My 1987 Mercury Colony Park

[87gtVIC]

Just slowly gathering parts and having them ready, so I'm not rushing to acquire everything.

If you're down this way, I'd certainly be more than happy to buy that HO stick off you.

Nah. Don’t worry about that. You went out of your way and helped me out before. Plus it is just sitting around. I have no problems just gifting it to you.

I will keep you up to date on if and when this would be.

[gadget73]

86+ is roller, sometime in 85 the roller compatible blocks came out. Some 85s have them, some don't. Converting needs the holes drilled and tapped in the lifter galley, but thats not all that difficult. The distributor gear is different too, steel for roller cam, iron for flat cam. The iron gives to the steel, so if you're going to have a mismatch you want it to be the distributor. Still not good since all the metal goes into the engine but if you eat the cam gear off the only fix is a new cam. At least the distributor you can just replace or re-gear.

[87GrandMarq]

I knew about the late 85+ blocks being roller but is the stock cam roller? I always thought it was a flat tappet cam.


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[Kodachrome Wolf]

I knew about the late 85+ blocks being roller but is the stock cam roller? I always thought it was a flat tappet cam.


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Stock camshaft from late '85 and onwards was roller for car engines. Flat tappet cams are in the '79-'85 cars.

[87GrandMarq]

Good to know thanks


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[Kodachrome Wolf]

Got a Class III/IV receiver installed today. Got this Putnam unit free from TecNickal, and reportedly came used from like a '92 Crown Victoria.





Unlike most I see for Panther applications, this one did not have the angled rear mount, but was instead totally flat. Compared to the installation on the '97, I had to drill the rear holes (towards the gas tank) vs drilling front holes (towards the bumper). I also had to level it a bit towards the front since it was going to unevenly contact where the bumper mount is attached to the frame.

I did notice what while the unit was generally level with the frame, the receiver opening is angled down a touch. I am well aware it has been dragged on the ground having worn down the tube at the bottom. I'm wondering if it was overloaded or was rear ended at some point and warped the tube a bit. That amount of wear isn't from hitting a driveway once in a blue moon.

As long as it works, its fine. If I have issues, I'll just get a comparable replacement.

[Tiggie]

Maybe dragged in the salvage yard? They can tear up some stuff getting the cars set for picking.

[87gtVIC]

I pulled a trailer hitch from a wagon before and it used wedge shaped shims to set it straight in the frame rails. Don’t remember if it was front or back but it was not all four corners. Was not needed when installing it into my crown Vic.

Interesting bolt together type. That does look like it was dragging ass for a long time. Must have been a good spark show.

[BigMerc96]

I pulled a trailer hitch from a wagon before and it used wedge shaped shims to set it straight in the frame rails. Don’t remember if it was front or back but it was not all four corners. Was not needed when installing it into my crown Vic.

Interesting bolt together type. That does look like it was dragging ass for a long time. Must have been a good spark show.

Yep. There are indeed wedge shims on a Wagon. Frame rails must be straighter on them behind the wheels or something. My buddy's '91 wagon had the factory installed hitch being a tow package car and all. We compared it to the Curt hitch he put on his '03 CVLX, they were damn near identical aside from the wagon having shims, IIRC they were at the front side closer to the axle. I want to say the Curt came with said shims, but I could be totally wrong and just thinking of it being mentioned in the paperwork. All I know is that the factory hitch on the wagon was still very solid and we used it more than a few times to haul stuff, like his '90 Gutlass Ciera on a tow dolly. Interesting side note, that 1990 Gutlass was actually a month newer than the 1991 Grand Marquis wagon, Ford started building '91s hella early, iirc that thing was a 4/90 build.

[VicCrownVic]

Usually damage done at the JY is fresh and obvious. I'm convinced that I'll never find a driveshaft in the yards here that hasn't at least been dinged by loader forks. It looks like the lower lip of the receiver opening has been ground off, that would have been a ton of dragging at the yard to accomplish that.

+1, '91s were built pretty early. The Scab also has a 4/90 build date. The Ice Car is within normal model year range at 11/90.

[sly]

If the original owner of that hitch had a steep driveway or workplace with a steep entry and scraped every day... it would eventually look like that as well. I know I've ground some off the bottom of the hitches that have been on my 93. Not that much mind you, but still.

[gadget73]

I've bottomed my Towncar out a few times in that spot. 4 people and a really steep driveway does it. Of course I was running one of those double ball things, so it had one ball sticking down for even more inclination to grind. Just typing that sounds painful.

[Master Shake]

As somebody who has towed with his wagon for over 3k miles, let me tell you that receiver drags and drags hard. Any kind of ramp for a gas station, a speed bump, a slightly steep driveway it would drag real good. Mine is a Curt one and it had the shims to make it mate it properly to the straight frame of the wagon.

I even had new shocks, new wagon specific rear springs, all that good jazz.

To be fair the trailer was pretty loaded up. Had 2 toolboxes full of tools, 2 giant bins of old pig iron Ford parts, a TV, 2 computers, video game consoles, and everything else in my life I could fit in a 8x6 trailer.

[sly]

This is why I have the Airlift 1000 load helpers on mine. It'll level out.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

HO project is slowly creeping towards the actual work aspect. Got the last major component, the fuel injectors, a la a '96 Marquis.



Got a kit to replace the pintle caps, filter baskets, o-rings, and little plastic spacer thing-a-majig. I figured refurb'd flow match injectors would be nice, but I doubt on a generally stock engine it'll make a noticeable difference.

So at this point, I've the following awaiting install:
-Stock HO Camshaft (A big thanks again to David!)
-19 LBS fuel injectors
-'87 Mark VII LSC PCM
-1.7 Roller Rockers


However, I plan on helping Nick finish his Explorer swap first, then we can tackle this job. Then we get to figure out which wagon does better: An '89 with an Explorer 302 and 3.08s vs an '87 with a HO swapped LoPo and 3.27s.

A good question though: Is there any special procedures I need to follow as far as breaking in a roller camshaft goes?

I also did get one of these:


It's a Ford OE aftermarket option for those wanting DRLs. It's suppose to tap into the low beam lamp circuit, however I think there's an option between half power on the circuit and full power. Since I'm running a relay harness, I'd need it to be on the full power output since I doubt the relay would agree having less than 12v going across it.

The next future project that lays after all of that is a '92 LTC underhood fusebox to replace the rats nest of fusible links. I'll also integrate the headlight relays/fuses and cooling fan relay/fuse combos into it as well. I've just got to do a little research and reading threads here to determine the closest fuse options to replacing the links. Photobucket has effectively ruined one of the threads and the pictures are just blurs.