MuscleTang mod project thread (1971 M-Mach 1)

Are you using synthetic gear oil in the differential? I lost two gear sets on a road course. Switched to synthetic and had no more gear set failures. I know this cooler works, my son has it on his S550. https://www.lethalperformance.com/f...DSaqFcfWWI-5jQ3bMhLccjziiKx6XpZUaAgx5EALw_wcB Obviously fabrication is required. Chuck

AcesArneson said:

I wonder if perhaps your heat issues aren’t coming from your brakes. The facts that you are super-heating your gear fluid so high could be breaking it down and not protecting your bearings. I have seen some cars in Motorsport add baffles to force air into the middle of disk brakes to help heat flow through the internal vents and cool the brakes quicker. If you can get the heat away from your breaks you can prolong the life of your bearings.
Additionally do you find your brakes spongy after heating up? If your bearings are toast that same heat is also destroying your brake fluid. Lots of guys in motor cross will bleed their brakes and add new fluid between races to get rid of water in the brake fluid which impedes brake pressure.

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Sorry, but I never said that my brakes are heating up. Actually the rear brakes stay relatively cool and I have been increasing the bias. So far I have no issues with brake fading or anything. I don't think that the rear axle oil is over heating., but I will not know for sure until I measure the temperature. From what I hear what is happening is not abnormal in track cars so that's why race cars use the catch can for the axle oil. It makes sense. Hot oil increases the level, reduces the viscosity. Then higher speeds turn the gears faster which pushes the oil around and up the breather. My bearings are sealed and have their own grease so they don't depend on the axle oil.

c9zx said:

Are you using synthetic gear oil in the differential? I lost two gear sets on a road course. Switched to synthetic and had no more gear set failures. I know this cooler works, my son has it on his S550. https://www.lethalperformance.com/f...DSaqFcfWWI-5jQ3bMhLccjziiKx6XpZUaAgx5EALw_wcB Obviously fabrication is required. Chuck

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My center section is from Strange and they actually recommend non-synthetic. I don't know why but now that we are talking I may shoot an email inquiring. Interesting cooler but I won't go that far until I can measure the temperature. I don't think I have an over heating issue. In track days you may have 15-20 minutes sessions before a break (including warm up and cool down laps), which is different than a race car where you can go around a lot longer.

Today it was time to finish the rag joint upgrade project. I wanted to fabricate a steering coupler that eliminated the elasticity from the rubber rag joint, but I still want it to have some give. I fabricated a hybrid coupler with the rubber rag joint and a 1/8" aluminum plate. Since it was thicker than stock I couldn't use the pins because the threads were short. However, with the aluminum plate I shouldn't need the pins, but I still used a longer bolt for the sake of it. As for materials, I used my old coupler, got a 3.25" aluminum washer in Amazon and used 5/16" Grade 8 bolts for hardware (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09N38Q2PP?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details). I had to remove the riveted pins from the coupler with a grinder. It could be painted, but I am not too concerned about its looks as long as it functions. Testing will have to wait until the Spring.
The theory of my design is that the aluminum plate would eliminate any rotating elasticity but the rubber coupler will allow some flex in the shaft direction. If there is any flex between the steering gear and column the u-joint of the tilt column should be able to handle it.

Here you can see an article about the Ultimate Street Car Challenge at Road America by Hot Rod. If you scroll through the pictures you will find me:
https://www.motortrend.com/events/2...e-streetcar-race-results-road-america/photos/


I had already posted about my experience running this event:
https://7173mustangs.com/threads/re...his-past-weekend-6-30-2024.45122/#post-454870

Your car looks nice in that turn!

Making it easy. Nice!

Done a lot of little things this year. I already posted about the new CHI 4V heads here: https://7173mustangs.com/threads/chi-4v-heads-report.45478/
I also upgraded my brakes to even bigger brakes. Now I am running the Wilwood 14" kit: https://www.wilwood.com/BrakeKits/B...=Ford&model=Mustang&option=Disc+Brake+Spindle
I didn't get to overheat my 12" kit on track and would have probably been okay, I don't want to find out so I want the extra insurance of bigger and thicker rotors. Off course, on the downside this added 7 lbs of rotating mass to each wheel. More mass now that will take longer to heat.

Then, I have had a dual oil temp/pressure gauge for a while but it was under the dash and it was hard to see. I also wanted to have a fuel pressure gauge inside the car instead of the one under the hood. So as I was thinking of where to install them, I started looking at the center console clock which never got to work. A light went off and perfect. I can place it there without permanently destroying anything. I removed the clock and build a panel from black ABS that I had leftover from another project. I had to trim the face of the clock console to fit the ABS panel so I did this on my "spare" clock console I had laying around. I got a second dual gauge for fuel pressure. These gauges are from SPA and are awesome! I got angled gauge rings (AUTO METER 2234), drilled the ABS panel and installed the two SPA dual gauges. Now I had a "problem". I have an extra temp gauge with no real use, but I quickly remembered that I always wanted to know at what temp is the differential fluid running at. I know it gets very hot on the track. Although not ideal, I placed the temperature sender on the filler plug. Here it will certainly get wet when the oil is splashing all over at speed. Since I was doing this I thought why not measure the transmission oil temp as well (snowball effect!). It is as "simple" as getting an extra temp sender for the filler plug (eventually will move to the drain plug once I replace the fluid this winter). I wired them to a switch that I installed on the ABS panel. Now with this switch I can select transmission or differential fluid temp. I have a track day tomorrow after which I will be reporting how hot each oil gets.

Following up my last post here is a report on temperatures. After 20 minutes on track the engine oil temp got to about 240, diff temp to about 240 and trans temp to about 210. I think these are very reasonable after pushing it very hard. Granted that I was not looking at those gauges all the time but those are the max I saw towards the end of the session. I did about 10 laps toping at 118 mph on the straight. The brakes were amazing and did not flinch!
Needless to say, very happy!

tony-muscle said:

Following up my last post here is a report on temperatures. After 20 minutes on track the engine oil temp got to about 240, diff temp to about 240 and trans temp to about 210. I think these are very reasonable after pushing it very hard. Granted that I was not looking at those gauges all the time but those are the max I saw towards the end of the session. I did about 10 laps toping at 118 mph on the straight. The brakes were amazing and did not flinch!
Needless to say, very happy!

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Tony your fluid temps are very, very close to mine after some hard driving. My engine oil & differential drops from about 240 degrees down to about 200-210 while cruising.

Cleveland Crush said:

Tony your fluid temps are very, very close to mine after some hard driving. My engine oil & differential drops from about 240 degrees down to about 200-210 while cruising.

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Thanks! good to have another data point. That's a great temp. With synthetic it should be fine the whole day! I don't see the need for an oil cooler. However, in two weeks I will be in the big track so I will keep an eye on temps there!

I didn't realize the differential oil gets that hot on normal cruising.

basstrix said:

I didn't realize the differential oil gets that hot on normal cruising.

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Many variables to rear end temps (gear ratio, manufacturer, gear oil weight, setup clearances). About 140-200 degrees is what I've personally seen on Ford 9's in normal driving.

For my racing adventures I wanted to add a shift light to keep me focused ahead. I wanted a sequential shift light since i not always shift at the red line. I eventually found the Cartek Club. It is small, easy to program and sequential. I also wanted to mount it temporarily to be used only for races. I always go great lengths to hide my mods. I already use our incredible metal dashtop to place magnets holding various devices so it made sense that i place it right on the dashpad in front of me. For that i used magnet tape. After thinking for a while on what to do with the wiring I came up with using a USB plug to connect the shift light through a USB female plug hidden un the defrost vent. I epoxied it in place and made a hole for the wires. Not visible unless you really look for it and easy to plug once i want the shift light out.

I like your shift light, much better than mine. Similar gauge panel too. I made mine out of metal and the gauge brackets hold it together.

cjstaci said:

I like your shift light, much better than mine. Similar gauge panel too. I made mine out of metal and the gauge brackets hold it together.

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Your gauge panel looks much better than mine. You even kept the original chrome outline I had to cut about 1/4" from the panel front to create a gap between the gauges and shifter. The angle bezel of the gauges make them protrude a good distance from the panel. I even cut the angle bezel to have them as flush as possible. I forgot to mention it above.