Gary Lewis

Good pics, Paul. 👍

Looking good! Can't wait for the report.

You should be good on the detonation, when you pull the plugs out now you should have a tan color porcelain which means you are not too hot and not too cold. I suspect what was happening is your electrode was getting hot enough on some cylinders to cause a slight detonation. You didnt have what appeared to be silver pyramids so you weren't knocking metal off your pistons, you were detonating just enough to rattle some carbon loose. Heres an old diagram I got about timing indicator mark on the electrode strap. Its one of those things that I am kind of dreading to do for my build, considering the proper way to do a plug read is to do a hard full throttle pass then kill the ignition system then pull the plugs. No way for me to do that unless I do it on the side of the road away from home. Rusty - Your plug diagram matches what I've read, and both say the timing is about right - for part throttle usage. I've not done any full throttle runs in a long time, and certainly haven't stopped on the side of the road to read the plugs. And I agree that the UR5's may have been causing pinging or detonation at low RPM. I have a corner in the neighborhood that is fairly tight and the engine would rattle if I took it in 3rd and gave it any throttle at all. That was down just below 1000 RPM. But yesterday I tried it after we'd been on the highway for 90 minutes and it didn't rattle. Maybe tomorrow I can pull #1 and see what it looks like.

Can't wait! Go for it!!!!

Late reply just saw this, but what I am seeing is the plugs you have in now are too hot and you need a colder plug not a hotter plug. You have nice colorization on the electrode strap indicating you have good heat, but the clean white porcelain is showing your plug is running too hot and is burning everything off preventing a nice fuel ring around the base of the porcelain. The black specs on cylinder number one is a sign of detonation, carbon is being blown off the piston and is sticking to the porcelain. Cylinder three has some slight speckling on the porcelain indicating it has some detonation as well. Another thing is your timing mark on the electrode strap is not too bad, depending on the source they want that timing mark on the electrode strap to be from between the ninety-degree curve and the fire ring where it is welded at. Some like cylinder seven I feel is a bit too close to the weld while cylinder eight I feel is about ideal close to the ninety-degree curve. I wouldn't mess with the timing however, I would try running one plug colder temp wise try and get some color into the porcelain, that should knock down on your slight detonation issue, it also has a very good chance at moving your timing mark on the electrode strap closer to the ninety-degree curve. Thanks. I did go one notch colder on the plugs and we took a ~200 mile trip today with no problems. I'll pull the #1 plug one of these days and post a closeup of it beside the previous #1 plug. As for detonation, I think I can tell a little bit of difference. Before it rattled a bit when I got it below 1000 RPM, but today it didn't seem to do that. However that is quite subjective so I'll drive it more and see if that observation holds.

The tire trick works wonders. Glad you are getting it done, Bob. But if you aren't spinning tires that 460 is tired. As for what I did with my truck today, we took BB on another ~200 mile jaunt. Temp was only up to 96F but the cooling system only got to 210F after a long run at 75 MPH running the A/C. But, I've discovered a problem with using the stator circuit to pull in a relay to supply engine-running power to the AFR meter. At idle the voltage drops low enough that the relay chatters and the AFR meter is getting pulsing power. I used the hand throttle to bring the RPM up at idle, which we had plenty of as we had construction with one-lane roads, and that got around the problem. But I'm going to have to rewire to use the fuel pump relay power to feed that relay. However the new cooler plugs worked fine. In fact, I think I can lug it down a bit more w/o pinging/rattling, but that is a very subjective observation so I'm not sure of that. In any event I'll pull the #1 plug one of these days to see what it looks like compared to what the hotter plugs looked like.

Alignment specs are on the page at Documenation/Suspension & Steering/Alignment.

Merry Christmas on the 4th of July. Just got two documents scanned today, both of which are on the same webpage: EEC-IV Sensors & Actuators - Original Bulletin & Later Update ELECTRONIC ENGINE CONTROLS (EEC-IV)SENSORS AND ACTUATORS (THROUGH MODEL YEAR 1986) 36 pages ELECTRONIC ENGINE CONTROLS (EEC-IV) INFORMATION UPDATE (THROUGH MODEL YEAR 1986) 20 pages Note that both of them refer to the "Emission Diagnosis/Engine Electronics Shop Manual, Volume H", which we also have on the site.

But now you know, and with your memory you won't forget.

Right. We actually have a how-to on our page at Documentation/Driveline/Speedometers, Gears, Cables, & Sensors and then the Speedo Cables tab.

Happy 4th of July! As an update on the migration of the forum from Nabble to Invision, we've paid the $2050 to do the migration. The next step is to upload a current backup of the Nabble forum for them to write a routine to translate it into Invision format, but we've run afoul of the holiday and apparently the Invision staff are off at the moment. In fact their statement says "Normal support services will resume on Monday, July 8th." So I'm hoping that on Monday I'll be given a place to upload our 7.3GB backup file and they can start coding. But I have no idea how long that will take, so I'll give y'all an update when I have one. In the interim, be safe!

I missed that. But good! Except that while their advert agrees with the part number listing from the Text section of the MPC, which shows those fitting all 4WD’s through 86. But it doesn’t match the Illustration section which shows that in 85 it changed to the style you and I have.

"Oh, and the part numbers on one of the lower don't exactly match up with what the book says or at least I don't think they do. I may clean it more later to see if I can read more of the number." Any number on a part is not a part number. See our page here: Documentation/How To Decode Ford Part Numbers. But the short version is that #'s on parts are ID or engineering #'s and you have to use a cross reference to get from those to part numbers, which are what is listed in the master parts catalog. I know it doesn't make sense, but that was not one of Ford's "Better Ideas". The upper and lower insulators/bushing/mounts may be hard to find. But you may be able to find other bushings that will work. I'd look at the cab bushings and radiator support bushings to see if they are about the same size.

You are now on the map. As for the cam, retarding the timing helps with emissions but hurts power - badly. The 351M & 400 got timing sets that retarded the cam timing in order to pass emissions testing, and were forever called "boat anchors" because of it.

Agreed. But there were really two problems with both the 351M & 400 - lack of carburetion & cam timing. I know a guy that put a straight-up timing set on his 400 and a 600 CFM Edelbrock and said it doubled his power. Don't know which is the most important, but both are significant. The 400 has a tad longer stroke than the 460 and much larger inlet and exhaust ports than a 351W. So it can make gobs of torque and it can breath. But it came out of the factory neutered badly.

Derek - My bad as I hadn't updated that page. It now reads: As for the blower switch, it doesn't have an off position. You have to move the function lever to Off to turn the blower off. The bottom position on the blower speed is just Low.

The guys gave you good advice. Glad you got it fixed. As for the idle, you probably had really weak spark before and should now have a very strong one. That could improve the idle speed by lighting off the mix more reliably. And it may also improve the power and MPG.

I'll get right back with you, Paul. Would sure like to see you - and the truck.

Which is why this grandpa put a non-tilt column in Big Blue. He's tall enough that the wheel comes in very handy for pulling yourself in.

Here's hoping, Jim.

I wouldn't recommend anyone else try this, as it has been the picture of reliabilty. Other than normal PM stuff, and a water pump (on a cummins? No way!!!! LOL) I did replace the belt, since I was there. Old one behind seat, just in case. I get plenty of looks, and questions. Even after living in this town for 3 years, some folks are still surprised by what's hiding under the hood..... I've had several folks ask for advice on doing a Cummins swap, but haven't had many that actually followed through. A former co-worked did complete the same swap in his 85 D150 Dodge. We kinda stole the show at the recent Mopar event here in town..... Paul - Welcome back, Kotter!!! Glad to hear that nameless engine is still running. Please plan on bringing it all the way up here for the show, which I think will be Sept 14th. You might steal this show.

Welcome! Glad you joined. So, where's home? We have a map (Bullnose Forum/Member's Map) and can add you with a zip or city/state.

Dunno, Jim. But in my fairly lengthy highway driving in 5th gear Big Blue gets 11 - 12 MPG at a steady 2000 RPM, which is about 68 MPH.

I have and fired it up, but haven’t had a chance to drive it yet. We may take it for a spin this weekend.

Yes, that cleaner has been doing a really good job. But I can't find a gooseneck hitch in either the MPC or the accessories catalog.