PART 6
With our sm block installed, it’s time to think about rewiring the Pace Car
Afew months back, we left RPM readers with an assembled small block Ford on the engine stand and ready to be planted between the stock framerails of the Pace Car Race Car 1979 Mustang Pace Car.
we chose 2” primary 4 inch collector stainless steel headers.
With our 6th installment, the motor is in and we are almost ready to fire it up, but we realized the car needed to be completely rewired and budgeted for it. This month we wanted to introduce the MSD Grid ignition system we’ll
be using, but first let’s recap some of the other things we’ve taken care of over the past few months.
To put the power to track, we need certain parts like solid engine mounts, large diameter headers, a high single plane intake manifold which will be topped off with a nitrous plate and carburetor.
After figuring out the carb size to fit our application, we chose a FST 1050cfm Billet X-treme Pro carburetor and a Super Victor single plane intake manifold. We complimented the intake charge with a 1 inch thick nitrous plate and 1 inch thick spacer plate. In order to expel all those spent exhaust gases
Over the years, we have installed many different brands of headers in several different chassis - the Fox Body chassis should be an easy one. However, think of all the variations -like tube size, block deck height, engine mounts and plates, etc. Surprisingly, the Pace Car Race Car headers fit perfectly. It’s not hard to remember the days when headers were made for a specific engine only, and more often than not required a couple or more swift hits with a hammer and a tickle or two with the torches to install that big long tube header in your street car. I always chuckle when I think of my first header installation… I was a young motorhead,
Our small block Ford looks right at home between the stock framerails of The Pace Car Race Car. The car had an existing aftermarket K-member and we tweaked the engine mounting system and other areas of the front of the car, being careful to stay on budget.
Here you can see how the large tube headers fit perfectly in our PCRC chassis. Do yourself a favor and spend a bit extra on a quality set of headers. We can say from experience that all headers are NOT created equally!
drooling over those “Cragar Hot Pipes”. How can you not get you excited about that name alone! Anyway, I can remember taking a whole day, many friends, many “gamma cookies” and many beers to install the left header in a very large framed car. Today’s manufacturing techniques are very refined and a quality set of headers can be made to fit any engine in any chassis to perfection. In fact, ours went in from the top, with the engine just sitting off the mounts. Do yourself a favor and spend a few extra bucks on good brand name headers, its worth it just to save the stress and bloody knuckles trying to cram a cheap set in place.
The PCRC nitrous kit is a col-
lection of various brand parts from other projects. I had an old Bill Trovato (BTR Performance) nitrous solenoid laying in the parts bin as well as a couple used fuel and purge solenoids taking up space. The bottles will be 15lb Nitrous Express units that I will update to their new Lightning Valve technology. We found an NOS plate with a cross tube design, meant for a 4150 hole. The jetting will go to a maximum of 300hp, keeping in mind our stock block. From the parts bin, we also found two Aeromotive fuel systems and thought, why not use them both for the PCRC? Two pumps and two regulators will be used to adequately feed the carburetor and tune the nitrous end
The MSD Power Grid #77303 Controller and #7720 Ignition is your starting point for the Power Grid system.
The
speed for optimum traction.
There was a variety of ignition brands to choose from and we did try many others, but always came back to MSD
successfully and is totally overkill for our horsepower level, but like I said, we had them and might just as well use them.
During the time it took to install the engine and parts on it, we decided on an ignition system. Over the decades, we used countless 6al ignition boxes and won many races with the tried and true 7al ignition, as well. When MSD came out with their digital ignition systems we also used them with great success, and it’s tough to argue with success. Back in my speed shop days, there was a variety of ignition brands to choose from and we did try many others, but always came back to MSD. We already have a Digital 7 ignition system, but it’s time to try the Power Grid from MSD to gain a whole new level of control on this car. We will use an MSD #8640 crank trigger for accurate trigger signals and a dead distributor to transport the spark to the plugs. We’ll be using the follow-
The MSD Power Grid
Part #7740 is a 4 connector hub which makes attaching your Power Grid modules a cinch!
This is our MSD Part # 2273 Wide Band 02 sensors with Harness and Bung kit.
ing MSD parts in our Pace Car Race Car project:
Part # 7720 The ignition box
Part # 7730 The Power Grid
Controller, complete with View Software, wiring harness, micro-SD card and mounting hardware.
Part # 7555 The Inductive Spark Plug Wire Pickup
Part # 7761 ARC Module
Part # 7766 Dual Wideband O2
Module
The MSD Power Grid Ignition System incorporates a 32 bit microcontroller and MSD VIEW which is an easy to use Windows based software program. We found the ignition easy to install as it uses CAN-Bus technology to simplify the wiring and adding additional MSD accessories, as well as Racepak accessories. The ignition can be powered up by a USB connection, eliminating the need to turn the key on for changing its parameters. Data Acquisition you say?
No problem with the Power Grid, as the ignition has a SD storage card slot for storage and reviewing data. The Power Grid also incorporates options to change timing based on engine rpm, gear value and time, as well as advanced individual cylinder timing, based on gear or time. The Grid has five retard stages for nitrous, five steps of rpm limits for burnout, spool, launch, overrev and safety. The shift light settings for each gear and Ignition data acquisition records multiple runs to top off all the Grids features.
With all of our new MSD ignition parts now in-hand, we can finally finish rewiring the Pace Car and share our progress right here in RPM MAG. Until then, stay safe and have fun building your own project. Remember, you don’t need a pocket full of money, just some common sense and good friends like you who just want to have some building a car and go racing! RPM