First some housekeeping, sort comments below oldest first, and the build will be chronological
In here I’m going to try and document as much as I can about my Ford 302 V8 swapped s13 coupe. As far as I'm aware, it's a somewhat rare swap, maybe 20-30 in the US, and only a handful that are driven regulary or at tracks. I've had this engine in the car since 2015, and it's been a constant R&D battle to get to the reliability that I have today.
To those super into the JDM aspect, this build might not be something to gravitate towards, but let me explain(rant) my mindframe and how I view this car. I love 80/90's japanese (and german) cars, and I love seeing all of your authentic, OEM/JDM styling, and all the passion that it takes to maintain that level of aestetic while drifting the car. But I dont watch anime, I can't read kanji, or have any real desire to go to japan, or feel deeply connected to that culture at all. I love hotrodding, and the mentality that drives that culture. Not hotrods that you see at some fairground in $8,000 of easter egg colored paint, a poster propping the hood up, full of pictures of the car youre looking at, telling you that Carroll Shelby once breathed on it. Hotrodding, to me, is the DIY or die attitude, 2am nights building something that shakes the ground a little when started, as fast and lean as you could make it given the peices you have, and every part and bracket has that perfect imperfection about it, but you created it.
'Building a hotrod is like a jigsaw puzzle, except some of the peices in the box are missing, you dont use all the peices it came with, some peices are from other boxes, or are fabricated entirely, and in the end it doesnt look anything like the picture on the box it came in'
So, in my opinion, this is my hotrod.
First, the current mod list. I’m including parts numbers mostly for my own reference later if I break something, I’m going through all my email invoices to write out this list XD
Engine
Ford Windsor 302 V8
E7 Heads w/ larger valves, port work
ARP head studs 154-4001
Crower 15512 282/286 camshaft
Scorpion 1.6 roller rockers 1021
FMS hydraulic lifters 6500-R302H
Comp Cams pushrods 6.248” 7826-16
Edelbrock Victor EFI intake manifold
Edlebrock 70mm Throttle body
OEM 19# injectors
Pro-M MAF 75MM Bullet 75BP-M93
Powermaster starter 9603
March Performance PS pump bracket 30035-09
Procomp alternator bracket 232-1001
Ford “3G” Alternator
Nitrous Outlet single nozzle 50 wet shot (not used while drifting)
Nitrous Outlet Promod solenoid 22-50001PM
Nitrous Express Maximizer Controller 16006
Nitrous Pro Flow Purge Kit 307704
Zex 10# nitrous bottle
BBK Headers 1515
2.5” to single 3” steel exhaust, vband clamps
Flowmaster FlowFX Muffler 71229
Drivetrain
Tremec TKX Transmission 18084 (Road Race .81 5th gear)
FMS Bellhousing 6392-R58
Tilton Hydraulic throwout bearing 60-6102
Tilton Clutch Delay Valve 90-5000
Wilwood Clutch Master 260-10372
Wilwood clutch pedal 13574
Spec 6 puck clutch SF483
Sachs Flywheel NFW1100
Shaftmaster 3” steel driveshaft
Fluids
Jaz 12Gal Foamed Fuel Cell 012-06
KRC 100 Micron Fuel Filter 4708
Tanks Inc. 10 Micron Fuel Filter FF-10
Deatschwerks fuel pump 250iL
DIY fuel surge tank
Griffin Dual Pass 3” Radiator 29221-X
Flexalite Black Magic 3000cfm FLX-168
AFCO LM7B Oil Cooler
Canton Accusump 3qt, electric valve 24-006
Permacool remote oil filter 1791
Derale Oil Thermostat 180F 25719
Derale PS cooler 13215
Suspension
Fortune Auto 500 Gen 6 Coilovers (10k/6k)
B Knuckle
S13 LCA - Stock length
GKtech 50mm front spacer
ISR arms
ISR front sway bar
Interior
Rollcagecomponents.com 6 point 1.5” cage
Sparco Seats Evo II-US
Momo steering wheel
Quickcar Steering wheel quick release 68-012
Howe steering column mount 91997
Allstar performance steering support bearings 52140
Borgenson Steering ujoints 013446
Borgenson Collapsible steering shaft 460018
Autometer Procomp gauges (tachometer, oil pressure, water/oil/trans temp, volts)
Longacre oil pressure/water temp warning lights
Electronics
Ford A9L ECU
Nitrousdave.com Relay Board
MSD 6AL Ignition Box
MSD Blaster Ignition Coil 8227
Ron Francis Engine Wiring Harness Cobra-75
Tefzel chassis wiring
Quickcar Switch Panel 50-166
Quickcar Kill Switch 55-009
Ultima Red Top 9004-003
Exterior
Summit Racing Bright Aqua Pearl paint UP-326G
Allstar Performance Front Crash Bar ALL22328
KBD front bumper
Fake Spirit Rei Rear Bumper
Fake generic sideskirts
Fake Origin fenders
Fake dmax hood vent
OEM s14 Kouki wing
GKTech mirrors
Enkei RPF1 17x9.5 +15
Enkei PF01
Gramlight 57f
Riverside Aldstat 18” (multiple)
Braking
Z32 Front calipers (steel)
Hawk HPS+ pads
Stainless steel brake lines
Sikky inline handbrake (with Wilwood remote reservoir)
Villians drift dual rear caliper kit
Awesome build. Can't wait to read more of the story
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So with a working car and a few drift events under my belt, I decided it was time for some mods. Fortune Auto coilovers, angle from MA Motorsports Awesometron 5000 knuckles, and megan/isis/ebay arms all around. Having more angle than stock was very nice.
Plus having even tire wear in the rear was a nice bonus!
I decided I had enough of the 'good enough' interior, and I had way too many wiring connections that could have faulted out. so I redid everyhting and aded a relay/fuse board from nitrousdave. Love this board, makes life so simple. Pulled the mess of wiring out.
Replaced and simplified
And cleaned up the dash situation with a quickcar switch panel.
Fixing the exterior was next! I didnt have a ton of money but wanted something better than stock shark nose.
So KBD and some free veilside skirts from a freind appeared, as well as getting rid of the cowl hood I made to fit the 5.0L intake. Ebay bomex style hood vent worked.
Summer 2017!
Also done at the same time was a new radiator.. apparently the used one I found on craigslist was severly clogged and was the cause of my overheating issues. I got a dual pass, 3" thick radiator that was the same diamensions as the Chasebays tucked radiator.
Now that I was able to do more than 3 laps without hitting 220f water temp, I was able to get comfortable in the car and really driving it hard.. which led to finding the limits of the drivetrain. Tremec T5 3rd gear apparently does not like big clutch kicks.
Luckily a coworker had a stockpile of three T5's and wanted to sell them in bulk for a good price. My original plan was to replace my broken transmission, keep one as a spare, and sell one to help offset costs. But before I knew it, I broke my 2nd T5. I think it happened the very next event after I replaced it haha. Which left me with 2 broken and 2 working T5's.
Next was fixing my driving position. I am 6'3 with apparently long legs, and that's not ideal with the 90's japanese man seating position. I ordered the largest Sparco seat, which at the time was called an Evo-II US.. fucking Italians think their funny naming their biggest seat the US model haha.
Condition of the interior before
Cut cat hump, welded in a plate, bolted seat brackets. Still booger welds with a borrowed flux core welder, but getting better! They're structurally okay, but I take alot of pride in learning with this car and all the work done by myself.
After I did the seat mounts, I decided to pull the trigger on my own welder setup. I went with a little 110v everlast mig welder, and BOY that was a game changer. I got some good advice to get a bunch of scrap steel and go though one bottle of argon just practicing random connections and positions. After a couple weeks of that, I decided to go for extending my front LCA's. Pretty proud how much my welding progressed in such a small timeframe. Only wish I bought my own mig sooner!
And then I got lost in the sauce a bit from 2018 to 2019 on building the car, instead of driving it. I was just excited about my newfound ability to glue metal together with electricity. So I decided to try and fix some overcentering I had with the front wheels at angle by relocating the steering rack forward. Unfortunatly for my 5.0L swap, I had to heavily notch the front subframe for oilpan clearance. So I got a new stock subframe, make a jig, and cut the whole center section out of it. Then put a solid bar in it's place, welded in some bink industries steering rack camps, as well as notched the oil pan. Looking back, this setup was so, so overbuilding the car. But I didnt know any different and was excited to fabricate.
In keeping with the overbuilding and underdriving theme, while fabricating the subframe stuff I had aquired a bunch of parts, including a new fuel cell/pumps/filters, dual rear calipers, rear tube bumper, etc.
I was really wondering if I wanted to cut the rear end up for the "half bumper" look. glad I didnt!
Progression thus far. Going in the right direction, but still not anywhere close to what I had in my mind.
Part 1: Initial Assembly, sucess and failures
A little backstory about how this came to be. I got the car in 2015 after months of trying to figure out what my next project/fun car would be. I previously had BMWs and a VW MK2 GTI, but all mild bolt on’s. The ford engine originally belonged to my dad, he planned to put it in a first gen mustang, or a cobra kit car. It is a crate engine built by Rex Hutchinson Racing Engines in Sacramento CA. It’s a mostly stock 302, with some valve/head work done to the iron E7 heads, a big cam, etc. Some plans fell though and the engine sat in our garage for 8+ years, until I asked if I could do something with it.
As fate would have it, the perfect s13 shell I was searching for popped up on craigslist that same week.
While there was alot of figuring stuff out for this car, there was alot of dumb luck initially. Stock Ford explorer motor mounts are the same angle/spacing as the nissan front subframe, they just need to be raised up something like 1.5". I had some steel stock laying around, which looking back on it was just the heaviest possible option I could have went with. lol.
I also hacked up a front subframe to clear the front sump oil pan on the ford, which again, I learned later would have been a million times easier to modify the oil pan and subframe, not just the subframe. But, the flux core booger welds and reinforcing angle iron held and I didnt have any issues, it just was the extent of the skills, knowledge, and budget at the time. Much better solutions come down the road.
So with that, the engine was in. Next was figuring out steering, and getting the steering shaft around the exhaust headers. I read on zilvia at the time that stock explorer exhaust would clear the steering shaft, but nobody posted any pictures or had proof. BBK headers had the most clearance in the area that I needed, so I went with those and returned the other 4+ pairs of manifolds I ordered. Again, booger flux core welds on a universal DD hotrod steering shaft, to a universal stering column I bolted to the dash bar. Not ideal, but it did work and ster the car fine. Slapped in a used craigslist corbeau seat too and within a month I was getting really modivated that this was going to work.
Front end accessories went on, distributor etc. The car didnt come with a gas tank, so I (regrettably) saw a cheap used fuel cell on craigslist and decided that would be fine, and it was for a few years, but again, just not ideal and that was the limits of the knowledge at the time. Also found a used radiator that would fit in the diamesions I have. I could not make a stock style radiator fit with the crank pulley, or I'd have to use a pusher fan, which I knew from previous cars do not work very well.
The car also didnt come with any sort of chassis wiring. I knew this would not be any sort of daily driver, and despite Virginia not being the most relaxed on road law enforment, I didnt really care about having small things like a liscense plate light, turn signals, etc. So I decided to make my own wiring harness just for the small number of things I'd need, fuel pump, brake lights, fan, etc. I know this looks a little cringe now in the world of PDM, solid state canbus whositwhatsit, but 10 years ago this looked pretty hot shit for amatuer wiring in my garage. Also you can see the first of many T5 transmissions got mounted up using OEM crossmember, exhaust getting put in, as well as the rest of the needed engine components.
Wide angle of my parents garage I was working in, driving 1hr each way from my college city apartment to come work on it. Super inconvenient haha.
And I know this is a screenshot, but this is from a video of its first start. May 13, 2016. Quickly adjusted timing and fuel pressure and it ran flawlessly from the get go. I cant tell you how happy I was.
After that, it was a few months of getting all the little parts that make it 100% drivable, testing it on the street with my freinds also equally junky s13's haha. what a time. Then in July 2016 was the first drift event. Drift Valley at Shanendoah Speedway, VA.
The car absolutly ripped! The suspension/angle was horrid, I was a subpar at best driver, it wouldnt go more than 3 laps without overheating, but I didnt care. It turned tires into smoke and I was stoked.