Ford ThunderBirdFord thought they'd take their own stab at the nostalgia business. There are quite a few last-century icons that wear the blue oval. For a revival subject, why not use a car famous enough to have been the subject of Beach Boys songs, starred in George Lucas movies, and has been gone long enough to be missed? Why not indeed. In 2002, the Thunderbird was reborn.
My uncle just built a engine for his 87 thunderbird, and he has modified it greatly. it is a 302 with auto o/d trans and it has a cam (5/12 lift and 288 duration) roller rockers, flat top forged pistons (2 valve reliefs), ported 351 truck heads, bee-hive springs, headers, ported intake and head to match OEM gaskets, no catalytic convertor, no AIR injection, no EGR (plugged at bottom of intake manifold, and 160 thermostat. He is planning to run the stock fuel injection, and use 2 heated o2 sensors in the header collectors. The issue is, what is the easiest way to go about the computer? He has talked to Motorvations, and a chip from them that would work for him would cost around $400, so is there a better way? also will the stock fuel pump/regulator work?
An aftermarket PCM (even an EEC-IV with modified firmware) would be better than an OEM especially with twin heated O2 sensors (I don't even know if the original PCM from that year had twin HEGO inputs).
The stock fuel pump/regulator will probably be fine, but it will need bigger injectors.
Remember that most PCM software (at least OEM) ignores the O2 sensor at WOT and goes to an "open loop" table. The OEM WOT table would be much too lean and you might actually burn a piston on a 1/4 mile run !
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1998 E150 Club Wagon, 4.6L Modular, E4OD
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2008 Mazda3 5 door, 2.3L, 5 speed manual
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