Got me a project car :D

[Turkina]

Sounds like money could be made shipping low mileage used trucks to Australia via container ships since you do drive on the right side of the road.

Australia is left handed traffic (and right seat drive). I kept walking over to the passenger side of my rental car when I was down there :-/

[A_Pickle]

I like that it has a trailer hitch.

[AMD Damo]

Sounds like money could be made shipping low mileage used trucks to Australia via container ships since you do drive on the right side of the road.
Are US trucks/cars heavily taxed or prohibited ?

Shark tank pitch.

We drive on the left, and sit on the right, unfortunately.

Which is one of the reasons your trucks here are so damn expensive, as they're not made in RHD, F250/350 was made in RHD from the Brazil factory from 2001-2006, but it was pretty much your 1999 version of the Superduty the whole time, build quality is poor, they don't even have glove boxes, the aircon in them sucks, and they were prices from about $55,000 when they were new, then in 2006 they closed down the Brazil plant and we lost the F230/350, prices skyrocketed over night, the 7.3L V8s are still fetching $60-70K for a used one with 300,000km on the clock, they're popular with the caravan/trailer people because they can tow such a big load legally and do it with ease, and they're also popular with posers like me who want one for the sake of wanting one LOL.

The car was sold to a local government from factory, so it would have had a very hard life, I imagine that LSD would have had a workout, lol. Its actually got every service up to 170,000km stamped and done on time in its log book though, then it ended up going to the auctions and someone else had owned it, and carried out some minor work there because the front sway bar bushes are urethane, and it had some aftermarket copy 17" wheels on it, it ended up at the auctions again then the guy I bought it off, had bought it and drove it for a long time, eventually selling it to me.

The car would likely have been driven by senior management ie old fart who drives it like a granddad. The main thing about local govt cars is lots of short trips. They're generally not thrashed as that would soon get driver reprimanded. I'm a former LG officer who's beater is an EF formerly owned by LG.

Good to see you've made great progress. Still looking to convert to manual? I imagine you'd have spent quite a few $$$$'s already getting here!

Installing new power steering pump in my EF. I can't believe what local shops (Perth) want to charge me for a new pump $350-$450! Ordered a newie from Ebay for $120...

Was thinking heavily on the manual conversion, but now the car is worked with the latest addition of a head and cam package, with some goodies:

Fully serviced head
New heavy duty valve springs
Oversize exhaust valves
Minor & specific Porting
Reground stage 2a cam & shims
New vernier cam gear

The 2a cam is a low down torque type cam, something to give me strong low-mid range pull, so ideal for a cruisy luxury barge

The head has been shaved slightly and I've got an AU Falcon head gasket for it, which is half the thickness of the EL one, so slight bump in compression.

A company called TI Performance has reversed engineered the EEC-V engine management system in these things, to the extent they can adjust fuel, spark and even line pressures in the transmission, so the car will eventually go for a retune, with two fuel maps, one for regular 91, and one for premium 98 with line pressures in the transmission changed when the ECU sees over say 60% throttle, make it hold gears longer, shift quicker and harder to the next gear, but still be able to retain factory smooth shifts under 60% throttle.

Manual trans really wakes these things up, but I just can't be bothered changing out the tail shaft, take the dash out to change the pedal box to a manual one, reinforce the firewall for the clutch cable, because it cracks the firewall etc, so its easier just to buy go fast mods haha.

Yeah, the problem with getting work done at a workshop is they have a mark up on parts, a workshop I was working at was 40% on top of parts cost, even though we got it at trade prices not retail, add on the labour it takes to do the job and there is your price, the good thing about your own time is its free

I like that it has a trailer hitch.

Rated to 1600kg for this particular hitch, the car is actually capable of a maximum legal of 2300kg with the heavy duty hitch haha. I'll only be using it for a 6x4 trailer anyways.

[AMD Damo]

240,000km, smooth as a babies ass in the cylinders, no damage to pistons, no lip on the bore.

The head is fine but its being replaced anyway.

[AMD Damo]

Inspecting another vehicle this week, for another project as this one is nearly finished

Teaser photo:



You boys (and girls?) should be able to pick this one easily if you know your American vehicles

[AMD Damo]

Progress on the Falcon:



New head is on!

[JohnC]

Inspecting another vehicle this week, for another project as this one is nearly finished

Teaser photo:



You boys (and girls?) should be able to pick this one easily if you know your American vehicles

This is not "American" - teh steering column is totally on wrong side
Teh dashboard looks like it's from Chevy Tahoe or from similar GM's abomination made in late 90's...

[AMD Damo]

Booyah! GMC Sierra.

It used to be an Ambulance, then they decomissioned it and a company called "First Intervention" (which is a training company for paramedics/patient transport officers) bought it from Ambulance Victoria. They took off the rear box body and had a new one made up and refitted for training purposes, they're retiring it, I noticed it when it came into my workshop for some aircon work, so I had a look and fell in love.

I plan on either converting it into a pretty sweet camper van, or getting rid of the rear box body, whacking a tray on the back, 5 poster bull bar on the front with spot lights, two flag poles with a confederate and eureka flag on either side, alloy roll bar for the tray with more lights on top.

Hillbilly deluxe

[Captain Ned]

I plan on either converting it into a pretty sweet camper van, or getting rid of the rear box body, whacking a tray on the back, 5 poster bull bar on the front with spot lights, two flag poles with a confederate and eureka flag on either side, alloy roll bar for the tray with more lights on top.

Does the Eureka Flag have the same impact/connotation in Australia as the Confederate Battle Flag has here in the US?

Oh, and that box will make a totally sweet bush camper. Room for all sorts of stuff in that.

[AMD Damo]

I plan on either converting it into a pretty sweet camper van, or getting rid of the rear box body, whacking a tray on the back, 5 poster bull bar on the front with spot lights, two flag poles with a confederate and eureka flag on either side, alloy roll bar for the tray with more lights on top.

Does the Eureka Flag have the same impact/connotation in Australia as the Confederate Battle Flag has here in the US?

Oh, and that box will make a totally sweet bush camper. Room for all sorts of stuff in that.

Eureka flag signifies the battle between gold miners and the British colonial authority in the 1850s, because the government tried to introduce a miners license to tax gold mining, it was also a fight for conditions. Its also incorporated in the logos for various trade unions.

It pretty much symbolises protest and civil disobedience.



Unsure about the meaning of the confederate flag, other than it represented the southern states.

[Captain Ned]

Unsure about the meaning of the confederate flag, other than it represented the southern states.

Um, the Confederate flag, at least here in the US, is full-on R&P. I was simply wondering if the Eureka Flag had the same negative connotation in Australia.

[AMD Damo]

Unsure about the meaning of the confederate flag, other than it represented the southern states.

Um, the Confederate flag, at least here in the US, is full-on R&P. I was simply wondering if the Eureka Flag had the same negative connotation in Australia.

I just saw the movie "Lincoln".

Negative connotation indeed.

[AMD Damo]

Its been on the road for about a month:



Its in a shop at the moment for some ECU tuning and a dyno run

[AMD Damo]

Grandpa on his way to church, then a quick game of bingo afterwards:



Nothing modified under here?



Booyah! 138KW (185HP) at the rear tyres



Not bad, she goes alright

[JustAnEngineer]

138 kW ÷ 746 W/hp = 185 horsepower at the wheels

[Captain Ned]

Be nice to see the torque curves as well.

[JustAnEngineer]

Torque at the flywheel is pretty meaningless. You can derive it by dividing horsepower by rpm if you really must. If you need more torque to the drive wheels, just select a lower gear.

[Captain Ned]

You can derive it by dividing horsepower by rpm if you really must.

Um, the rollers on a chassis dyno measure torque and then derive HP through the formula adjusted for the gearing. HP is not a first-level measurement, it is a derived measurement. Torque can be measured directly, HP cannot.

HP means top-end speed. Torque measures how quickly you get there. In my mind I'll take torque over HP any day, since using the top-end speed promised by my engine's HP rating is a lot less likely than using the acceleration promised by its torque spec.

[JustAnEngineer]

Torque at the drive wheel divided by the height of the wheel gives you the force that will accelerate the vehicle. That's what you're after for acceleration (Newton's second law tells us that acceleration is equal to force divided by mass).

Torque at the drive wheel is equal to torque at the engine crankshaft multiplied by the overall drive ratio (less some frictional losses). Therefore, if you select a higher gear ratio, you get more torque at the drive wheels without changing the torque generated by the engine. That's why it's not the engine torque that matters but its power (torque multiplied by rpm).

Looking at AMD Damo's power curve, we can see that the red "tuned" line develops more horsepower at lower speed. Since he didn't change the gear ratio, that means that the engine is producing more torque at those rpms. However, the peak engine torque is still unimportant. What matters is that he's created a broader rpm band where the engine is producing good power.

If you're driving a vehicle with widely-spaced transmission gear ratios, developing more power at low rpm is important for acceleration because you have to use a wider range of engine speeds between shifts. If you've got more closely-spaced gears, then low power output on the left side of the curve doesn't matter. You just select the gear that puts the engine into the rpm range that generates good power. Given the choice between the 8-speed transmission in a 2007 or newer Lexus LS460 or the lazy old 3-speed transmissions that were common 35 to 55 years ago, you're a lot more likely to be able to keep the engine in a good part of the power (or efficiency) curve with a decent number of gears to choose from.

Peak engine torque is only important if you're designing the engine mounts (and the frame that has to support those forces) or if you assume that it's impossible to change the overall drive ratio.


P.S.: A bit of Googling turned up the specifications of the stock 4.0L in-line 6:

4.0L 6 cyl (Fairmont Ghia)
Bore and stroke: 93 x 99 mm
Power: 162kW at 4900rpm
Torque: 361Nm at 3000rpm
Overhead camshaft, 2 valves per cylinder
Fuel system: EEC V fuel injection
Compression ratio: 9.3:1

[AMD Damo]

Before all the modifications they put out around 100kw at the wheels when they get to this age, so we're going alright.

I asked for torque curves as well but they couldn't get it to stay in 3rd gear (1:1), it kept kicking back down to 2nd gear when they were running it up on the dyno, so they could only show me power unfortunately.

Its pretty slow off the line, its only 4sp auto and its very tall geared, but if you boot it and you're already moving it moves along pretty well. I think 1st gear is screwed as well as it makes a really loud whining noise.

My intake side of the engine is 100% stock (airbox, intake snorkel and intake pipe) besides the head work obviously, they said if I wanted to there is easily a few more ponies to be unlocked there if I wanted to improve that side, but I want to keep it looking standard, thats why I had the heat shield made up to cover the damn bright blue extractors.

These are fairly torquey engines anyway.

If it was manual it would be so much better, these 4sp autos are crap.

EDIT:

I just busted a tyre on my Focus daily driver, PSSSSSHHHHHHH, front right tyre, punched a gate peg through it driving out of a mates place, its 11pm, its dark, tomorrow is Sunday, I limped 400m down the road on a dead flat tyre, got out of my car, I'll take the wheel off tomorrow and see if a tyre joint is open.

[AMD Damo]

[Captain Ned]

P.S.: A bit of Googling turned up the specifications of the stock 4.0L in-line 6:

4.0L 6 cyl (Fairmont Ghia)
Bore and stroke: 93 x 99 mm
Power: 162kW at 4900rpm
Torque: 361Nm at 3000rpm
Overhead camshaft, 2 valves per cylinder
Fuel system: EEC V fuel injection
Compression ratio: 9.3:1

In shade-tree speak, 217hp and 266 ft/lb stock. Not bad for a 246ci I6.

[JustAnEngineer]

http://blog.caranddriver.com/quoth-the- ... acilities/

[AMD Damo]

People here in Victoria are quite angry with Ford Detroit at the moment. Its not just the 1200 people out of work from Ford, its all their little suppliers.

Ford Australia is the canary in the underground mine, Toyota and Holden will eventually follow.

[Synchromesh]

I just don't understand this fascination with investing all this money into a grandpamobile with auto tranny. It's like hotrodding a beige Taurus or Camry - you could but what's the point? I'd much rather save all this money and buy a car that's designed to go fast from the get go. And the ambulance? Don't even get me started there. But to each his own I guess.

Also, 217hp from 4L is hardly impressive nowadays. My 2.5 turbo engine makes 265hp stock and with a simple ECU reflash it can do near 300hp.

[Captain Ned]

My 2.5 turbo engine makes 265hp stock and with a simple ECU reflash it can do near 300hp.

And a Legacy GT Premium down under (Liberty GT for Aussies) has an MSRP of $58,000 AUD/$56,140 USD. I paid $32K USD for my GT Limited (trim level not offered in Australia) in 2009. Given the hoon laws I'd be surprised if Cobb even sells in Australia.

[Waco]

Also, 217hp from 4L is hardly impressive nowadays. My 2.5 turbo engine makes 265hp stock and with a simple ECU reflash it can do near 300hp.

Did you miss the part where it's cheap and reliable?

[ludi]

I just don't understand this fascination with investing all this money into a grandpamobile with auto tranny. It's like hotrodding a beige Taurus or Camry - you could but what's the point?

It really annoys the ricers, that's why For a while I drove a 1994 Camry with the 4cyl and 5spd manual. Not a fast car by any stretch, but the (uncommon) manual tranny made it quicker off the line than most Civics.

[JohnC]

I just don't understand this fascination with investing all this money into a grandpamobile with auto tranny. It's like hotrodding a beige Taurus or Camry - you could but what's the point?

It really annoys the ricers, that's why For a while I drove a 1994 Camry with the 4cyl and 5spd manual. Not a fast car by any stretch, but the (uncommon) manual tranny made it quicker off the line than most Civics.

Why bother trying to annoy them? Just ignore such people. I never try to play racing games with anyone on public roads - not in my past cars, not in my newer ones. Unless, of course, you went to a track with it...

[Captain Ned]

I just don't understand this fascination with investing all this money into a grandpamobile with auto tranny. It's like hotrodding a beige Taurus or Camry

Think of the original automotive Q-ship, the 1989 Taurus SHO. Easy to miss the subtle badging and assume it another appliance car until the light changed.