The best way to make your stock 5.0 fast?

[Mustang5L5]

I Now i await your reply why it's a good idea to run 3.73's with a bone stock high milage engine. I can't wait to hear this

I have 3.73's on mine. It hasn't blown up yet.



You have your opinion and that's fine you said it, but don't get upset when people disagree with you. I have no problem sticking 3.73's or 4.10's ona high mileage motors. I've seen plenty of engines go well up in the 100K's with tall gears. If the engine is tired then it's tired, it's gonna give p the ghost with 3.27's or 4.10's

And the ecam is still a plenty capable camshaft. I personally wouldn't use it, but plenty of guys do and put down solid numbers.

We don't know how good of a shape his car is. It has 127K but that's what my car has and it runs great. I personally witnessed a basically stock 145K mile 5.0 put down 202 HP to the rear wheels two weeks ago on a dyno.

And tone it down with the condescending comments towards other members here. Asking why not to run higher the 3.55's is a perfectly good question which i'm sure a lot of people here wouldn't mind knowing why as well. You can post your opinion all you want, but don't start talking down to people who question why you say what you say.

 

[Rick James]

Turd tops,why wont you wont even give your reason to why he shouldnt run a deeper gear because he has high mileage.Why?do you even have a theory? anyway like Mustang 5l5 said it doesnt matter what gear your running,if its time for the engine to say goodbye its done.Maybe you should call the fast and the furious tech line and see what they say?

 

[50sleeper]

Plenty of opinions

You'll get no shortage of opinions for "go fast for cheap"

My 2 cents...

First things first: TUNE UP
Plugs, wires, cap, rotor, and fuel filter: $100

Then some easy bolt ons:
Remove air silencer and K&N drop in filter: $50
Underdrive pulleys: $100
Bump Timing: Free or $20 if you dont have a timing light

You may find this stuff for less but that's roughly $250 well spent and should give you a good start.

 

[SHOJOE]

Personally I say gears, subframe connectors, U/L Control arms, slicks and 100 shot of n20 = cheap 12 second car. Not to mention a full tune up before any of those things are put on.

 

[Turd Tops]

I have 3.73's on mine. It hasn't blown up yet.



You have your opinion and that's fine you said it, but don't get upset when people disagree with you. I have no problem sticking 3.73's or 4.10's ona high mileage motors. I've seen plenty of engines go well up in the 100K's with tall gears. If the engine is tired then it's tired, it's gonna give p the ghost with 3.27's or 4.10's

And the ecam is still a plenty capable camshaft. I personally wouldn't use it, but plenty of guys do and put down solid numbers.

We don't know how good of a shape his car is. It has 127K but that's what my car has and it runs great. I personally witnessed a basically stock 145K mile 5.0 put down 202 HP to the rear wheels two weeks ago on a dyno.

And tone it down with the condescending comments towards other members here. Asking why not to run higher the 3.55's is a perfectly good question which i'm sure a lot of people here wouldn't mind knowing why as well. You can post your opinion all you want, but don't start talking down to people who question why you say what you say.

I agree with everything you said. I personaly have a 90 with 245,000 miles on it and yes it does have 3.73's. Now i have also owned the car for the last 145,000 miles. If the engine is weak it's weak, it's going to let loose no matter what gears are in it. Sounds like he just picked this engine up and has no idea what what shape it's in. Thats why i recommended a compresion so we could get a better idea of what's going on inside this lump. Sounds like he's on a very limited budget and wants the best bang for the buck and i hope would want it to last ass long as it can.

It also sounds like any cam at this point is out of the qustion because he said he did not wanta do heavy motor work at all or maybe at this point. Either way i think the e-cam is a cam. That's all i can say about them. It is a GREAT cam if you need to pass smog and if a new one was given to you.
There are sooooo many better cams to use in a very mild build. Maybe my comment to Stopsign32v was wrong and i take it back. sorry to him.
If you have the e-cam in your car right now thats fine. I would leave it in there if there's no reson to take stuff apart. Now if you had to do something like a timing gear, or if your removing your heads i would take the extra time to install a new more updated cam. I think the work would be worth it. Only if you have the extra cash. If not the e-cam is fine.

I recommended 3.55's because of the engine. There is no way of knowing whats going on in there yet. I think we all agree 3.55's is a great set of gears for a engine we know nothing about and want to last. Just by steping down one gear size we save alot of stress and the unknown engine. Now if we could crack the oil pan off and pop the heads off. Get a better idea what he has i might change my mind. Even with a really good compresion check i would say 3.73's if it was just a project car. If it was a daily driver i would go back to the 3.55's.

I hope this clears up more of why i would run 3.55's over 3.73's in any unknown engine that was just picked up. Either way the jump in gears from the 2. somethings or 3.08's will awsome. I'm sure he will love any of the 2 gears.

 

[Turd Tops]

Turd tops,why wont you wont even give your reason to why he shouldnt run a deeper gear because he has high mileage.Why?do you even have a theory? anyway like Mustang 5l5 said it doesnt matter what gear your running,if its time for the engine to say goodbye its done.Maybe you should call the fast and the furious tech line and see what they say?

I did give my theory above.

"Because of the mileage. Things get weaker with age and mileage.
Valve springs get weaker, valve seats start leaking, Timing gears get sloppy. The lower end i'm sure is far from new. I'm sure the bearing show wear and we all know the 5.0's with high mileage have great oil presure lol, I'm sure there is some kind of blow by going on in there. Now add all those weaker parts together with a engine that now rev's alot quicker because of the high gears i'm sure it won't hold very long before things start breaking and timing start's jumping. In short a bone stock engine with a stock cam needs nothing more then 3.55's."

 

[Mustang5L5]

That is a valid arguement, but i wouldn't put a set in stone limit of 3.55's to 3.73's as the border of engine death. One could make the argument of taking said tired engine and tossing Nitrous or a supercharger on the engine. That could very well do it in. There could be a ton of variables here.

Personally i would be more worried about the car driving off the road at over 80MPH if it's on original suspension with 127K miles and 20+ years of service.

But now we are making assumptions and this thread wasn't about how old 5.0's are ready to keel over and die.

 

[Turd Tops]

That is a valid arguement, but i wouldn't put a set in stone limit of 3.55's to 3.73's as the border of engine death. One could make the argument of taking said tired engine and tossing Nitrous or a supercharger on the engine. That could very well do it in. There could be a ton of variables here.

Personally i would be more worried about the car driving off the road at over 80MPH if it's on original suspension with 127K miles and 20+ years of service.

But now we are making assumptions and this thread wasn't about how old 5.0's are ready to keel over and die.

I agree there is not set limt of gear for engine death. I personaly have gotten junk yard motors with unknow mileage and put a butt kicking to them. back in the day "late 90" i would get a 100,000 miler and put a 125 kit on them. some would hold up better then others but for the most part i would get a whole summer out of it and rape the hell out of it all year. Most of the time i would loss a piston and move on to the next engine.

For someone who does'nt or can't get engine as easy as i can i think high mileage is a big thing to look at. At very min i would atleast pull the pan and take a peek. If it's fairly clean then i would'nt look any more if it's your 1st time in any engine. If you know alittle bit more then i would hope that you would look alot better. With noway of knowing whats going on in there i say the easier you treat it the better. For this guy i would even say put the engine and run it for acouple weeks. If you think it's a strong runner think about gears then. Let's see if the engine is even worth keeping.

Oh yeah, are we talking about a engine thats in the car with 127+ on it or just the engine? Sometimes the shape of the car will give great clues as to what the engine may be like. If the car is or was in pretty good shape then there is more hope for the engine. If the car is or was a pile then i don't think we need to talk about the engine. thats talk finding a diff engine.

 

[Lawbreaker5.0]

3.55 and 3.73's are basically the same thing.

my 2 cents

 

[Stopsign32v]

I can't believe people thought I was serious with my reply..

 

[white 89 GT]

Put in 3.73`s it will reach shift points quicker but still need to be shifted at the same rpm as any other ratio, and besides its easier on the engine to move the car with higher numerical gears.

Look for some used bolt ons (ebay,salvage yard) will save some $$$

 

[11sec5ohh]

What is the biggest FRPP cam I can install without changing anything E303? or can I go bigger?
Thanks for everything!

 

[11sec5ohh]

Low 13's!!

Just flat-foot shifted my way to 13.32 @ 91mph!! (6/12)
Following mods since my first post:

FRPP 3.73 gears
FRPP shorty headers
Stock h-pipe with gutted cats
2 chamber flowmasters
Removed air silencer (stock MAF)
Removed about 100lbs of random junk and re-located battery to the trunk.
Timing advance and BFG Drag radials (10psi)

Started out with a dissapointing 14.8 but worked my way down as I started to get the car dialed in.

Clutch is shot and 3rd is grinding but she's still holding together, I will post up vids and time slips soon!

 

[fivespeedsteed]

i dont think anyones mentioned the trans either. if you have a good shape t5 and you can nail gears thats allot better off than a slop ass AOD.

just get a clean K&N, no silencer, bigger tb and maf if you can afford it. seafoam it. thats got the intake

then do the timing bump and new plugs, maybe FRPP wires. thats got ignition

then do some headers, offroad h, catback, whatever you can afford

then gears, short shifter, again whatever you can afford

then take out weight wherever you can. i personally dont like being interiorless, if you take weight off it should be from the front of the car. move the battery back and to the passenger side of the car, yank the front sway bar.

then the shortbelt, and get a taurus fan to get that drag off your belt if you can (no clutch fan)

and some sticky ass tires.

then drive the piss out of it. remember no burnout unless your on slicks, dont even graze street tires in my opinion. launch hard, keep wheel spin at bay, shove the pedal through the floor and piss off your trans.

 

[90lxcoupe]

Ok first off, there is nothing wrong wiht an e-cam, my car made 480 to the wheels with one on 10psi, and ran great. we all GET IT, alphabet cams are old technology... but that SHT works, you cant argue with that, point made.

Back on topic.

If your gonna keep the stock motor, and you say your a racer at heart, so i assume you would sacrifice certain things for a timeslip... so heres what i think you should do, if you have the stones

Slicks
4.30 gears
manual rack(you can get a flaming river rack for pretty cheap and use the addapter for a stock shaft)
taurus fans
pick up a good used upper/lower intake
bump the timing/fuel pressure
remove the swaybar(that thing is useless)
battery in the trunk
Offroad midpipe
and drive the bananas out of it.

this should be in the 12's no problem as long as you can drive

 

[NotchAbove]

Just flat-foot shifted my way to 13.32 @ 91mph!! (6/12)
Following mods since my first post:

FRPP 3.73 gears
FRPP shorty headers
Stock h-pipe with gutted cats
2 chamber flowmasters
Removed air silencer (stock MAF)
Removed about 100lbs of random junk and re-located battery to the trunk.
Timing advance and BFG Drag radials (10psi)

Started out with a dissapointing 14.8 but worked my way down as I started to get the car dialed in.

Clutch is shot and 3rd is grinding but she's still holding together, I will post up vids and time slips soon!

Nice work, let me see if I can add anything else for you. You need to find about 40 more horses to get to the 12's but your close.

1) Short Belt ? - I would pull the A/C and Smog stuff this will shorten the belt. If you just drive this car to the track and don't have to pull into parking spots etc. You can yank the power steering as well. This will leave you with a real short belt and will net you probably 10+ horses.

2) Electric Fan - This also goes hand in hand with #1 above. With an e-fan you will have less accessory drag on the engine. Perhaps 10 horses here as well.

3) Air Filter - Please tell me you went to a K&N ? You can get a K&N panal filter and pop it into the stock airbox.

4) Since you did exhaust, how about some intake ? You can get a used larger throttle body everywhere you look, I picked up a FMS 65mm and EGR for $65 I think, perfect shape, just have to look around. And if you do have MAF, I though you said speed density, but on the bay you could pick up one of those 70mm MAF's that are calibrated for 19# injectors. I ran one, and no issues.

5) Underdrive pullies - Not a bad idea either, easy project.

I think with the above you should be there, you just need to get a clutch and hook the tires. How were your 60ft ?

 

[BigHairyMonkey]

my cars got 170k miles and longblock is stock down to the throttle body. All it has is

BBK CAI
75mm MAF Pro-M
Kirban AFPR
Walbaro 190lph
BBK Shorties
BBK o/r H
Flows
3.73s
Southside LCAs

only got to make one pass, im sure i coulda goten deeper into the 13s

 

[jason5641]

There may be validity to the low gear. I put 4.10 in my stock 90 gt with 113k in april. My engine seized Saturday. Joy.

 

[Domindart]

What Ive done thus far:

-back seats and hatch area gutted
-hurst shifter
-bbk springs
-gettting new alum probably radiator/elec fan
-takeing out the A/c and related things like condensor
-racing seats soon
-soon 3.55 rear end gearing
-31 spline axles
-take out front sway bar for dragstrip

It should make 12.9, if I can drive it right.