Mulligan

December 29, 2016


It's been a month of work and now a lot of do-overs. Let me get into it.

Over a month ago we felt pretty good since we got the engine running on the floor and we were getting ready to lower the engine onto the frame. Well, that all went pear shaped. For the past week and a half after getting all the wiring connected to the engine, we did get the engine to fire up, but only for 3 seconds at a time, unless we sprayed ether into the manifold in which it could run as long as we were spraying it - so it was getting spark. So debugging and wild diagnosis began. We thought it might be a fuel problem, so even though we could hear the fuel pump running in the fuel tank, we put a fuel pressure gauge on the fuel rails. With the key on we had  40lbs of pressure and over the 3 seconds it went down to 25-30lbs, enough to keep it running, but still not a positive sign, especially as we were gunning the throttle.

We then thought we might have a vacuum problem, so we went around hooking up all the vacuum lines - no change. 

All the time we were doing research on-line, was it the pats( passive anti-theft) system, the O2 sensors, were there any broken wires or bad connections, how long did the engine computer need to be disconnected so it could reset, was there a kink in the fuel lines, a rag left in the tank, the air intake MAF( mass air flow) sensor, or the IMRC ( intake manifold runner control).  

We hooked up the SCIL(steering column, ignition, and lighting computer) and donor car ignition key to see if it was pats, still no change, so we were confident that the anti-theft system was not causing the no-run condition. We also knew the hardest part of getting the engine working is getting it to run and we had it running for 3 secs every time. 

It was classic debug and diagnosis; wild theories were brought up, laughed about and then checked out as we were running out of ideas.

Since the signature of the problem had something killing the engine, we started to think back to it running on the floor and started to realize that maybe we have had this problem for a while. We would only let it run on the floor for a few seconds for a number of reasons including not wanting the engine to get damaged (rolling over, overheating); since it was running rich, we didn't want to poison ourselves. There was no reason to run it more - we figured if we got it to run 3 seconds why was 5 seconds better, until we now couldn't get it to run for more.

The signature of this problem had us go back to pats and look to see if we were missing something. We took apart the SCIL and our assumption that since there were four connectors on the SCIL box  - two for each circuit board. We figured that each circuit board had it's own power supply and since all the anti-theft signals were on the bottom circuit board, we thought that was the only circuit board needing to be powered - wrong. We took it apart, and there were a couple of ribbon cables connecting both boards, so we hooked up all the power to the SCIL box. We also noticed there is an anti-theft indicator light output and a hood and door alarm input. We hooked all these up  - still not working, but we connected a test light to the anti-theft indicator light wire and it flashed indicating the alarm was being set off. 

The SCIL box on the right, the PCM on the left
all the red power wires to the SCIL box
the test light in the middle 

We relooked at the service manual to figure out what does what to make the pats system work. It's a bit complicated as there are 5 different set ups depending on the make and model. The system we have was only produced for the 1997 and 1998 Lincoln MarkVIII - this limits the collective knowledge on the system and ways around it. For example this is the only system where you need two programmed keys to make another one, unfortunately for us, we only have 1 key limiting our options if the key is the issue. As an aside the reason for 2 keys is that the engineers were concerned that if you valet the car the attendant could go get a copy with just one, with this requirement the owner would be the only one with 2 keys to have a copy made.

Here is how the system works. The key has a chip and magnetic exciter embedded in the hard plastic of the key. The ignition switch has a round antenna ring that is wired in a loop to the SCIL computer. When the key is in start mode the SCIL sends a signal and within 800 milliseconds a J1850 PWM code is sent back from the key to the SCIL. The SCIL compares it to the programmed value of the key. If it's the same everything is cool, if not a kill the engine signal goes to PCM( powertrain computer module). With the anti-theft light acknowledging the event, we knew the SCIl was sending the kill signal, but why?

We then hooked up the OBD (on-board diagnostics) connector and then saw what repair codes the PCM was collecting. It triggered code P1260, which is Theft detected vehicle immobilized. We then tried to isolate it to the key, hood latch or door lock, problem was we needed to turn the key for it to trigger - no luck here. We went through the service manual diagnostic trees and most of them had you replacing the key  - something we couldn't do because we needed two keys to make a new one, or replacing the SCIL ( hard to find with a key). Since we were only using the donor car ignition switch to fool the system that the key was on, we started to take it apart. (BTW we use a simple ignition switch to start the car.We found that it did not need any power for the ring antenna to work with the key, so on a lark, we removed the ring antenna and placed the key right in it - see the picture below. 

The white part is the ring antenna, the black part has the embedded chip

At this point, it started and works consistently and reliably - hallelujah a holiday miracle. 

There are a few other mulligans (do-overs), but we will save that for the next blog post.

Punch List - Getting Ready For Wiring Installation

December 22, 2016

We are looking at using the days around Christmas to use for installing the wiring. Therefore the last week or so we have been cleaning up and completing tasks all around the car. David and my brother Larry have been helping out with most of it.

Here are some of the tasks we completed

- Installed horns
- Built trunk electrical panel  - This has the remote battery terminals ( for easy charging or jump starting - with the battery mounted below the fuel tank with little clearance this is a must), the fuel pump computer and a battery cutoff switch (this is used for disconnecting the battery when the car is in storage)

hard to get at red battery 

 

two remote battery posts, disconnect switch, and fuel pump driver computer

We added the plastic cover so that we could use the top shelf in the trunk without worrying about shorting anything out - it's just an inverted Tupperware storage container.

- Modified exhaust headers - Even though we went with the smaller aftermarket headers, they are still too big for the engine to seat correctly on the motor mount brackets. David was able to heat them up, bend them with a hammer so they cleared the mounts and now the engine is properly resting on the mounts and the headers are installed.

- Cleaned and installed the air conditioning compressor

- Installed rear brake lines

- Added engine ground strap

- Getting the wiring ready - Larry continues to remove unnecessary wires cleaning up the loom

- Installed a new transmission mount - Since we moved the engine forward 2.5 inches, the kit mount did not line up correctly, so we found a mustang one that worked

We are ready for the weekend to get the wiring squared away, our goal is getting the engine running. Of course, we will need to hook up the fuel lines and the radiator 

Lots of work on the Hot Rod, not so much on the blog

December 11, 2016

It's been a busy couple of weeks working on the hot rod and we have made some significant progress. The highlight is getting the engine in for the final time, which was quite an effort and made us change some of our strategy regarding the build. Let me explain how things went and how it affected the build.

We spent a number of hours going one last time through the wiring to eliminate as many unnecessary wires; getting down to just what runs the engine, fuel pump and the computer. After all the work we did here it might of made more sense to just start with no wires and use the wiring diagrams to wire everything up.  We still have work to do to make the wires now fit the frame we have, but the finish line is in sight.

The wiring is now on a table, the 2x4s are a layout of the dimensions and placement of key components like the fuel pump, starter and firewall. We will now spend time making the wires on the table fit to this 2x4 skeleton.

We were also not happy with the last placement of the engine as it was right up against the fire wall (we were worried about heat transfer into the cabin) and we didn't have room for the IRMC (Intake Manifold Runner Control) - this  operates a butterfly valve in the intake manifold. We also did not have room for the EGR(Exhaust Gas Recirculator) pipe return from the exhaust header to the intake manifold. The purpose of both of these is to optimize the air/fuel ratio for best fuel economy and drivability. These both play a part in passing emission testing and our plan was to keep all of the emissions controls in case the car would be sold in a state which would require it for daily driving. In Illinois, our hot rod falls under the classifications of street rod custom vehicle; and doesn't require passing emission testing, so although not required, it was on our nice to have list, and we were proceeding with this plan.

So we needed to make room and move the engine forward. This required us to modify the frame motor mount brackets. Jake did most of the work here using the torch to add an additional mounting hole two inches forward. This was about all we could bring it forward since the AC air compressor would then hit the frame in the front, and we only had so much play in the length of the drive shaft to accommodate a longer path between the engine/transmission and differential in the rear end.

Once we had the new position on the motor mount frame mounting brackets we added the IRMC, EGR exhaust tube and the exhaust headers to the engine before we lowered it in. After about an hour of lifting and lowering the engine, snaking it's way into position, we had it in and things were looking good. David started to begin the process of putting things back on the engine. We also spent some time cleaning and painting a few of the parts we were installing so the engine could look as best as possible. 

We then moved on to installing the fuel tank, the transmission mounts and the drive shaft. 

For the fuel tank we had to place an aluminum panel and we did this using an aircraft system tool called Clecos for rivet placement. Whenever you look at an airplane and see the precision mounting of panels using rivets, they use this system to hold down sections of panels so every hole they drill does not move the panel, once all the holes are drilled we could remove these Celcos (temp rivets) and then apply construction adhesive and rivets. We also added a rubber mat under the fuel tank to help dampen vibration.

We ran into some trouble with the transmission mounts and driveshaft. The transmission will need a spacer and the supplied kit spacers are just too flimsy in our opinion, so we will fabricate a spacer block, also since we moved the engine up 2 inches, we need to modify the mount as well.  As we tried to make the mount work we discovered that the motor mount alignment pins just missed the hole and the engine was not properly seated on the frame mounting brackets, even though we had the hold down bolt go through the adjacent hole. When looking at it further, the alignment pin fell right on the vertical support, so we had to remove the alignment pins requiring us to lift the engine up a half a foot while we did this. Of course this required us to take off the intake manifold once again  - a bit frustrating, but an hour later we had the engine seated properly and the intake manifold and injector wiring harness installed.  

Now that the engine was properly seated we discovered another issue. Although we had clearance for the IRMC and EGR pipe, the driver side exhaust header was binding on the steering shaft and frame. We removed a heat shield on the header, a small improvement, but it was still binding. After much heated discussion and the I told you we should have never worried about having the car pass emissions reminders, we decided to change out the headers to ones without the embedded catalytic converter. These headers have a reduced profile so the huge engine can fit into hot rod engine bays. Also most hot rodders get rid of emission so they can boost performance. Luckily we had bought some of these so we could swap out the original headers with these new chrome ones. We solved the problem, but we gave up on our 50 state sales strategy. 

Old Header

New Header

           

Make that Engine Roar

November 26, 2016

Now that we have the fuel tank modified, we can use the donor car ( 1997 Lincoln Mark VIII) fuel pump. Our strategy is to wire the engine back up again and get it to run. In the process of fitting the engine in the frame, we needed to take off the intake manifold, generator, aircon compressor, starter, and the fuel and electrical lines. Here are some photos of putting that all back together a job completed by David and Jacob.

While we had the engine out we did the best we could to clean up this 20-year-old engine. While it looks a lot better, once we have it in the car it will still be 20 years old and will look dingy. We continue to think about it, but since it's an all aluminum block we don't want to paint or powdercoat it. 

When we first turned the key we had no crank at all, over the last week we debugged the wiring and found a few broken wires and unconnected wires, some additional grounding points were needed and after a few days and 10's of hours we got the engine reliably starting. 

Although at times this was frustrating, it solidified our thinking that we need to eliminate the car systems (lights, heater air con, wipers, radio, gauges) from the engine system (ignition, starter, engine controls, transmission controls, fuel delivery system and PCM (powertrain computer). 

So we are now looking at every connector, and every wire to see if we need it. For example, there is an electronic control box called the SCIL (steering column, ignition, and lighting) it has four connectors with over 70 wires entering it. Upon examination only 3 wires are needed to run the engine system. We are looking if we can direct connect these three wire to the PCM and eliminate the SCIL box and over 60 wires, it may be needed for the PATS system (anti theft key). Our next job is to look at every connector, electronic control box, fuse and relay to see what else we can eliminate. The desire here is that it will make the final wire looms less complex, and we will know every wire which will make it easier to debug if we have a problem down the road. We think this is a must as we are putting 20-year-old technology in a newly built car. Most people who do this, put a brand new engine and custom wiring kit into an old body and frame. We are doing the opposite since this 20-year-old engine is one of the first 32V DOHC 300HP motors, and doing it is quite a challenge. We are also starting to think about how we get the wiring to fit the car. It's like tailoring a suit you got from your taller, heavier cousin. For example, on the donor car, the battery is in the front and in the new configuration it's in the back.  Just one more challenge to keep us on our toes.

Back at it

November 15, 2016

Just back from a trip to California for Rachel's (my brothers step daughter) wedding in Piedmont.  It was Larry and the boys first time to Northern California so we made a trip to Silicon Valley and toured the high-tech scene.

Larry, Jacob, David, and Isaac in front of Apple HQ

The fuel tank is back from being pressure tested so we are good to get the engine running on the ground again to make sure all the wiring we did is still functional.

For the fuel tank, we needed to modify it so it could accept the in-tank fuel pump from our donor car. The fuel system does a few things that make using the fuel pump a necessity if we want to use the vehicle computer as is. The anti-theft system shuts off the fuel pump through a fuel pump computer, and it also changes the pump pressure/fuel flow during various stages of fuel consumption like starting, idling, acceleration and coordinating with the EGR (exhaust gas recirculation) fuel to make sure the engine does not run too rich in fuel.

To mount the fuel pump we needed to enlarge the fuel pump hole to accept the donor car set up.

the new whole is much larger than the old one
what we cut out

Jake working on the tank

before the fuel pump installed

after pump installed

Tomorrow we are going to start on getting the engine running before we lower it back on the frame for hopefully the final time.

A Window of Work

September 9, 2016

We have been on hold waiting for parts and this week the rear brakes finally showed up. We ordered them back in June. After painting the raw metal brackets for the calipers, and trimming the backing plate since these brakes are mounted in a different position than the stock Ford Mustang brakes. The rear end/suspension is from a 2015 Ford Mustang.

David and I installed the new calipers this morning. 

Next up is finishing the rear brake lines  - we completed the fronts a few months ago, and I am glad we waited on the rears since the location of the caliper inlet for the brake line is in a different position than where we expected it to be based on the standard mustang caliper mounting. So no rework will be needed.

The rears are 13-inch rotors while the fronts are 11-inch, good news is we have two different size master cylinders to apply the correct amount of pressure to give correct braking power to the different size rotors/wheels.


We are headed to another long pause in our build due to traveling this fall will have us in Chicago for less than 2 weeks between now and mid-November.

The good news is the fuel tank should be back by then, and we will be able to get the engine and wiring sorted on the ground before we get it fitted to the frame for one last time.

Little by Little

July 25, 2016

We have gotten to a point where we still have a mountain of stuff to do but we are also stuck waiting for parts and re-thinking the build.

For example, we just completed the front brake lines but are on hold with the rears since we are waiting for the rear disc brake calipers. Issues with Ford supplies have us going back to Factory Five for a new designed caliper that current lead times are 8 weeks.

We procured the battery and installed it, but the rest of the electrical is waiting on getting the engine started outside the car. 

For that we are waiting on the fuel tank to be checked out - it's a favor so it on the back burner - our fault since we said we wouldn't need it for months. That was because we were going to do the wiring without checking it out on the ground, our change in strategy has us waiting now.

We also just discovered that the chrome exhaust header pipes we got on the cheap won't work with the EGR ( exhaust gas recirculation) pipe on the 1997 Lincoln 4.6L engine we are using. The parts store lead us to believe that these ones for the Mustang 4.6L would work, so we need to rethink the exhaust strategy. 

We could jump ahead and for example, install the aluminum panels floor, but then it would make the wiring much more difficult. We could assemble the suicide door frames, but the real trick is to adjust them to fit the body and that's a long way off. We could mount the grill and radiator, but then we could damage them when we install the engine. This goes on and on and it seems the best thing is to wait out the part lead times and avoid the sauna-like heat conditions of August in Chicago. Good thing is that there is no rush since the purpose of the build is just doing it with family.

An interesting Comparison

July 8, 2016

Last night I went to a concert and halfway through the show I couldn't help but think about family businesses and how they develop. I was seeing Neil Finn. He was is the groups Split Enz and Crowded house. He has also done solo work and a couple of discs with his brother Tim. Last night his backing band was his family - wife Sharon ( bass guitar), and son's Liam (lead and rhythm guitar) and Elroy ( drums).  It was hard not to make the comparison to our family business and could see a few generations of this type of band working things out. Currently, my brother is the band leader and headliner, when I was growing up it was my father, and a few years from know it will be David and Jacob. 

I picked up on little things like how Neil, still the father, chimed in a few times to acknowledge and correct a few mistakes and the boys wanting to make their father proud - the family banter was great! 

It was a great show, but more it was another reminder of how families in business work together and alone.  

Addendum:
After JoAnn read the post, and we realized that Neil Finn was playing in Milwaukee and we could make his show there on 7/9. We caught his 4:00pm set at Summerfest. Here is a photo with all his family in the shot.

Engine In But Not Happy

July 5, 2016

We mounted the transmission to the engine and spent a few hours getting it in. Isaac and David were helping out.

With the transmission bolted up, the engine had less play and is really tight up against the firewall. We are not happy with it so we installed the drive shaft to see if we had enough play in the spline to move the motor mounts forward an inch to give the engine a bit of space between it and the firewall. It looks like we have a good amount of play so out will come the engine so we can move the motor mount brackets or add some mounting holes an inch or so forward. 

We can move the engine about 2 inches forward before the aircon compressor will hit the front part of the frame. Everything is so tight. It will also give us a chance to bolt up the exhaust headers as installing them while the engine is in is nearly impossible.

While we have the engine in, we started to look at the wiring to see how we could route the looms from the 1997 Lincoln Mark VIII which we will be using for the computer, fuel pump, ignition system with anti-theft and the EFI ( electronic fuel injection). 

It was a real mess as we first just were trying to get an idea of where things would be routed. 

After looking at what remained we realized that we still had some extra circuits that could be cut out since we would be using a second wiring system for lights, AC, gauges, speedo, turn signals...

Cutting out another pile of wires and using zip ties to organize the looms, things are starting to look a whole lot better. Once we are happy with it, we will wrap it to keep the wiring from getting nicked or cut.

We also decided that since we will be taking the engine out again, we should hook it all up outside the cramped quarters of the frame and see if it still runs. If not it will be much easier to troubleshoot on the floor than in the frame. Also, if we give up on the donor car wiring, it will be easier to install a new wiring loom without having to work it through the routing holes we would make with the donor wiring loom.

In the next few days, we will be taking the engine out once again.

Fathers Day

June 19, 2016

Today I am thinking about my father on fathers day. 

Sid Plofsky passed away a little over 10 years ago, but he would have loved being a part of this project and especially seeing his grandchildren being a big part of the business he created. As I work with my brother and nephews, I can't help but be drawn into many memories around the business and my father. I won't bore you with many memories but one stands out as I was working on the project this past week alone one morning, this memory surfaced.

Almost 20 years ago in the late 90's my folks were planning on visiting CA for an extended stay. I had the idea that during the month stay, I would take off 2-3 weeks of it and maybe for the last time, my father being in his late sixties at the time, we would go out and purchase my dream muscle car and restore it. The idea was to look for it, purchase it and get it ready for the paint shop in the 4 weeks. I figured it would be long days but that he would really enjoy the project but more importantly just working on it with his son. I also thought it might be the last big project we could work on. We were on the hunt for a 1963-64 Chevy Impala convertible. 

 

On paper the plan seemed reasonable, but in reality it was flawed from the start. Having done no real pre-work and at the time finding project cars on the internet wasn't like it is today, we started with a local edition of the classifieds and a copy of weekly that had all sorts of cars and truck advertised for sale. This is where the plan started to fall apart. In the reasonable 200 mile radius there were few if any Impalas to chose from, so we went to plan B and changed our target to any 60's cool car. We hit as many U sell it and parking lot auto dealers looking for something unique, not too expensive, had a workable list for 3 weeks and we could get the parts for in time to complete. I also forgot to mention that during this time we also had a few tourist things to do since this was my parents second trip out to see me in CA and the first was just a weekend in San Francisco, so the list was fairly long - 17 mile drive, a beach party at a friends house, Napa Valley - you get the picture some of these were whole day events. 

I'll cut to the chase, we never did get around to pulling the trigger on a vehicle to restore. I remember about a 2 weeks of trying and coming close on a 1964 Ford Thunderbird 










and a 1967 Pontiac Bonneville. 

Both of course were not a bargain, again a flaw in the plan and they never really captured the dream of an Impala convertible. But all was not lost and in fact looking back the results were much better. The days I got to spend with my father driving around to check out the potential cars, working up the punch list of things to get done, figuring out how much money we would be dumping into the car and it's potential resale value were all are great memories and what they call quality time. Once we figured out we couldn't make it happen, we went on to do a few projects on my house at the time and ticked off a number of tourist items. All in all a great memory and everytime I see a 1960's Impala, Thunderbird, or Bonneville I am reminded of that time.


Also here is a picture of all the grandkids with their Bubbi 
(Grandmother)