Mikey's new four-door

[1987cp]

Took the car around the block last night, and so far as I can tell, it's reasonably quiet and feels decent. I do need to make another Ace Hardware run since I bought the wrong replacement nuts for the header collectors and one of the old ones is stripping. Fairly sure the nuts I bought were M12x1.75, so I'll have to try M12x1.5.

[packman]

So, when are we gonna see a vid of the P72 beast?.



Packman

[1987cp]

Right now! Here's a sneak preview .... official version will come once the correct tailpipes are on and everything's welded and nice. Exhaust note is fairly subdued, but resonance is currently unacceptable.

http://www.supermotors.net/getfile/703277/fullsize/dscn0548.avi

[torquelover]

Sounds great! How about some vids from inside the car, with the engine under a load?

[packman]

Sounds nice!!! Are you putting resonators at the tails to cut down on the resonance?



Packman

[1987cp]

Shall have to acquire some interior vids. Maybe tomorrow, as I have a couple of errands to run.

Like I said, I believe the resonance in the system is due to incorrect parts and lack of secure connections. I do not intend to run tips of any kind, as the old system had only a minimum of resonance, despite using one of the world's loudest street mufflers and NO crossover pipe, and looked completely stock from the outside. My intent is to add piping to the rear of the soon-to-be-installed Impala SS tailpipes to replicate the routing of a stock system. There are a pair of 45-degree bends visible in the video; those were added only to direct the exhaust gases out from under the car rather than up around the trunk lid (man, that looked weird) and are currently secured only with screws.

Still have that annoying stumble/hesitation just over 4000rpm. I found the 1487 tuning kits, though, so maybe I'll try .098 jets in the secondaries. I've got a feeling, though, that the problem is the secondaries not opening soon enough .... don't think there's a real cure for that with the AFB carb design except to run the smaller carb. Makes one feel tempted to buy the AVS that Fordman75 has for sale!

[packman]

You should definitely make one of the CVs that you have into a strip car. Just to confuse people and make them have to guess what you're running on a given day. Most people probably couldn't tell the difference between the '81 2-door and the '87 P72 at first glance.



Packman

[1987cp]

Nope, no strip cars for me. For starters, they're a big waste of money, plus I need these for transportation. Also, the nearest dragstrip I'm aware of is over an hour away and I still have yet to visit there even once, because it's simply not a priority and I'd be hard up trying to get the OK from the other half here even if it were!

Oh, and did I mention that I don't do strip cars?

[85crownHPP]

these mid-pipes for sale - are they the type that bolt up to a mustang H-pipe?? how much you want for them??

[1987cp]

Yep. I've got one set of 2.5" Mustang midpipes with nothing attached, unfortunately no collarey-flangey bits either because I needed them for my Walker 43281s, and one set of the same with clamped-on extensions and the aforementioned Flowmaster 942543s all still attached and that I don't really feel like taking apart because it'll probably involve cutting, but I'll probably end up taking apart anyway to make a smaller container for shipping.

One set of mids is Flowtech and one is Dynomax, for what that matters.

[1987cp]

Hm. Just changed the spark plugs and found some weirdness. Ground straps on the frontmost cylinders (1 and 2 especially) are quite white, and the back plugs (4 and 8) are pretty nicely fouled. Looks very much like oil fouling on #8, while #4 could be either oil or carbon. One of the Champion plugs I substituted when a couple of the old Motorcrafts broke while installing the oil dipstick tube seemed to show a bit of speckling on the insulator - which, if assumptions are correct, would seem consistent with the periodic tapping I've been hearing under load. That said, I do think the header is leaking somewhat on that side, so one of these days I need to take it off again and install a new gasket.

[1987cp]

Sooo .............. with a set of Autolite 24s, the tapping under light throttle continued. Tried switching back to vacuum advance (0 degrees initial with 14 degrees vacuum advance hooked up to manifold vacuum), kept on tapping. Went from tuning-chart position 22 (65/52 rods) to position 26 (62/52 rods) and got lots of stumbling both on and off the throttle, so I went back to the 65/52s. Driving with a vacuum gauge suggests that the tapping isn't highly dependent on manifold vacuum, and can happen when the vacuum is fairly high. When I got home I removed the vacuum advance again, set the initial timing conservatively at 6, and changed out the suspect header gasket for an older copper gasket I've had sitting around. Checked the d/s spark plugs against this pic (here), and the insulators look pretty much perfect with no real discoloration of the side electrode, so at this point I'm really starting to wonder whether this tapping noise really is spark knock after all.

Anywhoo, broke an AmPro wobble extension reinstalling the header and was reminded of the need for a good set of flex sockets as well as higher-quality 1/4" extensions in shortish lengths. I do appreciate the 3/8" head header bolts, will have to get some for the wagon. Started the engine again, listened with a tube, and decided I'm definitely getting some tapping from under the d/s valve cover, and more towards the back than the front, so early tomorrow I'm going to pull that off and see about checking the valve lash (Crane adjustable rocker arms => I suppose lash could possibly go out of adjustment somehow).

[1987cp]

Well, I just adjusted adjustable roller rockers for the first time! Did the eight on the driver's side before getting chased indoors by rain. Oddly, more than one adjuster seemed a bit loose and turned with relatively little provocation. Hopefully that's where some of my tapping noise has been coming from. Since I had to remove the fan and loosen all the spark plugs to conveniently turn the engine over by hand, I'm going to go ahead and adjust the valves on the passenger side as well - though I probably should anyway, as if one adjuster can loosen up after about 70k miles, any of them could.

With luck, the procedure I used is generally considered acceptable for short-duration hydraulic flat-tappet cams like the Edelbrock 2122 - find zero lash by turning the pushrod and finding resistance, turn the nut 3/8 turn, snug the lock, and turn the nut another 1/8 turn. My back didn't enjoy doing this on cylinder number 8.

[torquelover]

Since I had to remove the fan and loosen all the spark plugs to conveniently turn the engine over by hand...

Wow, never had to do that before. Just grab the huge crank pulley and tug. How does it look in there? Still keeping up the synthetic routine? You should post some pics of that stuff for the mangs here to see. Not your everyday Panther valvetrain.

[1987cp]

Quite. Looks pretty reasonable, really, just the usual small amount of pale goo stuck to the valvecover that hasn't boiled off lately. I forgot to get a pic of that side, but there's the other side, and also I just realized I only did about 1/4 turn preload instead of 1/2 so I may be opening that side back up as well.

Grab the crank pulley ..... maybe if I were a lot stronger.