ScottyDsntKnow
Veteran CEG'er
Hi all, beed gone awhile AGAIN... My current saga started when the transmisison speedo sensor in my CSVT broke at the shaft, lodged in my transmission and the sensor housing would not come out, the little release pin was jammed so I let the thing sit for a few months trying different things to get the piece out or the housing out since it was not my DD then the car sat for a few more months, then life happened and between a few moves it sat some more. FINALLY got around to it again and was getting ready to get a 3L, mod the 3L and turn it into a road racer/fun weekend car and then a literally MINT condition modded 1998 GT Mustang fell into my lap for cheap and the CSVT sat some more while I played with that GT and then I got deployed for 3 months... yeah...
Finally, when I got back, I decided to just drive the car as is with a digital gps speedo as my DD since I sold my last DD and low and behold it won't start and has a VERY hard time even turning over. One of the battery cables actually started smoking after being on it for only 5 or 6 seconds... no idea. Well I need this car back up and running as a DD and if I'm going to do the motor its going to be a 3L, going to put MSDS headers on it since the header cats are probably clogged up and while that is all out I'll be able to have plenty of room to get that stupid piece of plastic out of my speedo sensor housing...
Long and the short of it is, I need to do the 3L swap on the cheap as cheap as possible while still doing it right. This means a Taurus engine, no Nautilus adapter plates, I would like not to deal with doing any home porting with the bugzukis if possible and don't want to have to get a tune either so that means the straight 3L is out too am I right? Does this leave the Hybrid as my best option? I would like to keep the SVT cams in whatever motor I do and I've done head swaps before on Mustangs no issue. A few headgaskets and some ARP bolts should not run very much at all for a duratec and I have all the tools. The car is not going to be meant to set the world on fire, all I want to do is get it back up and running with the 3L, the speedo working again and call it good as my DD so future modifications are not a huge concern as far as the motor. So as long as everything bolts right back up and I can just swap all the 2.5L stuff over to the 3L (minus the balancer IIRC, I have to read back up on the swap) is that the easiest or am I wanting to do the bugzuki porting and just deal with it on a port matched jobber?
Sorry for the novel, I'm just wanting to get this done fast as I currently drive an Expedition 60 miles round trip each day and the gas is KILLING me, my CSVT got 28mpg hand calculated and was alot more fun to drive in too... I miss it...
Or am I overthinking this whole thing and my 2.5L might be salvagable? I dunno the motor did not want to turn over and when I put a brand new batter in there... like I said it sounded like it was struggling and the cable started smoking. I've had weak/bad starters before but they just didn't turn the motor over, they didn't draw a crapton of current and start the cable smoking... I'm going to put a new starter into the 2.5L and check all the wiring/grounds but I'm kind of looking for an excuse to do the 3L anyway. At least if I do get the 2.5L running first it'll make the 3L swap that much easier plus I need to pull the motor to do the headers and get at the stupid speedo sensor from the top.
Finally, when I got back, I decided to just drive the car as is with a digital gps speedo as my DD since I sold my last DD and low and behold it won't start and has a VERY hard time even turning over. One of the battery cables actually started smoking after being on it for only 5 or 6 seconds... no idea. Well I need this car back up and running as a DD and if I'm going to do the motor its going to be a 3L, going to put MSDS headers on it since the header cats are probably clogged up and while that is all out I'll be able to have plenty of room to get that stupid piece of plastic out of my speedo sensor housing...
Long and the short of it is, I need to do the 3L swap on the cheap as cheap as possible while still doing it right. This means a Taurus engine, no Nautilus adapter plates, I would like not to deal with doing any home porting with the bugzukis if possible and don't want to have to get a tune either so that means the straight 3L is out too am I right? Does this leave the Hybrid as my best option? I would like to keep the SVT cams in whatever motor I do and I've done head swaps before on Mustangs no issue. A few headgaskets and some ARP bolts should not run very much at all for a duratec and I have all the tools. The car is not going to be meant to set the world on fire, all I want to do is get it back up and running with the 3L, the speedo working again and call it good as my DD so future modifications are not a huge concern as far as the motor. So as long as everything bolts right back up and I can just swap all the 2.5L stuff over to the 3L (minus the balancer IIRC, I have to read back up on the swap) is that the easiest or am I wanting to do the bugzuki porting and just deal with it on a port matched jobber?
Sorry for the novel, I'm just wanting to get this done fast as I currently drive an Expedition 60 miles round trip each day and the gas is KILLING me, my CSVT got 28mpg hand calculated and was alot more fun to drive in too... I miss it...
Or am I overthinking this whole thing and my 2.5L might be salvagable? I dunno the motor did not want to turn over and when I put a brand new batter in there... like I said it sounded like it was struggling and the cable started smoking. I've had weak/bad starters before but they just didn't turn the motor over, they didn't draw a crapton of current and start the cable smoking... I'm going to put a new starter into the 2.5L and check all the wiring/grounds but I'm kind of looking for an excuse to do the 3L anyway. At least if I do get the 2.5L running first it'll make the 3L swap that much easier plus I need to pull the motor to do the headers and get at the stupid speedo sensor from the top.
