Well, I'm throwing in the towel on my attempt. I spent all afternoon and evening tearing the M-90 off my ranger and mocking up with the kenne bell setup. The lightning lower manifold just isn't going to work for my intentions.
Issues:
On my 97 motor, the fuel regulator is actually in the way of the blower casing itself, not to mention the inlet. I believe I might be able to swap in a set of 5.0 F-150 rails to fix this. The schrader valve is touching the discharge as well, but thats minor.
There is no room to expand the inlet rearward as much as I'd like. Its pretty tight to the firewall.
There is effectively no room to build a bypass setup. The explorer fuel rails block a good portion of the discharge manifold, so I don't see a way to plum the bypass without some goofy fab work.
I just bought the lightning manifolds and a 270mm drive, so that was an expensive failure.
Now for the good news, for the OP: Blown.
Your 2000 explorer motor runs a returnless fuel system IIRC. That makes tuning harder, but should completely avoid the clearance issues I was running into.
The inlet will clear the firewall. Its tight, and the main harness to the transmission is gonna be really snug, but it will work.
Hood clearance is awesome. I was worried about the IAC motor, since it sticks way above the throttle body. Even with the TB level with the top of the compressor, theres at least an inch or more clearance above the IAC. The drive pulley had plenty of clearance as well.
If you don't want to swap to a F-150 lower, I'll sell you this lightning discharge for half of what I paid. (I'm keeping the inlet to cut up for my build, it actually will work perfectly.) The GT-40 flows better, plus saves you the work of swapping a lower.
It looks to me like shortening the drive will be the only significant work required for your build. The TB adapter should be easy.
I was going to knock apart the drive today to see what would be required for shortening, but I have now realized I'm not pursuing this route, so I'm hoping I can return it. You're on your own for that part of the mockup.
And the good news for me:
The 2.2L Kenne Bell IS getting installed on my ranger.
The explorer express discharge manifold setup can be modified relatively simply to work.
A 141mm termi cobra drive will put the discharge of the kenne bell roughly lined up with the M-90's discharge, and give me plenty of space at the rear of the compressor to open up the inlet and add a bypass valve.
The lightning inlet will be sectioned, and expanded 1" rearward to make it larger than the Flowzilla inlet on my car. The TB mount will be cut off, EGR provisions cut out and opening enlarged to 90mm, and reattached facing forward. Basically, I'm making an explorer Flowzilla manifold, even larger than the mustang version.
There's just enough space behind the expanded inlet for a bypass valve to fit perfectly, no goofy u-bends required. Straight shot from inlet to outlet, with a 90* fitting added to the back of the inlet. Again, basically mustang Flowzilla setup.
I took quite a few pics of the mockups and part comparisons, let me know what you want to see. I was really frustrated by the fuel rail clearance issues, so I actually didn't get any of the compressor on with the lightning lower. Let me know if it would help you and I can toss it back on tomorrow. For now the KB is sitting on the X-charger manifold.
Thanks,
Chris