Well, I figured out why the cam signal was off. After some emails back and forth between Henry at AEM tech support we decided the problem was the cam sync. So he asked me to take pictures of the inside and send them to him so he could be sure the cam sync really does trigger once for every one crankshaft rotation like I was telling him it does. I took the cover off the MSD cam sync and found a surprise waiting for me. Take a look at the photos below:



The stuff that looks like fuzz is really lots of tiny little pieces of broken magnet. This was the reason why I was getting strange input from the cam signal. I also noticed the magnet inside the shaft was loose and moving back and forth, which I can only guess is the reason for the pieces of broken magnet everywhere. No wonder I was having problems! I spoke with a tech at MSD who told me even though it was out of warranty to return it back for a free fix. Im not sure how long its going to take to repair and send back, but this really puts the pressure on for getting the car ready by Fun Ford Weekend in March.

To see more pictures of the mangled sensor click here.

Its been a while since my last update so I'll just give a quick summary of what I've been working on.

Over the Chirstmas break I decided since all my wiring was 95% done I would reinstall most of the interior. I decided I would change it from stock a little bit and perform a few personal touches while I was at it. First I installed the new black carpet from ACC. The original interior was a two-tone black and titanium grey, a very very common color combination from the factory. I wanted my argent silver painted roll cage to stand out more so I thought this would be a great start. On the one hand the carpet comes pre-molded to the factory floorpan with the jute backing and sound deadener pre-glued. On the other hand having a roll cage to trim around is a huge pain in the ass, especially with the jute backing and sound deadener pre-glued. I also had to cut out the location of the e-brake handle, which worked out OK except I took a little too much material on the driver side where the center console doesn't quite cover. Its not really noticeable unless I point it out but its going to bother me because I know its there.

Next I purchased some ebony black paint from www.50resto.com which is made specifically for the interior material and to match factory colors. I sprayed down everything (even the interior panels that were already black) to make sure it would all match. Then reinstalled the main dashboard and related pieces.

Next came the seats and harnesses which have been sitting in my house for 2 years collecting dust (and cat hair). They were easy to install with exception to the rear seat mounts. Here the convienent backing supplied with the carpet wasn't allowing the seat nut to grab enough thread on the seat bolts. I had to cut out alot of the backing material while the carpet was already installed which is hard to do considering its underneath!! I eventually got them bolted down after alot of cursing. The harnesses went in pretty easy but my only complaint is the length. Because they are designed to be a universal fit they are very long. I have a good two to three feet of belt material that isnt being used. I'll have to trim it up somehow but Im not sure what the best way to do it without compromising the integrity. Last thing I need is a failed safety belt flying down the track at speed. Here are a few pics of the carpet/seats:




I also purchased two new guage cages for my AutoMeter guages. The first is the A-pillar guage pod for the 2 1/16" diameter Ultalite series Boost/Vac and oil pressure guages. I went with this series because of the silver backplate and silver bezels which match the rollcage nicely. I went with this size because I think they look a a little better and dont take up as much space as the larger ones (I mention those below). See the pic below to see how they turned out:



The second guage cage was for the A/C vent, but rather than install it in its intended place I decided I would go lower and move it to the location of the A/C panel. This would set it apart from many of the other Mustangs out there, plus since there is no more A/C controls it was the natural choice. This cage holds 3 of the larger 2 5/8" guages. For this one I am using oil temp, water temp, and fuel pressure. All three are elctronic full-sweep design (they use stepper motors to read the signals from small sending units), as opposed to the ones on the A-pillar which are mechanical. See below:



All in all I think it came out great! The Cobra T-56 shiftnob doesnt match the ebony black paint but its not too big a deal. I'm also going to hold off on the rear of the car for now. The hatch is still leaking water and I dont want to mess up new carpet until that gets taken care of. Other than that and a few very small details I'd say the interior is now functional enough to drive the car around.



Also during the break I was working on different settings with the AEM trying to troubleshoot some problems...

Its funny how things work. For the longest time I had planned on moving my website hosting from my Linux Server at home to a dedicated server with a faster internet connection. But there was always a reason why I would put it off which would eventually lead to me forgetting about the problem until the next month. The desire to move was brought on by the fact that my Road Runner Business Class service I had at home was losing its luster. My bill seemed to be getting higher (because of tax increases) while at the same time my roommates would complain how slow things were getting. Well, the other day I decided to finally take the time and get it done and just rent a server. I decided to go with a VDS (Virtual Dedicated Server) Hosting account with Jumpline.com. I picked Jumpline after some searching around to see who hosts the fastest connections at the lowest costs.

Then, as if planned and without warning, after more than 4 years of running completely stable, I tried logging in to my Linux server at home (to transfer the files to the new server) and my hard drive died. Now, if you've read my progress up to now you will know how incredably unlucky I am. That being said, I retrieved my most recent server backup and realized it was 3 months old! All the updates I had made since then were now gone...

On a positive note returning visitors may notice how much faster the site loads now. File downloads like videos and images are also much faster when compared to my old connection. But for now, its time to try and recreate all the old content. That'll be fun!

More later...

Now that the coils were done the only other thing I needed to wrap up as far as getting the engine to run was the fuel. A while back I installed the fuel tank and loosely positioned and ran the lines with zip ties just until I could get around to permanently mounting them. Now that I had the time I figured I would do it the right way. I starting by getting ahold of some rubber lined C-clamps to grip the lines and keep them from moving. Next I marked where I wanted to drill the holes to mount the clamps. I used some oversized heavy-duty pop rivets to keep them from going anywhere. Once I had all the lines situated I bought about 10 gallons of 93 octane and filled the tank.

I didnt notice any leaks so I brought out the laptop, hooked up the AEM, and turned the pump on manually from the software. As the pump ran I was continually listening and smelling. I found a few spots that needed to be tightend up so I took care of that and set the fuel pressure.

I thought I was done and moved on to working on a few other things. While doing that I could still smell fuel coming from somewhere! I didn't see anything leaking but I also couldn't track down where the smell was coming from. Turns out I have a very slow drip coming from the feed line to the pump. The problem is, even after tightening, it still wants to leak! The rate at which its doing it is about 1 drop every few minutes. I wouldnt normally care but the smell of fuel is still there and kind of bothersome. Its something I will have to take care of eventually but for now it will sit on standby...

One of the other things I have been working on is the alternator mount. More on the this later.

I finally finished building the coil mount and figured out how to mount it in the engine bay. My first thought was to place it directly in the center of the firewall over the transmission, which would sort of hide the wiring and the mount itself behind the upper intake and allow the spark plug wires to just be reversed. Unfortunately, the coils height conflicted with the upper intake enough that it wouldn't allow a plug wire to be plugged in. So the next logical step was to move it toward the passenger side of the firewall. This keeps the wiring short and hidden but also allows easy access to the plug wires. On the downside the plug wires now have no logical order since all the longer wires need to be used on the drivers side and the shorter length ones on the passenger side. Below are some pics after the mount was installed:



Try to ignore the rusted hex cap screws on the mounts (and yes that does piss me off). I took these pics after they had been mounted for about a month (remember when I accidentally deleted the pics). Im going to replace the rusted hardware with something less prone to looking like crap after its been exposed to moisture.

Well, for as much time and money as I have spent on the fabricated aluminum valve covers (as you may recall I had them anodized black) I finally decided to just remove them from the engine. My number one reason for doing this was clearance. They were too tall to fit next to the Tial wastegates so they had to go! I could have taken them to get the anodizing stripped and then taken it to an aluminum welder and have them clearanced to fit, then taken them back to the anodizer, but that would cost too much time and money to screw with. Instead I bought a set of standard height SBF TrickFlow valve covers from Summit Racing for $103 (Part # 51411801). They come already powdercoated black and without holes for the breather. This will allow me to custom locate a place for the -8AN weld bungs for the breather line.

EDIT: Below is a picture taken a few months after this log entry was created. It shows how well the valve covers look in the engine compartment:

I moved the older log entries because the page was getting too long. To read older entries go to page 2 by clicking here.