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I have been busy working away on the interior of the Darkside Garage Inc. Millennium Falcon Longreach. Still heaps to do.

I had the day off work today, so spent the day on the Escort, and it just got better and better as the day went on I started the day by getting the 1600 bottom end back together. Once that was done, I dropped the flywheel off to be machined ready for the new clutch. Then spent the afternoon with Rod working on the gearbox. We nearly finished making up the jig to weld the shifter in its new location. We have basically set this jig up so that this conversion can be done with or without the need of the entire gearbox, but rather just the extension housing and shifter rod. Now, for the moment we have all been waiting for (or at least i have )..... IT'S IN COLOUR! I haven't seen the car yet in the flesh. these are just photos that Mark has sent me. The front still needs to be blacked out behind the grill.

Big day today. The Escort is home at last Covered in dust First time washing it since December 2020 *not me in the photo* all nice and clean at last. ready to go into its new home. this is how you clean the inside, right? its fine, there is no interior at the moment Engine bay looks so pretty In it's new home. the shed is a little squishy with the car running this way across the shed, but once i get some shelving into the shed and a bit more storage ill have space to move.

Mark sent these through today. Bonnet and grill fitted and aligned. This makes me smile seeing it look a little more like a car again

It's in!!!!! Now to hook everything up.

Found a safe DIY method, for basic leak testing of Injectors - Connect compressed air, set at normal fuel pump supply pressure (often 40-60 psi) Leave for a few hrs, and results should show.

Pre crossflow use the same cam bearings as xflow, its an extra hole for the pre xflow to oil the rockers as they have an extra oil gallery to supply oil to the head and rocker shaft, that gallery gets supplied from the top of the cam journals, whereas xflow use the lifters and pushrods to supply the rockers with oil, its no real biggie just interchangeable bearings

Well, last Saturday was an epic day and has given me and my mate confidence and inspiration to push on harder than ever with the restoration of Granddad's old XC... After liberally lubricating each cylinder and leaving it for a week, we gently turned her over by hand. There were NO tight spots, weird sounds or unwanted friction at all and she turned beautifully... Battery was connected and carby was primed and after about 6 attempts, she briefly coughed and died... A few more attempts were made until, incredibly, the super fuel that was still in her tank (no, it HASN'T gone off at all) made it to the fuel pump and she ran long enough for me to get this very quick video. Pretty much a testament to the strength and engineering of the mighty crossflow engine...

more progress on the car. Back panel is in, but not welded. just getting things all setup before being welded in. more little imperfections being sorted out. factory creases from panel and body joins being smoothed. tonight after hours, we made a start on the underside of the car. got most of it done and prepped. (this was after only a short amount of time) Awaiting a conclusion as to how far Mark wants me to take the underside. Or rather, how far I think I should go with the underside of the car. given we got so much of it cleaned and back to bare metal tonight, id imagine another solid day and it will be ready to go underneath.

Evening all. I picked this up today. Let me know if the pics don't work. She's an early dentside F250 4x4, commonly called the 'Highboy' option. She has a 351C and manual trans, lots of rust in the floors and a fairly clean engine compartment.

I have news on the Escort. Quicker than I expected, but I have an answer from Shannons. The bad (but not so bad) news is that it is a write off The good news outweighs the bad. What I didn't realise is, that Mark, from the start, had quoted in such a way, that the cost sounded correct, and appeared correct to Shannons assessor, but also in such a way that they would write it off. Now in most cases, that would be bad. that the repairer has made the insurance company write a car off, but not in my case. Shannons will write the car off, and pay me out 100% of what it is insured for. Due to being older than 35 years of age, there is no salvage fee, so I get to keep the car, and its entire insured value. Working off Mark's quote, this means I will have around $3000 to spare, to go towards the cost of the chrome trim repairs, and the extra paint work. Depending on the cost of the extra paint work, i may also pay to have the wheels painted professionally, and, it has been suggested to me that I pull the engine out, and have the engine bay done at the same time. Which is looking like a pretty good idea to me. With the extra $3k up my sleeve, to get a full respray, including engine bay, i may not be too far out of pocket, if any, unlike with the XF, where I was a long way out of pocket. Im not sure about other states, but here in victoria, anything that is older than 25 years old, written off cars do not go onto the WOVR, which means the rego never gets cancelled, and they do not need an engineers certificate, or roadworthy to be put back on the road. So yes the car is a write off, but it actually works out better for me than if Shannons decided not to write it off, and repair it.

This thread is quite old, but it caught my attention. I have a 300ci factory EFI six in my 1971 F100. I transplanted it in 1998 - ousting the original 240. It's a 4.9 litre, 4" bore with 3.98" stroke. Armour guard brought 6 into Queensland during Expo in '88. They were fitted into F250's. 4 were ultimately crushed would you believe? Two survived - I have one and I believe the other went to a South Australian farmer who removed the EFI. Just though that may be of interest to some. Cheers.

I have been busy with a new direction on the interior still star wars themed but more Millennium Falcon. cheers Scott

Been through some changes since this photo.

Ok block is cleaned and painted and put the core plug set in tomorrow will drop the crank in and maybe a piston or 2 Sent from my SM-A125F using Tapatalk

Finally my cam plate came so on with the rest,nice xe black 1982 heads. Sent from my SM-A125F using Tapatalk

OK, just thought I would put this up for people who were looking at replacing the head gasket on their 4L SOHC motor. There are a few different head gaskets available for the 4L. From left to right are.... (Left) Endurotec Composite head gasket with silicon embossed seals. (Centre) Permaseal Composite head gasket. (Right) Permaseal AU style Multi Layer Steel head gasket with Viton coating. The 4L SOHC motor from EA-EL come from the factory with a Composite style head gasket. This has steel fire rings around the bore holes and a steel inner layer sandwiched between 2 composite layers. This can also have silicon sealing rings to help with sealing water jackets , oil galleys etc as with this Endurotec Composite head gasket.... The 4L SOHC motor in the AU came from the factory with a Multi Layer Steel (MLS) style head gasket. This is an aftermarket Permaseal AU style MLS head gasket..... This is usually 3-5 layers of stainless steel with embossing around all the ports and a rubber/viton layer to help with sealing. Now it is common practice for people to replace the older style factory Composite head gaskets on EA-EL with the AU style Multi Layer Steel (MLS) head gaskets. This will increase compression on the EA-EL motors as the gasket is thinner and can increase head gasket life and strength for boosted applications. Now if you are rebuilding an engine and have had the head and block faces machined, it's a no brainer. Switch to the AU style Multi Layer Steel head gasket. Just make sure you mention to the machinists you want the faces of the head and block to suit, as the MLS head gaskets require a much smoother surface on both faces for correct sealing. Usually 15Ra-50Ra (up to MAX of 70Ra) Blocking the surfaces may not even be enough to get a smooth enough surface. Also try to avoid any sealants, install dry. The coating on the MLS needs to be able to seal by itself and expand and contract with the steel it is bonded to. But what happens if your not able to machine both surfaces? What happens if the head is machined but not the block? What if you have fire ring marks or corrosion marks/low spots? Chances are you won't be able to get the required finish to run an MLS head gasket and get it to seal properly without machining the head and block to suit. MLS gaskets are less forgiving of surface imperfections. This is a block that needed a head gasket replacing. It has been block sanded already, but as you can see, there are still imperfections in the surface. These include Fire ring marks and Corrosion marks. The block is super smooth but has imperfections. But not to fear..... While machining of the block and head would be the ideal thing to do for a perfect finish, it's not always possible. I suggest at LEAST the head should be machined....... And the block then block sanded with fine wet and dry, a lubricant and alternating between 45 degrees one way, then 45 degrees the opposite way with a Large sanding block. Composite head gaskets are a lot more forgiving than Multi Layered Steel head gaskets when it comes to surface finish. They can better seal imperfections in the mating surfaces. They require 30Ra-110Ra, which is a much rougher and wider range. Composite head gaskets with silicon sealing rings can give help with dodgy water port sealing. This doesn't mean you can just slap them in. Good surface preparation is still required. Composite head gaskets can also hold boost up to about 20psi, so don't worry too much about using them on most N/A applications. Better to have a head gasket that seals properly and works than a fancy one that can't because of imperfect mating surfaces. This is what happens to an MLS head gasket if installed on too rough a finish..... That was a Permaseal MLS-R head gasket, less than 500km old. Installed by a 'mechanic'. Also if installing a Permaseal MLS-R head gasket to an EA-EL motor, check the rivet on the rear of the gasket doesn't foul and get stuck between the head and block..... The permaseal MLS-R has rather large rivets, the one on the rear will foul. The permaseal MLS has smaller rivets but I would still check the clearance. Just a couple of things to keep in mind if deciding to go the MLS route. I could install another MLS head gasket but chances are it would fail again due to surface roughness. My Composite head gasket lasted 300,000km from the factory before it failed, so if installed properly it will last. I will leave the MLS until everything is machined properly to suit it on the next rebuild...... Happy Head Gasketing! Outback Jack.

Picked up a couple of US army radio boxes from from 1967 to fit in the back of the side boxes.