I got a buddy who was gonna turbo his 97 Cobra, but now wants to drop one of those FRPP 514ci crate motors into it. I kinda tried to convince him to just forge the shortblock and go with more boost. Its gonna be a PITA but what are all ya'all's opinion on that?
Not only will it be a PITA to fit the 514 in there, but he's probably looking at close to $20K+ for it and all the supporting mods and custom fabrication that would be required. He can forge his 4.6 and get a turbo kit for less than half that price and probably make even more hp (in the higher rpm range of course).
Actually, a 514 (aka 429/460) is not that much larger than a 4.6 4 valve. I would bet that the 514 is not quite as wide as the 4 valve. May be a little longer though, as the accessory drives were designed for much larger cars. I would like to see both built and then raced against one another.
It would still be quite the undertaking though. For a 4.6L car it means k-member swap, custom headers (unless someone makes 460 swap headers for the sn95 body), upgrade to a stronger tranny (auto?), possible conversion to a carb fuel system, which also means lots of custom wiring (mainly removing whats there already), stronger rear-end, and who knows what else. I agree with the above statement of doing this with a v6 car instead of taking-out all the good Cobra components from his.
Yeah, that pretty much confirms my thoughts on it, just wanted some other views. I told him to post his question in the 4.6 section so we'll see what he finally decides. Either way I'm gonna help him and it should be fun.
