Thanks Moto Hero. I've seen so many people do the whole crown vic frame swap, but that essentially becomes a car with a truck shell on it. I wanted to maintain the truck frame, rear suspension, truck firewall. Keep it as original as possible, but with updated front suspension and motor. I just like that path better.

 

Next was time to start cleaning up the motor. It seemed to be leaking from about every place it could. So I bought all new gaskets. Upper and lower intake manifold, Oil pan, transmission pan. The coolant/oil filter base 'module' gasket on these older mod-motors, and more.
First thing I did was several cans of carb cleaner to degrease the engine. I didn't get it perfect but it was the best I could do.


I then found this 2K spray paint. You actually puncture an inner bladder to mix the catalyst and start spraying. It came out pretty good and hopefully is tougher and lasts longer than regular 1K spray paint.


Painted the engine....


I prepped the firewall for paint. Not much. I didn't strip it down to smooth metal. I was fine with the factory spray on stuff still there that was a rough texture. I'm fine with the old look (it's an old truck), but wanted to clean it up just a bit. So I masked.....


And painted the firewall.....


While I was cleaning and prepping parts, I didn't get a picture of all the miscellaneous brackets that I cleaned and powder coated. I have a simple electric kitchen oven I got off Facebook marketplace for $35 and a powder coat gun from a local tool store. No pics, but I'm sure they will be visible later.

On my cobra, I powder coated the lower intake. As much as I cleaned out the intake, there was still enough oil inside that 'flashed off' when baking the powder. Blew the oven door open. Scared the hell out of me. So this time...I used the 2K spray paint on the lower intake. Here it is masked and painted......


The new inner fenders I bought (the original ones were too far gone with rust) were too big to powder coat in my oven, plus the local coaters here are just insane on prices. So again, I used the 2K spray paint. I hope this stuff last. I've used a bunch of it on several parts. LOL....




Time to put the motor in for the last time! Not. It had to come out immediately. But it was nice to have it back in for a few minutes.....


It had to come out because I thought I would change the oil pan gasket later. As soon as the motor was in, I saw that there is no way to drop the oil pan with the motor in the original crown vic (come on Ford engineers! LOL). You can see the oil pan right above the k-member. So back out it came and.....


Put in the new oil pan gasket.....



More soon.
Craig

 

Next was the core support. It had a couple places of rust. I have looked and looked for a used one in better condition. Can't find. So i looked at a new one. Way more money than i want to spend. This is a budget build. So I thought, I've done rust repair on the body, why not on the core support. Plus the core support is mostly hidden from view. So here is what I did.

Here you can see a rusted area......


I cut out the rot, and started welding in metal that fit the same shape.....






Here is the bottom view (you can see the 'new' steel from the bottom as well). I cut the rotted sections out....


I fit in new metal. This metal happened to be the frame shortening fixtures that I used back on page 1. Once the frame is welded with the thicker splice brackets, these thinner template/guides aren't used. It was perfect for this core support.....


Also some smaller inner structural parts were beefed up.....


I test fitted it on the truck to see it was all good. Seemed to be.....

 

Next was fitting the radiator assembly from the crown vic to the core support. This assembly is HUGE. It's a radiator, separate transmission cooler, separate power steering cooler, air conditioning condenser, fan shroud, coolant overflow tank. It's huge, but in a nice tidy package. You mount the radiator, and all the other parts are automatically are mounted as well.

First I found the triangular 'gussets' on the core support were barely too narrow to allow the crown vic radiator to fit. So I had to cut them out......


I had to rim off some small plastic 'tabs' from the radiator tank. They were preventing the radiator from sitting flush up against the core support. These tabs were holding a wire harness. (I'll figure out how to secure the wires later).....


I marked some small areas (Sharpie line here) to cut out....


One side cut.....


Other side cut......


I built some small tabs the extended off the main core support mount (you can see the rubber mounts) from some 'U' channel I bought at Home Depot.....




I took one of the old core support rubber bushings and cut it in half to use as isolators for the radiator......






For the upper mount, I simply rotated the rubber mount 90 degrees and drilled a hole in the core support to pass a 3/8 bolt through. You can see it here.....


Remember the triangular gusset I cut out above, I decided to add a piece back to re-create it.....

 

Hey all.
I kind of let this thread die. Was so busy working on the truck, i just didn't post updates. I can throw some at you now (for those interested. I know this is not everyones cup of tea.)
BTW, the truck was finished up last May. Had a great summer with it.
I left off here. Started painting valve covers and calipers. I used the old Marauder calipers as cores on remanufactured ones. Much cleaner to work with.

 

Engine cleaned up and going back together......

 

Under the steering column, back on the firewall, i built a bracket that mimicked the Marauder console shifter bracket. I used the factory Marauder shifter cable and attached it to the F100 column lever. It works perfect. The column shifter in the truck actuating the trans. Plus, the drive indicator (PRNDL) on the column works as it should. So easy (after I made a custom bracket. lol)....

 

Starting to go back together......

 

You can see the intake tube/adapter and master cylinder as so close, but it works.....

 

I then installed the Range Industries caliper brackets to use the larger 14" Mustang rotors. Uses the stock caliper, but spaces it out further with a larger rotor. Probably not much performance improvement, but i like the look......

 

Radiator back in.
Fan shroud. All factory Marauder stuff.


With the F100 the same wheelbase as the Marauder, the stock aluminum drive shaft went right in. No additional cost required for modification.

 

More parts going on.....


The factory upper coolant cross-over on the Marauder had several pinholes from rust. I couldn't find a replacement so I went with the crossover delete kit. Looks better than the factory metal tube...

 

Since I'm using the factory Marauder wire harness, i needed to put everything in 'about' the same location. The ECU was in the firewall near the master cylinder. So, i cut a similar hole in the F100 firewall.....


I think it turned out pretty well (ECU is the vertical connector on the left, and a harness connector to inside the cab is on the right....

 

New tires and wheels arrived......

 

Replaced the rubber gasket on the firewall side of the inner fenders.....