First post after nearly two years of lurking around the forums!

I'm working on swapping a V10 into my '07 along with a ZF6 and a manual transfer case. Currently the truck is a 5.4 / 5R110 / ESOF and I just wanted something a bit more exciting I suppose. Plus, I'll never have to worry about replacing a VVT solenoid in the middle of a road trip again. She's about to hit 250k miles (~80k of that is mine).

Getting everything wired up properly will be a little bit of fun but thankfully nothing seems super complicated. I'll have to do a little bit of work to properly wire up the reverse light switch on the ZF6 as well as the 4x4 range switch on the NP271. How I want to manage the vacuum hubs isn't quite decided on yet but I have a few designs in my head on how to still maintain the vacuum lock system along with a manual shift gearbox. That being said, getting out and locking the hubs by hand isn't really a problem and it matches well with the "make everything manual" theme of this project haha. So we shall see where interests, desires, and laziness intersect on that side quest.

This isn't my first engine swap, my other car is a Subaru BRZ with a Coyote in it so I've dealt with these kinds of things before... Thankfully everything in this swap is Ford and also an option for that year truck. The BRZ is a mutt of parts from just about every major manufacturer on the planet.

Anywho, here's some pictures of the engine I've built for the project. The blue isn't quite what I wanted it to be shade wise but it still looks good.

 

Like you said, the color is a little paler than Ford blue, but it looks great all the same. Good luck on the project!

 

Just an update...

I'm about 90% done with everything. Just a few more things to install and then it's time for a test start. Once everything is done I will hopefully have a whole lot of pictures to post of everything.

This has been WAY more difficult than it had any good reason to be, mostly due to Ford's inability to design things that are easy to work on as well as their insatiable desire to change everything all the time between models/years. It took me 8 hours to remove the engine in my BRZ and install a V8 and gearbox that had no business being there, whereas it took me almost 4 days to do the same amount of work in this truck with all OE components.

Many of the issues came from the fact that the engine I have is an '08 whereas my truck is an '07. Some of the issues I have come across:

• The oil filter/cooler mount setup is ever so slightly different. The lower radiator hose connection on that part does not have the extra nozzle for the expansion tank, so I had to build that into my lower radiator hose. Additionally, the location and orientation of the oil filter and cooler is different. The filter not sits about an inch higher and a few inches forward of the original setup, so the filter is about a quarter inch from the frame. Everything ended up working out but I had to switch up the oil cooler and oil filter sandwich so that the cooler is on the bottom now, otherwise the coolant line connections hit the engine mount. I had the opportunity to buy an entire '06 (I think) V10 for cheap since it was blown and it would have come with the correct oil filter mount. But I didn't do that because I was worried about having yet another engine sitting around the garage haha.
• Engine mounts are almost unobtainium. And there are three different designs of mounts from what I can see: 98-04, 05-07, and 08-10. Fortunately I was able to find some on marketplace.
• Manual transmission cooler lines are PURE unobtainium. I knew this going in so I had planned on modifying the auto cooler lines to work with the manual. BUTTTTTTTTT OF COURSE the fitting threads are different diameters between the auto and manual, even though the lines seem to be the same diameter. And the fittings on the transmissions are NOT swappable since the manual has a larger thread diameter than the auto, even though the line fittings on the auto have the larger thread diameter when compared to the manual.
• I was unable to find an '07 V10 engine wiring harness, so I had to modify an '08 harness. Being a facelift year, they also changed the location of the main power connector going into the harness from the fuse box. Not really a difficult problem to solve, but it did take a little bit of effort to properly modify that prior to installing everything.
• The floor of the cabs are different between the auto and manual. Not entirely difficult to swap them out but it does take some cutting and bending. I'm not exactly impressed with my own work installing the manual cab piece into the floor of the cab, but I think it will work just fine. Funny enough, even though the floors of the cabs are different, the firewall has all the provisions for the clutch pedal and clutch master cylinder. So I had no problem at all mounting that stuff. You do have to route wires for the clutch switch, so I ended up using the now empty grommet originally used by the automatic transmission shifter cable and routed the wires through the automatic transmission harness empty wires. I had to also do a crossover connector to jump those clutch wires from the PCM transmission connector to the PCM body connector.
  • On the note of manual transmission stuff, the clutch hydraulics for this truck are absolutely the worst I have ever seen. I'm not sure who signed off on the idea of having an entirely plastic system with no real positive retention anywhere and with plastic lines running within inches of an exhaust pipe, but they should reconsider their choices in life. It'll be nice being able to replace this entire system without a single wrench when the time comes though I guess.
• The transmission crossmember in my truck needed to be modified slightly to allow the manual transmission to sit properly. My crossmember has only two slots for the mount, but when I looked up crossmembers on ebay all of the ones had 4 slots and two of them looked to be right where the manual wants to sit. Nothing a step drill can't fix, but I just laugh at the fact that my truck just so happened to not have the crossmember with the two sets of holes. And of course, it is absolutely impossible for Ford to design a mount system that only requires one set of holes.... the two pairs are literally an inch apart from each other so it's not like it would have been hard to do.
• The placement/orientation of the catalytic converters makes getting to the exhaust flange nuts nearly impossible. Two of the nuts came off alright, one was difficult but doable, and the final one (passenger side upper nut) required removing the passenger front fender well to access. You need a deep well socket to get the nut, but that puts the u-joint too close to the catalytic converter which requires a steep angle. On the passenger side you're basically blocked at all angles. Rotating the flanges 20 degrees or so would have entirely eliminated this issue, and still would have fit in the same area. But, Ford.
• The A/C compressor bolts on the 5.4 have holes positioned in the frame so they can be accessed. Trouble is, two of the holes don't even properly line up with the bolts so you can't just slide them out. You have to take out both and then remove the compressor.
• This next one is something that was assumed going in, but you absolutely need a leveler to install the engine/gearbox together. And even still you will bump that leveler up against the top of the firewall/hood seal when installing. Having a transmission jack or a friend under the truck to guide the gearbox in while you slowly inch the engine down and back is a must.
• The 5.4 and 6.8 have different sized threads for the big nut on the radiator fan, so the clutches are not interchangeable. Because why would they be......... In addition to that, apparently there are two different style clutches: one with 5/16 or 8mm bolts, and another with 6mm bolts. Make sure you have the right one if you do this swap.

The really good things:

• The NP273F transfer case bolted right up to the ZF6, and on top of that the location of the transfer case once everything was installed was close enough (if not exactly right) so I didn't need to change driveshafts.
• The fan shroud between the V8 and V10 are technically different, however the only real difference I could see in pictures was that the V8 shroud has an extra few inches of the "tube" that goes around the fan. About ten minutes with a dremel and router bit solved that issue.
• The front accessories of the 5.4 and 6.8 are all basically the same (except fan clutch of course), so everything bolted right up. One line each for the power steering as well as the A/C wasn't quite as happy being positioned farther forward, but this was easy to overcome.

I still have a few more things to do before she's officially done, but the vast majority of the heavy lifting is done. Thanks for reading!

 

Next hiccup: PCM Programming.

This has turned into a WAY bigger pain than I had ever anticipated it would be. The truck has been sitting dead in my driveway for almost three weeks while I've been waiting to get this figured out. I'm currently at a point where it has taken longer to get the PCM to be happy than it did for me to do the entire swap.

I have two different PCMs: one from an '08 motorhome that came with the V10 when I bought it, and an '05 PCM that I pulled from a parts truck (2005 F350 V10). I originally had a calibration built for the '08 PCM by 5 Star, but this did not work as PATS was left in the PCM so of course starting was inhibited since my '07 truck does not have PATS equipment. I've been trying to get them to fix this (if it is even possible) but communication has been lackluster. The other issues I noticed is that the VIN in the PCM was still the original VIN, and updating that with Forscan requires a full firmware rewrite. Getting these files has proven to be more difficult to do than I had hoped. In addition to the rewrite, the as-built data entry has a few more fields that my '07 as-built data does not have.
So I tried loading the as-built data for my truck into the 05 PCM, but of course this ALSO requires a firmware rewrite. Without the proper files to do this I cannot get Forscan to write them properly.

If anybody has any way to help/guide me with this process, I'm all ears.

Overall, my understanding of how these PCMs work is that the "strategy code" is basically the firmware that is running on the PCM and doing all the work, whereas the calibration file you get from 5 star or wherever is simply the data that the firmware pulls from to actually run the truck with maybe a few more configuration bits in there as well. I haven't been able to confirm this, but having designed embedded controllers (including engine controllers) in the past this is how I'd do it. With all that in mind, I wonder if the "strategy" needs to change to make the manual swap work so that things like the clutch position switches are available as inputs as opposed to the auto transmission setup that does not look at these pins on the PCM input.

Like before, if anyone can steer me in the right direction (or even provide me with the firmware I need to make this work!!!) I'd be happy as a clam. I want to wrap this up soon but getting information on how a PCM works and the files it needs to make that work happen has been a black hole of despair.

 

Update to the PCM fiasco.

I did a little digging to see what else I could find out. The clutch switches work by grounding the wire that goes to the PCM. There are two switches that the PCM uses: the Starter Interlock and the Clutch Disable. The starter interlock is for inhibiting the starter motor until the clutch pedal is fully depressed, and the clutch disable is for (at the very least) disabling cruise control the moment the pedal starts being depressed. I'm sure it does more than that, but that's the bare minimum. When the pedal is all the way up (not depressed), the "Clutch Disable" signal is grounded and the "Starter Interlock" is (probably) pulled high to 12V by internal PCM circuitry. When the pedal starts to be depressed, the "Clutch Disable" signal is released (the switch opens) so that the signal probably goes to 12V. Once the pedal is fully depressed, the "Starter Interlock" signal is grounded and the "Clutch Disable" signal remains pulled up.

I checked the wiring of the clutch switch signals to see if the signals were being pulled up at all, and it turns out they were in fact NOT being pulled up. So I immediately began to theorize that the physical hardware within the PCM itself is not there at all to pull these signals up. Luckily, I had pulled apart the original PCM to the truck which was for the automatic transmission (just like the new V10 PCM I have) so I pinned out the signals that come from the clutch switch input. Sure enough, there are several components (likely resistors and diodes) that are not installed right around where those two signals make their way into the PCM from the external connectors. I was able to make a very basic circuit schematic for the inputs but without the actual components most of it was just left up to guessing or best practice types of things (I design this kind of stuff for a living). So regardless of what the firmware might be doing, there is no way at all that it was ever going to be able to see the state of the clutch switch inputs.

 

So I am left with a couple of options.

1. Wire up a transmission range sensor emulator to the PCM to see what it does with that information. I figured out the signal that comes from the transmission range sensor in the 5R110 and it would be a pretty easy signal to emulate, so I can probably code something up with an Arduino pretty quickly.
2. Figure out how to pull apart my PCM (without breaking anything) and then install the missing components myself. This is a very high risk option here considering how easy it would be to break many of the components on the board during removal. These missing components are on the bottom side of the board so I have to fully remove it from the PCM housing rather than just being able to remove the top of the housing. Nevermind the fact that I may get a component value or even type wrong. I don't like this option. If the housing was easier to disassemble I would be much less afraid of this option, but here we are.
3. Do a few rain dances to see if I can actually find a V10 / manual transmission PCM somewhere. This has proved to be exceptionally difficult even without considering the ~$1k price that unit will likely command. This option sucks, but assuming the range sensor emulator solution doesn't work it is my next best bet.

 

I feel your pain sir .
I have a 99 V10 ,manual 5 speed ,4x4 .
in 15 years ,I have never found another in the bone yard ,so I believe these manual V10 trucks , are like hens teeth .
I would most likely ,use market place , to find some one that parts out super duties , and see if you can find a manual ecm .
where are you located ?

 

Well I've got everything figured out (so far) up here in Seattle.

I was able to get the engine to crank with the transmission range sensor plugged into the PCM. This was accomplished by putting the auto transmission in front of the truck and running 3 long wires up to the PCM. I will have to devise a better (more mobile) way of doing this and it probably rhymes with Arduino. Relatively easy task.
I ran into difficulty actually getting the engine to fire unfortunately. After lots of troubleshooting, I discovered that all but one of the injectors were totally stuck shut. The only reason one wasn't stuck is that I had replaced one injector, and that was the one that wasn't stuck.... Never in my life have I see 9 stuck injectors (and presumably 10 if I had left the other one alone) on the same engine, so this was a hard conclusion to come to. I've got a full set coming in this week and hopefully that is the last obstacle between me and a running truck.

I've requested a tune from 5 star that uses the automatic transmission range sensor signal in place of the clutch switch wiring but otherwise runs just like a manual transmission calibration. I'm hoping there are no issues with cruise control but that is a bridge we will cross when we get there... I will design an electronics box that takes in the clutch switch signals and generates the necessary transmission range signal to send to the PCM so it can start. My thoughts right now are to have it send the "park" signal when the clutch is depressed for more than a certain amount of time and send a "drive" signal when the clutch is released. This will be fun to figure out but it is orders of magnitude easier than pulling a PCM apart safely to install some resistors.

 

I found a V10 Zf6 truck being parted out in Oakland Oregon , about 20 miles North of Roseburg , Facebook Market place .
I believe the price is 800 bucks . Might be worth your time and money .

 

Ended up finding (somehow) a V10 ZF6 PCM out of an '05 F-250 and buying that. The one down in Oregon was an '04 2V truck (assuming that was the same one) so it has a different PCM.

Otherwise, I got the engine to run last night on the original '05 PCM I bought to get around the PATS issue on the '08 PCM I started this project with. Engine runs like a top! The new PCM should arrive tomorrow so once that is in I'll do a full warm up and engine break in.

 

And she drives!

I got that V10 ZF6 PCM (P/N 5C3A-12A650-NHB) installed into the truck and it fired right up and had no issues running properly with the rest of the truck. No lights on the dash either. Currently working on getting the engine nice and broken in properly... hopefully I know what I'm doing!

To sum up the big points of the project for anyone looking to dive into this rabbit hole:

• The automatic transmission PCM will likely never directly work with the clutch switch. The components on the PCB are not populated so the signal will never make its way to the controller. You will need to either source a V10/ZF6 PCM (good luck) or find a good way of generating the automatic transmission range sensor. It's an easy sensor to emulate with an Arduino since it is a 5V 120Hz (ish) PWM signal. There are some tables online that show the duty cycle ranges of each gear, but you can manually figure it out by supplying 12V to the sensor and reading the output pin with a multimeter that has DC% capability or an oscilloscope. You can also use the voltage measurement on the multimeter and calculate the duty cycle that way as well. Theoretically you can have the PCM programmed such that it thinks it is always in neutral, but I'm not sure how that affects cruise control.
• '08 PCM has PATS, '05-'07 ones do not. I was able to get the engine running on two different '05 PCMs without having to program or mess with anything. The '05 manual V10 PCM was 100% plug and play.
• Assume that anything you find from an '08-'10 V10 will NOT fit in an '05-'07 truck. See my above posts for specifics, but overall there are just so many small differences between those ranges that it is not worth dealing with.
• The transmission cooler lines for the ZF6 are impossible to find, but a 5/8-18 inverted flare fittings threads (and seals) right into the cooler line inputs to the gearbox. After that, you can just make some custom lines however you see fit. I modified the automatic transmission lines by cutting out the fittings so that I could run flex hose from those lines right under the starter to the fittings and barbs that I put on the gearbox. I also wrapped that setup in heat shielding because it runs right next to the catalytic converters. We'll see how long all of that lasts.
• The air filter box for the V10 needs an extra set of brackets to mount properly. There is a bracket and an arm that goes from the bracket mount to the side fender.
• The manual transmission mount is the same as the automatic transmission, but I think it goes on the other way (backwards). At least that's how I put mine on but it likely doesn't matter. The crossmember is supposed to have two separate pairs of holes, one pair for the auto and one for the manual. Mine did not, so I made my own holes and called it good.
• The automatic transfer case from my '07 truck bolted right up to the '08 ZF6 I bought for the swap. Same for the '08 manual transfer case I bought. On top of that, the transfer case ends up pretty much right in the same place as before with the automatic, so the driveshafts are able to be reused and all of the wiring and whatnot lines right up.
• The engine and transmission can be both installed and removed without lifting the cab. That being said, lifting the cab would have made a LOT of things SIGNIFICANTLY easier. If this is an option available to you, definitely consider going that route. Most of the difficulties I ran into simply wouldn't have been a problem if I had been able to lift the cab.
• Technically you need to swap the transmission tunnel portion of the cab to make the ZF6 fit. I cannot verify this, but I bet with just a little bit of hammering, cutting, and welding, you could get it to fit with the auto tunnel. Don't quote me on that though, this was jut an observation. Obviously having the manual tunnel in makes everything else easier.
• There is no provision to mount the clutch fluid reservoir. I custom made my own out of a piece of the original transmission tunnel and bolted that to the coolant expansion tank mount.

 

Clutch reservoir mount.

The bracket and support arm you will need to mount the V10 air filter box.

I'll address this eventually... the new carpet I bought that was supposed to fit ended up being terrible so I just cut out the transmission part of the original carpet and called it good. The metal gets hot there so I will have to insulate this eventually. Or just find the right carpet...

Cut the extended part off of the V8 fan shroud with a dremel and you now have yourself a V10 fan shroud.

Fitting combo needed to make your own ZF6 cooler lines. I found the black fittings online pretty easily.

My less than stellar but totally sufficient sealing of the manual transmission tunnel cutout.

Fan shroud works.