Jesse builds a Cobra #10,008 - Full of hot air

[CaptB]

What Chopper said is correct. Mine are even a little more weird as I have silver ceramic coated 302 headers and raw steal catalytic converters. With the hood open you only really notice the headers and it makes no real difference. Unless it really bothers the builder or it's a show car it probably doesn't matter.

I think I'll ride the train for now. I can always pull headers later and have them redone. Thanks!

[BadAsp427]

Looks great.. congratulations...

[460.465USMC]

Really enjoyed watching your build come together, Jesse. Appreciate you sharing all the good info. along the way. Hope you stick around the forum and continue to help us guys still plugging along. Maybe we'll cross paths someday. Would be so cool to see it in person. Glad you and your wife are enjoying it together.

P.S. Cool license plate!

[Blitzboy54]

Really enjoyed watching your build come together, Jesse. Appreciate you sharing all the good info. along the way. Hope you stick around the forum and continue to help us guys still plugging along. Maybe we'll cross paths someday. Would be so cool to see it in person. Glad you and your wife are enjoying it together.

P.S. Cool license plate!

Thanks so much Chris, There is no chance in H E double hockey sticks I'm going to miss the open house next year.

Keep up the good work!

[danmas]

Your build is pretty inspirational. I love it. Got my kit on order and expect it in May of 23. I am dropping in a 427 stage 1 from Blueprint and I hope I can come close to what you have achieved. Its quite simply gorgeous.

[Blitzboy54]

Your build is pretty inspirational. I love it. Got my kit on order and expect it in May of 23. I am dropping in a 427 stage 1 from Blueprint and I hope I can come close to what you have achieved. Its quite simply gorgeous.

Thank you so much! I really appreciate the kind words. Feel free to reach out if there is anything I can do to help.





Reminds me I have a updated photos

[danmas]

I haven't read through your entire build thread yet, so I apologize if its already listed, but, where or how did you get your exhaust black? Did you order them that way or did you aftermarket treat them?

Also, what wheels? I like them a lot...Any links you might have.

[Blitzboy54]

I purchased the standard mild steel pipes and had them ceramic coated. Most powder coat shops can do it. I got the wheels from LMR. Link below


https://lmr.com/item/WTK-1007UBSR/mu...t555r-17x9-105

[Blitzboy54]

I've been struggling to have my cake and eat it too when it comes to my heater. The original problem is this, on my intake manifold I have 2 ports that have direct access to the coolant flow. One of those spots is being used by my Holley Sniper temperature gauge. This is vital as the engine temp is one of the 2 inputs the Sniper uses to manage the engine. In the other port I originally put a brass tee in and duel purposed it to both feed my heater core and run my water temp gauge in the cockpit. This "worked' but my cockpit gauge would read 20 degrees too low. It needs to be directly in the coolant flow to read properly and I really want it to be accurate.

So to solve that problem I quite ingeniously replaced my thermostat housing with one that had a threaded port and moved my heater corp input to that spot. I figured once the thermostat was open I would have all the hot water I needed to run the heater. Except I am a dope and didn't realize the thermostat constantly opens and closes. I thought once it was open it stayed that way, it doesn't. So the heat worked great then it didn't, then it did, and then it didn't (and so on).

In order to get everything to work I decided to do something a little different. The thermostat has a bypass loop that runs engine hot at all times. It's a short 90 degree bend. I decided to remove and modify it.



I figured there was just enough space to make and extended loop that also serves to feed the heater core. It's tight but everything fits





It turns out this works exactly as I hoped. The heater runs strong and now that it's fall in the Northeast it is critical that this be the case as the co pilot is loving the warm cockpit. Also speaking of fall we got out in the fall colors just before the leaves drop.

[Fman]

If your looking for one more heat source for a cold day drive I picked up 12volt electric blanket for my wife, actually works pretty good to help keep your boss warm and happy... only draws 5 amps

https://www.amazon.com/Lifetivity-Ma...3d670b6bc&th=1

and your car sure is looking good

[DW66]

Your car looks great. Also living in the North East I strongly recommend the soft top. The top is a game changer. Turn on the heat and go.[ATTACH=CONFIG]174104

[Blitzboy54]

If your looking for one more heat source for a cold day drive I picked up 12volt electric blanket for my wife, actually works pretty to help keep your boss warm and happy... only draws 5 amps

https://www.amazon.com/Lifetivity-Ma...3d670b6bc&th=1

and your car sure is looking good

That's genius!!! Ordering now

[Blitzboy54]

Your car looks great. Also living in the North East I strongly recommend the soft top. The top is a game changer. Turn on the heat and go.[ATTACH=CONFIG]174104

Agreed. They were not available for a while and not in the budget for right now. My oldest is starting college next fall so I will have to save up. But it's definitely in the long term plan

[460.465USMC]

Nice resolution on the heater. I imagine it will pay big dividends with your better half.

I'm still not tired of looking at your beautiful car. Such a great paint color. And, that last shot with the trees and changing colors in the background is money! Is F5 still doing the POM? It would make a great Oct. or Nov. POM.

[Blitzboy54]

Like any project you learn some stuff from (pardon the pun) kicking the tires. I like most people that do this have a quiet list of things I would do differently if I ever do it again. I have about 2500 miles on her now and wanted to take the opportunity make some adjustments. First I can't say enough how fun this car is to drive. It's like getting into and driving a motorcycle. That's the best way I can describe it. Only it handles better. Its simply fantastic and this thing has given me one more reason to hate winter. The good news is it gives me time to work on it.

Issue one: The oil filter relocation kit. I used the kit because I built the car with Mustang headers. The problem is I could never get it not to leak. In order to make it tight enough not to seep oil the inputs and outputs would line up in a way that made it funtionally useless. I bit the bullet and purchased the 90 adapter from Ford. Very well made piece that's easy to use/install and best of all it works! No more leaks.



Issue two: Drive Shaft Safety Loop. I never installed one. By the time I discovered why I needed one I was already on the road. I purchased an inexpensive universal from Summit but it required me to make some modifications. That's not a problem right up until I needed tools I don't own to make it work. At that point simply purchasing the Metco unit made more sense. So thats what I did. It took all of 15 minutes to install the only issue is my car is on jack stands. The hoop goes right over the spot that I put my jack to get the back of the car down. Not complete sure what I am going to do yet. the metal will flex back and forth but I don't want to scratch the frame. I need to find a piece of wood or rubber to slide in between that I can get out once the car is back on the ground.





Issue three: Fuel lines. When you first purchase your kit (at least in my case) I had spent a lot of money up front. So from that point on I had to be careful about what upgrades I wanted and what ones I didn't want to spend the money on. The Sniper came with an external fuel pump and CPE flexible fuel lines. They are connected with 6AN nipple fittings with external worm drive clamps. I mounted the pump under the passenger seat and hated it. It's loud and annoying. I installed a submersible and bypassed it. It was an ugly mess under the car and I wanted to clean it up. Late fall I had a fuel leak from one of the fittings and decided I had seen enough. I decided to upgrade to SS lines.



If anyone wants this pump despite my "endorsement" reach out. Happy send it to you.

[Blitzboy54]

I had extended the pump power to the back fuel tank for the new pump. I took the opportunity to pull it back out and route it properly through the transmission tunnel. Much cleaner now. Next was getting to work on the lines. The line comes in a coil. I couldn't find any straight pieces. So I did the best I could. Not my best work but it's functional and is a vast improvement from the previous setup and now a lot cleaner.









In the engine bay I made braided fittings. As documented in another post the regulator on my Sniper failed. After speaking to Holley I decided the best long term solution was to remove it and install an external regulator. This is what I did. I have the gauge in to setup the pressure. I plan to drive it a few times to make sure it holds then I will back it out and install a plug. That's the reason I didn't bother to fight with it to get the gauge to sit upright. Just doesn't matter, it's temporary. I do like the look of the regulator though. Now everything North of the rear axle has a proper AN or compression fitting.

[Blitzboy54]

FULL OF HOT AIR

One issue I noticed last driving season was engine heat in the cockpit. I fully insulated the cockpit and I have found that worked as hoped. There is a little warmness but myself and passenger are largely protected. EXCEPT, in the case of warm air pushing its way through the vents. So when the engine heats up it creates a lot of hot air. When the car is in motion air enters the engine bay and pushes that hot air out through this





Then pushes itself through the FFR provided vents which ends up on my lap. I turn them away but it still makes my lap and foot well hot.





This blow through effect has been talked about in the past. Some folks have covered the inlet to the heater. I saw one guy build a box around it with a valve that opens and closes (pretty sweet but can't find the thread). I decided to purchased closable vents. Finding these in 2" form was more of a challenge than I expected but find them I did (link below).

https://www.oldairproducts.com/produ...er-2-duct-hose



I am pleased to report these work exactly as I had hoped. They effectively block the warm air pushing through. On a side note, in a real head slapper moment I was playing with the FFR provided vents I removed and discovered this. If you turn them 180 degrees they do the same thing. DOH!!! So you can just do that if you prefer.





Lastly I installed in the build push button turn signals using an SDC Module. This uses a momentary button input to start and potentially stop the directional. They self cancel on a timer depending on how long you hold the button down. I got the idea from Papa's build and I really like the concept, for me though I ran into a couple issues. First is these cars have stiff suspension. When your bouncing around a bit and often double tap the button. This cancels them. Also at slightly longer lights I would have to check in to make sure I had them on long enough. At the end of the day I was spending a lot of time making sure my signals were working right and I didn't want to. I already have the dash laid out so I removed the SDC Module, put the relay back in and ordered latching buttons. Now I just push them once to turn them on and again to turn them off. It works much better for me.