Nick's 302 Swap Update

[sirdan]

I feel like these f150 headers may work.
https://www.bbkperformance.com/ford-f150-302-1-5-8-in-shorty-headers-chrome-87-95.html

[nickster9781]

Thanks for the tip! I'll look into them, but sadly summit says they're out of stock. I love their return system so I'll see if BBK can do anything for me if I order direct from them.

[sirdan]

Ill save you some digging here is a picture of my driver side header:





Passenger side was just the stock fox body header.

[nickster9781]

Hey guys, sorry it's been awhile since I've updated this.
There is some much to talk about it, but at the moment my progress has been hauled a little bit.
My ranger needs to be repaired so I can sell it and buy another vehicle.

[nickster9781]

Alright, its been a hot minute. I've been a little busy in some ways, and a little lazy in others. But my semester has ended so I have a good month to try to make some serious progress on my car for the first time in ages. So I bought a 2009 camry to replace my ranger so that should solve my daily issues. So lets dig in shall we

To be completely honest, I did not get much done in the time I haven't posted an update. So I stated by rebuilding my rear LSD and that was way more than I bargained for. Now I know that seems obvious but I still wanted to give it a try. Sadly I didn't take many pictures but I do have a few




As you can see with the coast pattern, this diff needed a rebuild. I got this 7.5" lsd from ebay with unknown miles on it. But I swapped it in as is almost two years ago.



So I got the wier rebuild kit and it is a very good kit don't get me wrong, however I am not experienced enough and ultimately brought my diff to a shop to have them fully rebuild it. I couldn't set the proper preload for my pinion no matter what shims I used, so I gave up.



Turns out my pinion shaft was too worn out along with my axel shafts, so they are machining sleeves to fix the issue.

After that I have been trying to make my headers as previously stated. I have been practicing my tig welding so I should have a decent base before my friend does the finishing welds for me. So I bought this header kit:



I also went out and bought 1" 5/8 pipe insulation and metal coat hangers to help me roughly mock up my headers







With this I have been cutting, measuring, checking, and rinse and repeat. I am going to reroute my power steering lines to allow for more room for my headers. The goal is to try to make them equal length, but it's not necessary just a nice plus. I also believe I bought the last of the major parts I need for my build to get the engine running in the car.

Speaking of the engine, I go the back in February and it made 394.5 bhp and 376 lb-ft to the crank!!! I have videos of it running on the engine dyno if anyone wants me to post them and send a link. I'll post a pic of the dyno graph when I get a chance but I have been dying to get driving again, even though I have been procrastinating finishing the car.

Overall I hope to make some major progress and get to the UConn car show this spring, so if anyone else is in New England, I hope to see you there

P.S. I don't know why the pictures are huge

[nickster9781]

Here's my engine dyno graph for you guys!

[nickster9781]

Header Update!
So I'm still new to welding so ignore the bad welds lol. But the runners are coming along!

Runner 1:


Runner 2:


Runner 3:


Runner 4:


Runner 3 you can see my progression at welding lol!





So far this clears my steering coloum in the car so hopefully I can get it fully welded up soon, knock out the passenger side and pull the mock up motor out and tear into my front suspenion. Gotta make my T3 coilovers and swap in a better condition subframe, the new AE86 swaybar and put the front back together. Can't wait to hear it be alive again.

[sirdan]

I'm excited to see the end result. The welds don't look too bad. Whenever I did this I always had the welder loaded with .030 wire since it kinda does everything. I'm betting some .024 would make this a lot easier you may want to try it out if your running .030. Don't forget you need a different tip too.

[nickster9781]

So I'm tig welding this as my first real welding project. My dad bought a Eastwood tig and stick welder, so some would say I'm learning to weld a little backwards lol. But I had my friend who welds at Electric Boat help me get started. But I'm using 1/16" filler rod, I had 1/8" before on my practice welds and I couldn't heat up the filler before putting a hole in the metal itself. But at this pace it should be getting done soon. I only have 2 classes this semester so I should have plenty of time to work on it!

[Teranfirbt]

Looking good for being your first time! Check out welding tips and tricks on Youtube, the guy is a really good teacher and jumps right into the good info. I learned a lot about what good welding looks like, helps you get better when you know what you're looking for.

[nickster9781]

Thanks for the tip, I’ll check them out. One of my co workers who had a 402 Chevy swapped ma70 recommend another channel called “The Fabrication Series”. His car actually is an old pro 2 fd chassis but I can’t find the drivers name.

[nickster9781]

Hey guys made some more progress! I've talked to my dad and I am going to be treating this as a v1 design, and buy another kit to smooth the bends and make the fit up better, but for now this will work. Still gotta work on runner 1, but so far I got 2, 3, and 4 tached to the flange. Take a look'

[nickster9781]

Driver Header V1 is done! Now I need to order the new kit and make it cleaner!!!

[sirdan]

It might be cheaper to get some bends, you have the flange already. It looks like a good fit, the passenger side will be cake it has so much room. I almost think a fox long tube would fit.

[nickster9781]

Yeah maybe, I was thinking of running the stick foxy header for a bit so I can make the t3 coil overs, however I might be able to find a decent header that could fit, there is a lot more room for sure. I also have to make new powersteering lines since they were in the way of the driver side header. So I’ll see what I can find