I am actually going back tonight to test drive it. However I am concerned that if I drive it I may actually buy it.

This thread has 322 post's. and it's not finished yet:willy: .What are we waiting on.Let's get a motor built.trans bought,and some paint sprayed.We are burning daylight boy's.:lol:

I have a transmission. Two actually. :lol:

In other news, I did more research on cam specs for the Coyote mod motors. It looks like even the road race engines are using the 263/290 cam sets with 13mm lift.

I also found the perfect bolt on for Marty in case he was having any reservations about pulling the trigger on a '13 Boss 302.

http://i.imgur.com/nAC7Y.jpg

Who is ready for some crappy cell phone pictures? :lol:

Since a number of people have asked me about the DSE Aluma-Frame, and are interested in hearing feedback, or seeing it on a car, I figured I would post up some pictures of the install process. Don't expect anything as organized, or cool looking as a Fab53 write up though.

The Aluma-frame installs onto the car's factory frame rails using basic hand tools and and a little bit of welding. I watched the video they provided and it looks like a two hour project. :lol:

the list of tools really isn't that big, you will need a drill, a few hole saws, a cutting wheel, and a die grinder or two. As I have also found out, you will need a little bit of patience on a few steps.

The first thing I did was cut out the original shock towers per DSE's instructions.Don't bother with the spot welds, just cut along the separation between the shock tower and inner fender.

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...ps45cb2d96.jpg
http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...ps92f75c75.jpg

Once the big piece is out, drill (or my preference - grind) out all of the spot welds on the remaining little pieces so that you are left with bare frame rails.
There will be one bolt hole underneath the frame rails boxed in by a stamped piece of metal. Per DSE's instructions this piece stays. These bolt holes serve to locate the aluminum cradle during mock up. Depending on your car, you may need to deviate from their instructions a little to cut out an embossed bump around the bolt hole.

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...ps0210bb03.jpg

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...ps1de288a9.jpg

Once the cradle is mocked up, check the car front to back, and diagonally to make sure that everything is square.

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...ps2ae10605.jpg

After squaring it up, the real fun begins. The next step involves installing the steel crush sleeves and adapter brackets to bolt the upper control arm and shock mounts onto the frame rails. You will need to locate where to drill the holes from underneath the car with the cradle bolted up. After marking your spots, break out the hole saws and go to town underneath the car. DSE now provides an alignment pin tool for drilling, and I would recommend using that to help locate your first holes, as opposed to a punch (It wasn't shown in their install video, and it showed up after everything else). After drilling holes for the four primary crush sleeves, test fit everything, check that it is square, and locate the hole for the shock mount on the steel adapter plate.

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...A/IMAG0792.jpg

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...A/IMAG0793.jpg

Drill that out with a hole saw, then bolt everything else back up. Now transfer the hole to the bottom.

http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/o...A/IMAG0806.jpg

That is it for pictures today. The next step is welding the adapter plates on and fitting the go fast parts up.

Matt

Nice work Matt! :thumbsup:

Call me wierd, but I love seeing those shock towers getting cut out. It means something good comes next.

I'd call you weird, but I'm not sure sure I have a leg to stand on there. Cutting the old pieces out was my favorite part. There is just something satisfying about cutting away things. It was also the fastest part of the process. It only took part of an afternoon. Putting the crush tubes into the frame rails has taken up a couple days.

Nice job Matt, its shaping up.

thanks for this write up.

Progress,:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Wow that DSE setup is nice. If that stuff had been available 10 years ago I wouldn't have had to build my own tube chassis for my '67.

I remember back in '97 absolutely lusting after an MII conversion before I realized how inadequate that would have been for me. Either way it was still far out of my budget (as would this DSE piece if I was in that same place today. I didn't see a price on it but I"m guessing $5k ? )

HOwever I have the same concern with this that I had with the MII conversion - How are they reinforcing or traingulating that frame rail ? The strut towers provide a ton of reinforcement and that frame rail is not really designed to hold the loads on its own. I look forward to seeing the rest of the install. We have come so far in this hobby.