HorsePower Builds
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Join the PowerNation Email NewsletterParts Used In This Episode
[none]
Max-Tuff assembly lube.
Accufab,Inc.
Clamshell clamp custom 90mm throttle body, clamshell clamp, 4" ferrule, IAC block off plate, throttle position sensor.
ARP
Harmonic balancer bolt, accessory kit stainless steel 12pt., head studs with 12 pt. nuts, flexplate bolts, oil pump driveshaft.
ATI Performance Products
OEM 4 bolt 6.37 diameter Super Damper harmonic balancer.
Calico Coatings
Main bearing sets, rod bearing sets, Durabond cam set.
CP Pistons
Custom pistons, rings, wrist pins, and locks.
Crower Cams & Equipment Co., Inc.
4340 Forged steel crankshaft custom stroke, Maxi-Light #5 connecting rods, severe duty roller lifters,8620 billet roller camshaft.
Crower Cams & Equipment Co., Inc.
One-piece pushrod 5/16" 8.350 length.
Crower Cams & Equipment Co., Inc.
Shaft mounted rocker arms 1.6 ratio.
Federal-Mogul Corporation
Performance head gaskets, rear main bearing seal, Permadry Plus oil pan gasket, performance valve covers,performance R.A.C.E. set, Performance intake manifold set, Performance exhaust set.
Hellion Power Systems
Turbonetics Turbocharger (88mm), 16 gauge Stainless Steel hot and cold parts (Mild Steel Headers), Spearco high flow air to air intercooler, High flow Turbonetics wastegate, Silicone hose kit,
Stainless T-bolt clamp kit, 45 mm Blow-off valve, Oil feed and drain lines.
All other necessary hardware to install kit.
Loctite
Threadlocking compound.
Meziere Enterprises,Inc.
Electric water pump, high flow style, fits small block Ford Windsor/5.0, 55GPM, standard motor, blue.
Water neck, fits small block Ford windsor and 5.0, 1 1/2" hose exit, blue.
Coolant Recovery Tank, 28 ounce capacity, 2"x3"x10", blue.
Milodon
351W Oil pan, pickup assembly, filter block adapter, single filter kit.
O'Reilly Auto Parts
Melling high volume oil pump.
Robert Bosch LLC
High performance "blue top" fuel injectors. 1680cc (160lb/hr).
Summit Racing
Ford Motorsports thrust plate, Summit oil dipstick, Summit timing chain cover, Cloyes timing chain set.
Trick Flow Specialties
Trick Flow CNC ported 225cc cylinder heads with 70cc combustion chambers, Performance head gaskets for use with o-rings, upper plenum kit.
Tube Shark
Shark Pool, bending notching station. Air over Hydraulic bender with ability to perfrom 180 degree bends on all types of tubing square and round.
World Products
Man O' War SBF engine block with 4.030 bore and 9.5" deck, Man O' War polished valve covers.
Episode Transcript
Well, the motor's gone along with a lot of other things, man. This thing's been sitting here so long. I forgot what year it is. It's a 92 model and we used the motor for a dyno segment a while back. But before that, do you remember what this car was used for? Absolutely. It was a pony. We used for a mule, right? So your minds still all there?
Oh, yeah, I remember using the 92 LX to demonstrate an in car cam swap and later we treated it to upgrades like high performance heads and a new trick flow intake. Oh, we even put it on the bottle
with a fairly
basic fogger system
as best as I remember our top chassis dyno
run was about 380 horsepower.
Months later, Lou and I attacked it with a plasma cutter to back half the car and give it a four length suspension.
Now, Lou built a cage for it and we even took it to the track for some shakedown runs and I never forgot what I told Lou after the final pass. We've got one little problem. What's that? A little too much car not enough motor. Hey, that is not my problem. That's yours. That is. And I've got a small block turbo on my mind.
It's gonna be a lot of work. But, you know, I'm glad we're following up on your idea. Turbo Mustang. That's a first for us. Yeah, it's gonna be worth it because it's gonna be a lot of fun to drive too. You know what, Ian owes us a little favor. Remember that big block Chevy we built for his mud truck.
Well, he's got all the steel in the tube shark, so we'll have him finish off the cage. All right, let's
check
of them, buddy now.
01 more thing there, man. This block looks killer. I'm really glad World helped us out with it. Yeah, me too. It's got some really nice features. It's a high cast iron block has a deck height of 9.500
has been clearance to accept four and a quarter inch Stroker cranks.
It has expanded water jackets to help for cooling. Now, we won't use them, but it has two extra bolt holes per cylinder. And ours came with four bolt billets, blade caps.
Now, you might want to ask is this uh Turbo Stain motor destined for the street or the strip? Well, the answer is yes, a little both
but to handle the horsepower we're gonna throw at it 900 plus has to have a stout bottom in
the crank shaft comes from Crow.
It's a 4340 chrome moley forging that's been vacuumed,
degassed
and it has straight shot oil.
Oh, and check out how they've knife edged the counterweights. These maxi light rods also came from Crow
and they utilize a radio beam technology design. Now, this allows them to remove excess weight from low stress areas, making them a light rod while also keeping the rigidity. Now, these things are also made from 4340 Cromley steel and they utilize a 716 rod bowl.
Now, the CP pistons, well, they only weigh 512 g and they're almost too pretty to put into an engine. So maybe we should hang these on the wall, but people from CP wouldn't like that. Now, the diameter is 4.025. The dish is 100 77,000, and they use a ring pack that's really cool. But we'll show you that later when we install them,
we're using coated calico bearings in the whole bottom end. By the way, the cam bearings and cam go in the same location as the factory Ford Motor.
Now, here's how I get caught up in my work looping up the main bearings using royal purple max stuff, a semi
loop.
Now we can drop in the crank and be careful not to hit the studs with the crank journals. Install the main caps with more bearing loop.
I usually
put a little bit of silicone underneath the caps to eliminate most of your oil leaks.
Now tor
down the main studs.
Now, what I talked about earlier about displayed bolts. What that means is the outer bolts are angled to go into the block where most of the meat is
now lube up the piston pin bosses and the rod
then insert the pin,
then the spiral locks to hold the pin in place. The CP rings look like other sets we've used. But the top and second rings are thinner
and that means less drag inside the cylinders. Plus the top ring comes file pit to your specs.
Now it's time to drop the pistons in
and be careful not to hit the journal with the edge of the rug.
The C
we're using also comes from crow
with a lift of 158 on the intake, 133 on the exhaust
and the advertised duration is 283 intake 276 exhaust.
We're using lock tight to keep the boat snug on this camp late. We can't use any washers because of clearance issues.
This timing chain is the hex
aist double roller from CLO
with the hex Aju set up. It allows us to rotate the fuel pump eccentric two degree increments to advance it to a total of six or retard it two degree increments for a total of six
with us. We're gonna set it up straight up.
Any stock style timing cover will fit
like this one we got from Summit. Here's a heads up though. Be careful knocking in the front seal. If you knock out this spring, you're asking for a leak,
put some silicone on the cover to hold the gaskets in place and to help seal it,
then install it.
Well, we got our World block just about filled up, but there's a lot more in store for this project, like cylinder heads that'll handle a horse fow or of a turbo stain coming right up.
Hey, we're back and we're ready to install these high port race heads that have been CNC machine. Now, they're made by trick flow specialties and we actually got them from summit racing. Now, the intake runners measure up at 225 CCS, the exhaust runner at 95. Now the combustion chamber, well, they come in at 70 check this out. We even had them oing to handle all that extra boost. We're gonna be thrown in this motor
and to keep them in place, we're gonna be using fell pro gaskets
and of course, a RP head studs.
Now, our whole valve train combination came from rower,
including the solid roller lifters. Now, unlike hydraulic roller lifters, solid rollers will make more power because they stay more consistent in tolerances and they'll last a lot longer too.
Next, we can install the bars for our rocker arms.
The push rods are a one piece design
made from Chrome Molly heat treated steel.
The rocker arms are stainless steel with a 1.6 ratio.
We got ours with needle bearing roller tips,
stud mounted rockers are fine for most applications, but a shaft mounted set up like this can handle the higher spring rate you experience in competition.
Now, we want to check our valve train geometry and you want your roller tip to be just off center of the valve stem.
If it's too far in board, you want to use these shims supplied in the kit to raise up the rocker arm stand to get you in the right geometry.
Right. Now, we're dropping on the gasket so we can install our lower trick flow intake manifold. Now, this is the box R series and it's been computer engineered to deliver a balance of airflow distribution and velocity. Now, it has runners that measure two by 1.2 inches and they're actually 11 inches long with the upper portion installed. Now, that'll give us great low end torque and a lot of high RPM horsepower. Now, it also has an RPM range from 25 to 7500 RPM.
After we install the A RP bolts, we'll torque them down using a three step pattern.
Next thing we do is bolt this one inch spacer to the bottom half of the upper intake manifold.
Then we can drop the assembly onto the lower manifold studs
and don't forget to install the O ring or else you'll have big time leaks. Finally, the top half bolts up,
by the way, this trick flow setup is designed for use with factory or aftermarket fuel rails and it comes with a 90 millimeter throttle body opening
and the throttle body that makes up to it is this f 90 from ACU
fab. This machine out of one solid piece of billet aluminum
that's got a location for an I AC or idle air control that will block off of this plate since we're not using it.
It also accepts a Ford throttle position sensor that bolts up here and check this out. The lip has been machined to accept a four inch clamshell clamp. So we won't be blowing off any hoses when that turbo starts making boost.
Now, since our intake manifold setup is so tall,
we're installing this throttle body with the actuator on bottom with 100 and 60 pound blue top injectors from Bosch installed in the U Pr billet fuel rail. It's ready to go in place on the intake.
Well, let's go ahead and button up the bottom end with our oiling system.
We got this high volume oil pump from an o'reilly parts store
and we're using it with
a
Midon
pickup
and one of their street strip oil pans with a deep sump, low profile design.
It's also got internal
bling which should be good for freeing up some horse power
because of the increased capacity and ease of change we're gonna use a remote oil filter. So we have to use this adapter kit for mile a ton and the oil filter itself will mount up here,
bulked up inside the car
to prevent torsional vibration. We're using an A T I super damper made exclusively for high performance engines.
After knocking the hub onto the crank shaft,
we can install the balancer which has laser engrave timing marks
while we're up here, the water pump can go on too. It's a Mazure 300 series that blows up to 55 gallons per hour.
That's enough for a 2000 horse pro mod motor.
What do you think, buddy? That would be interesting to see what numbers we pull on the
dyno. Oh, yeah. Well, with this, we got what we need for phase two of our turbo.
Same project. Feat eye on this.
The guys at hell and power systems hooked us up with a system that includes a turbines,
88 millimeter turbo charger
comes with an F 189 3.5
inch wheel and it's in a mid size frame for lightning fast spool up and can produce up to 50 P SI. It's the same set up you see in a lot of pro outlaw race cars. Now, next week here in the shop with any luck we'll put it all together, take it to the
dyno
and hopefully make 1000 horsepower or more ought to be good.
Have you ever had one of those annoying vibrations that seem to appear at different speeds but disappear while you slow down. Well, if you know your wheels are balanced and all your drive train mounts are satisfactory, there's a good chance it's your U joints
for this tech tip. We're going to show you how to replace one universal joints in a drive shaft. So they last a lot longer and rotate a lot smoother. Now, there are a couple of ways that the joints are secured in a drive shaft and we're going to cover some of those today.
First mark the yoke and the chef for orientation
GM uses a urethane, they inject into the groove to hold them in place to remove the urethane. You're going to need a pair of safety glasses and a torch
start by heating the area around the bearing cup.
Once it is hot enough, the heat will force the urethane out of the whole and empty from the group.
Now, if you don't have a set of big torches, like we used, a small handheld will work, it'll just take you a little bit longer to do it.
Now that the drive shafts cooled off, we can go ahead and remove our caps,
set the drive shaft up on the vice and now it's time to remove the joint.
Here's a group we're talking about where the urethane retains the universal joint into the drive shaft on the replacement one it uses a retaining clip and that's a lot nicer than using the hot urethane
to get started on the new U joint. Remove two caps, making sure the bearings stay put.
Now place the joint into the yolk
and slide the caps into the ears.
Now place it in a vice and slowly tighten, pressing in the caps,
then install the retaining clips
and do the same thing to connect the yolk to the shaft
and don't forget the reference marks
finally with the Zerk fitting in,
fill the U joint with grease
and check it for smooth operation.
After installing the U joint, you want to tape up the caps to keep them from falling off because if they do, you'll have needle bearings all over the floor. All right, one down one to go. Now, this style actually uses a clip on the outside of the cup. The only problem with these can actually happen during installation. If the cups are pressed on too tight, it can cause the inside the U joint to right against the inside of the cup. Now, this will cause a lot of heat and push all the grease out which will eventually result in premature bearing failure. Start by removing the retaining clips with pliers. Then using the socket and hammer tap the old caps out, being careful not to damage the shaft.
Now grease up the needle bearings
and tighten the caps with the vice.
Last is to reinstall the new clips
Have you ever noticed that a Ford shaft is usually a little bigger than a Chevrolet.
That's because they got to hold the junk in the trunk.
All right, replacing your U joint should take you about an hour and a half. The cost may vary a little, but on an average, it'll cost you about 45 bucks for parts. The benefit is a smoother ride without the vibration
and hopefully you get rid of that annoying clunk when you drop the vehicle into gear. Now, next on horsepower. You know how much we love grassroots racing. Well, this time it's not about reaction times or ETS. It's all about high speeds, fast moves and a lot of left hand turns,
feed me,
feed me money
and done. Hey, welcome back. Ever wonder what we like to do on our free time. Well, in addition to a lot of hunting and fishing, I like to help some friends out at our local circle track to race stock cars.
Now, Joe likes to hang out there quite a bit too and we thought it would be fun to follow a racer who's on the home stretch to a championship.
It's SA TJ
three days before the 50th anniversary race at this legendary 58 mile track.
Andy Johnson is on a win streak with big hopes for his first late model class championship.
But usually we run at night, 930 or 10 o'clock and this week it's a five o'clock race. So,
yeah, we're trying to get tuned in for the daylight hours
after a few test laps. Andy's longtime
Pie. Billy Cisco
wants to swap out the right rear sprint.
We're just trying to come down off the spring to give it enough, more grip off the for him. That's where we've been hurt.
If you're having an issue like that at night, it's gonna be worse in the day.
He, he's probably the reason this car is going so fast now, he's been in a whole lot longer than I have and
he's really smart
and he's got a ton of laps here. I mean, he's super experienced here and, uh, got
good race cars, you know, I mean, everybody's doing their job and
we got a pretty good motor there with Kevin Fisher and
it's a great engine, you know. And, uh,
that's kind of a, a topic of conversation here lately. You know, why is a $5000 crate motor out run a $20,000 built motor?
We don't know,
after a second test run and he's not too happy with the spring slot.
It hurt it.
Ok?
You wanna put that back in it and, um,
oh,
you just sn it up just a hair.
So the old tired and proven spring goes back in
there you go.
But with a little different adjustment this time
and after a few elapse and he's comfortable and confident about his setup for Saturday's race
Well, that's it for test and tune. No more runs till Saturday night. The big anniversary race here at this legendary American track
on race day with near record heat and humidity, the front air dam gets taped up for qualifying.
Then it's tech time where Andy's car is well, over the 2800 and 50 pound minimum
would be louder.
Oh, yeah, you can be louder.
Be quite a bit louder.
Now. He only qualifies six, but with a long race ahead of him, he'll have lots of time to move up.
I'm ready 100 and 25 laps. You know, Jack, we're ready to go. I think we can win it
for a dozen or so laps. Andy just patiently holds his own, getting a firm feel for the track soon. The number 20 car is consistently moving up
with the kind of performance only possible with a skilled driver in a properly set up race car
for some, the heat of the track creates havoc for Andy. It seems to create opportunities
by lap 50. He's already making a move for the league.
Meanwhile, the 19 car field is steadily shrinking.
A number of drivers themselves fall victim to the scorching heat
in the final laps. Andy and his Monte Carlo hang in with a runaway lead,
then suddenly there's a smash up right after turn three and a red caution halts the race.
But when the green flag flies and he goes back to work
securing his biggest late model win of the season.
Man. We gotta kill a race car, kill our crew. We work hard on, you know
why I say you went racing in the shop, man. That was awesome. You can pick them, dude. Well, man, working out here on a truck team every week and you get to see the racing as he has been running up front and he's been doing real good. That's six in a row.
And while the fame and fortune may not rival the ranks of NASCAR,
the taste of victory could be just as sweet.
We'll see you next time.
Show Full Transcript
Oh, yeah, I remember using the 92 LX to demonstrate an in car cam swap and later we treated it to upgrades like high performance heads and a new trick flow intake. Oh, we even put it on the bottle
with a fairly
basic fogger system
as best as I remember our top chassis dyno
run was about 380 horsepower.
Months later, Lou and I attacked it with a plasma cutter to back half the car and give it a four length suspension.
Now, Lou built a cage for it and we even took it to the track for some shakedown runs and I never forgot what I told Lou after the final pass. We've got one little problem. What's that? A little too much car not enough motor. Hey, that is not my problem. That's yours. That is. And I've got a small block turbo on my mind.
It's gonna be a lot of work. But, you know, I'm glad we're following up on your idea. Turbo Mustang. That's a first for us. Yeah, it's gonna be worth it because it's gonna be a lot of fun to drive too. You know what, Ian owes us a little favor. Remember that big block Chevy we built for his mud truck.
Well, he's got all the steel in the tube shark, so we'll have him finish off the cage. All right, let's
check
of them, buddy now.
01 more thing there, man. This block looks killer. I'm really glad World helped us out with it. Yeah, me too. It's got some really nice features. It's a high cast iron block has a deck height of 9.500
has been clearance to accept four and a quarter inch Stroker cranks.
It has expanded water jackets to help for cooling. Now, we won't use them, but it has two extra bolt holes per cylinder. And ours came with four bolt billets, blade caps.
Now, you might want to ask is this uh Turbo Stain motor destined for the street or the strip? Well, the answer is yes, a little both
but to handle the horsepower we're gonna throw at it 900 plus has to have a stout bottom in
the crank shaft comes from Crow.
It's a 4340 chrome moley forging that's been vacuumed,
degassed
and it has straight shot oil.
Oh, and check out how they've knife edged the counterweights. These maxi light rods also came from Crow
and they utilize a radio beam technology design. Now, this allows them to remove excess weight from low stress areas, making them a light rod while also keeping the rigidity. Now, these things are also made from 4340 Cromley steel and they utilize a 716 rod bowl.
Now, the CP pistons, well, they only weigh 512 g and they're almost too pretty to put into an engine. So maybe we should hang these on the wall, but people from CP wouldn't like that. Now, the diameter is 4.025. The dish is 100 77,000, and they use a ring pack that's really cool. But we'll show you that later when we install them,
we're using coated calico bearings in the whole bottom end. By the way, the cam bearings and cam go in the same location as the factory Ford Motor.
Now, here's how I get caught up in my work looping up the main bearings using royal purple max stuff, a semi
loop.
Now we can drop in the crank and be careful not to hit the studs with the crank journals. Install the main caps with more bearing loop.
I usually
put a little bit of silicone underneath the caps to eliminate most of your oil leaks.
Now tor
down the main studs.
Now, what I talked about earlier about displayed bolts. What that means is the outer bolts are angled to go into the block where most of the meat is
now lube up the piston pin bosses and the rod
then insert the pin,
then the spiral locks to hold the pin in place. The CP rings look like other sets we've used. But the top and second rings are thinner
and that means less drag inside the cylinders. Plus the top ring comes file pit to your specs.
Now it's time to drop the pistons in
and be careful not to hit the journal with the edge of the rug.
The C
we're using also comes from crow
with a lift of 158 on the intake, 133 on the exhaust
and the advertised duration is 283 intake 276 exhaust.
We're using lock tight to keep the boat snug on this camp late. We can't use any washers because of clearance issues.
This timing chain is the hex
aist double roller from CLO
with the hex Aju set up. It allows us to rotate the fuel pump eccentric two degree increments to advance it to a total of six or retard it two degree increments for a total of six
with us. We're gonna set it up straight up.
Any stock style timing cover will fit
like this one we got from Summit. Here's a heads up though. Be careful knocking in the front seal. If you knock out this spring, you're asking for a leak,
put some silicone on the cover to hold the gaskets in place and to help seal it,
then install it.
Well, we got our World block just about filled up, but there's a lot more in store for this project, like cylinder heads that'll handle a horse fow or of a turbo stain coming right up.
Hey, we're back and we're ready to install these high port race heads that have been CNC machine. Now, they're made by trick flow specialties and we actually got them from summit racing. Now, the intake runners measure up at 225 CCS, the exhaust runner at 95. Now the combustion chamber, well, they come in at 70 check this out. We even had them oing to handle all that extra boost. We're gonna be thrown in this motor
and to keep them in place, we're gonna be using fell pro gaskets
and of course, a RP head studs.
Now, our whole valve train combination came from rower,
including the solid roller lifters. Now, unlike hydraulic roller lifters, solid rollers will make more power because they stay more consistent in tolerances and they'll last a lot longer too.
Next, we can install the bars for our rocker arms.
The push rods are a one piece design
made from Chrome Molly heat treated steel.
The rocker arms are stainless steel with a 1.6 ratio.
We got ours with needle bearing roller tips,
stud mounted rockers are fine for most applications, but a shaft mounted set up like this can handle the higher spring rate you experience in competition.
Now, we want to check our valve train geometry and you want your roller tip to be just off center of the valve stem.
If it's too far in board, you want to use these shims supplied in the kit to raise up the rocker arm stand to get you in the right geometry.
Right. Now, we're dropping on the gasket so we can install our lower trick flow intake manifold. Now, this is the box R series and it's been computer engineered to deliver a balance of airflow distribution and velocity. Now, it has runners that measure two by 1.2 inches and they're actually 11 inches long with the upper portion installed. Now, that'll give us great low end torque and a lot of high RPM horsepower. Now, it also has an RPM range from 25 to 7500 RPM.
After we install the A RP bolts, we'll torque them down using a three step pattern.
Next thing we do is bolt this one inch spacer to the bottom half of the upper intake manifold.
Then we can drop the assembly onto the lower manifold studs
and don't forget to install the O ring or else you'll have big time leaks. Finally, the top half bolts up,
by the way, this trick flow setup is designed for use with factory or aftermarket fuel rails and it comes with a 90 millimeter throttle body opening
and the throttle body that makes up to it is this f 90 from ACU
fab. This machine out of one solid piece of billet aluminum
that's got a location for an I AC or idle air control that will block off of this plate since we're not using it.
It also accepts a Ford throttle position sensor that bolts up here and check this out. The lip has been machined to accept a four inch clamshell clamp. So we won't be blowing off any hoses when that turbo starts making boost.
Now, since our intake manifold setup is so tall,
we're installing this throttle body with the actuator on bottom with 100 and 60 pound blue top injectors from Bosch installed in the U Pr billet fuel rail. It's ready to go in place on the intake.
Well, let's go ahead and button up the bottom end with our oiling system.
We got this high volume oil pump from an o'reilly parts store
and we're using it with
a
Midon
pickup
and one of their street strip oil pans with a deep sump, low profile design.
It's also got internal
bling which should be good for freeing up some horse power
because of the increased capacity and ease of change we're gonna use a remote oil filter. So we have to use this adapter kit for mile a ton and the oil filter itself will mount up here,
bulked up inside the car
to prevent torsional vibration. We're using an A T I super damper made exclusively for high performance engines.
After knocking the hub onto the crank shaft,
we can install the balancer which has laser engrave timing marks
while we're up here, the water pump can go on too. It's a Mazure 300 series that blows up to 55 gallons per hour.
That's enough for a 2000 horse pro mod motor.
What do you think, buddy? That would be interesting to see what numbers we pull on the
dyno. Oh, yeah. Well, with this, we got what we need for phase two of our turbo.
Same project. Feat eye on this.
The guys at hell and power systems hooked us up with a system that includes a turbines,
88 millimeter turbo charger
comes with an F 189 3.5
inch wheel and it's in a mid size frame for lightning fast spool up and can produce up to 50 P SI. It's the same set up you see in a lot of pro outlaw race cars. Now, next week here in the shop with any luck we'll put it all together, take it to the
dyno
and hopefully make 1000 horsepower or more ought to be good.
Have you ever had one of those annoying vibrations that seem to appear at different speeds but disappear while you slow down. Well, if you know your wheels are balanced and all your drive train mounts are satisfactory, there's a good chance it's your U joints
for this tech tip. We're going to show you how to replace one universal joints in a drive shaft. So they last a lot longer and rotate a lot smoother. Now, there are a couple of ways that the joints are secured in a drive shaft and we're going to cover some of those today.
First mark the yoke and the chef for orientation
GM uses a urethane, they inject into the groove to hold them in place to remove the urethane. You're going to need a pair of safety glasses and a torch
start by heating the area around the bearing cup.
Once it is hot enough, the heat will force the urethane out of the whole and empty from the group.
Now, if you don't have a set of big torches, like we used, a small handheld will work, it'll just take you a little bit longer to do it.
Now that the drive shafts cooled off, we can go ahead and remove our caps,
set the drive shaft up on the vice and now it's time to remove the joint.
Here's a group we're talking about where the urethane retains the universal joint into the drive shaft on the replacement one it uses a retaining clip and that's a lot nicer than using the hot urethane
to get started on the new U joint. Remove two caps, making sure the bearings stay put.
Now place the joint into the yolk
and slide the caps into the ears.
Now place it in a vice and slowly tighten, pressing in the caps,
then install the retaining clips
and do the same thing to connect the yolk to the shaft
and don't forget the reference marks
finally with the Zerk fitting in,
fill the U joint with grease
and check it for smooth operation.
After installing the U joint, you want to tape up the caps to keep them from falling off because if they do, you'll have needle bearings all over the floor. All right, one down one to go. Now, this style actually uses a clip on the outside of the cup. The only problem with these can actually happen during installation. If the cups are pressed on too tight, it can cause the inside the U joint to right against the inside of the cup. Now, this will cause a lot of heat and push all the grease out which will eventually result in premature bearing failure. Start by removing the retaining clips with pliers. Then using the socket and hammer tap the old caps out, being careful not to damage the shaft.
Now grease up the needle bearings
and tighten the caps with the vice.
Last is to reinstall the new clips
Have you ever noticed that a Ford shaft is usually a little bigger than a Chevrolet.
That's because they got to hold the junk in the trunk.
All right, replacing your U joint should take you about an hour and a half. The cost may vary a little, but on an average, it'll cost you about 45 bucks for parts. The benefit is a smoother ride without the vibration
and hopefully you get rid of that annoying clunk when you drop the vehicle into gear. Now, next on horsepower. You know how much we love grassroots racing. Well, this time it's not about reaction times or ETS. It's all about high speeds, fast moves and a lot of left hand turns,
feed me,
feed me money
and done. Hey, welcome back. Ever wonder what we like to do on our free time. Well, in addition to a lot of hunting and fishing, I like to help some friends out at our local circle track to race stock cars.
Now, Joe likes to hang out there quite a bit too and we thought it would be fun to follow a racer who's on the home stretch to a championship.
It's SA TJ
three days before the 50th anniversary race at this legendary 58 mile track.
Andy Johnson is on a win streak with big hopes for his first late model class championship.
But usually we run at night, 930 or 10 o'clock and this week it's a five o'clock race. So,
yeah, we're trying to get tuned in for the daylight hours
after a few test laps. Andy's longtime
Pie. Billy Cisco
wants to swap out the right rear sprint.
We're just trying to come down off the spring to give it enough, more grip off the for him. That's where we've been hurt.
If you're having an issue like that at night, it's gonna be worse in the day.
He, he's probably the reason this car is going so fast now, he's been in a whole lot longer than I have and
he's really smart
and he's got a ton of laps here. I mean, he's super experienced here and, uh, got
good race cars, you know, I mean, everybody's doing their job and
we got a pretty good motor there with Kevin Fisher and
it's a great engine, you know. And, uh,
that's kind of a, a topic of conversation here lately. You know, why is a $5000 crate motor out run a $20,000 built motor?
We don't know,
after a second test run and he's not too happy with the spring slot.
It hurt it.
Ok?
You wanna put that back in it and, um,
oh,
you just sn it up just a hair.
So the old tired and proven spring goes back in
there you go.
But with a little different adjustment this time
and after a few elapse and he's comfortable and confident about his setup for Saturday's race
Well, that's it for test and tune. No more runs till Saturday night. The big anniversary race here at this legendary American track
on race day with near record heat and humidity, the front air dam gets taped up for qualifying.
Then it's tech time where Andy's car is well, over the 2800 and 50 pound minimum
would be louder.
Oh, yeah, you can be louder.
Be quite a bit louder.
Now. He only qualifies six, but with a long race ahead of him, he'll have lots of time to move up.
I'm ready 100 and 25 laps. You know, Jack, we're ready to go. I think we can win it
for a dozen or so laps. Andy just patiently holds his own, getting a firm feel for the track soon. The number 20 car is consistently moving up
with the kind of performance only possible with a skilled driver in a properly set up race car
for some, the heat of the track creates havoc for Andy. It seems to create opportunities
by lap 50. He's already making a move for the league.
Meanwhile, the 19 car field is steadily shrinking.
A number of drivers themselves fall victim to the scorching heat
in the final laps. Andy and his Monte Carlo hang in with a runaway lead,
then suddenly there's a smash up right after turn three and a red caution halts the race.
But when the green flag flies and he goes back to work
securing his biggest late model win of the season.
Man. We gotta kill a race car, kill our crew. We work hard on, you know
why I say you went racing in the shop, man. That was awesome. You can pick them, dude. Well, man, working out here on a truck team every week and you get to see the racing as he has been running up front and he's been doing real good. That's six in a row.
And while the fame and fortune may not rival the ranks of NASCAR,
the taste of victory could be just as sweet.
We'll see you next time.