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Engine swap 98 sohc

I'll second the above. As long as the TC is fully seated you have no wories. On the back of the TC casing are ridges and these rub on the bell housing when pushed fully back. Also as said above the weight of the TC hanging is all that is preventing it moving forward/back easily (weight maybe 15 KG), so once the snout is seated in the middle of the flexplate and the TC bolted up all will be good.
The Valve cover gaskets are pretty good and with a clean up can usually be reused.
Keep up the good work.
 



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Mustang Motor reassembly Phase 1

I'm feelin pretty good right about now. It was a good day.
The Mustang motor is stripped down to pretty much a long block and so is the Explorer motor. Now on to cleaning stuff up and reassembling the Mustang motor with the explorer parts and the new stuff I bought.

Here are four pics:
1. Mustang before dissassembly. You can see it looks very different than the ex at this stage.
2. Mustang motor stripped down to long block (Ex looks pretty much the same at this point now that it is stripped too)
3. All the stuff I will not re-use from the mustang
4. Mustang motor staged for phase 1 reassembly with parts up to the lower intake.

The Ex wire harness is way simpler than the mustang. I was suprised by this. I will also will do in this phase valve covers/fuel rail/injectors/exhaust manifold/egr tube/lower intake/thermostat housing/oil pressure sensor/ps/ac bracket/crankase oil breather box and front and back breather tubes all from the explorer.

New parts needed in this phase are belt tensioner, valve cover/exhaust/lower manifold gaskets, thermostat housing seal, thermostat, thermostat seal, fuel injector o-rings, pcv valve which all will be in tomorrow.

Some parts I will need to go to the dealer as they were not available at advance or napa. Therm housing to block seal, therm housing seal, egr o-ring.

I will leave the water pump in and also use the mustang coil pack.

Just found out need to do the brakes on my kid's cavalier so I'll probably slow down a bit. See you soon.

RYDREW55
 

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Now you are cooking...

Damn that looks like so much more fun than what I did today...Earlier in the day did sheetrock and tile in my house...Then got a call from Mom asking about the water shutoff...

I thought she had a leak or something...It was the or something.. One of her neighbors had a leak and she was tryingto turn the water off...Went over @ 2 pm and got talked into digging the pipe up and fixing it...Talk about digging a foot or so down and a trench of 3 ft or so in 104 F heat...Just to fix a pipe...Clean water is really overrated...

Man your engine is looking good...I wish I was doing what you are doing ...Like I did with my truck in April/May this year...Good luck and drop that beast in and fire it up!!!:burnout:
 












Go on, while it's out give way to the temptation to make it pretty

Finished%20%26%20ready.jpg
 












Yur real purdy

Hey baby...you come around here often?? ;)

You know what they say.....you can put lipstick on a pig and it's still a pig!!!

I'm just kidding janolsson. I must say, you did a real nice job on your motor. It looks fantastic. I just don't have the time or patience. Maybe if I was doing up a 66 Mustang, but I'll be happy with a smooth running 98 Explorer.
 






Oil Filters are way different

Wow, didn't see that one coming.
The Mustang filter is way different than the explorer.
So I can either use a Mustang filter, or change the filter mount and use an explorer type.

From the Fram website:

Explorer
PH8A (economy), TG8A (better) or XG8A (best)
5.14" high
3.8" wide
relief valve 12 psi
most important
ID is 3/4-16 thread


Mustang
PH2 (economy), TG2 (better) or XG2 (best)
3.98" high
3.66" wide
relief valve 12 psi
most important
ID is 22mm x 1.5 mm thread


Glad I didn't just spin that new explorer filter on.
 






Thermostat Housing Differences

I was hoping to use the newer thermostat housing from the Mustang and just swap the outlet tube which faces towards the passenger side on the ex vs the stang which comes towards the front. However, the stang has only one sensor, where the ex has two. The extra hole is just moled closed on the mustang.

I like the newer housing because the sensor uses a nice clip and seal instead of being threaded into the plastic.

Anyone know what the 2nd sensor is on the explorer?
Do I need it?

Probably easier to just use the older explorer housing.

picture below:
 

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thermostat housing sensors

One is the engine temperature sender for the instrument cluster gauge and the other is the engine coolant temperature sensor for the PCM. I believe the 3rd generation Explorers have both sensors and are the clip on type. The housing is also much less expensive. You need both sensors.
 






Oil filter mounts

There may be a clearance issue if you retain the Mustang oil filter mount adapter. I suggest you reuse the Explorer adapter or examine the orientation of the filter very closely if you keep the Mustang adapter. If you reuse the Explorer adapter, consider replacing the seal between the adapter and the block. Other members have had leaks there. I always fill the filter with oil before installing. It cuts down on the "dry start" time. One nice thing about the Explorer mounted filter since it is vertical.
 






Thermostat housing and oil filter

Thanks Dale,
I'll use the explorer thermostat housing.
I will check closely but I think the mustang filter set up will be ok. It is a shorter and narrower filter so that will not be a clearance issue. The mount looks like it sits exactly the same but I will measure it to be absolutely sure. The old one is pretty corroded so I prefer to leave the mustang filter intact. But I will follow your advice to measure twice and cut once.
Thanks again for the good input on both issues.
 






fuel injectors problem with swap

OK, First big (or maybe not so big) problem.

The injector hole in the heads are different.
I need to use the ex injectors as the connectors are different in the harness.
Problem is, the ex injector has a plastic spacer which fits in a single large OD hole in the heads.
The Mustang has a smaller two step hole and the injector goes in without a spacer.

The only thing I can think of is to use the ex injector without the spacer.

The orings are a little different (ex is thicker but seems to be same OD)

What do you think?

MR2FIX2IT and STANGSTEEDA - What did you do?
 

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Must use the ex oil filter adapter

Thanks Dale,
I'll use the explorer thermostat housing.
I will check closely but I think the mustang filter set up will be ok. It is a shorter and narrower filter so that will not be a clearance issue. The mount looks like it sits exactly the same but I will measure it to be absolutely sure. The old one is pretty corroded so I prefer to leave the mustang filter intact. But I will follow your advice to measure twice and cut once.
Thanks again for the good input on both issues.

I was wrong. The very slight difference in how it angles, causes the filter to hit the exhaust headers. NAPA had the o-ring, but not advance auto or autozone.
 






fuel injectors problem with swap

OK, First big (or maybe not so big) problem.

The injector hole in the heads are different.
I need to use the ex injectors as the connectors are different in the harness.
Problem is, the ex injector has a plastic spacer which fits in a single large OD hole in the heads.
The Mustang has a smaller two step hole and the injector goes in without a spacer.

The only thing I can think of is to use the ex injector without the spacer.

The orings are a little different (ex is thicker but seems to be same OD)

What do you think?

MR2FIX2IT and STANGSTEEDA - What did you do?

I could think of no other solution. So I assembled it with the ex fuel injectors minus the fat black spacers. Seems to fit OK. I guess I'll know when I turn on the key and gas pours out. No, I think they sit in there OK.
 






Good progress today but new issue - tensioner

I am almost done building up the mustang motor but hit another roadblock.

Bought a new tensioner at Autozone. They had the same listing for the explorer and the Mustang.

THIS IS NOT CORRECT. THEY LIST THE WRONG TENSIONER FOR THE EXPLORER. I CAN'T BELEIVE THEY LIST THE WRONG PART. You could really mess up things with the wrong tension and belt location.

NAPA correcly lists two different tensioners. The explorer has different locating tabs and angles differently than the mustang.

That also means I need to swap the alternator bracket as this is where the location points are. Also I found out that the mustang alternator is wider and the mounting holes are further apart too so you need the explorer bracket anyway.

You can see in the pictures below how the Mustang locates with a post into a hole and angles down. The explorer locates with two tabs and angles up.

UPDATE-The explorer actually does angle down after applying tension. I think mine was actually broken which is why it rotated up a little. Still leaves the problem though. The Autozone listing is wrong and the locating tabs are in fact are not the same.

No issue with the idler pulley as they are in fact identical.

I'll need to return the wrong one to Autozone and go to NAPA sinse AZ does not even list the correct one.

Hopefully I will finish up tomorrow and try to put it back in next weekend.
 

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You know what they say.....you can put lipstick on a pig and it's still a pig!!!

I'm just kidding janolsson. I must say, you did a real nice job on your motor. It looks fantastic. I just don't have the time or patience. Maybe if I was doing up a 66 Mustang, but I'll be happy with a smooth running 98 Explorer.

You know your actually right, every time i set to the block with a brass brush i thought to myself "why am i wasting my time makin it pretty when i don't even know it's gonna run" especially as i had to do some work replacing a valve and lifter as well as the front and rear guides and rebuild the oil pump and replace con rod shells AND make sure the upper sump gasket sealed properly etc .....
Up shot is i spent prob 6 hrs working on the engine and 20 hrs cleaning and spraying but fortunately it all worked.

As for you issues
the injectors should be good without the outer spacer, mine does not have them.
The tensioner should be around 7 o'clock IIRC
Just found this photo
Spare%20engine.jpg

Keep up the good work
 






The bracket must be changed the mustang one is different. As for the oil filter housing I used the one from Mustang with no problem and now use FL-820 filter instead of FL-1A. As for the injectors that plastic insert that is broken off the one injector that you have in picture is not part of the injector.You must use explorer injectors and those plastic sleeves are the same on both engines they come off injectors. A note use a little wheel Bering grease on o-rings to slide injectors into head and fuel rails so they dont bind and cut.
 






Havin just looked at your photos again i have a couple of opinions;
The tensioner for the stang engine appears to have a smaller pulley and the locating notch looks to be in a different position, so i would use the mounting bracket and the tensioner from the ex engine as this would be right for the stock belt now and for future service/owners.
The same applies for the oil filter mount. Then you know explorer has stock fittings when it comes to sevice items. Just my 2 cents
 



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The FL-1A and FL-820 are both common FORD filters and I don't Find it to be a big problem. As I said the belt configuration is not the same you must use the Explorer Bracket.
 






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