August update: Engine bay video — Coyotify Tach Connector for sale.

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Things are coming together in the engine bay.

I’ve sold a couple of tachometer connectors to people doing swaps into New Edge cars. The instructions are kind of rough, but the part is unique — If you have a New Edge car and you’re wondering what to do to get your tach working, contact me. More news to come here for sure.

Matthew Overbeek and I are possibly going to tear my car down this winter and document, document, document. I’d like to come away with a working swap manual (and service manual). If this interests me, please message me and I’ll put you on a list. There are still quite a few parts in the swap that aren’t exactly off the shelf, so we may actually have a kit eventually (that’s the plan).

I’ve been driving the beast back and forth to work and it’s been on quite a few extended runs. There’s no other way to put it, the car sings. I haven’t even tuned it yet and yet it’s got a boat-load of power. I do think I need to do a torque tube and panhard bar — more news there to come I’m sure as well.

–Fericyde

Summertime Coyote Fun Begins

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I got some terrific footage with the GoPro recently. I did this by holding the camera and driving the car (kinda tricky, as one hand needs to shift, the other hand, steer, and with my third hand, I hold the camera).

Had a great time going to the back to the 50’s show with my Dad — we rode around a lot over the weekend with the top down. The car was quite bouncy, mainly due to the fact that I had the adjustable shock valving on the KYB struts (in the front of the car) set to their maximum stiffness setting :/ … Too bad I didn’t figure this out till Dad was back in Ohio. A small screwdriver and now the car is a lot more civilized.

During the show I had time to do a photo-shoot with Matthew Overbeek’s incredible 94. Here’s the photo album on Imgur:

I’m working on cleaning up the appearance of the engine bay. It’s not a simple operation — but a big portion of the mess is located in the passenger/front corner. Basically the Coyote PCM sits there, and a ton of wires run through that spot. I’ll be using a cheap plastic toolbox there to hide the mess. I’m probably going to use something black and round to cover the hydroboost plumbing in the opposite corner, and leave the fuel regulator on display. The final piece will come later — I’m looking at replacing the stock hood with a Cobra R hood, and that will give me vertical room for the Coyote engine cover.

Interest continues to pick up — more people are attempting Coyote swaps with New Edge cars. Happy Day! Contact me if you’re thinking about this, by the way.

-=FeriCyde=-

Update: Tachometer working and more

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Here’s some footage of the car from about 2 weeks ago. I mounted my GoPro to my head for the video.

I got the car aligned a few days ago. It’s really coming together:
Album of recent pictures for June of 2014.

The car is really drivable. It has an amazing sound. I have some minor tuning to do (mainly want to get a tune that allows the motor to hit its very realistic 7700 RPM red-line. Right now I’m “limited” to “only” 6500 RPM. Now that I have the tach working I feel much more confident winding it to the limit. It has an addictive sound. I’ll get some video of that in the next few weeks.

-=FeriCyde=-

The first sounds of the Aluminator

I wanted the next video posted after first start to be a first drive — but there was a lot to be done (it’s evident if you watch the first start that there’s a lot of road in front of me before a first drive, but I was optimistic).

Still, the sound is pretty amazing. That motor has a wonderful sound and reminds me a bit of my Mach 1 on steroids. The coolant is now in the motor and there don’t appear to be any leaks (hallelujah). The transmission fluid is in the TR3650 and I’ve bolted the shifter into place for hopefully a few years. I have 1 gauge wired (fuel pressure) and the following remain: Water temp, trans temp, diff temp, oil pressure. I also have to wire up the vehicle speed sensor to the speed dial and to the Coyote PCM (and possibly find some way to get the stock electronics to see this output signal as well — since it runs the speedometer). The tach wire needs to be connected as well. I still need to wire the fan up, and the starter wiring is in a temporary (rigged) position. I’m still not happy with the route it takes to get to the starter, so I may end up cutting and re-splicing it. The ground situation to the motor/trans is still in limbo as well, since I don’t like the way it runs as well.

It sounds like a lot, but really we’re in the final stretch here. I’m buttoning things up and the car is quickly coming together. Here are some recent pics of the build for the curious:

Enjoy!

-=FeriCyde=-

First Start!


We (Matthew Overbeek and I) have been working a lot of nights to get the car running recently. The hydro-boost plumbing and fuel system are braided stainless lines (AN fittings). Matthew’s engine bay on his car is amazingly clean compared to mine (And I don’t mean just free of dirt — the motor in his car could be a Coyote show-case, as all of the lines and fittings are hidden from vie). I’ve gone for a more industrial look (cough) :) I did really dig his hydro-boost setup — so I have my hydro-boost plumbing hidden like his. I’m working on at least making the visible stuff yellow and black (or stainless/gray for minor items). It’s going to take some time to clean that up, and even after the fact there’s still going to be some warts.

Anyway, Matt came over and we were talking about what the bare minimum would be needed to get the car running. One thing led to another, and we got enough together to check the fuel system for leaks — and there were some minor leaks due mainly to running 100mph (figuratively) trying to get the car done. After closing those, we disconnected the fuel system and worked on just getting the hydro-boost lines filled with fluid. Score 2 for 2, as almost all of the hydro-boost lines were good.

At that point, Matt was in for extra innings I think — it was late, like 11 PM at night and I have to say I was running on adrenalin (and Mountain Dew) — we decided to start the car.

Stuff was half-butted everywhere. The fuel system in the back was grounded with a pair of vice grips and a temporary line. The engine in the front was grounded with a pair of vice grips (The line was there but will bolt to the engine using one of the motor mount bolts). The fan wire was not hooked up. There was no radiator fluid in the radiator. No exhaust hooked up past the shorty headers. No drive shaft in the transmission. No transmission fluid in the trans for that matter. The clutch cable is sitting in a box. The drive by wire gas petal was temporarily hooked up and sitting on the floor (still have some work to do on the adjustable bracket I fabbed). wiring for the starter was temporarily in place. The main power to the PDB was rigged with a bolt and some electrical tape.

And yet, the car started right up like a champ.

So much remains, but I have to say this was one satisfying moment, and I owe a lot of credit where it’s due. Ray Herron of FRPP helped a lot with my endless questions. My buddy Jess Dale who loaned me an engine hoist and a lot of moral support. Mike (Gold Dust) of “Coyote swaps “suck” fame, helped out early in the game as well. But the real help and amazing synchronicity was the help of Matthew Overbeek, who was there through a lot of my planning and all the way through this moment. I don’t know where my swap would be without his amazing perseverance.

Thanks everyone – I hope to have a “first drive” video out here shortly.

-=FeriCyde=-

Engine Install Finalizing 7/7/13

Had some issues with the clearance between the k-member and the engine oil pan. A good friend helped me through this — but I should have looked more closely while the engine was on the k-member stand and I would have noticed it at that time. The bottom line is that the engine sits differently on the k-member when it’s on the car, and stuff like the steering rack clearance is extremely important for a Coyote swap.

The good news though is that the anti-sway bar does not interfere with the oil filter for the Coyote in a new edge. At least not mine :) A bunch of things have happened since last post — the fuel system is cut to length and installed. The computer mounting is almost complete. We’re down to a couple of items to mount in the engine bay (coolant overflow and windshield wiper tank and pump assembly. Minor compared to what we’ve been through.

Note that without some modification, my engine shock tower brace is not going to fit without keeping the main cover off the motor (a minor problem, but still).

The hydroboost lines are off at Pirtek being brazed for -6 and -8 AN fittings at this time, so that should be the next thing you see here.

Enjoy!

-=FeriCyde=-

Wiring and Fuel System 6/10/13

What a busy week. My wiring harness is coming together slowly — I’ve been busy snapping together the components that make up the new harness and whittling down the stuff that made up the old harness that I need to keep — mostly sensors and some odds and ends. I have a ton of pics to share — we’ll start with these three photo albums.

The engine is coming together, but the odds and ends of the build in the engine bay are not exactly coming cheap, time-wise. A lot of small issues prevent me from having this complete — I’m almost there though. I have some bracket work to do and some painting — it’s close!

This album shows the wiring decomposition progress (looks really ugly, but it’s honestly not all that bad once you get into it). It’s extremely important that you label everything — I have a label machine and I wish I had labeled a lot more stuff while I was pulling it apart. I’m making sure to add labels as much as possible during the build.

Fuel system pictures — basically I had to cobble together a new fuel system wiring harness using the old harness connection points and a tank harness from a 94-97. Bonus! The new harness is a good 2 feet longer than the stock one, meaning I can drop the tank all the way to the ground without having to disconnect the wiring :) Well, it was there, so I took advantage of it. Some zip ties hold the excess to the frame.

Finally, here’s some youtube video of the present state of the build:

It may not look like it, but we’re nearing the end of the build! The hard stuff is dwindling and the rest is some trivial wiring and bolting together of stuff — very exciting moment to live in.

Stay tuned, it gets faster from here :)

-=FeriCyde=-

Engine bay assembly / painting / wiring

My engine bay work continues — I’m almost done painting the primer coat (John Deere Yellow). I’m running the wiring for the battery relocation. I decided to use the hole that was in the firewall for the hood release cable — I drilled a “sister” hole to the right (looking toward the back of the car) and enlarged the hole.

The boss control pack wiring harness will be run shortly through the passenger side of the firewall using the hole for the original wiring harness. My buddy Matt explained that I could just pop the grommet (visible in the imgur album — barely visible in the video) and cut it a bit to allow for the coyote wiring.

I “deleted” the passenger air bag and fabbed a nifty bracket so I have a place to set the power distribution box (PDB) and a spot to easily hook up to the ODB2 (on board diagnostics port version two). The original ODB2 will also be live if I continue my original plan of using both PCMs (the factory one, mainly for doing instrument cluster duty).

Here’s the video below:

And an update from last week (5/10):

Here’s an imgur album that’s related to the work — some of the pictures are more useful than the video as the lighting on my 5/19 video is pretty crappy (my gopro was discharged — I need to charge it but can’t find the cable ATM).

We’re nearing the final engine fitting into the engine bay, which is so awesome. I’ve been inching down the road for months toward this day. I am thrilled to be this close.

Enjoy!

-=FeriCyde=-