Tim knapp's 460 swap into Walt's '69 F250

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Sat Nov 12, 2005 2:02 pm

The clutch is working! (kinda, sorta). Whew! What a struggle this has been. I manage to boil, bend, and cool the nylon tubing into a shape that allowed me to hook up both ends. This stuff sure wants to remain in the shape it came in. Next, I enlarged the master cylinder mounting holes in the firewall to allow the engagement rod a straighter shot into it. Since this is just a mockup to see if the basic arrangement will work, I didn't fully insert the roll pins that hold the tubing fittings. I actually used some pins of smaller diameter that easily and temporarily insert to hold the tubing in place just for the test.
Bleeding this system has been nothing short of an exercise in frustration. I won't bore you with the details other than to say that I have tried everything I can think of including using a vacuum pump to pull the fluid through and have spent more that 5 hours at it. I now have a clutch the will move the arm in the bellhousing for about half of the pedal travel. It seems that the master cylinder can't be coerced into taking a full gulp of fluid. The first inch of the piston travel does nothing, then it takes hold and works to the end of it's travel. Sounds like the master cylinder needs to be bled, doesn't it? I already thought of that and did it by removing the fitting from the slave, bringing it back around and putting it into the master cylinder reservoir. Then I operated the clutch pedal to pump the air out. Since I was doing this alone, I couldn't observe and pump at the same time, but the concept should have been sound.
Finally, to further discourage me, the pedal squeeks as it is operated. I'll have to deal with that later, because there's nothing more annoying than a squeaky pedal.
Another item of note is that I learned that some Ford trucks with hydraulic clutches came with steel tubing instead of nylon. They seem to have similar fittings to the ones I currently have. I called the local Ford dealer and they want $76 plus tax for the clutch line. I refuse to pay it.

Feel free to offer any thoughts or suggestion that may come to mind.
Oops, I almost forgot that you guys like your pictures so here's some shots of the slave cylinder mounted and partially operational.

Fred32v · Post by **Fred32v** » Sat Nov 12, 2005 4:47 pm

Great progress. If you had a part number for that steel clutch line or a truck year and model, I'd go see Bob with Basement's number and price that thing out at this end.

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Sat Nov 12, 2005 4:56 pm

I saw the steel line on a '93 F350 with a 7.3 liter diesel. I can only assume that the fittings are the same and the length is OK.

XeroxBill · Post by **XeroxBill** » Sun Nov 13, 2005 3:40 pm

Hey Walt, nice project. I'll try to keep up.

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Sun Nov 13, 2005 7:27 pm

Bill, it took me long enough to get started, but I'm rollin' now (thanks to Fred).
New information:
While trying to locate exhaust flanges for my manifolds, I learned that there are truck manifolds with larger exit holes. Mine have 3 3/16 holes and the other has 3 7/16 holes. No use giving up some flow in the exhaust manifolds, so I'm bidding on a set on ebay tonight.
C'mon AuctionStealer...

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 10:15 pm

Not much tangible progress this week, but here's where I am on the clutch. Jim Arnold and I spent a couple of hours this week trying get the air out of the system, but ended up in the same place...about an inch of piston travel in the master cylinder which doesn't do anything. The length of the tubing appeared to be a stumbling block because it's switchbacks tended to trap air. So after much fruitless investigation into splicing the tubing, I decided to bite the bullet and use a compression union. After I cut the line, I saw that the nylon tubing has a heavier sidewall than I expected so I didn't feel like I needed anything inside to support the compression fittings. The heavy sidewall also explains why the dadburned stuff was so hard to form, and why it always likes to return to its original shape. The splice seems like it will work. I cut out about 18" of the original tubing.
While on a visit to my local NAPA store, look what I stumbled on>>>

The top rod is the new NAPA one and the bottom is my fabrication.
Unbelievably the size of the hole is correct and the end that goes into the master cylinder is perfect. It even has more adjustability that the one I made not to mention the fact that it is straight.
Today, I removed the master cylinder so that I could take it apart and figure out why it is not working to my satisfaction. I removed the spring, put the piston back in and added fluid. Once I got all the air out, I found that there was no free play like it had while on the truck. So I now believe that I need to figure out how to get all the air out and it should work to my expectations. Things are lookin' up. Another problem I ran into was a type of scrubbing vibration when the piston is traveling through the bore of the master cylinder. It did not operate smoothly. I have been using synthetic brake fluid, but I'm going to clean out both the master and slave cylinders and see if I can find a fluid specially designed for clutch operation. Hopefully it will work better.
Hope all you fellas have a great Thanksgiving and keep those cards and letters comin'.

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 10:00 pm

I put the whole clutch system back together today (hopefully for the last time). I decided to forget the search for special clutch fluid and just go with the synthetic brake fluid that I started with. I bled the master cylinder on the bench with the line attached, then installed everything.
It seems to work well. The first inch or so of pedal movement still doesn't seem to do much, but it's hard to tell when you are only one person trying to operate the clutch and watch what is happening at the same time. Anyway, after I get some help for the final bleeding, I'll be calling this part of the swap complete and I will deal later with any problems that may crop up.

Here's a picture of me testing out the new clutch>>>>>

Note the new TireSmoke hat. Thanks, Fred.

Fred32v · Post by **Fred32v** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 11:06 pm

You are welcome. A special thanks to Mark for having the idea to have our special "TireSmoke" caps made available.

Post by **TireSmoker** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 11:55 am

Tiresmoke.org's existance was Mark's idea, not just the hats.

Walt, now that you've gotten the engine and trans in, the clutch is working .. what's next? How soon till it can be taken down the road?

-Dave

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 5:30 pm

I think I will tackle the throttle linkage next, Dave. It, too, needs to be engineered. I hope that once I'm past that, it should be smooth sailing.
I'm shooting for Spring Carlisle for completion. Now that the weather is turning colder, I'm not too keen on spending time in the cold garage.
I've lost my tolerance for the cold. You'll just have to be patient and see how things go. My objective is to accomplish at least one thing a week so that I can report it on TireSmoke.

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Sat Nov 26, 2005 1:39 pm

The clutch setup appears to be working! My brother, Ed, visiting from Pittsburgh helped me to verify the operation. While he operated the clutch pedal, I watched underneath and the arm to the throwout bearing moves with the first movements of the pedal. Hooray! I was fooled by the non-linear pedal pressure required to operate the clutch. The first inch or so is very easy and the pressure increases as the pedal gets closer to the floor. Either way, I'm happy. Time to move on.

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 7:19 pm

The UPS guy just delivered my new exhaust manifolds. Take a look at the exit hole size of the new manifold (black) vs the old (silver). Now I realize that it ain't headers, but I got to believe it will help the ol' 466 breathe better.

Fred32v · Post by **Fred32v** » Fri Dec 02, 2005 11:09 am

WOW! Yes, but will those exhaust down pipes you had made still work good enough to get you to the Muffler shop?

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Fri Dec 02, 2005 11:18 am

Sure will! Yesterday, I cleaned up the stud holes and put in new studs.
The tapered mounting point where the flanged pipe mates with the manifold was somewhat irregular and pitted with corrosion. It looked like it might leak, so I used my Dremel and a file and cleaned it up before assembling the exhaust pipe stub. It all looks good. I just need to find some of that flexible pipe you talked about.

wxo · Post by **wxo** » Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:45 pm

The throttle linkage is finished. I used the mechanism from the old 360, cut it, and welded it back together and now it looks like a Lenco hooked up to the Holley.