My Foxbody Adventure

Nope, those are Koni SA's. 

I'm not actively "campaigning" the car right now as I got an Fmod in 2018 to take over primary racer duties.

In reply to anger_enginering :

You see I sold the torque are with my car, it had a panhard, with the torque are going in next.  Yes other electric fans will work and I agree about using a factory option, IF one wants to add the wiring.  A quality radiator and engine driven fan is the EASY button and will work also, mine worked on 90+ degree days even when I forgot to turn off the AC. 

As for the springs, my S197 came with simmilar springs not closed but almost touching coils, called sport springs.  They were just very low and worthless.

My stock 92 had the same A-arm stiffeners, my 245's may have rubbed a bit.  So many options, don't get lost.  It all depends on how well you want it to handle, more mods with make it faster and better but only marginally more fun.  

I focused on steering geometry, front and rear roll centers, chassis stiffening, and brakes.  It worked lovely for what I wanted and sounds like what Tom1200 is looking for.  The other option is to just throw the MM catalog at it and it will work but cost as much as you have into the car.

A quality aluminum head with stock cam will get you a 75hp bump and take 50 lbs off the front of the car.  With so many coyote swaps happening old push rod parts are showing up used.  Pick up some AFR, Edelbrock or similar, have them freshened and let her eat.  I had a cam custom ground to match the flow characteristics of the heads for about $100 more than an off the shelf cam.  It matched the specs of the car, weight, gearing and my intended use.  I sold the whole top end kit to a fella, it make 350hp and pulled from idle on up.  Better heads on a stock cam is totally not a bad idea either, it will run like stock, just more.

Carry on

Wasnt it the Lincoln MKVIII that had an electric fan that had enough CFM to put most aftermarket ones to shame?  I seem to remember those being the hot item. Something like 3500-4000CFM factory from a single fan?

In reply to Apexcarver :

That is the best, but alot harder to find. 

In reply to akylekoz :

I was just mentioning not doing the PM3L because on alot of forums it seems that alot of people "push" that as the solution, and without the proper bracing that will tear up a foxbody.

Trust me, I understand dollars to cost. I only paid 2000 for my current SN, and the only new suspension items I have purchased were replacement Isolators (previous owner wasnt running them at all), the MM rack bushings and the BMR control arms. And those were a splurge. My MM C/C plates I picked up on FB marketplace for 75. My Bilsteins I bought from MPS.. Shoot, most of my car has been rebuilt from second hand or jy parts. I was trying to go for an early 2000's look and feel because my (now late) wife called it our Date car and said she felt like she had just graduated HS. She was even making 90's mixes to play exclusively while in the car.  

Those are New Edge wheels which are made for the single front wheel bearings. Wouldn't that be the source of the clearance issue as opposed to '94-'98 double bearing wheels? And of course '79-'93 wheels but there's no going back now!

Apexcarver said:

Nope, those are Koni SA's. 

I'm not actively "campaigning" the car right now as I got an Fmod in 2018 to take over primary racer duties.

It's rather ironic; I sold my F500/Fmod and am now playing with a Mustang.

In reply to akylekoz :

You are correct in your assesment; I am simply trying tomake it fun. It just needs to be competent rather than fast.

I am not looking to dominate Cam-C or win time trials with it. I simply.wanted a classic Street car that I could go do some fun events with. I also wanted a car with great support.

I started by running my 92 with crappy all season tires, upgraded pads, shoes and fluid.  It was a lot of fun to make one or two small changes and hit the track again.   Like I said it was fun right out of the box, full of under-steer and one wheel peel with worn out clutches.  One corner required a left foot brake stab to get it to bite and rotate a bit.  

At Grattan one day a guy was walking around my car feeling under the fenders, he asks if it had stock paint and what I had done to the suspension, commented on how flat it cornered.  I told him about the small tweaks and that it was purchased for $1500 at 88k miles and the AC still worked.  Don't know if he was an appraiser or what but proceeded to tell me confidently that it was worth at least $7000, this was before the fox craze. 

In reply to akylekoz :

I feel lucky to get in at the dollar level I did.........I am sure I could get 10K for it tomorrow. 

Looking forward to following along. I miss my fox sometimes :)

anger_enginering said:

In reply to Apexcarver :

That is the best, but alot harder to find. 

Yes, and a huge percentage of the "Mark VIII" fans you'll see for sale are actually Thunderbird/Cougar fans. They're visually identical. The only way to tell is the part number.

The T-Bird fan is good (dual speed), but not nearly as good as the Mark VIII fan (continuously variable and more total CFM). So don't pay for the latter and get the former.

OK it's started; small parts are arriving and getting installed.

So today I went to install the steeering rack travel limiters. When I popped the boots off fluid poured allmover.the floor.

Clearly the rack needs seals or I need to get a new rack.

The joys of a 34 year old car.

If you pull it off to reseal it, machine .250" off of the back side of the mount area where it touches the k member.  Small steering geometry aid, also a good time to replace or upgrade the rack mounts.  The stock ones are probably worn or oil soaked and squishy.

Next issue: the car ran great at it's first autocross but the clutch started slipping on the way home.

Fortunately the car came equipped with a firewall cable adjuster. I backed off th adjust until I had a little bit of play in the cable.

After a test drive The clutch is still slipping but not nearly as bad. 

My next step will to inspect the clutch fork to make sure it's not binding..........if it isn't then the car will be getting a clutch.

I will decide if I want to do an upgrade of any sort as the motor will be in mild trim for quite some time.

You know to pull up on the clutch pedal to adjust it right?  There is a ratcheting semi-self adjuster built in.  This doesn't normally help with slip but it does help with shifting and full release.

In reply to akylekoz :

Yes, I read up on that.

This morning I pulled the clutch cable cover off and found the cable incorrectly installed. The nut on the clutch fork was on the backside of the fork and the lock nut was on the front side.

I rectified this but as expected the clutch is still slipping.......when I gas it the races rise 500rpm and the go back down again.  I've decided to take it to a shop I use and let them do it. I really don't want to do this without a lift.

On the plus side I've found an aluminum clutch quadrant has already been installed along with the firewall adjuster.

Tom1200 said:

This morning I pulled the clutch cable cover off and found the cable incorrectly installed. The nut on the clutch fork was on the backside of the fork and the lock nut was on the front side.

I rectified this but as expected the clutch is still slipping.......when I gas it the races rise 500rpm and the go back down again.  I've decided to take it to a shop I use and let them do it. I really don't want to do this without a lift.

On the plus side I've found an aluminum clutch quadrant has already been installed along with the firewall adjuster.

My best advice from experience would be to rip all of that stuff out and buy the MM adjustable kit.  It includes a quality Ford cable, and will return the clutch to the factory feel.  My '92 Notch 5.0/5speed came with an aftermarket cable, aftermarket firewall adjuster, and aftermarket clutch quadrant. The effort was brutal, it was poorly adjusted, and I believe the shift cable was binding.  I ripped all of that stuff out in favor of the MM kit, and it was like I had a stock pedal back.

It looks like the MM kit is not available currently, I'd pair their other kit with a Ford clutch cable.

In reply to dj06482 (Forum Supporter) :

The kit in my car is from Steeda.

There appears to be some type of heavy duty pressure plate; it's bright red.

Update:

Well I was lazy and took the car to a local shop.that does Datsun's and older cars. The bill for the clutch replacement and AC fix was $1400. They replaced the rear main seal as it was leaking. I also went with a new flyweheel; I went with a standard weight for now as I expect to build a separate motor so I will put the lighter flywheel on that motor.

All that for $1400? Fox is living up to its reputation for low buck for sure! A bill like that for for an F-Body would be at least $2K and people consider those cheap to fix.

Tom1200 said:

They replaced the rear main seal as it was leaking. 

Of course it was, it's a small block Ford. I give it a year before it starts to leak again.

In reply to Tom_Spangler (Forum Supporter) :

A year!!! That's awesome the ones in the Datsun start leaking after two race weekends.