Mike in Texas FFR Roadster Build - Assembly, Going in the Right Direction

[Mike.Bray]

Hello FFR forum, thanks for having me. I recently sold a 2008 Viper (very fun car) and decided to build another car instead of buying one. Finally settled on an FFR Roadster, I had a Cobra many years ago and of all my cars it was always the most fun to drive. And my wife really likes them so that helps. So this past September I ordered a kit with a due date of May 7th. During the wait I've cleaned up the garage, convinced the wife to park her Camaro on the other side, installed a new floor, built the engine (will cover in separate posts), and got the rear end ready to go. I'm hoping to test fire the engine in a couple of weeks so fingers crossed.

My plan is to build the car with 100% new parts and do a reasonably high-end build.

MKIV complete kit
Powder coated frame
Pin drive front suspension w/power rack
3-link Ford 8.8" rear end, narrowed for pin drive wheels
351W/TKX drivetrain
Stainless exhaust
Leather seats w/Forte heaters
Wilwood 6 piston front brakes
Wilwood 4 piston rear brakes
Vintage Wheels 17" polished pin drive wheels
Russ Thompson turn signal kit
Breeze LED headlights
And the list goes on and on...

A little about me. My name is Mike Bray and I'm 61 years young with two grown daughters. A little over 5 years ago I was fortunate enough to marry the love of my life Mari. We mark everything with our initials to keep our things straight. Like me she's a gearhead and likes cars and especially fast cars. Between us we have 7 grandsons with my 6 year old being a total and complete car nut. Wonder where he gets it?

My father was into cars and built some of the first quarter midgets here in Texas in the mid fifties for my brother to race.



Later he built some dune buggies and even a couple of rail dragsters. When I was around 15 he started teaching me how to work on cars. He helped me fix up my first first truck, hey this is Texas! Then my first street rod, a T Bucket roadster with a 6-71 blown SBC.

In my 20's and 30's I was working for a large manufacturing company so I had access to a lot of machine tools, a gear department, and a complete fabrication shop. I used these to build my second street rod, a 1928 Ford Tudor sedan.


Later I put together my own shop and built a few more street rods.



And my Cobra


I got tired of all the hours in the garage, got a new job and new wife, and sold most of my shop off. 15 years later I was having a very hard time getting along with my new wife's boyfriend so we went our separate ways. I got into go karts, 120 MPH an inch off the ground will give you a thrill! A few Corvettes, Vipers, and other assorted toys and here I am coming around full circle to build another car instead of buying it. Well, sort of as before I started with a rusty body and a pile of steel plate/tubing/billet aluminum instead of a kit. But I'm really looking forward to building this and of course driving it! And thanks to this forum I've got a treasure trove of great information to pull from.

Currently I'm easing into retirement so I've got some nice time available to work on this kit. I've been with my company for 23 years, I'm the R&D manager which gives me access to some great 3D software and other tools of the trade. My company is based in Sydney Australia and I'm based in our Dallas Office. Yes, I do travel there and no, I do not want to live there. But it's a great company and I really enjoy working for it.

Well that's about it for me. If you've read this far you're better than I am. I do hope you enjoy following along for the next couple of years.

[RRussellTx]

Nice build plan - The Pin Drive definitely takes the cool factor up a notch!

I'm over in Parker if you ever need any help or want to check out a completed car.

[Ted G]

Welcome aboard! We ordered right about the same time.

[460.465USMC]

Welcome aboard, Mike! You bring a ton of experience to your Roadster build. And, your wife loves cars--huge bonus! What year Camaro does she drive?

[Jeff Kleiner]

I’m looking forward to following along Mike!

Jeff

[GoDadGo]

After seeing your former rides, this is going to be a Cake-Walk for you.

........................Welcome Aboard Mr. Mike!

[Mike.Bray]

Nice build plan - The Pin Drive definitely takes the cool factor up a notch!

I'm over in Parker if you ever need any help or want to check out a completed car.

Hey thanks for that, I might take you up on your offer.

I'm not that far, I'm in Flower Mound. My youngest daughter lives in Wylie so I go out your way pretty regularly. She's right off Parker Rd or whatever it turns into.

[Mike.Bray]

Welcome aboard, Mike! You bring a ton of experience to your Roadster build. And, your wife loves cars--huge bonus! What year Camaro does she drive?

She has a 2015 SS with the Corvette engine. It's a nice car and she loves it.

[Mike.Bray]

After seeing your former rides, this is going to be a Cake-Walk for you.

........................Welcome Aboard Mr. Mike!

Well it might be a little less involved but nothing is ever a cake walk for me! I'm hoping it goes okay. One thing for sure, it's a lot easier doing research and ordering parts with the internet!

[Mike.Bray]

While I'm waiting on the kit to arrive I've been able to acquire a few fun parts.

17" pin drive wheels (yes, that's our kitchen island)


Borla stack EFI


8.8 Ford rear end, keeping it simple.


Finished up the garage floor


And put together a test rig to fire and tune the engine

[JDFinley]

Welcome Mike! Very nice progress!! I had the same boyfriend issue - had to chuckle! Still working out your initial marking...

[RRussellTx]

Hey thanks for that, I might take you up on your offer.

I'm not that far, I'm in Flower Mound. My youngest daughter lives in Wylie so I go out your way pretty regularly. She's right off Parker Rd or whatever it turns into.

Sounds good, don't be shy.

There are a couple more guys in Wylie right off that same road. One is working through the registration process to drive in gel coat for a while and the other one has his car in paint right now. We get together every once in a while so PM me your number if you want me to let you know the next time we do something. I might do up some crawfish when it warms up a bit.

[Mike.Bray]

I've been able to get the engine put together. Originally started out with a Fast EZ 2.0 but ended up sending the ECU in to trade for the XFI Sportsman for better tuning capability. It should be back in a few days and then I'm ready to program and test run. Big fingers crossed!

I've built small block Chevy's, big block Chevy's, and even a couple of odd Buick V6 engines but this is my first Ford. It's been quite the learning experience (which of the three places do I put the timing pointer???). But there's definitely some neat things about the Windsor engines. I like the tall deck and long connecting rods, good for torque.

ENGINE SPECIFICATIONS, 393 CI

New Cast Iron Roller Block, 351W
Bored .030" Over
Forged Scat Crank, 3.85" stroke
Forged Pistons, 10:1
Forged Rods, 7/16
Total Seal Molly Rings
Internally Balanced
Clevite 77 Bearings
ATI Harmonic Balancer
Ram Flywheel (22 lbs)
Ram 10.5" Clutch
Aluminum Oil Pan
Aluminum Heads 210CC Intake runners
62 CC Combustion Chambers
2.02" Stainless Steel Intake Valves
1.60" Stainless Steel Non Magnetic Exhaust Valves
Comp Cams 26918 Springs
ARP Screw-In Studs
Comp Cams Guide Plates
ARP Head Studs
Comp Cams Hydraulic Roller Cam, 35-775-8
Intake Lift 579, Duration 236 @ .050"
Exhaust Lift 579, Duration 248 @ .050"
Comp Cams 1.6:1 Stainless Steel Roller Rockers
Comp Cams Double Roller Timing Chain
Comp Cams Hydraulic Roller Lifters
Comp Cams Hardened Pushrods
Borla 50mm EFI Stack injection
47 lb/hr Injectors
Port Matched Individual Runner Aluminum Intake Manifold
Screw-In Air Horns
FAST ECU, XFI Sportsman
Holley 19-350 In-Tank Fuel Pump
Holley 10 Micron Fuel Filter
Holley 565-201 Dual Sync Distributor
MSD 6RFI Ignition
Ford Performance Spark Plug Wires

Pictures to follow.

[Cobradavid]

Welcome, Mike!

[WIS89]

Mike-

Welcome to the madness! I have to be frank though, I like the additions you made to your kitchen, and I would leave them. They blend in nicely, and truly complement the rest of the kitchen! Perhaps your wife will learn to love them!

Great wheels; I am a fan of the polished finish, and I keep going back to that option when I look at wheels for my ride. They just look great!

Then the velocity stacks... well they're just engine porn, plain and simple!

I look forward to seeing how things come together for you and will enjoy following along.

Regards,

Steve

[Mike.Bray]

Mike-

Welcome to the madness! I have to be frank though, I like the additions you made to your kitchen, and I would leave them. They blend in nicely, and truly complement the rest of the kitchen! Perhaps your wife will learn to love them!

Oh she loves them, she just loves her kitchen more! We need that space though when we're making Philly Cheesesteaks on the Tappan grill.

Glad you like the goodies.

[GoDadGo]

Mike,

Those specs will yield a potent serpent with a nice strong & flat torque curve.
Just be prepared to replace your rear tires annually.
Get ready to pedal 1st, 2nd & 3rd gears.

Steve

[Mike.Bray]

Those specs will yield a potent serpent with a nice strong & flat torque curve.

That's what I'm striving for Steve. This car will be a Saturday night cruiser, no plans for racing or getting it on the track. I understand that the body does not sense speed but only change in velocity. I want torque to feel some real acceleration and big brakes to feel big stopping power. I read years ago that they took a 427 Cobra and went 0-100 and back to 0 in something like 12 seconds. I never forgot that.

[Mike.Bray]

Engine Build Part 1

It all starts with a block right? While there's lots of 351W blocks out there I wasn't having much luck finding a good quality one so I went with a new one. In hindsight I wish I would have put an extra $1k with it and bought an aluminum version but I'm happy with what I ended up with.

One of my old street rod buddies recommended a machine shop to me and this guy was great. Literally a one man automotive shop who's been doing it for decades and has a ton of Ford experience. He took the block and bored it 0.030" over, decked it 0.010", checked everything else he could check, and installed the cam bearings. A final cleaning, some paint, and ready for assembly.







I bought a Scat rotating assembly. They had to grind the 3.85" forged crank for me as this block has smaller Cleveland main bearings. Danny at Scat was great to work with and got my assembly pushed through in less than a month. Everything is forged and the assembly is internally balanced.

[WIS89]

Mike-

I meant to comment on this earlier... I love the pics of the 1/4 midget cars. I grew up watching 3/4 midget racing with my best friend. Small oval dirt track and a true contact sport with some great (and some not-so-great) driving! Brings back some great memories; thanks for that!

I look forward to following along on your engine build! There are two areas on my own build that I simply know are off-limits; paint and engine. I truly admire the guys that can build up their own powerplants. While I know I can watch all the utoob videos and read other interweb knowledge-based info, the cost of making a mistake is too great, and it scares me off.

Thanks for letting us follow along on your progress. I really look forward to seeing it all come together!

Regards,

Steve

[GoDadGo]

Mike,

I looked at your specs and find that all of the numbers (Cam, Head, Compression, Etc) match up to my SBC version but with a .10" longer stroke.
Even with 10 fewer cubes, I can play the coveted Zero-100 back to Zero Game in the 12-13 second range. (Be Careful Because It Isn't Easy!)
Also, zero to 60 times for me has been between 3.0-5.0 seconds depending on wheel spin, which happens quite often.
If you're running the Siamese Race Block, engine temps will run rather cool because of the thick walls.

Good Luck!

Steve

PS: ..I Can't Wait To See You Go-Karting That Sucker This Spring and/or Summer!

[ggunter]

Must be something about wive's boyfriends. I couldn't get along with mine either.

[Mike.Bray]

I meant to comment on this earlier... I love the pics of the 1/4 midget cars. I grew up watching 3/4 midget racing with my best friend. Small oval dirt track and a true contact sport with some great (and some not-so-great) driving! Brings back some great memories; thanks for that!

My brother is the most non-gearhead I've ever met and really had no interest in racing the quarter midgets. They raced them around 56-57 and I was born in 60 so I missed out. My mother told me my dad sold them about a year or two after I was born (I never forgave him). The only thing left was my brother's helmet which we still have.

Funny story, my father worked at The Frito Company in their shop and back then they built all of their own equipment. While building the plant in Los Angeles they came across these little quarter midgets. Seeing how my father and his co-workers were all engineers and shop guys with 5-10 year old sons back home they sketched them up and got all the information they could.

When they got back home there wasn't much to work on in the Frito shop until the next plant came along so they built a bunch of quarter midgets. My dad told me they had like a mini assembly line going. Frito paid for all the material and even bought the engines! The story became like an urban legend in Frito Lay until a few years ago when an engineer there asked me if I knew anything about them. I dug out a bunch of pictures, newspaper clippings, and home movies and sent them to him.

Here's a couple of color pictures. that's my father holding onto the "roll bar". He would have been about 26 then. If alive today he would be 91!

[Mike.Bray]

More engine assembly pictures.

[Mike.Bray]

Getting ready to test run while waiting on my kit.












Engine is ready, valves are set, filled with break-in oil, oil pump primed, and fuel system primed and ready. On advice from FAST I exchanged the EZ-2.0 for the XFI Sportsman ECU. Got it configured and everything wired up for test running. I'm running a Holley dual sync distributor as anything taller hits one of the fuel rails. A word of advice, the wiring instructions from Holley for connecting to the FAST ECU with timing control are WRONG! Once that was sorted ready to hit the button....

[Mike.Bray]

Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good! I hit the button and it started right up and settled down to a nice lumpy throaty idle. YooHoo! Now it's time to get some cooling so I can confirm the timing and balance the throttle bodies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHwxYOzZgwQ

[Rudson]

Looks awesome! I'm in Plano and just starting to read into all the build threads to educate myself on how I might want to attack mine. I don't have the background you do so building my own engine is some scary S**t to me! Looking forward to following!

[BadAsp427]

I am just getting caught up on your thread, looks like you’re off to a really good start. Your attention to detail on your engine is awesome. Congratulations!

[WIS89]

Mike-

That story about your Dad and his work at Frito is awesome! How cool is it that he and his coworkers did all of that -- and even had Frito taking care of the expenses. Damn shame your brother ruined it for you!! haha

I really appreciate you sharing the story and the great pictures; such an awesome story!

Your engine looks and sounds amazing. Nice work on that, and your engine run stand too. I am really enjoying following along!

Regards,

Steve

[Mike.Bray]

That story about your Dad and his work at Frito is awesome! How cool is it that he and his coworkers did all of that -- and even had Frito taking care of the expenses. Damn shame your brother ruined it for you!! haha

I really appreciate you sharing the story and the great pictures; such an awesome story!

Thanks for that Steve. I've got some videos made from home movies, I'll see if I can get them onto YouTube and upload them.

Another funny Frito story, the company was famously started by C.E. Doolin in 1932. C.E. had a brother, Earl, who ran the shop and who my father reported to. Earl was a certified crazy guy though who's main interest in life was chasing women. He had an upstairs office that looked over the shop. My dad said he had the shop build a rear set of stairs and door to his office so he could sneak women into his office during the day. Earl was the one who paid for all the quarter midgets parts and other special projects they did. I heard he was later committed, probably by his long suffering wife lol

It was sure a different time!

[Mike.Bray]

[Mike.Bray]

My kit is due to ship May 7th and I'm running out of things to buy/do! Ugh! I got the brakes organized and ready to go. I'm running the pin drive front end setup which uses 94/95 Mustang SN95 spindles instead of the FFR ones. This required a different brake kit from Wilwood, 140-9107. 1.25" x 12.88" rotors and 6 piston calipers.

For the rear Mike Forte fixed me up with a narrowed Moser 8.8" fitted with Wilwood 140-7146 brake kit. 0.81" x 12.19" rotors and 4 piston calipers. I really like this setup over the Wilwood kit from FFR as it has 4 piston calipers and uses a mini drum brake inside the rotor hat for an emergency brake.



Assembled the rotors and started safety wiring the screws. One of my least favorite things to do.



I'm going with Tilton 76 series master cylinders as I don't have very much confidence in the Wilwood ones FFR supplies. Did the calcs and came up with 3/4" for the front, 1" for the rear, and 13/16" for the throwout bearing.

Pretty sure this little car is going to have some serious stopping power.

Found some 95 SN95 spindles on eBay and sent them off to the powder coater.

That's about all I've got for now. Can I just hibernate for a couple of months?

[Blitzboy54]

I have the same rear brakes on my car. you have to get a touch creative with the supplied ebrake cable. You can purchase the Wilwood version or you can modify the FFR offering. Reach out if you have any questions.

Build looks good!

[Mike.Bray]

I have the same rear brakes on my car. you have to get a touch creative with the supplied ebrake cable. You can purchase the Wilwood version or you can modify the FFR offering. Reach out if you have any questions.

Build looks good!

Thanks for that! I'm planning on running the electric e-brake system from 520 Speedworks. See how that goes.

[OB6]

Hi Mike -- I'm in Flower Mound too, and just ordered my kit a couple weeks ago for a Nov/Dec delivery. Happy to help if you ever need it... looks like you're making good progress already!
Terry

[Mike.Bray]

Hi Mike -- I'm in Flower Mound too, and just ordered my kit a couple weeks ago for a Nov/Dec delivery. Happy to help if you ever need it... looks like you're making good progress already!
Terry

Hey that's all great news. We need to get together someday.

[Mike.Bray]

I'm down to about 6 weeks from my ship date and seriously trying to find stuff to do so I don't go bonkers. We've got beautiful spring weather here in Texas right now so it's double frustrating. I decided to go with power steering after reading enough posts here in the forum for it. Plus my wife broke her arm in three places last year so she could use a little help when driving it.

My engine has this cool cog drive for the water pump and alternator and I wanted to keep it if I could. A little creative design work and I think I solved the issue by making a special water pump pulley.


And the finished assembly (I know I haven't installed all of the screws in the PS pulley yet). Just hoping it works

[WIS89]

Mike-

A belated thanks for posting the video on the quarter midgets. That was so ridiculously cool!! I would have been in heaven having access to something like that growing up. WOW!!

And, your engine is an absolute BEAST! You have done a beautiful job of getting her all together! She sounded great, and I like your pulley set-up.

Keep up the great work, and hang in there waiting for the kit. I hated that part of the build, but it is so awesome when it shows up, you will forget all about the waiting!!

Regards,

Steve

[JB in NOVA]

Mike, just one comment on your engine build: WOW!

[Fman]

Seriously, that engine looks sweet! Awesome job on that... and you definitely won't have any issues with that alternator belt breaking!

Looking forward to watching you start your build. Subcribed