core job was a bit more annoying than my '87 and his '89, mostly since we found the heater box really didn't wanna come off the firewall. Seemed like the drain was causing some trouble on removal and install, but we got through it. Only trim fatality was the driver A-pillar trim cracked right at the bottom while trying to align the screw, oops. Very clean break, so it can be repaired with Q-Bond or something similar.

Worth noting a few things on this job. Firstly there were a few additional factory screws holding certain things in places. Both footwell trim panels have a rearward screw to help hold them in place instead of a plastic christmas tree plug. There was additional sound deadening panels fitted as well in those areas. The dash pad has an extra tab that wraps around behind the glove box door and is held in place with a screw. There was a brace to help support the radio/HVAC area that went from the dash to the transmission tunnel, and I don't recall that on the '87 or '89. Shockingly, the gear indicator collar had not broken, and when reinstalled I did not crank down on the screw. All in all, that's not all that interesting, but we also quickly determined we weren't the first people to have been in there...









Now whoever put the core in did cut a section of the dash right below the steering column in a place that's hidden by the column shroud/fuse panel trim. Perhaps to make dropping the column easier? That's a question lost to time, but otherwise there weren't any additional surprises.

Regarding the core, I used an aluminum Four Seasons unit. Tested for leaks prior to install, and found none. Unfortunately I had to use the provided foam wrap material as the OE wrap while more substantial did not fit around the aluminum unit properly and obviously must only fit the brass units. The replacement did fit fine in the box, and provides fantastic heat as one would expect.

Another thing I noticed was after having done all that, the dash is effectively rattle/squeak free. There was the occasional rattle, but having been handled and reset seems to have quelled that.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

Finally got around to installing a headlight relay harness. I was very lazy and just purchased a Painless Wiring 30814 kit, simply because I know their stuff at least has properly sized wires as opposed to the cheap Amazon harnesses.







Used the alternator output stud for my hot lead connection. Fuse and relays were mounted where the external voltage regulator used to be. Was worth noting the factory wiring with the car running was indicating 14.06v on low beam, but removing the load from the headlamp switch was the primary objective.

[gadget73]

Mine was a good 2 volts down from battery voltage so the relays made a big difference in light output.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

Took the car up to my brother's place after New Years.



No issues on the trip. For roughly one year post engine swap, nothing weird or troublesome to report with the replacement. Replacement heater core has worked well on cold days, so again, no complaints there.

Only current "issue" is the A/C isn't blowing as cold as it should, and that's very likely due to the nature of the original A6 compressor and the front seal being known to leak by at a marginal rate. We had a particularly warm week here with temps creeping into the high 60s, and I noticed the A/C wasn't as cold as it was during the summer last year. When spring actually rolls around, it'll probably get a touch of 12a to keep things working correctly. Arguably not the most troublesome thing to deal with considering the car will be 47 years old in February.

[gadget73]

The FS6 also tends to leak a bit out of the front. I think that was on purpose to lube the seal itself.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

I've decided to revisit the 4BBL topic for this car.

As prior discussion has gone, there was a 4BBL intake that I tried on the old engine that leaked coolant out the back and was determined to not be milled properly and the kick down linkage on the Carter AFB I have was positioned strangely and wouldn't work right on this application. Then the car had a VV2700 which worked great until it decided not to and delivered awful economy, and was subsequently replaced with a Autolite 2100 of the larger venturi type. Of course, the trade off to that 2100 was slightly worse tip-in throttle response but it doesn't choke at higher RPMs.

So now I'm back where things started, but with different goals. Firstly, this is a three speed automatic car with a 2.26 axle. It does not spend much time at all running at high RPM, the engine configuration really doesn't favor anything past 5k RPM, and mostly focuses on the low to mid range power. So I did some research, and there was a energy-crisis era intake offered by Offenhauser, the 360 Dual Port intake.



Having done some research, there's two groups that distinctively stood out, which were performance oriented folks who complained it didn't do well on a spicy, high revving engine and driver oriented folks who used them on trucks and heavy cars that weren't high revving applications that praised it for improved low/mid response and economy. Even Offenhauser's own catalog noted this was a design best suited to applications not exceeding 5500 RPM and a 600 CFM carb.

I managed to find one for cheap, so I picked it up. I need to extract two broken throttle cable hold down bolts, but otherwise it's in decent shape.





I'm also planning on picking up a Summit Racing 500 CFM 4BBL carburetor for this application. Summit's carb has annular boosters and a overall design similar to a Holley 4010 with some mild improvements towards overall end-user serviceability and adjustments. I'm not looking for large horsepower numbers, but more so a focus on improving the low end response/torque while also seeing about picking a smidge more economy. If this car could slip into the 20-21 MPG and no A/C or 18-19 MPG with A/C range on the highway at 70-72 MPH, I'd be satisfied. Right now it'll do 17-18 MPG without A/C and 14-16 MPG with A/C at speed. Not sure what in town mileage adjustments would look like, but it typically returns 13-15 MPG in mixed driving, which doesn't seem too off base.

[Arquemann]

Looks a lot like a mopar intake, even says 360 right on it

On the topic of obscure intakes, a friend of mine scored an Edelbrock SP2 intake from a swap meet for his economy 400m build. Going to pair it with a 500cfm AVS2. They also made the SP2/SP2P for SBF, but it was 2bbl and ridiculously rare nowadays. Just as ugly!

[Tiggie]

Interesting intake. If the marketing is true, then you may have a winner for your application. I'm running a stock iron four barrel intake on the Rustang and it's a good match for the E6 heads. Low on power but good cruising combo.

[gadget73]

Shame spread bore intakes are such an oddity unless you're dealing with stock GM stuff. Small primaries and big vac secondaries are a good match for a small engine. Kind-of seems like this dual port thing is working in a similar way but using small intake runners rather than small carb venturi. The casting process for this must have been a bastard.