81 Black Magic
I have finally gotten far enough along in my mock up to share my plans for my 81 Black Magic. The car was originally a 200ci 6cyl auto. A PO had already swapped out the original k-member to one from an 87+ Mustang.
My goals for this car is to make it my hotrod/toy. One of the reasons I like Capri's so much is they are not seen every where and aren't what every one expects. With that said, this brings me to my drive train choice for this build.
The engine I selected is a 400. The goal is to fit it under the stock hood without having to put spacers between the k-member and body. Once I decided to use a 400, I started looking for and engine. Being somewhat bored one day I was looking through the free items on Craigslist and there was a 400 and C6 listed. I called the gentleman up and arranged to pick it up. about 2hrs later I arrived at his house, backed my truck up to his shop and took possession of my engine/trans.
Mockup started with the oil pan. I looked at swap pans for 351C, took their dimensions and started doing some measuring. The aftermarket pans did not allow me to set the engine as low as I wanted nor did I care for the price. My solution was to take the 400 pan and marry it to a 5.0 pan. This way I can get a pan that has the profile I need and will still fit the chassis. Unfortunately I did not document this portion of the mod but I will try to explain what I had to do to put this together.
The work on the pans started with cutting the sump and the remainder of the bottom on the 400 pan. Next I measured and cut the sumps off the 5.0 pan. The widths of the pans were fairly close however the 5.0 pan was about 1/2 in. shorter. The 400's oil pump is also larger than the 5.0's. To address the length issue I ended up cutting the pan in two, tack welded the back of the 5.0 pan to the 400 pan. I then tacked the front part of the 5.0 pan to the 400's pan and started to work the front sump to clear the oil pump while still clearing the k-member. Once I had everything where I wanted it, I welded it up. It was much more involved than it sounds but I now present to you "Franken Pan"
I'm not real happy with my welds but it has been almost 20 yrs since I welded anything and it will clean up OK. Besides, I need the practice before I tackle the roof replacement.
The next parts I acquired fir this build was the headers. My original thought was to cut the flanges of a set of 5.0 headers and weld them to some Cleavland flanges. So I picked up some factory 5.0 headers for the mock up. The more I looked at the headers I had, the more I realized they won't meet the needs of the engine. Once again back to Craigslist for another set that will fit my needs better. I was able to find a set of headers for a 351C in a 67-69 Mustang. Off I go on another jaunt to pick them up. The guy I got them from had a sweet 351C powered Comet.
As I started mocking up a stock 87 k-member I realized this would take a lot of work rebuilding the k-member just to get motor mounts to work the way I wanted. As I pondered this I remembered reading that the 96+ k-members dropped the engine lower in the chassis. As luck would have it, I was able to score a k-member from a 96 Cobra. Comparing the 96 to the 87, the engine pads are located further to the rear on the 96 which places them in line with the truck motor mounts I purchased for the 400. Beneath the factory mount slots were two .60" holes which I slotted an additional .95" so the k-member would fit on the motor mounts.
I will have to do some work to the headers but for the most part they fit fairly well.
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Originally Posted by mustangxtreme
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