On the Stand

March 27, 2016

Just back from a week off where along with some college friends helping out on a house remodel project by installing some new hardwood flooring and catching a few concerts ( Springsteen, Pete Yorn and the Subdudes). We are also trying to get a few more pictures with some of us in them vs. just wire and metal.

Here are a few with two brothers and an engine.

Jacob ( Left) and David ( Right) 

Larry ( Left) and Jordan ( Right)

Today we removed the rest of the wire looms from the engine. 

We still need to exactly identify the purpose of each wire, but we know with this set of wires, the engine runs.

We have the transmission ready to be cleaned up and tuned.

We attached the engine to a stand, and removed the exhaust and intake manifolds. The engine looks very clean - no oil leaks on any of the manifolds.

Our frame, body and kit parts should be on the truck heading to Chicago, I expect we will get a call for exact delivery sometime this week. We are ready and waiting!!!!

50 pounds lighter

March 15, 2016

Over the last few days, we have been trimming wire and sniffing exhaust fumes. It's been a task of finding a connector to something we don't think is necessary to start the engine or that the computer needs to run the engine efficiently and then cutting those wirea, checking if the engine still starts and runs; and then eliminating those wires from the wire loom. David has done an awesome job of pulling out the wires from the loom, Jacob helped zip tie-ing the wires we made sure we didn't want to eliminate like the transmission, the fuel pump, and many others. Because we don't have a full exhaust system and the oxygen sensors hooked into the computer the engine is running very rich in fuel causing us to have the windows and doors open, luckily it's been in the low 50's so we aren't freezing, but it's still a bit nippy in the shop. 

We had a few scares during the process, we have cut some wires that caused a no start and even when we tied them back together it was still a no start until we realized that the Ford operating system is much like the Microsoft operating system. Hence our solution was to remove the battery and restart - the computer caught up with our changes and the engine started !!! We could then find the wire that needed to be spliced back together again and continue our march to eliminating as much wire as we can.

A few before and after pictures as well as once last video of the engine running before we will rebuild it. We are still deciding on how much we do on the engine, our dilemma is it's running well now- maybe no need to do a full rebuild. 

Wire loom before the cutting. Blue zip ties are good wires are here. Jacob identified these

After we cut out all the wires, we knew from starting the engine and looking at the wiring diagrams this would be our close to final engine wire loom. We will still need a chassis wire loom and we will use the one from the kit. The chassis wire loom will control all of the electrical from things not necessary to run the engine. For example the radio, headlights, power windows.....

We will clean this up, but this is our where we are at today.

This is what we are recycling - 50+ pounds of wire

After all that wire was eliminated, the engine still runs - our strategy is working whoo-hoo!

Fire in the Hole

March 10-13, 2016

Job one for the weekend was to get the engine running with the full wire loom, fuel tank, transmission and PATS ( passive anti theft system). There are many stories on the web about failed attempts in getting the engine running with a PATS system. We are trying because the alternative is expensive and we are stubborn and really want to learn, even if it means failing. We can always pay for someone to clean up our mess, but for now, it's both scary and exciting. We had all three boys in on the fun.

Saturday was all scary - after we hooked up the fuel tank and fuel pump lines ( Issac went for gas), David circulated the trans fluids - since we didn't hook up the radiator, and Jacob hooked up the remaining modules we thought were required to run the engine.

A little background is required, this engine has a computer and a few safety and security mechanisms that can prevent getting the engine started or remain running. Base on a research of the 4.6L DOHC engine from a 1997 Lincoln Mark VIII, we knew that if we didn't get the anti-theft warning light to go out thus letting us know the key ignition registration process was successful; the PCM (engine computer) would not enable the fuel pump - specifically, it would cut off the power to the fuel pump. The car also has a safety feature called an inertia switch that in the event the automobile is in and accident, it shuts down the fuel pump to prevent an explosion or raging fire from the continued pumping of fuel after a collision.

So after an hour of getting things ready, which also included hooking the battery up to a charger, David turned the ignition key, good news it turned over, the anti-theft light went out, but bad news no fuel was pumping. Was it the PATS system or something else. Immediately we checked the inertia switch. It had blown, obviously removing it from the car trigger it. So we reset it( it's mechanical), all the time thinking we solved the issue. David turned the key again, same result engine turns over, anti theft light goes out while the fuel pump is not pumping. Since we were convinced it must be that the inertia switch was defective, we decided to by pass the switch and tried again. Same result no start.

We then decided to see if we could get power to the fuel pump. We jumped a known power signal to the fuel pump driver module, the fuel pump started to hum and when we turned the engine over it started right up.  This bothered us a bit since we now knew the fuel pump worked, the PATS looked ok, the inertia switch signal was ok, we drove the car just a few weeks ago, but we couldn't figure out how to get power to the fuel pump. We spent the next few hours probing that fuel pump driver module and getting nowhere except frustrated.

Now we started to question our plans to use the PATS as we were sure it was the issue, even though the anti theft light went out. Too many Internet stories of its issues. We started to think maybe we could just put in an independent from the computer fuel pump and run it off the ignition key. Being frustrated, and tired we decided to sleep on it, but before we actually went to sleep, might as well see if the Internet had any answers.

Many fuel pump related issues, but none exactly like ours, but they highlighted that the signals we thought were 12volt into the fuel pump module, they were all over the map, we also found out that power isn't switched through the ignition but switches a relay that controls the power signal - now we knew why the fuel pump relay was good but still now power to the fuel pump.

Sunday Morning  - 3/13/2016

Since yesterday we had a lot of connectors that we thought did not have anything to do with starting the engine not hooked up, we decided to hook everything we could up, even if it was an air ride sensor or an audio speaker. During this process of identifying every connector and adding all modules, we found a few unconnected grounds, an in-line connector not mated correctly, a much better understanding what directly hooked up to the computer and the fuel pump.

We tried again and now it turned over and started - Hooray!!

Check it out - our engine running on the floor and ready for wires not needed to be eliminated.

Above 60 Degrees in Early March

March 4-9, 2016

Cabin fever caused little to get accomplished this past weekend when the temperatures in Chicago topped 60 degrees and taking advantage of the unusually warm weather took precedence. The result is that things remained the same until I got back from the weekend trip to New York. Tuesday morning started with the realization that the engine and wire loom now off the chassis, our electrical system does not have a return ground path for many of the active circuits necessary to get the engine running. We took care of this by supplementing the wire loom with additional ground wires tied directly to the negative battery connection. Each sub loom and many splices had an exposed ground wire (ring tongue connectors) we could connect to.  David joined in the fun and took charge connecting up the transmission, and getting the fuel pump wire loom with fuel pump driver computer connected to the electrical system. Our goal is to start the engine on the ground with the full wire loom, fuel tank, transmission, shifter and PATS system working, then we can see as we remove parts of the electrical wiring, will the engine start and stay running? We don't fully understand the PATS security system and think that even if we can start the engine, there might be a 5-15 min timeout circuit which will shut the engine down, so this will be a lot of trial and error.  Good news is having the trans and wire loom hooked up we were able to get the engine to turn over. We didn't try running it since the battery was weak (we have it on a charger) and we quit for the day without getting the fuel tank or radiator hooked up so we can let it run for a few minutes. We also need to find out if we need a foot on the brake signal for ignition - something we might be able to enable always on. Good progress and this coming weekend, when Jake can help out, we are planning on putting the wiring on a diet.

David attaching the torque converter to the flywheel

Parting Out & Wiring Removal

February 29 - March 3, 2016

We have taken great care to disassemble every part on our donor car so we might have the chance to re-sell those parts on Craig's list or E-Bay. We have read in the forums about many builders who have recaptured enough from parting out their donor cars to recoup the purchase of the donor car and sometimes more. I am skeptical that we will be able to accomplish this. My opinion is that on our 1997 Lincoln Mark VIII we will be using the valuable parts - engine, trans, and rear end ( we might have a problem here- more in a further post). We might be able to get a few dollars for the wheels, tires, and maybe a few interior items; but the market for 20-year-old car parts in which less than 17,000 1997 Mark VIIIs were manufactured and much less were pewter grey with a black interior is the proverbial needle in a haystack. My guess is less than 5,000 are still on the road, running and are daily drivers looking to fix something wrong. Hopefully, we will be pleasantly surprised as David and Jacob did an awesome job of being careful during deconstructing without destruction. Destruction is much faster and way more fun!

A few pictures of parts we are trying to sell, and took extreme care to remove with no damage.

All the wiring is out and not a single wire was cut - what a job. Larry tried to cut some, but David and I stopped him :)  The donor car has been picked clean and David got the forklift and a furniture dolly and got it out in the yard. It's full of the all those parts we are trying to sell.

We continue on our plan to hook everything back up now that it's out of the donor car and get the engine started. From there we can remove things not necessary to keep the engine and trans running and remove those wires and connectors. We now have the engine, trans and all the wiring laid out. 

This coming weekend I will be in New York, but Larry and the boys will be assembling the engine, transmission, exhaust, radiator and fuel systems as well as the wiring. We have labeled all the connectors that have a wire that is necessary to start and run the engine - see the tags in the pictures below. Those will be the last wires we will disconnect to see if they are necessary for a fully running with PATS ( passive anti theft system) intact. We want to go this way since it's just costs us more to remove PATS and we have it, so why not use it if we can get it to work reliably. 

BTW we took off the valve covers and things look really clean from the top end, a real good sign along with how well it was running on the drive back to the shop.

Cross our fingers and everything starts up this coming weekend.

Pick and Pull on the Donor Car

February 21-28, 2016

We are continuing to harvest the donor car for major parts to redeploy on our 1933 Hot Rod build.  David did a great job removing the rear suspension and getting a jump on the engine removal.

We also started to label all the wiring connections around the car. Our goal is to take all the necessary wiring out of our donor car to get the engine and trans running and shifting on the engine stand before it ever gets close to the new frame. This is a complicated and tricky task as everything is controlled by the on board computer called the PCM( Powertrain control module) and the engine starting sequence makes sure all the anti-theft capabilities are satisfied. If we can't make it work we will need either to reprogram this PCM or get one from an earlier model Ford that doesn't have the PATS ( passive anti theft system). Once we have met that milestone we can look at rebuilding what is necessary, and making things look bright shiny and brand new.

Larry, David and Jacob got the engine out with no wire damage. Instead of the usual removal from the top with an engine jack, they were able to drop it out from the bottom allowing them to raise the car on the lift. The engine remained on jack stands and allowed us to pick it up on the forklift and move it around. In the photo you can see the frame cross member still attached to the engine motor mounts.

Work continues on removing and labeling all the wiring, and removing other parts to sell on e-bay. We have this fantasy that we can sell piece parts from the donor car and recoup some or all of our money before getting $200 at the scrap yard for what's left.