Quality control in 1973

7173Mustangs.com

Help Support 7173Mustangs.com:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Dec 4, 2014
Messages
477
Reaction score
20
Location
Az
My Car
1971 Mach 1 restored in the original light pewter metallic with TMI interior and custom stereo from Pacific Car Audio
When we tore down the 351C 2V in our 73 Cougar a few years back we were a bit surprised to find this

xc2o00.jpg


The passenger's side exhaust manifold was blocked from the factory. For the first 115k miles of its life this poor thing had to breathe out through the crossover in the intake and out the driver's side manifold. This lead to a cracked head and intake manifold. We were able to find a date code correct head on eBay and we replaced the intake with a Edelbrock Performer 4v. We also changed out to a dual exhaust. Still by no means a performance car, at least she can finally breathe

 
Last edited by a moderator:
I've sen a lot of strange factory mistakes but that is a first for me. Thanks for posting. Chuck

 
yes, a forging problem. 95% or so blocked. The open space was about the size of a nickel if it was sideways

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Good find.

That used to be a problem with those exhaust manifold heat riser valves. They would get carbon'd up and remain closed and block off the exhaust. A buddy had one go bad like this on his 65 Buick LeSabre. I thought something was funny when he would rev the engine and some smoke/dust would flash up across the heat crossover on the intake manifold. Was blocked with about 1/8" of carbon.

 
This had nothing to do with carbon, this was slag from when the manifold was manufactured. No heat riser valve involved

 
Back
Top