Toph6888

I paid $400 for the welder. There were a couple basic kits taht were cheaper, but this one came with everything but the bottle, and had good reviews except that it sometimes is shipped from the factory without everything (Mine was fine). This is my first welder and I like it a lot. I don't know a whole ton about welding, but for a first timer I was able to get some decent results and I feel I am getting some good penetration. I work in a lab where we have microscopes and stuff and I took some welds in, cut the cross section and I was getting decent penetration for what I need. The bottle cost me another $100, and another $30 to fill, but its well worth it over the flux core.

Been working on it some more today, had to help a friend wiht their brakes for a bit so that took a little bit of time away. The other night I patched up a hole that I got in my tranmission tunnel a year or so ago when I went to pull up on my ebrake and the bolt had rusted and ripped a quarter size hole into it. So out with the welder and a patch panel! Got the handle bolted down and painted it to help prevent some rust Interior back in. Need to take the shifter cover off to finish up a couple more last connections, but all in all pretty much done inside. Worked on getting the down pipe figured out. Just going through and figureing out all my bends and taping it together, then I will tack weld, make sure everything is good, and then I will let my buddy tig weld all the joints together. Lots of time with the grinder to make sure I even out all my cuts to make sure there aren't any gaps so the tig welds will be good. Pipe coming up from the midpipe about half of the stuff I have to work with Piece for under the PS pump and by the manifold Where I left off at the end of the night. Getting closer. I should have this finished up tomorrow Once the exhaust is done I can work on getting hte upper intake all done and the intercooler piping all finished up. Gotta work on getting the engine oil primed and a couple other odds and ends and then we will be ready to go.

Got my wiring gremlins squared away, so just waiting for my battery to finish charging at autozone since it lost all the charge with me trying to find the missing grounds on my gauges lol. I spent last night and today working on my mid pipe for my exhaust to go from the 3" dump to the dual cobra IRS exhaust. New welder I got a while ago Got the bends cut up and taped together so that I could tack them off of the car Took a couple attempts to get all the tacks on correctly due to the pipe shifting a bit, but managed to get a decent tack with it on the car and having to almost blindly tack it haha. working on finish welding it all Finished project: I will be busy tomorrow, but I am hoping to get the stainless pipe that is going around the engine mocked up and tacked this week sometime, and then my friend with a tig is going to finish weld it all for me. Got the cam position alignment tool so once my oil pressure gauge works and I get the engine primed I will get that put in, and get the coil pack on with the spark plug wires and it will be ready to start. Getting nervous haha.

Haha, thats what everyone keeps telling me "it will be nice to garage it right away" lol. Things will get done eventually lol. Did some miscellaneous stuff today, no pics bc honestly it isn't anything you have't seen before. Got the coolant overflow tube painted and on, and also plugged up the vacuum ports on the intake since I won't be using half of them anymore (hydroboost, egr delete, PVC delete, etc). Got some more tubing for the oil separator, so all I have to do is make a bracket for it and get it on. Got an old oil pump driveshaft from the pic and pull along with a socket/extension that way I can weld them together and use a drill to prime my engine. Been practicing with the welder and got a 40cuft Ar/CO2 bottle and its not even funny how much better it is then the flux core. I will keep playing on some more scrap I have from my old exhaust, then work on making up my downpipe and midpipe for the dual exhaust. Things are starting to get close, and next weekend is looking like I will ahve more free time, so hopefully we can get this exhaust finished up and that will be it.

Got a good number of little things done this weekend. I was having a hell of a time finding a 45* bend silicone coupler for the intake piping, and I had a bit of angled piping left so I just bought two straight couplers and used the tube for the bend. Got the wiring harness on the car. The fuel injectors don't have the clip on them, so I will have to ziptie the connectors down. And I managed to get the oxygen sensors to connect up with my extenders. Just need to get a few more things on to have all the sensors hooked up, and ground the old oil pressure sensor since I have the aftermarket sensor where teh stock one used to go. Was painting my coolant overflow tube and ran out of black, again, so I will have to pick up another can of that. Finished paiting the rear calipers for the rear brakes, got them all set to go with new hardware, but I need to compress the piston so I have to go and rent that tool from autozone to do it. Also gotta get a little bit of brake line for the master cylinder, I was able to bend my stock lines to fit, but then I couldn't flare them, so I will have to get something softer then what ford orginally used. Finally said fuck it I'm tired of not having one and bought a welder. It should be here tomorrow/tuesday. Its a 120V 130A mig welder running off of a normal house socket. Got the welder, regulator, helmet, wire, and cart for $410, so I think I came out with a pretty decent welder for what I spent. We will see how it does, I'll most likely spend tomorrow doing some practice welds. I have a buddy coming down on tuesday to help me with the exhaust piping for getting it around the engine, so I am hoping to finish up my mid pipe (mild steel) by myself tomorrow, and then when he comes over we can tack the stainless portions of it (hes bringing a gas cylinder) and then he is gonna take it back to his place to TIG weld it all together. Hopefully by next week after labor day I should have all my exhaust in! After that it will only be a couple little things till we start putting fluids in it and get ready to fire it up.

I am having the car tuned by David Dalke from supercoupes unlimited up by Cleveland, he tunes mostly these 3.8L ford engines, supercharged and turbocharged, and he has been helping a lot along the way with random questions I had for him while putting the engine together. I already have the X3/email tune from him, so I will break the engine in, and then drive up there and have him dyno tune it. This car has snowballed quite a bit, it was originally just supposed to be a basic engine rebuild and put the turbo kit on. most of the gauges/trans/rear axle/wheels/brakes/interior, etc all came out because I kept finding good deals. To do a v8 I still would have been paying a good 3-4 grand more for one that I would want and it would have made more power then I was shooting for anyways lol. With the parts I have now I still have a good base if my v6 blows, and put a pushrod 5.0 in it or something with a turbo.

My current goal is to hit 400rwtq, haven't really cared too much about top end hp bc I won't be doing a ton of racing to start off with. I imagine my first tune with it will be pretty tame (timing low, etc, I don't want it to blow up haha) but I guess if I had to pick numbers I'm shooting for 400rwtq, and 425rwhp. I'm thinking I should be able to hit that at around 10-12psi of boost.

Thanks for the help. Does anyone have a rough price idea on what I would be looking at for renting a tank, say a 20cu ft or a 40cuft? I was assuming taht the 20cuft would be enough to at least get started with, I only have maybe 4-5 welds to do right now, but would like to be able to spend some time learning the machine, and also be able to still do those welds.

Hey everyone, I'm looking to get a welder this weekend (probably the lincoln easy mig since I only have a 110V, no 220V) and wanted to get something with gas. I found a 20cuft bottle (figured this would be ok since it would only be rare that I would use the welder, I mainly need it to finish my exhaust haha) at harbor freight for $80, that I could take to tractor supply to fill for another $25, and was wondering if anyone knew any places around Dublin to rent/fill gas tanks.

Got a decent bit done tonight. Started off with putting the cobra brakes on since I was able to put them back together last night with the pistons/pads. cobra/mach 1 brakes on the left, stock on the right Rotor size difference And on the car. Looks much better then the stock brakes behind that wheel Then worked on getting all the intake piping done. I was happy that I was able to fit the filter up top and still get the upper intake piping through the existing fenderwell hole without having to cut anything to make it fit. I need to get another couple tclamps and one 45* coupler and it will be all finished. One step closer...

No big updates right now, but hoping to get 1-2 nights this weekend to work on the car, plus I have the whole weekend off to work on it coming up. Been getting a lot of the last couple miscellaneous parts in: Stock Cobra IRS Catback Coolant Overflow bottle Oil/Air separator/catch can 2000 Throttle Cable PS Pump to hydroboost steering fluid line New firewall adjuster (mine was all sorts of messed up) I also got a nice goodie from Dave Dalke, SCT X3 with custom tune Got my front calipers back from my buddy who was powdercoating them Getting the red on them before bake: and after bake: I'll have the brakes put back together and on the car later this weekend. Things left to do: I am ordering exhaust tubing, I have a friend coming over Thursday or Friday hopefully so we can tack the exhaust all together (dump around the engine and midpipe to adapt to the IRS catback) Put the brake booster/master cylinder on Put the calipers on/bleed brakes Put on the clutch cable and throttle cable Block off some ports on the upper intake, finish painting it, and put the IAC and throttle body together Route my intercooler piping connect all the PS line hoses. Finish wiring my Wideband and Boost controller reflash the ecu Prime the engine, install the cam timing sensor Make sure all my bolts are tight/fill fluids So the list has gotten very short and I am hopeing that if we can get the exhaust stuff tacked this week, he can take it home to his tig welder and finish weld everything. Hoping to get all the other stuff done this weekend, and if so start up isn't too far off (I told you only two weeks...)

got another decent chunk done today. Started off cleaning and painting the AC compressor. Looks much better now. Got the new power steering pump on, brackets all on, alternator on, and started putting the turbo kit back on. all the accessories are finally on haha that took way too long. Put the downpipe back on for now. I have a much better idea of how much room I have now with the PS pump back on, and I think I have a pretty good idea with how I will be working on getting the exhaust around the engine, I don't think it will be too bad so long as everything goes according to plan. Roommate is powder coating my front brakes for me since when I tried to paint them red they just peeled the previous paint off :/ He has sent me some pics of the process, first is of the calipers as he got them, the right one is the one I started painting red but stopped because the paint was cracking after paint stripper dip And finished sandblasting. He is hoping to get the powdercoating done this week. Things remaining: Put power booster/master cylinder on Put on all the calipers/bleed brakes Put on the oil feed line for the turbo Put the rest of the wiring harness on bolt the upper intake on once its been cleaned up a bit more Run the intercooler piping Reflash the computer (tuner is in the mail!) Finish wiring two gauges Fill with oil/coolant install coolant bypass tube install timing position sensor Install powersteering lines Exhaust shenanigans So all mostly small stuff that I will try to get finished up as the week goes by. I am getting a cobra IRS catback this week, so after we finish the dump pipe we will work on making a mid pipe to connect the two together.

Made some good progress on the engine today. Started with tearing out the turbo stuff so I had access to all the accesories, then worked on getting things cleaned up. Taking apart the alternator: Got the alternator casing off for painting Painting the alternator casing, valve covers and coolant pipes. Coolant pipes are ok, the paint didn't really stick to them since they are stainless steel (even after sanding them a bunch lol) Was able to get the oil pressure sender from autometer to fit behind the PS/alternator bracket. Its gonna suck if that thing goes bad but it should be pretty protected from everything there. Its the shiny thing in the middle haha Checked my pushrods again and they appear to be the correct length, I have enough clearance on teh springs so run em! The lifter obviously didn't have oil pressure behind it, but I have about 0.070" clearance between coils, and five coils, so I will have plenty of clearance before the springs bottom out. They are the same length as when I measure with the pushrod checker, so I ordered them correclty, and when I was measuring with the solid lifters they had a good contact patch, so I am glad this is all done with haha. Passenger side going on: Passenger side done: Drivers side done: All in all it took a crap ton of time to put these in, prob about an hr or so, just to make sure everything was torqued correctly and making sure everything was on the base circle of the cam while torquing. All of them in: Valve covers on: And most of the accessories on I am just waiting on my PS pump to get here, I decided it wasn't worth not spending the $45 since I am in here and I will now be having my power brakes rely on them. Goodbye 145k miles PS pump, you were good till the last push. Tomorrow I plan on getting all the accessories finished up and the AC compressor painted, then getting the last two or three header bolts in, get the wiring harness all in, finish up the gauge wiring, and put the turbo stuff back on. Also hoping to get the upper intake finished up (cleaned and a couple spots painted that I missed) and the intercooler piping all done. If I can get all this stuff together the only things remaining will be the brakes, the timing sensor, and then the exhaust. Woot woot getting close.

Got a little bit done today because I got back a bit early from my buisness trip. Got my pushrods in. I love living close to summit racing (<2 hrs). I ordered these yesterday at noon. I got them today, 7.150" chromoly hardened rods. It was buy 12 individual for $98, or get a set of 16 for $99. And the $99 had free shipping lol, so looks like I will have a couple spares It was pretty nice out so I did a light porting job on my stock intake. I didn't go too in depth because I was running low on sand rolls and was having a hard time getting in the tight spaces, but it will be better then stock. Went ahead and painted it with a crinkle black paint (in the photo it is still wet). Hopefully once it dries and wrinkles it will add some dimension to the intake and make it look a little nicer. First time trying this paint, figure why the hell not, it will match the valve covers when I paint them this weekend after installing my pushrods. Gonna be busy the next couple nights, but this weekend I plan on getting the intercooler piping put together, getting the pushrods in, getting the coolant over flow painted an on, getting the valve covers painted and on, and getting the upper intake and maf and what not on. Also plan on hopefully getting the powersteering bracket on at least (hopefully the PS and alternator too) so I can run the belt and put the turbo on for good (the bracket has to come off to run the belt )

I had never thought of a tailpipe cutter, I might go with that (lot cheaper then the sawzall which I can still return). Thanks for that. Glad to hear the angle iron worked, its pretty nice having the holes already in it and its realively inexpensive. Looks like we are even :dumb:

Got some more things done today. Went to the store to get a new sawzall so I will be able to cut the intercooler piping. Fixed up my battery tie down by getting a piece of tube to slip over either end to keep it bolted down properly. Took the windstar intake off so that I can work on getting the wiring for the gauges into the engine bay. Couldn't find a good place I wanted to work on running the wires for the gauges so I said fuck it and ran them through the firewall. I have them ziptied up and out of the way, so shouldn't be any issue. Put my oil pressure sender on in the stock location. I am just going to ground the stock cable so it still reads as pressure so the gauge panel doesn't look wierd. And then I got lazy and didnt connect everything up. Gonna wait till next weekend when I am putting the wiring harness in that way I can wrap it onto the stock loom so that they are hidden and look close to stock Got new bolts for the front seats since the old ones had to be drilled out. All thats left for the interior is to hook up the brake/clutch/throttle cables for the pedals. Put the floormats in so it feels done haha I'm gonna order my pushrods this week so hopefully I will finish up the engine next weekend. Still working on getting ahold of the tuner to have him ship me my tuner, hopefully start up in a couple weeks (like I haven't said that before!)

Kinda hard to see (which is good) but I did go ahead and paint the bracket black, looks like it worked perfectly I did paint those top two bolts before I put the bumper cover back on

Got a couple things done today up front since I had a couple hours after I got home from work at 5. First things first, took care of the grounding the old battery location's negative terminal. I just bought another bolt down terminal from autozone, and bolted it to the existing ground. Worked on stuff under the bumper, damn you previous owner and running it into something! Nothing really bent, I've had the frame looked at and its still straight, just a fender bender Got the powersteering cooler on PS lines run for the cooler and ziptied out of the way Worked on the 4th installment of the intercooler bracket to lower it and hide it better so the grille doesn't look so terrible. Lowered it and also added lower brackets to hold it in place I'm just gonna run it like this, it looks cooler wtih that giant intercooler, and being able to see how wide the front tires are Bumper cover back on No bracket = happy mustang

Got some good progress done today tying up some loose ends. I have to work for about 4 hrs tomorrow, but other then that I will have tomorrow night and all day sunday to work on this thing. Hoping to get pretty far with it. Worked on the running the battery positive cable up front and making the connections. Found a grommet already existing that wasn't doing anything so I was able to get the cable through there and still have a decent seal Running it into the engine bay Just gotta cut off the excess and crimp the end Bolted it to the firewall so it won't move around. I also wrapped it up so it would look almost stock coming into the engine bay, or at least hard for people to notice. Bolted this to the firewall as well. I used a bolt down terminal end for the fusebox/starter, and then I bolted that terminal to the crimp end on the power cable. Then I wrapped the shit out of it with electrical tape. Will probably also add some heat tape around it as well since my dump will be on that side, but I mounted it there and a little high so the master cylinder will be between it and the dump tube to hopefully help protect it. Next I worked on painting the parts of the engine bay I couldn't get to when I was painting when the engine was out. Looks much better having everything black now. Intake side primer Intake side black Booster area primer Booster area black Engine bay shot. I have decided to go back to the stock intake for a couple random reasons, but I am thinking that I am actually going to spray it black instead of silver like I was originally planning, I think it will give it a nice contrast. I have some textured paint that I was going to use on the valve covers so I will use that to add some dimension. Finally I worked on getting the seats in for good. When I took mine out the rear bolts all sheared off from being rusted in becuase they bolt into the floorboard instead of being studs like the fronts. I went ahead and center punched them and drilled them out. Just need to stop by the hardware store to grab a couple bolts and they will be in for good. It was nice getting the battery stuff all set because I finally got to test out that power cobra seat, that thing has a lot of motors haha And lastly, I have accumulated so many tools over this build from pneumatics to grinders to compressors to vacuums, but the best of all is still the garage lol

Got a little bit more done tonight Got the tank back in Got the parking brake cables connected to the lower control arms so they aren't flying all over the place. Just used the stock brackets, cut them to fit and drilled the hole large enough for the bolt that was already on the control arm. Also Tightened up the sway bar link on the IRS on both side since I forgot to do that when I originally put it on Then got the driveshaft on I have plenty of clearance wtih the stock length driveshaft (mine is an aftermarket aluminum one) so pretty happy there Also picked up a power steering line cooler since I had to get rid of the stock one when I mounted my intercooler. I will mount it between the intercooler and the AC condenser. Hopefully it should keep the lines cooler then the stock one since I will be running the hydroboost set up, not sure how much extra heat that will add to the system. Nothing else to really report. Gonna be out of town this weekend, hopefully next week I will get the upper intake ported, get the wiring run into the engine bay, and then that weekend work on getting most of the remaining parts in the engine together. It feels good to have finally caught my second wind, I needed that break.

Got the intercooler on today after about three attempts at different brackets/locations. Ended up taking off the hood latch support and moving the power steering cooler line so I could tuck it right up to the ac condenser. getting started, bought a length of angle iron and straight section that had holes in it that are used for mounting garage doors haha. Didn't take a lot of photos till I really got it on, its solid as all hell, I'm really happy. Always go basic with the brackets, no need to try to get crazy with bends and connections and whatnot. Really doesn't stand out as much as I thought it would, pretty happy with that, looks stock(ish) Gonna paint the brackets so its not *quite* so obvious, might have to come up with some panel to put behind the pony so you can't notice the ghetto bracket and the very old and bent ac condenser, ahh 145k ohio car, why must you have so much random wear... Tomorrow night going to get the fuel tank back in, get the driveshaft back in, and take my front calipers to get powdercoated at a friends shop, hopefully they turn out nice, going with a nice red.

Got the battery box relocation installed into the trunk and most of the positive wire run up to the front. Battery box and tie downs mocked up Started running the positive wire Tying it down with some clamps. Just used some self tappers and undercoated where they went through to prevent rust. Found an existing hole in the rear seat frame to run the cable through Running it under the panel so you won't be able to see it. Working it in under the carpet and whatnot Supports in for good with some solid bolting and undercoating to protect it Good to finally see the rear carpet and whatnot back in the car, its been sitting randomly in the garage for a while. Just need to go get the battery charged and should be all good on this end, just have to hook up the power positive/starter/fusebox positive cables and will be good to go. Speaking of running things into the engine bay, I should get all of these routed haha Tomorrows goal is to get the fuel tank back in, then tuesday get the cables run into the engine bay, and maybe thrusday if I have time get the intercooler on, but probably not since it will be the girlfriends birthday weekend.

I need to get a new bumper and trying to decide if I want to get one that is prepainted my color code (I know it won't be perfect but for hte money I can live with it till I get the whole car painted in a couple years) or if I should get an unpainted one and try to have a shop blend it to my current color. Anyone have a good shop around here that does decent work? I was assuming roughly $250 to paint it to match, not necessarily blending, think this is too high or too low? Any place that could do it for cheaper?

Haha, yah thats not far at all. If you are interested in checking it out just PM and we can go from there. Well I got the three gauges done (for the interior at least) this morning. Finished the wiring, and screwed the HVAC panel in so it wouldn't fall out Lots of screws in hard to reach places, as well as all the cables made getting it in a bit tricky, but I finally got it all in there flush and even. Had to clearance part of the dash so the gauges would fit in the top port but nothing the dremel with a router couldn't clear haha. Got the radio in wtih it and tested it all, and everything seems good to go. Just gotta run the sensor cables out into the engine bay once I get my other two gauges set up. Woo Ipod dock in the radio! Hard to tell with the photo but made sure that the gauges had lighting. Not terribly bright, but I imagine that the bulbs will need some time to get heated up and whatnot as they are regular bulbs, not LED's Forgot how many miles were on her, good thing that was just the warm up, hopefully lots of miles to go now that this has been a total refresh.

I'm over by Tuttle mall area. Ya I take way too many pictures, but I don't want to have to do This build twice haha so taking all the pictures reminds me what I have done so I don't freak out about forgetting to torque a bolt or something haha