Crane's 1968 Mustang Restomod

Only checked the one. We also checked a rod bearing, which was MUCH better. Still, after weighing the pros and cons of rebuilding it, another engine happened to come available locally. For a good price I was able to pick up a brand newly rebuilt 351 4V engine.

It is a 2 bolt main 351C 4V, and has been completely been rebuilt by a company back east. It has a Comp Cam 290H, an Edelbrock Performer LB 351-4V intake, Speed Pro pistons, high volume oil pump, and Comp cam lifters. We took off the valve covers and pan and everything looks good. You can still see the assembly lube. It is clean enough not to really need much. They painted the intake, which I don't care for. I think I will sandblast it back to aluminum.

I would be interested to know if anyone has an estimate for the power this beast will put out. It has never been fired up- so basically I will be treating it like a fresh rebuild- because it is.

I also have been working on the fenders. I washed the insides, which is a much bigger job then it would seem like, and then undercoated the inner walls. I want to get the engine in first before I install the fenders.

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Also I need to get the steering and brakes hooked up. Not sure if I will tackle these before or after I set in the engine. I think the brake lines will be a lot easier to bend and install without the engine in. I will need to bend new ones, as the old ones kinda followed the shock towers.
 

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Also I need to get the steering and brakes hooked up. Not sure if I will tackle these before or after I set in the engine. I think the brake lines will be a lot easier to bend and install without the engine in. I will need to bend new ones, as the old ones kinda followed the shock towers.

I second the before engine gets set theory!
 
I keep making progress! The new engine is looking great! All these pics of the engine are NOT the same engine as before...this one is newly rebuilt, a 4V 351c, with a few nice little upgrades. BUT, I found it extremely boring. I painted the water pump, sandblasted the intake back to aluminum, and swapped out the pulleys and balancer for the ones I already painted.

Before:
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After:

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I cannot overstate how pretty this engine is. The pictures do not do it justice. I am still having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that it is mine.

Anyways, I am also working on getting the steering column ready. I choose to rebuild mine instead of buying a new one. It is going well, but just takes time. My new steering wheel should be here soon too. I hate that I have to wait until I complete this to install the engine, but I need to get the steering in before I install the brakes, and I don't want to put the engine in until the brakes are done.

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Well I royally jacked up my steering column.... so a new one is on the way from Ididit. Don't ask me how.

Anyways, I installed the brake booster and started bending brake lines. This started as a daunting task- but got easier as I got more confident in what I was doing. I got the booster installed and the R side routed. I also got the mounting tabs installed. Here is a picture of the progress mid way through. I will try to post some more tomorrow. You can also see my tab locations, which is where the owners of Rod and Custom recommended. The tabs were included in the kit, along with the brake lines. Made it SUPER easy. The only thing not included was the new hard lines.

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Got more work done today. I have got all my front brake lines bent. I am working on getting the under side of the car spot free so I can spray undercoating, and then I am going to install new brake lines to the rear drums....or I might just re-use the old lines. It's a 3/16 line and I would install a 1/4" one, but then again they are just drum brakes and most of the stopping power is in the front brakes. New disc brakes might be in order for the rear- eventually- but it can wait for now.

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And just because the engine is sooooo pretty I will show another picture of it.

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I did run into another snag today....this might be an expensive one. I bolted up my flex plate and torqued it to spec, and went to throw on my torque converter only to find the hole spacing was completely off.

I measured the spacing on the flex plate and it reads 9.375, and the converter had a stud diameter of 11.something. After doing some research I found I do in fact need anther torque converter...and it's not the $99 dollar one at Autozone. I have only found 2 places I can actually get one. One it at Summit Racing, and the other is by a custom builder here in Boise. Both run about $530. Ouch! I am leaning towards the custom builder because he can get it to me by mid next week- but still does anyone have any better ideas?

Another reason I am leaning towards the custom guy is he can build mine to fit my car. After doing some research I found that with my Comp 290H CAM and the generally high RPM power that the Cleveland makes, a 3000 stall would be about right for driving around town. He even seems to think that my motor might be overbuilt (or at least have a bit too much cam) for a daily driver, and is saying this one leans more on the "sport" side.
 

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Worked on the Stang some more today. I accomplished a lot. Seems that the same amount of work equates in to less bolts actually turned, less surface area painted, fewer parts polished, etc... More time means less payoff. Either way, it is still rewarding.

Spent the first half of the day spraying undercoating on the underside of the car. Sorry no pics. I wanted to get the underside taken care of before I put in my brake lines to the rear. I don't want them painted with the undercoating. Weird, I know, but it would bug me if they were.

Anyways, my headers came in the mail today. I send the 2v ones back that were for the old engine and got these for the 4v. Dallas Mustang was EXCELLENT about taking the old ones back and shipping me the new ones. They even ate the shipping to have the new ones sent out and all I paid was the price difference for the product and return shipping for the 2v heads.

The engine looks more complete with the headers on it. I think I am going to put the whole thing in as a package- the engine, headers, and tranny. It seems like less time hunched over an engine bay, which sounds appealing to me. That plan might very well change once I try...who knows. Without the shock towers in place it should be no problem.

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Also worked on the steering column again. I just ordered a new housing for it after I jacked the old one up. Honestly I don't think the $525 is worth it to upgrade to the iDidit column, so I just stayed with this one. iDidit makes a great product, but I would rather throw the money elsewhere right now. A new collar off of eBay got me going again.

A bit of chopping was needed to get the old shaft in for the steering column, but over all it was not too bad. I followed the directions and created recesses for the set screws. Having my steering linkage fall off while going down the road just doesn't seem like an option to me.

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Cleaned up the existing mechanism. If I remember right it worked fine, but if I need to replace it, it would not be too hard of a job later on.

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Reassembly.

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I have no clue what I am doing here...but it is a ton of fun! I am really enjoying the process! Looking forward to the day I can drive this beast...
 

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Worked on my steering column a bit more today. It is looking really good. I like the quality of the Grant wheel, it is better then I expected, honestly. I don't care for the horn bezel too much, it seems like it would "pop off" easily, but that is secondary at this point. I can probably find a way to make it stay put easier later. Tomorrow I am going to install the column in the car and finish the linkage to the R&P.

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Well the engine is IN. I would like to say it was a super easy process...it was not. I thought it would be better to put the engine and transmission in as one unit. I am rethinking this now. It would probably have been much easier to install the engine first and the transmission later. The whole assembly is so long that you really have to tilt the engine so the transmission is pointing down at a big angle-which is a pain in the neck. We used a leveler, which was probably necessary but still tough. I did end up scuffing my firewall a bit, but at least only in areas where it is covered. I don't think anyone will ever notice it but me.

Unfortunately I was fighting the weather. Just as we were getting it lowered into the car it started to rain and snow and we had to call it a day.

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There is one thing I am not sure of- and that is aligning the motor mounts. As you can see in this picture the mount seems to offset "back" a ways. If I were to take the mounts and swap them left and right, the "long" side would point backward, essentially shifting the engine forward a bit, perhaps a 1/2" or so. It would seem that this would fit the crossmember a bit better with the R&P steering.

I am tempted to try to hoist the engine up again just far enough to get them off of the mounts, take the mounts off and swap them. It looks like it should move forward a bit- but then again I'm just not sure. The transmission mounts look about right. It would also give me some more room between the engine and firewall.

I am actually fairly confident in the placement of the crossmember. Since the motor mounts are fixed to the crossmember the pan being offset would have nothing to do with that.

One of those things.....

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Also I was a bit disappointed to see that my pretty valve covers conflict with my brake booster. They just barely rub, so it probably wont be a huge deal, but it was kinda a bummer. I might have to get covers that are not quite as tall, or figure something else out.

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So I'm going back to this again...

The X distance in this figure is 1.5", and the Y is 2.5", which means it is 3 inches from back bolt on the block to the center of the mount (which is also center of the crossmember.) If If I swap the left and right mounts, the long side will point to the back making this distance 4". So by my calculations, reversing the motor mounts by switching the left and right will set the motor forward in the 1". Unless I am completely missing something, which my gut tells me I am. The one thing is my transmission fits right now with the arch. If I move the engine forward 1 inch I am not sure the back arch will fit. Those bolt holes are slotted, so they have a bit of room. Not sure how much. Any help on this would be great.

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Ok so I got it all sorted out, (think)

It will not matter if I swap out the left and right. They are not mirrored copies of eachother, they are the same. So if I do swap them out it will be configured the same way. The pic you saw up above was the passenger side. Here you can see the "long" end going forward. On the drivers side the long side points back. After crawling around and taking some measurements it turns out that the motor mount holes on the block are an inch offset from eachother. The passenger side holes are 1" farther from the transmission then the drivers side.

Mystery solved.

Since there is no other way for it to go, it will remain where it is. Also since the mounts for the transmission are perfectly centered, I know my crossmember is exactly where it should be. My only dissapointment is the alignment of the pan and crossmember, which was set with the kit. There is a 1.5" gap between the crossmember and the oil pan, where the R&P is pretty crowded. No huge deal, but it would be nice for it to align a bit better.

Anyways, good news.

Alex
 
BAD NEWS!

My R&P steering and headers DO NOT like each other. There is no room for both, unfortunately. So, I guess I am sending them back once again. Question: Does anyone know what actually WILL for my setup?

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While I do not know which headers will fit your car - I can tell you what I did with a similar setup. I installed the same RC motorsports front suspension kit in a 68 convertible with a 351W and hooker long tube headers and also had a steering rod clearing problem. I cut and rotated the 3rd back header tube, welded it in place, and had a local shop reapply the ceramic coating. This was back in 2005, no problems since.

Kent
 

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Looks really good. Unfortunately, I don't think that will work on mine, from the looks of things here. I would need to cut and weld 3 of the tubes- probably not worth it.

I am having a hard time finding headers that will work with my rack and pinion steering AND a 351 cleveland 4V. Can anyone recommend a good source? Long tube preferred, but I'm just about ready to go with anything at this point.

Alex
 
Ok, so here is a general question: When looking up info on "shorty" headers no one seems to ever mention R&P compatibility. Can I assume this to mean shorty headers generally will not interfere with my steering linkage?
 
This is an amazing build so far. I've been looking at the R&C kit for a while now...This thread is making me want to pull the trigger.

Here's the truth- I'm not a master mechanic. I am not even close to rich. I don't really have a lot of resources to put towards this car. Granted it's not a poor mans hobby, so if your broke you should be doing other things, but for the average Joe out there who simply likes the lines of these cars, it is NOT out of reach.

Honestly, I have put around $12,000 into this car so far.That is over 5 years. Honestly, I overpaid for the car itself by $2500, and the new suspension is about a $3,000 upgrade. Worth it? Depends on you. For me it was. Also the cleveland @ $1500 extra was not necessary...but it's what I wanted.

I have also bought and sold other cars to help pay for it, so the kid doesn't run out of diapers. Anyways, my point is if you want to do it, make a plan and go for it. I am sure glad I did. Granted it's going to be another $1,000 or so before I can drive it. (hopefully) Another $5,000 for it to look pretty. I'm not going to be spending $15,000 on a paint job. If anyone ever tells you that you need to spend some god-awful amount on one particular component- get some more opinions. I am not buying top notch stuff for this car, but I'm not buying junk either.

In the end I know it is a car that I will be happy with. I will also be completely cool with the fact that I only spent $400 on headers when others easily spent over a grand. I know all the components on my car are good quality, and that is enough for me. Top notch, gangbusters? Nope. Not even close.
 
Put the fenders and hood back on the 'Stang. Poorly, mind you, but they are there and the neighborhood watch should be ok with it for a bit. Still waiting on headers. Really excited that it is looking like a car again.

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Well it has a been a bit since I have worked on the 'Stang. I picked up a VW Passat for a good price and have been rebuilding that for the last month. (please don't ban me!)

I did get my header situation figured out. Sandersons looks like the way to go, and they seem to fit without too much hassle.

I am more then ready to get back to some American Muscle! Anyways, I have not started the car yet, and am waiting on a couple things. Here is the list:

1. I need to get my pulleys figured out. Nothing really lines up right now, and I need to somehow set it up so my water pump, alternator, and crank line up. I will try to post a pic later. Not going to worry about the power steering just yet.

2. Need to strip and paint the battery box. I have applied many coats of stripper to it, but it is stubborn. Sand blasting doesn't work too well either.

3. Need to hook up steering linkage. I am 90% sure my new Sanderson shorty headers will do the trick....fingers crossed. I do know I need to re route my linkage a bit...but nothing too terribly bad.

4. Valve covers interfere with my power brake booster. Need to get shorter ones, which is fine with my valves. The "tall" covers didn't serve a purpose with their height other then looking pretty.

5. Wiring. Should not be too bad, I just need to git'r done. I want my wiring to look pretty, so I will take my time with it.

6. Fire her up for the first time. Very nervous about this! Got a lot of money in that engine.

7. Exhaust system. Got a guy lined out to install one for $500 or so. His work looks good.

8. Paint....speaking of more money.

All in all....the list is a lot bigger then I would care to see. Time to get working on it. Just waiting on good weather at this point.

Alex