Terminated 89 LX

[67coupe]

Now for the interesting bits. Pretty much stuck with the combo I outlined in early posts.

Stock Termi
Gen 2 Whipple 2.3
3.25” upper only
LFP TB
FRPP 60 inj
Looks long tubes
Custom x pipe
Manga flow mufflers
JLT RAI
Upgraded idlers with aux pulley

Made quite a bit more than I expected. 575rwhp and 500 rwtq. This was exactly what I had in mind. I wanted an efficient “lower boost” setup. Wasn’t going for all our numbers. It drives so well. Well mannered until the loud pedal is pressed too far and then it’s obvious to me that I probably need to move to a drag radial out back. The NT05’s can’t maintain traction well into 3rd.

Here’s the most interesting piece. The 2.80 upper Eaton made 462 rwhp and 490 rwtq at about 14 psi. The 3.25 upper Whipple made the numbers mentioned above at 15 psi. 110 more rwhp at the same boost level! Clearly showing the M112 as a bottle neck in the upper rpms. I’m sure the single blade TB helped as well.

Save for new rims, the car is done. As Jeff at Mo’s speed shop said, “You’ve built the ultimate toy!”

Attached is a before and after graph and a video my dad took. Another huge shout to Mo’s Shop in the Atlanta area. These guys know mod motors!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=eMQOtmQWm1E#searching

[eschaider]

Long road but a very nice finish, Todd!

Those blue lines are why we like the Whipples so much


Ed

[67coupe]

Thanks Ed.

It’s an absolute blast to drive. Instant throttle response. Instant torque. So much that it’s probably time for a better rear tire.

A quick little side note. After the paint job, I finally decided to get the ac working. That part was easy, the hard part was chasing down an overheating problem.

I added an interceptor multi gauge to monitor the engine. It would run about 200 ac off and run very hot ac on. Like 230 and climbing. Granted this is the south and it was the middle of summer. Ambient temps were 95 plus. After much troubleshooting. I discovered I was using a thermostat that the IPSCO remote housing wasn’t designed to use. I was using a high flow thermostat. I’ve since learned, this same kind was used on Cleveland engines.

As you can see, this thermostat opens when the back shell pulls away from the flange. The fact that the shell diameter is almost the same size as the remote housing and seeing that as it opens , it moves toward the necked down diameter of the hose flange, it’s obvious why I had issues. I can’t believe it ran at 200 with the ac off. The back shell of the thermostat almost blocks off all coolant flow. If this is noteworthy, I’d be happy to post the details in the large cooling system thread.

[eschaider]

It is and it is good that you found it. 230˚F is not a happy temperature for these engines.

Something you might want to look into, Todd as the time and funding permits, is the use of a DIYAutotune MS3Pro P-n-P ECU. There are a wealth of engine save features, Flex fuel capability and very importantly a percentage based traction control where you tell the ECU how much tire slip you are willing to tolerate before it starts to pull timing to control the wheel spin. Very cool system very attractive price and it comes with a base tune and literally plugs right into the Ford wiring harness plug to the OEM ECU. Did I mention, it also runs the entire OEM instrument cluster?


Ed