Here it goes. I have built some lower performance engines before and wanted to get into something with a bit more power. I traded a 1986 Honda Rebel 250 straight up for the car in the pictures. It is rough, but I am okay with that since it will mainly be a track car that has occasional street use. It isn't a max effort, so some of the parts will be sub-par for a 351w (even with a completely stock bottom end). The car came from a guy in Melbourne, FL that built it many years ago in his yard and eventually kissed a tree with the driver's quarter after losing the rear end on slicks coming over a bridge in the rain. Before that he had welded in a decent cage, torque boxes, relocated/adjustable upper control arm mounts, sub-frames, and a few other things that are slipping my mind. It is just a shell right now, but I have most of the parts to begin putting it together. For some reason some dipshit in-between the guy from Melbourne and me cut out the front hoop of the cage along with the door bars but they gave me the front hoop with the car, so it will be going back in. I will probably post pictures of it on instagram as I go too (@I_Drive_For_Fun) so feel free to check it out on there. That is also my personal page though, so it will be more than just car stuff.

Currently the build is as follows (subject to change):
-sbe 351w
-GT40x 64cc heads that have had valves redone, new seals, and been decked
-Crane Cams 1.7rr (same as the ones from the 302 cobra motors in the 90s)
-Victor JR intake
-FiTech 1200PA or GoEFI8...whatever you want to call it
-Old Gen On3 70mm turbo with .96AR. I am looking at picking up an s475 soon and will probably build the turbo kit off of that as I am not sure I want to deal with the On3 or have to rebuild my hotside
-Looking at probably going with an F303 cam because the bottom end will explode well before I ever need a custom grind
-BBK shorties from a 302 that will be flipped forward for the hotside
-Built AOD that was behind a 600hp 302...not much more info than that. Pro-brake, lockup, manual valve body
-whatever other miscellaneous gaskets, pumps, and so on that you need to make the engine run

Hopefully I can get some things rolling on putting it together and posting up pics and updates relatively often. My new welder should be here today. I have zero experience welding anything and don't have anybody around that can really teach me...so I will be watching lots of YouTube and reading forums to figure that one out. Let me know what you think! Irrelevant comments will be ignored, negative comments will probably get a snarky response, and constructive comments will be responded to.

Danny
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Looks like a damn good trade to me! Good job.

 

Great start! Make lemonade when you reinstall the front hoop and install swing out bars (good to 8.5). Your back, head, neck, and entire body will thank you! No matter what, you will have to contort yourself at some point to access the under dash area and swing outs will help greatly. Regardless of your age, solid bars gets old, especially on a street driven car. Not to mention your passengers will thank you as well.

I too am self taught in welding. Your best bet is to watch every damn video from Weldingtipsandtricks on YouTube. Jody Collier is the fucking man. Watch a handful of videos, lay down some boogers, watch more videos, repeat. Hood time is your best friend. And since you have IG, there is a very large community of legitimate welders that post daily, most of which will post short clips of technique, advice, and settings.

 

Agreed. Jody is VERY good with his videos. I too taught myself to tig strictly from youtube. If I can do it, I know you can!

 

I have seen a few of his videos. I really liked the "walking the cup" one. It looked pretty easy and he explained it pretty well (plus the welds look nice). I will probably try and do the freehand variation of that on most of my pipes and tubes. I was so close to buying a cheap flux core for the turbo stuff and am glad I talked myself out of it. Just looks like a huge PITA.

Thanks for the replies. I'll try and post up some more picture of parts and such this weekend or maybe next since I have 4 exams in the next week

 

Good call on the flux. When I moved and got my own shop/garage, I picked up a HF 90 amp machine, laid a few welds down and hated every minute of it. There are some pretty solid Chinese units these days with matching customer support. I have an Everlast 140 MIG and Alpha TIG 200 and I love them both. HF also came out with a new line of welders (Vulcan) and I hear good things.

 

I ended up with the Eastwood TIG200 AC/DC digital (it had pretty good discounts on it, has a lot of helpful functions like the finger trigger, pulse, ramping, pre/post flow...etc). It is only like 25% at 200amps...but I didn't see myself running it at 200amps so the 25% didn't scare me. I think it will be just fine for a garage hobbyist.
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Nice machine. I almost bought one of those before settling on an Alpha Tig.

 

Ok, first change in build parts. Just bought an s475 (75/96 w/ 1.32AR). Should be shipping out tomorrow. Anybody want to buy an on3 70mm (.96AR)? Or maybe I'll squeeze it onto something else that it doesn't belong on in the future? Whatever. Excited for the Borg though

 

What size tubing is the main hoop & rear bars, ect. made of? Lorne

 

I'm not sure. I probably should measure it to be sure it is an eligible size though. I will grab a caliper tomorrow (if I can find it) and measure them all. I know that the harness bar looks to have a smaller OD than the rest of the cage does. I just messaged the guy that built it to see if he remembers.

UPDATE: Previous owner says it was this kit (the JEGS brand 10pt)
http://www.jegs.com/i/Jegster/550/940904K/10002/-1?ymm=4294829838 4294829830 4294829436

 

Side note, would it be better for me to post the pictures as thumbnails and make you guys open them to view? Or just keep posting as is so they are easier to see?

 

I prefer large format, but that is my opinion.

 

Got myself an 80cf argon tank today. Waiting on my intake to get back from the machine shop. I bought it used and it was full of buildup in the water passages so I need it cleaned up. Plus I figured it would be easier to get them to remover the old gasket material so I didn't have to. Haha. I guess I will go pick up some motor mounts soon so I can set it in place and start mocking everything up before I put the new heads and everything on it.

 

Have been putting off setting the motor in the car to see how it fits because I haven't had any motor mounts. Was waiting for a set to come up on craigslist or something like that that I could snatch up to use. I finally just bought a set of 3/4" drops to use since that is probably what I will end up with anyway. Only worry is that I hear they sometimes cause issues with the QA1 k-member because the back of the front sump on the oil pan hits the steering rack. But it seems to be hit or miss with this issue. I will let y'all know how it goes in a few weeks.

Cheers!

 

I have a set of Moroso SBF Fox Body solid mounts if interested.

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Got the intake back from the machine shop yesterday, the motor mounts should be here Thursday, turbo on Friday, and picking up the shifter for my trans in the next few days from across town. I still need a cam, then measure and buy pushrods, and find a driveshaft. It is probably going to drop in the car with the stock heads for a while though so I can mock up the turbo piping. Family and friends are trying to convince me to drive it around NA for a while before I do the turbo so that I can get used to driving it again...but that requires separate headers and midpipe setup and I REALLY don't want to be spending money twice if I don't have to.

For now, enjoy looking over this diagram of how cams are measured
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Excellent trade!

 

So I finally got around to cleaning up the motor. The first picture is to show what it looked like before (I didn't actually get any before pictures...but since I didn't touch the valve covers, I figured this was the best I could do to show was it looked like). I could literally wipe chunks of oil off with my finger. It's was disgusting. Fortunately I think I was able to get it looking much nicer now.

I also attached the motor mounts. Need some coil overs to be able to bolt up the k-member and drop the motor in to begin mockup.
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In for updates!