The valve train clearly needs to be up to the task that my camshaft will require.  Valve springs must deliver enough seat and open pressure to eliminate float and bounce, so I'm using an optional upgraded spring set AFR offers delivering 155lb on the seat and about 400lb at full lift.  Will use titanium retainers to minimize mass in the valvetrain.  Thick walled pushrods; not sure yet which ones.  Link-type Crane hydraulic lifters to withstand the high forces associated with the high ramp rates of the cam.  7/16" rocker studs to handle the higher forces.

Looking for a carb that is about 650cfm, probably vacuum secondaries and an electric choke to achieve great overall power performance while keeping it streetable year 'round.  Expecting to look for a good tuner carb, but may consider an off the shelf unit from Holley.  Considering BIGS Performance , Competition Fuel Systems, or Pro-Systems.

8/30/08 I disassembled the rear subframe assembly, and cleaned it up a bit.  I got a little carried away and ended up having most pieces powder coated.  Most of the rear has been reassembled and installed.  Also, my AFR 185 heads showed up, as well as the RPM Air-Gap intake manifold and hydraulic lifters.  The intake is going to be port matched to the heads (along with the gaskets), then off to be powder coated to match some other engine parts.

A few more things progressed with the engine at Kennedy Performance.  The Scorpion rocker arms and Cometic Multi-Layer Steel head gaskets have arrived.  Optimal pushrod lengths have been measured and ordered.  The intake manifold has been port matched to the heads and sent off to the local powder coater.  Valve covers have also arrived.

Shifting over to the clutch, I test fitted the slave cylinder, fork and adapter bracket for the slave.  In an effort to improve the clutch performance, I have reinforced the mounting bracket with two horizontal brackets made of 3/4" square steel tubing mounted to some available bosses on the tranny.  Also, the mounting bracket was bent a bit to point the slave just in the bell housing opening.  This was to improve the direction of the slave cylinder pushrod and to give more throw to the fork for the same displacement of the slave piston.  This required drilling a new hole (and radius the edges) for the push rod and pivot to meet against the fork.  Hole dimensions... center point is 0.325" above edge of "other" hole, hole is 7/16" diameter, and edges where chamfered (radius) using a 7/8" ball shaped grinder.  Since the metal is very hard, I had a machine shop do the work.  The dimensions above are what I used except I centered a hair higher at 0.350".  I think 0.325" would be better.

The color of this car is a very deep red.  It looks great; the pictures don't do it justice.  Here's a video of his car.

The next big checkpoint is to have the engine complete and running for the first time on an engine dyno.  I have tentatively scheduled a dyno session at the end of January so hopefully I'll have a running engine within a few weeks.  

A few more things have progressed:

The solution to the alternator interference with the valve cover was fairly easy.  I found some 1/8" thick washers at a local spring/suspension shop that I used to space out the accessory brackets.  This moved all of the pulleys out except for the water pump and crankshaft pulley.  The water pump pulley is so wide that I didn't need to do anything with it.  The crankshaft pulley was going to require a special spacer anyway so I added in the thickness of the washers.  I bought a spacer from Ford Racing and had it turned down to the thickness I needed.  I also had to grind a small area of the back of the alternator near the back bearing housing for additional clearance.  I got a little picky again and took it apart to have both housings powder coated.

The power steering pump pulley was pressed on and crankshaft pulley and spacer were mounted temporarily while I continue to wait for some ARP bolts to arrive.  I also realized that there really isn't a need for the smog pump bypass pulley in my case and figured out a simpler belt path.  The bypass pulley was removed.  The belt I ended up with was 81 1/8" long (K060806).  I have since then used a K060802 which is about 3/8" shorter as the other belt ended up being just a bit short (the belt tensioner was bottoming out).

The distributor would have been mounted up by now, but my engine builder and carb specialist have recommended that I have a special advance stop bushing made that is a little bigger than the biggest one that came w/ the dizzy.  This narrows the range of ignition advance change.  If we don't need it, we can swap back to one of the ones provided w/ the dizzy.

I also drilled and tapped some threads to accept the Mazda water temp sender into the 20mm x 1.5 plug on the side of the oil pan.  This is the spot where the oil level is normally measured in a Mustang.  Since I'll be reading water temps with a separate gauge, I wanted the original gauge to do something instead of sit there dead.  I decided to make it read oil temps from the pan.  I'm not real sure how useful this will be, but I'm going ahead with the plan.  I have a spare water temp gauge that was already modified to work linear with temperature changes, but I might alter a couple resistors to get a more useful temperature range.

I also made a bracket to mount up and hold my MSD 6AL.  It's not wired in yet; just mounted there for now to check fitment and plan how I want to wire it up.

The carb I have is a Holley 4777 which is their basic 4150 design with a flow rate spec of 650cfm.  I had this carb worked on by Competition Fuel Systems and it is a bit more adjustable now.  I had the choke removed for performance purposes but cold starts should be a little challenging.  To counter this, I'm going to hold the throttle open a little to let the engine idle high while it is warming up.  I installed an electric choke actuator and had to make a minor mod to it as well.  The partial engine in these pics is a blown block that I borrowed from a friend while I wait on my own.

I also modified my headers.  Since these headers were used, the 3 bolt flanges were bent.  I cut them off and had 3 inch long, 2.5" dia straight pipes added as I'm going to do a lap-joint with a band clamp instead.  The headers will be sent off to Jet Hot for a coating of Extreme Sterling to combat the heat emissions under the hood.  The spark plugs are in but the wires are just temporary for now.

Oh, and part of the plan has changed: the fuel log is back in and the heater tubes are now out of the plan.  There was an interference so I gave up on the heater tubes.

While playing around with the fuel pump and doing flow/pressure control tests, I think I damaged my fuel pump.  So, a Walbro 190 went in.  It was cheaper than a stock or Autozone pump.  I didn't need anything special for high pressure, and it turns out that a Walbro 190 can deliver more than adequate flow at low (5-7psi) pressures needed for a carb application.  I did have to modify the pick up tube to get the pump to connect to the tube, but it wasn't too hard.

The fuel lines have now been plumbed to the pressure regulator and tested for leaks.  With some Earls and Russell fittings, I went from the 5/16" fuel line to a -6AN hose.  I clamped it down in certain areas to keep the hoses from rubbing critical parts.  I also have the FM frame rail reinforcements and positioned the fuel line next to the rails so that when the tranny support bracket goes on, there is clearance.

I also mounted the original Miata oil pressure sender to the block.  I chose to use the Miata sender instead of the Ford one so that the oil pressure gauge would work as normal.  Apparently the Ford sender can be made to work with a resistor, but I've heard that folks still had trouble getting the gauge to read right.  The Miata sender attached to the block with two brass fittings: a 1/4" male NPT to 1/8" female NPT adapter, and a 1/8" male NPT to 1/8" female NPT 45 degree elbow.  The Miata sender is a 1/8" male NPT, and the Ford block is a 1/4" female NPT.  It mounted up nicely and doesn't appear to have any interference issues.

6/20/09 I test fitted an air cleaner assembly.  This is a 7/8" drop base, 14" x 3" tall filter. and chrome lid.  I didn't put the hood on, but I know it would slightly interfere just by looking at it.  I'm going to try a 2.5" tall filter and test fit the hood.  I don't want to go any smaller as I'm afraid the filter may cause some restriction issues.  There are filter elements lids that go on top of the filter that I might try, but I really like the look of the chrome ones better.  And hey, after all it has to look right, eh? 

Headers are now bolted in place.  The steering column is now bolted to the rack (man, that was a major pain to get the splines to cooperate).  I'm also working on the wiring connections to the starter and routing of the new battery cable under the car.

6/26/09 I swapped out the filter element for a 2.5" tall K&N filter (p/n E-3735).  Hopefully I'll get a hand tomorrow and mount the hood to check for clearance.  I think it will clear, but very close.  I tried a couple other shorter valve covers; one had problems with the baffle hitting a rocker arm, the other had an interference w/ the alternator.  For now, I'm still trying to make the tall valve covers work.  I also spent a little time today working with the drive train angle.  I don't have a lot of faith in the angle finder I have, but I think I have the angles close.  Engine and diff axes are parallel within 1 degree, and about a 2 degree operating angle on each end of the drive shaft.

6/30/09 My dad helped me mount the hood and to my surprise, there was about 1 inch of hood clearance!  Since I had the radiator out, I was able to climb into part of the engine bay with the hood shut and could actually see the clearance.  The top of the filter (wing nut area) had plenty clearance too.  I swapped out the 2.5" K&N for a 3.0" tall K&N (p/n E-3737) and everything still fits fine with about 3/8" hood clearance.

I also finished up some smaller yet time consuming things with the fuel line going to the carb, wiring to the dizzy and coil, and worked a bit on the wiring going to the starter.  The challenge here has been heat issues w/ wires near the headers.

8/12/09 The last month has been busy, both on the car and non-car related.  Progress is being made on the brakes, exhaust, power steering and cooling system.

Brakes is the Monster Miata system with big Wilwood Dynalite 4 piston calipers in the front, 2nd gen RX7 calipers in the rear, and 11" vented Wilwood rotors on all four corners.  I have also needed to massage the hard brake lines around the headers to reduce heat transfer to brake fluid.

I'm using an existing V8 miata exhaust system from a friend/prior V8 miata owner, except for the section that goes from the headers to the X-pipe.  Down the road, I might recreate the X-pipe-back section.  I made these pipes out of 2.5" stainless steel.  It was a bit of work, but quite enjoyable and perhaps a performance improvement.  The old exhaust was crimp bent and 2.25" at best. 

I swapped out the tips on the existing exhaust for some that were similar to what I had with the turbo.  These are pretty simple looking, but I like them.  They are 3 inch slant cut.  Since I have a fiberglass Racing Beat bumper, I didn't want to just cut the left side for the 2nd exhaust tip.  Instead, I removed the bumper and had Steve Kelley with SRC Collision modify my bumper to replicate the tunneled cutout for the 2nd tip.  It turned out great!  Thanks Steve!!!

One challenge I'm working through is figuring out a good way to plumb the Ford PS pump to the Miata steering rack.  I've tried starting with a couple Ford PS pump lines and am getting close with a little bending, but I'm not quite there yet.  Currently, I have a swivel end '93 Mustang hose attached to the pump and have bent it a bit to stay away from the sharp edges.  I had fitting on the rack end of the Ford hose cut off and had the original Miata fitting put on.  The metal tubing of the end of the hose that connects to the rack on the Ford line was the same diameter as the original miata line, so slipping on the Miata fitting to the Ford line and flaring it was pretty straight forward.  I also modified an existing Miata bracket to support the PS hose and reduce strain on the rack fitting.  I ended up mounting the bracket to the sway bar mount and clamped over the hose on an existing metal mount that was on the Ford hose.

As for the cooling system, I ran into a problem with plumbing the radiator inlet to the engine.  Also, I still needed to mount the fans and  needed a good baffling plan to channel air to the diff.  I hired Adam McFadden to modify my radiator with a fan shroud  and  mount fans (3/8" from core).  He also modified my coolant inlet port some.  I modified it a little more by melting and re-soldering the filler cap portion to rotate the over-flow port in a better direction.  I'm happy with the result.  It's a simple, down hill path going from the filler neck to the radiator upper port.  The fan shroud turned out good as well.  Supposedly this shroud will help with cooling; it has to help when the fans are running, but I'm concerned that the fans are pretty much going to be running a LOT as the shroud would likely block a lot of air flow from just air being pushed in while the car is moving.  We'll see.  I still need to do a little more shrouding of the radiator to the nose.

8/17/09  It runs!  Well, I spent the last few evenings and a good part of a weekend focusing on firing up the engine.  I hooked up the water temp and WBO2 sensor gauges, put in the seats, finished the interior, bled the brakes, retightened a few bolts, fill the tank with gas and turned the key.  IT RUNS!  Well, not without a few bugs but I'll get on it soon.  The suspension alignment is all out and the ride height is sitting way too low.  I took it for a test drive and scrapped  the exhaust just pulling out of the driveway.  Will be fixing that soon, along with a few other bugs.  I had a few friends over to watch it happen (either start or blow up).  Thanks to my friend Bijan for the video!  The pic above is from my friend David Brown who took a shot about 15 minutes before turning the key.  Notice the cog webs on the jack stand?  It was time to come down!
  

While I had the car up on jack stands again, I noticed a couple leaks.  The first one was engine oil.  It appears that I already scrapped my oil drain plug - not a good thing.  I checked it and it was a bit loose.  The leak looked to be coming from the drain plug so hopefully that was it.  The second leak is transmission fluid and it appeared to be coming out of the speed sensor/speedometer cable adapter.  I pulled the sensor and not only does it have a crack in it, it appears it may be missing an o-ring.  I'm going to replace the sensor with a new one.  Also, the speedometer wasn't working so hopefully reassembly with solve the problem.

I did get a chance to drive the car again after eye-balling the alignment a bit, and wow is it a handful to drive!  Easy on the throttle in 1st gear or the tires start screaming at you.

Another problem that I'm still thinking through has to do with the difficulty I'm having starting the car after it has had a chance to warm up and sit for an hour or so.  I'm hoping that I'm just flooding the engine, but I fear it's vapor lock.  Looking at how I have the fuel line going from the regulator over to the fuel log, that's a long section of fuel that gets well heated from the engine and doesn't have the benefit of being re-circulated into the fuel tank.  I'm fearing that this relatively slow moving fuel gets overly heated and since it goes no where but to the carb, it is causing fuel boiling problems.  I'm going to try a different shut down procedure by shutting the fuel pump off several seconds before shutting the car off.  Hopefully this will help drain the bowls before the engine shuts off and will help hot restart. 

I now have a 3/8" phenolic spacer between the carb and manifold.  This has helped slightly with the hot restart issue.  I'm still working on a better solution.

I installed an Innovate MAP sensor and SSI-4 to be able to datalog RPM, A/F and vacuum with my laptop.  Everything works except for some strange RPM readings.  A dedicated ground for RPM might fix that.

I swapped out the coilovers for Fat Cat Motorsport's package.  They include revalved Bilstein's, adjustable lower purches, 450lb/in front springs, 300lb/in rear springs and better bumpstops.  Compared to my Koni setup, these do work better.  It's not a lot better as the prior stuff was good, but ride quality over big bumps is certainly better.  The suspension seems to be more compliant with washboard surfaces as well.  I have a touch of oversteer and a bit more sway so I might be looking at putting in a stiffer front sway bar. 

My first autocross with the V8 was on 10/4/09.  It was the first autocross I've driven in over 4 years and I had an absolute blast.  The car drives very well.  The handling is just fine; any notion of a big stupid heavy V8 engine throwing off the balance is totally false.  I've heard people say that they would think this would be the case, but I can truly say that it's not the case.  Once again, thanks to Bijan for the great video work.