So, when I did that oil change a few weeks ago, I found just a tiny amount of antifreeze in the oil again, probably less than a half-pint. Still, even that much coolant in the oil is too much, so I made the executive decision to take the car off the road for the winter.
I suspect the antifreeze is coming from the intake manifold, since nearly every time I've found water in the oil of this engine in the past, I've also found torn intake gaskets, and I suspect the cheap Summit racing intake manifold may be a factor, since I've been using the FelPro gaskets recommended by AFR for a while now. (and they are highly rated too)
As a solution, (and yes, this is a
little bit overkill, but whatever) I will be replacing the intake manifold, with this: (A change in intake gasket will probably happen as well, perhaps to Ford Racing gaskets or something.)
Yes, it's time to start on the MPFI project.
That is an early 'Explorer' intake, which has been ported. I'm hoping that combined with a 70mm throttle body, it will feed sufficient air to my little 306. I would have preferred a non-egr later explorer manifold, or a GT40 manifold, but this is what was available, and cheap. the fact that it's ported was a plus for me too.
I'm aware that in that picture, the top manifold is on backwards as compared to how it would be done in a foxbody mustang, but I think that orientation is going to work better with my situation, and as far as I can tell, the top manifold is reversible (the pattern looks quite symmetrical at least)
I'll probably be making a custom badge plate as well, but more on that when I do it.
The real start of the project was the fuel tank though.
Now, my original tank has had a small leak around the vent tube for nearly as long as I've owned the car. I don't really loose much, if any, fuel through the leak, but in certain situations, the raw fuel smell can be quite strong.
The plan has always been to replace the tank when I went EFI, and so, a new fuel tank was obtained, and the weekend before halloween, I started cutting holes in it to allow for the install of the
Tanks Inc PA4 fuel pump
Since even at it's shortest length, the pump requires 6" of tank depth, and my tank was slightly shorter than that (as well as not flat on top) I made a little riser which the pump would mount to.
I started by marking a rough location: (you can also see the cad-plated "tray" sitting on top of the tank. It mounts to the pump bracket, and serves as a baffle, to ensure the pump is not run dry when driving)
before bending up some sheet metal:
and making a basic box:
welding up all the seams in the box:
roughly seeing where I wanted the pump to go: (this ring has threads in it, and eventually ends up welded to the underside)
and looking at how the box was going to be situated on the tank:
holes were cut and drilled in the box, so that the pump bracket could be fitted:
the underside: (obviously, the bracket has not been trimmed to length quite yet)
and i cut a big hole in my new tank too:
Additional trimming in progress:
and the tabs are bent: (tabs to help reduce the chance of burning through when I weld. I did a number of test welds to try different methods, and this worked the best)
before checking and adjusting fitment of the box to the tank
Finally, I started welding things up:
and a test fit of the full assembly:
Now, despite my best efforts, I am
not a pro welder, and there were a number of places where the seam between the box and the tank just did not seal, and no amount of booger welds could fix it, I was chasing leaks for hours, before I finally gave up on trying to get the welded seam to seal; all I was doing was making it look like shit.
No pics at the moment, since I am still not done yet, but the last weekend was spent cleaning and prepping the tank for a nice coat of POR-15 fuel tank sealer (on the inside), as well as some JB-weld fuel tank repair on the outside.
The plan is that between the sealer and the JB weld, I hope to have a good seal. (bonus: the tank will be protected on the inside too)
Once the inside is all sealed up, the outside will be getting either painted, or covered in bedliner, I haven't decided which yet.
Additionally, once I have this installed in the car, the fuel pump box will be getting a protective cover, to clean up the install, as well as protect the fuel lines as they exit the trunk area.
I still have not purchased the EFI computer yet, but after reading a bunch of documentation, and playing around with software, I am actually starting to lean away from Megasquirt. MS has a good community, but I don't care for the actual documentation, and the software feels clunky to me
On the other hand, though it's a very much more expensive option, I
have been looking much harder at the EFI options from Holley. The HP is the one my wallet likes, but after playing with the software, and seeing how the I/O's work, I think (with future expansion/plans in mind) the Dominator might be a better fit for my application. The Dominator will allow me to completely eliminate my OEM senders for the idiot lights, and drive them from the ECU directly, as well as allowing me to implement a number of nifty things, like AC compressor shutoff under hard acceleration, and multi-stage fan control.
The HP's limited I/O's would stop me from doing such things.
I think the MSIII could do all the same things as the Holley offerings, but the documentation... what a mess.
Holley has
way better, and clearer to understand documentation, and since I will not be just buying a plug and play kit, documentation is
key for me...
I also like that the Holley efferings are not only fully potted, but the connectors are environmental too, so installing the ECU in the engine compartment is fully possible. The MSIII ECU's are not potted, and the D-SUB connectors that the MS boxes use are not environmental connectors either, so moisture ingress is not only possible, but likely.
The Dominator is just
so damn expensive though...
I can afford it, but the number in decidedly
not friendly lol
Don't know. Don't care. The wiring is Fucked, and I am going to replace damn near everything from the firewall forward.
