Rick's 5.0/C6 swap 1985 BII

[Mechrick]

Went to the J/Y and grabbed 1 driveshaft, a V8 Explorer fan, and a V8 Explorer water pump pulley. Lathe time to fabricate a W/P pulley was wasted. Yes, that is annoying.

The radiator I decided on is for a 1995+ Explorer. They are a bit bigger than the HD 4.0 1992-1994 Explorer, but not as wide as a V8 Explorer. It should have no problem with the 5.0L. I fabricated lower mounts from U channel, and utilized two square holes in the core support for upper mounting. The lower hose nipple is uncomfortably close to the steering box. I'm looking for a hose that drops down and then up to the W/P.

Clearance between fan and radiator is enough that fan can be removed without hitting the radiator.

Remote filter adapter is a Hayden 291. I'm going to double-clamp all the connections and carry spare hose.

 

[Mechrick]

Lower hose...application is '92 ish f150, with 8" removed from the center and spliced.

Transmission dipstick tube stock location comes up to the right of the passenger valve cover. Since the A/C plenum is in the way, I cut, rotated and welded it to anchor to the left of the passenger valve cover.

Transmission lines bent from 5/16" stock.

 

[Mechrick]

Aftermarket fuse box to clean up the linguini. I've been wanting to do this for a while. The relays and fuses I had added for lighting and accessories was out of hand.

Made in China starter had a bad solenoid. I swapped the used one from the Pick a Part special that was in the four-cylinder.

Out came the EFI pump, in goes a 35 gph dead-head carb pump on the frame rail. That needed the original carb sender installed. The stock sender was flakey, so I borrowed the sending unit from one of the cheap classic Ford fuel cell senders (early Ford senders used a reversed resistance scheme: 73 ohms empty, 10 ohms full).

Power steering lines:

I welded the 5/16" lower to the Explorer pump end. Bent up the return to clear the A/C compressor.

 

[Shran]

You guys and your Explorer FEAD setups... making me all jelly for the room you save. I may have to convert over someday, it sure would be nice to have room for a mechanical fan.

 

[ford4wd08]

@Mechrick

I followed you thread over on the inline Ford forum.

Awesome work, I have been a fan of all the things you have done to your BII.

 

[Mechrick]

You guys and your Explorer FEAD setups...

Mine's been sitting in the shed for about 10 years. Glad to finally use it. I don't like having to use an electric pump though. Must carry a spare...

Rear driveshaft: My angles were 3 degrees at the transfer case and 1 degree at the axle. That's about perfect for a CV double-cardan setup in the front. I needed one without the flange as used on NP208's.

Pickings were slim at the junk yards. I ordered a new one. When it came in, it didn't fit the transfer case yoke until I realized the front and rear yokes were swapped. The front uses a Ford big cap U joint and U bolts. I grabbed a F150 rear shaft for the tube, thinking it was 2 1/2". It was actually 2 3/4".

This was one of the worst factory tubes I've reworked. With the spline end clamped in the lathe, the tube wobbled more than .050". Since the tube was too big, I welded the inside of the tube, machined it to size sort of creating an offset bushing with weld wire. The tube will wobble, but the spline and CV are indexed correctly.

Phasing the yokes: Technically didn't need to be done since it's a CV, but OCD kicked in...

Truing before welding... total runout at the yoke seal surface ended up at .006".

 

[Mechrick]

Awesome work, I have been a fan of all the things you have done to your BII.

If you followed all of that, then you realize what a learning experience this has been. Thank you for the comments.

Shifters:

The transfer case is a reworked BII shifter. I removed the gate and tweeked it to fit.

For the trans I wanted something cheap, that did not have a reverse lockout. The Mr. Gasket shifter seemed to fit the bill.

I got lazy and tack-welded the shift arm to the C6.

I started it and backed it out of the garage under it's own power for the first time. As soon as I figure out a throttle cable and exhaust I can take it for a drive.

 

[Shran]

I am going to use one of those trans shifters for my Explorer/C5 project - for the same reason you did. The ratcheting ones are nice for a race car but not ideal for a driver. I think the one I got is a Hurst though (same thing) but I have all of the stuff to use a cable instead of a direct linkage. There was somebody else that built a really nice floor plate that positioned it in a good spot and kept it out of the dash. I thought I had it in my bookmarks but for the life of me cannot find it now.

 

[Mechrick]

I won't be able to open the ashtray in park, but I didn't have a choice. Placement was dictated by the transfer case shifter.

-Action with both shifters is smooth though. I had to play with the lengths to get the shifter travel correct. I may grind an extra notch in the plate of the trans shifter to create a drive notch to stop the shifter in drive when pulling it toward forward gears.

 

[Shran]

Found it - from this thread:

C5 swap- cable linkage problems

The original C5 shifter would work fine, it's just a problem of the floor cover plate from an old truck not fitting a new truck. The old ones (87? and older?) are smaller and although two of the holes line up on a newer cab, the plate won't fill the hole. The solution here is to find a blank...

www.therangerstation.com

Was actually a B&W Unimatic, that's what I have too.

 

[Mechrick]

That's nice. If I had it to do over, I would get a shifter with a cable. Interference with the ashtray is the only issue so far.

-I can pull the shifter back out, set it up in the press and give the arm a bit more bend to clear. Maybe later, after I get some miles on it.

Here is the NP208 with the yokes installed backward. The 208 uses 32 spline outputs front and rear, the same as NP205/203. The slinger goes on the front output.

-I may shift the rear mount to the right for frame clearance. With a CV I can do that with no penalty. The Explorer 8.8 has it's center section offset to the right as well, so everything lines up that way.

-That's a disadvantage if rock-crawling, as the rear axle shafts are different lengths (have to carry two).

 

[Mechrick]

Throttle linkage:

I originally thought of installing a shorter cable, but the 5.0L is only inches off the firewall. The cable would have to make a tight 'S' bend to hook to the carb linkage. The EFI cable was just long enough that I could make a 180 degree bend and pull the carb linkage from the bottom.

I made a carb change. The Holley 600 I ended up with in a horse trade would have worked, but with the carb setting on the core support and electric fuel pump on to set float levels, I was shocked how little angle was needed to allow fuel to dribble out of the boosters. I realize the angle problem is fixable with the right parts, but decided to experiment with a Summit 600 cfm carb. The Autolite 2bbls are great at angles, I hope this one shares the heritage.

 

[Mechrick]

The exhaust is going to be tricky. There is no room to go down the left side due to the transfer case. I'm going to cross the left pipe over to the right side under the oil pan, then go over the radius arm crossmember parallel with the pipe from the right manifold. Pipe size will be 2 1/8", enough to support more than 300 HP.

2 1/4" pipe is a nice slip fit over 2 1/8". I'll make a nice slip fit 2 1/4" merge that can be removed for future service. After the merge will be 3" pipe and muffler.

Stubs:

Left head pipe: All mandrel bends welded together.

 

[Mechrick]

Head pipes installed: At this point it looks like a Harley.

Building the 2-1 merge: I used scraps of 2 1/8" merging into a 3" pipe and muffler.

The merge couples to the head pipes with 2 1/4". 16 gauge is an interference fit over 2 1/8". I stole an O2 bung from another pipe for the wideband sensor. One of these days I need to order a bushel basket of bungs...

Muffler is one of the cheap made in China items supplied by a well-known performance parts supply company. It's a 3" straight-through perforated tube with packing. The tail pipe s 2 1/2". One of these days I'll weld together a 3" over the axle tail pipe. The 2 1/2" tail pipe will limit HP a bit until I do...

 

[Mechrick]

Frame modifications:

I had to trim the left frame rail for transfer case clearance. I braced it with heavy gauge angle iron.

Front driveshaft:

This is probably not a great idea, but I cut and welded two tubes together to get the length I needed. It will probably not hold, but if it breaks, because of lockouts and the part time transfer case, it will still be driveable.