Fourth Horseman
05-10-2004, 10:18 PM
Somebody stole my car... and replaced it with one that looks exactly the same but performs so much better! :banana:
Picked up my car from Butterfield Ford after work and brought it right home. Gapped my new colder Motorcraft plugs to what the shop manual recommends and what the factory plugs were set to (0.053), and got them all installed. Drained the coolant system (decided not to mess with clamping hoses) and swapped in my new 180 deg thermostat and refilled the coolant system. Quick start and run to make sure all cylinders firing and no leakes in coolant system after run up to temp. All good.
Broke out the SCT tuner and followed instructions to load the custom program from Dennis. Everything went very smooth. Whole procedure took me about 2 hours including clean up.
Results? I'm very pleased! Everything said by those of you who blazed the trail ahead of me is very true. This is how the car should have come out of the factory. The choice of 4.10 gears is perfect for me. Is it a huge difference? No. It's nothing that'd make you mistake the car for an SVT Mustang Cobra. But that's not what I was after. What I wanted, and what I got, was crisper, more responsive acceleration. The real bonus, for me, is what the tune did for the transmission. It shifts perfect now. I love how it actually spends time in 3rd gear now, instead of making the panic rush to 4th. :) The shifts are firmer, crisper and more positive. I haven't had a chance to push the car too hard yet, so I can't comment much on any power gains. I'm not sure I could feel them over the gear change anyway. But so far, the overall effect is a very positive one.
I'm thrilled. Thanks to all on the forums for your help and recommendations and to Dennis for the parts and the great program.
:banana: :banana: :banana:
(Sorry for the long post, but I'm pretty excited)
Picked up my car from Butterfield Ford after work and brought it right home. Gapped my new colder Motorcraft plugs to what the shop manual recommends and what the factory plugs were set to (0.053), and got them all installed. Drained the coolant system (decided not to mess with clamping hoses) and swapped in my new 180 deg thermostat and refilled the coolant system. Quick start and run to make sure all cylinders firing and no leakes in coolant system after run up to temp. All good.
Broke out the SCT tuner and followed instructions to load the custom program from Dennis. Everything went very smooth. Whole procedure took me about 2 hours including clean up.
Results? I'm very pleased! Everything said by those of you who blazed the trail ahead of me is very true. This is how the car should have come out of the factory. The choice of 4.10 gears is perfect for me. Is it a huge difference? No. It's nothing that'd make you mistake the car for an SVT Mustang Cobra. But that's not what I was after. What I wanted, and what I got, was crisper, more responsive acceleration. The real bonus, for me, is what the tune did for the transmission. It shifts perfect now. I love how it actually spends time in 3rd gear now, instead of making the panic rush to 4th. :) The shifts are firmer, crisper and more positive. I haven't had a chance to push the car too hard yet, so I can't comment much on any power gains. I'm not sure I could feel them over the gear change anyway. But so far, the overall effect is a very positive one.
I'm thrilled. Thanks to all on the forums for your help and recommendations and to Dennis for the parts and the great program.
:banana: :banana: :banana:
(Sorry for the long post, but I'm pretty excited)