Looks amazing Andrew! Question about the Shims, was there a particular reason you needed to use them, or was the end height not matching up with stock specs that required them?

 

The shims 'shorten' the spring, so that it is exerting more pressure. There is a specific height for the comp 910 springs that achieves a certain amount of valve seat pressure that has been determined (by others, not sure how) to be appropriate for the 7.3. This installed height seems to be achieved with 0.0030 shims usually.

HOWEVER, the actual correct way to do this is buy a spring micrometer and measure each and every spring with cap on, then shim to desired height from there. Some might require 0.0035, some might have needed 0.0015. This would have been the BEst way to do it. But I talked with a few shops, and for my non-race, still only a stage 2 application, it seemed that just sticking with a 0.0030 shim for all would be sufficient (its been done this way before many times).

Anyways, there you have it. There is my way, and theres a better way, but I didn't want to anti-up for a spring micrometer, and I digress .

 

I measured every one of mine and everyone required .0045 total for shims to obtain the correct height.

 

Valve wear and original machining tolerences can all affect valve spring installed height. Measuring is the only way to be accurate. Not being precise on this can make doing the swap less effective.

Andrew, I wish you had said something, I know a guy with a mic that has a fair amount of frequent flyer miles lol

 

Thanks for that tid-bit of information regarding the shims! I picked up a bag of .030 and .015 shims just to be on the safe side. I found a micrometer that will work for our springs for about 70$, a little expensive, but it could always be passed around afterwards like a community tool.

 

That mic paid a visit to sunny AZ !

 

Well I wish I had now as well. Maybe I should think about redoing it.

 

Its easy enough to send out.
I'm not sure that I would go back in...yea I would lol

 

Thanks Aaron, I think Im going to leave it for now. Ive got too many irons in the fire at the moment, and the engine is scheduled/needs to go back in this weekend.

Not that it means anything, but I'll hypothesize that I would have been on the lower end of shim need with a low mile motor, I think the 0.030 will do. Dang its already screwing with me but it is what it is, I need to move on.

 

Alright guys, a quick update here. There is more to show but I think I'll wait to get some better pictures and such before I post it up.

Pretty much odds and ends, water pump went back on, fuel lines got routed for diesel and veggie, drain got made.

And the battle to have a rust free truck raged on..



Did one bit of patch work where I had taken a bif F hammer when I had first installed the intercooler, ah the good old day . Then got it roughed up and cleaned up.



Epoxy primer





First coat of epoxy paint. This stuff is the same stuff I used on the oil pan, and again, boy is it nasty stuff.



Also had the Oil dipstick reseal kit arrive from Guzzle/Diesel Orings. Pretty slick kit, fairly confident I won't ever have a issue there.



Tomorrow the truck rolls back in so that I can start prepping to have the engine back in. My BTS valve body arrived this week, but UPS dropped the ball on the torque converter, so I won't get the engine set in place tomorrow like i had hoped. But it'll be ready to go tomorrow, and monday evening I'll set the engine back in place and start building around it again.

-Andrew

 

Oh and forgot, Figured I would post this here first again in case anyone wants it. I Have the banks spider and turbo piece for running an intercooler on a OBS. Spider/turbo piece, boots, clamps, and anti-crush inserts from diesel site for stock OBS plenums. I am keeping the pipes and modifying them instead of starting from scratch, but this is a decent start if you reckon you could make yourself some pipes or mod some SD ones.



50 bucks plus the ride and it's yours.

-Andrew

 

I will take it!

 

Ok Aaron, shoot me a PM with your number and we can correspond/text that way?

-Andrew

 

Cool.gimmie a min.putting babies to bed lol

 

Hey guys,
There is a lot coming together on this, but not too many pics to show for it. I do have what I think is a really helpful little deal for us OBS guys.

First, I got to tackle the some of the transmission upgrades that will hopefully prolong the life of it for some time anyways, its probably gonna a meltdown but it is what it is.

I chose to go with diesel-sites torque converter. It was a nice balance up upgrade supposedly good for 500-600 HP, and reasonable cost that I won't feel too bad about if/when this thing explodes and takes out the money I invested with it.



Then the engine was going back in!



And now Im slowly reassembling things and taking my time making sure everything goes back together properly. Pretty happy with how the radiator supper came out. Fairly certain I won't have to worry about rust for as long as this truck runs.



This picture shows nothing, but its a BTS valve body installed



A little more progress



Ok, now here is the nice tip for OBS guys:

I bought a billet thermostat housing from Riffraff ages ago (for a super duty) with hopes of doing some kind of custom pipe or something. Well it came time to figure this out, and after some flexible stainless stuff I bought failed, I had to come up with a new plan.

Installed the diesel site 203 Thermostat and billet housing from Clay.



Now, take you original Ford thermostat housing, and cut the bottom off a little higher than the height of the new billet housing. Clean old paint and rust off as necessary.



Now, test fit the trimmed stock thermostat housing with a tight fitting silicone boot (frozen boost.com).



And boom, you're able to run the super-duty thermostat housings, not some hokey reinforcement ring, and not a 200 dollar upper rad hose from diesel site (which I like by the way, I think its awesome but poor people have poor ways and I wasn't about to drop 200 on a rad hose..)
^Paint that baby up, and final fit it with some good hose clamps for a pretty much permanent install.

Hope that helps some guys, really does make a billet housing more attainable for us.

-Andrew