I'm thinking that a set of headers, dual exhaust and a bit of an air/fuel induction change might be a good start for the 2.9

But I'm not finding headers available for the 2.9L.

Anyone know of a performance Cam for a 2.9? Anyone port/polish heads on a 2.9? Bigger valves? Higher compression ratio?

Things not to do?

Assistance in helping me determine what can be done within reason to my son's BroncoII engine will be appreciated.

-Steve

 

there is headers available...just not to many, like maybe 2 options
pacesetter and JBL... JBL's are far better , but, pricer

cams also few & far between.

Port and polish will improve flow but expencive if paying to get done, time consumming if doing it yourself

for the money spent on the 2.9, you might be better to swap it over to the 4.0. It should be pretty much a direct bolt up but will need the 4.0 wiring harness.

the reason for the suggestion for the swap is that the 4.0 has far greater performance mods available over the 2.9.

Yes the 2.9 (healthy one) produces more HP per cube inch than 302. the4.0 has a better overall powerband ,exspecialy off the bottom.

down fall of the 2.9 is heads, but later ones seem better, aftermarket World heads are beefier than the factory units

if you really want to freshen up the 2.9, fine...it can be done just don't look for vast increases of tire smoke'n power. anit gonna happen.

hope that helps

 

my brother in law (young kid, Ford pickup mechanic) just picked up a 87 ranger and reworked his 2.9 and is about ready to fire it up so I will have to keep you posted on how it worked out. He put 2.8 lt pistons in it, these are flat top vs the dished 2.9 pistons. Raised compression to 10:1 and will see how it runs on regular pump gas. Supreme will probably be in order. Had to do some clearancing on the underside of the pistons due to them hitting the crank weights. Piston pin heights are a bit different. Ported the heads (he did the work) but left the stock valve size (didn't have the money to run oversize valves and why spend the money it's a 2.9) port matched the intake manifold to the heads and the intake plenum to the intake manifold. Took the stock cam down to a local cam grinder and for $75.00 welded and reground the stock cam. They had 3 grinds and he chose the one for overall power gains. He is running mustang injectors and will be swapping over the a MAF system (off a mustang) which is pretty easy to do and not real expensive. He has a 87 ranger which I guess has a smaller throttle body so he picked up a earlier model throttle body which I guess is quite a bit larger. He got some pace setter headers and acutally I think they are pretty nice. Thick flange, and comes with a Y-pipe.

Will be interesting to see it run. I told him for the money it would have been easier to find a 4 liter but he didn't want to fuss with the wiring harness since that would be a big pain to swap.

Keep you posted.

 

I'm interested! My son wants a bit larger set of tires and a 3" lift, so just a bit more power would be nice unless we go to playing with gear ratios.

I assume that the 2.8L piston skirts were trimmed? Did he have the rotating assembly balanced after doing that?

-Steve

 

He didn't have to trim the skirts there is a little balancing patch (area to take material off when balacning) that is on either side of the piston pin boss. He had to take material off there. it only hit on a couple of the pistons if I'm not mistaken but he took it off all of them. He didn't want to spend the money on balancing so he didn't and I will be interested if it runs smoothly.

I will keep you posted. He got a set of rims and tires from a new Ranger for free that are 16" rims and I don't remember the size of the tires bit they are definately larger than stock. It's a automatic with 4.10 stock gears so I will tell you how it pulls with these and the milage. He is now waiting for the processor update with the Mustang MAF before he can fire it up. All these ideas came from a ranger website dedicated to only rangers. I don't remember what it was called but do a search and maybe you can find it. In the ranger webside on this mustang part conversion it calls for using the mustang throttle body but come to find out the older ranger TB's are the same size at I believe 58 mm vs 50 mm for the 87-88 rangers. He found the ranger on for $35.00 in a junk year that was good.

 

Camcraft sells aftermarket performance cams and valvetrain parts, including heads:

CamCraft Cams

Their 'new' site is still under construction and they are in process of moving from MD to North Carolina, if I remember right.

 

On My 1988 ranger i had the 2.9 now im swapping it out for the 4.0 . i need to know about the wiring please help....

 

Everything is pretty much the same. The 2.9 computer should even run the 4.0. BUT, if the 4.0 is MAF based (I'm pretty sure they are), you are going to need a 4.0 computer, and check out www.fordfuelinjection.com on how to convert it to sequential fuel injection with a MAF. They sell anything you might need as well.

 

Are ya interested in a set of headers there jack?? Ive got myself some pacesetters that are up for sale. Brandnew condition..

 

i did the 4.0 swap to a 92 2.9 manual ranger just find u a ranger or exp with a good motor for cheap and take the wireing harnes out of it will make it easyer because the 4.0 have maf and have coil pack setup i ended up using a harness from an 92 automatic exp so i just taped the nutral safty switch closed due to it being diffrent and it starts up like it it sould