Thread: P38 HSE: Powered by Ford

Ok, so I have collected the donor engine. It's out of a '98 Ford Fairlane and has 300000km on it. After I brought it home and put it onto a stand, I stripped it down. Sludge everywhere, bodgy factory fitment of a piston and worn out big end bearings. The bores were still good but I'm not taking any chances.

The idea is to use the existing ZF4HP24 and use a Australian LH starter bellhousing off a Ford V8, anything from EB-AU. The gearbox is good for 450NM so it should be ok if I'm gentle and keep it cool. Time will tell anyway.

I picked up the Ford bellhousing and a spare ZF4HP22 out of a Disco 1(thanks Allfourx4). I could then use the spare gearbox to dummy up the Ford and see what sort of adapter to make.

Disco 1 ZF:


Now with the Ford bellhousing:

I ran into a bit of a hurdle. The 4.6 thor V8 torque converter wouldn't fit inside the donor bellhousing. Now I have to make it fit. The alloy that I take out will have sheet aluminium welded back in. The end of the bellhousing will have a machined disc welded in with matching ZF holes. Progress thus far on the bell:

The ruler says 40mm. It should be closer to 20mm:


dummied up minus the bellhousing:


Let the grinding begin:

While I'm waiting to have the adapter pieces machined, I thought I rip out the motor. Much easier doing a Rangie than a Disco 2 let me tell you. The not so old motor has a few oil leaks and a coolant leak from the corner of the headgasket. I'll likely give it a freshen up with some new gaskets etc and sell it off.

Out she comes:

I don't want to put a dampner on your project, but is it really worth it?

The thor is around 390nm and 150/160kw.
According to this site your almost breaking even http://www.f150hub.com/specs/302.html

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All good benji, the motor is being stroked to 347ci or 5.7L. Iron heads for now to keep the engineer happy then some alloy heads and a Ford 4 speed auto later on.

Got a adapter disc machined up by a mate on his toy.



Now fitted to the ZF4HP24 in the rangie.

It sticks out by a bit, 21mm more than the original but the placement is better for the donor engine.





Two looms. Range Rover above that's been stripped and the Ford V8 EECV loom below it.