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My motor blew up......now what?

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Last event of the season and just an absolute gut punch. I was in 5th gear at close to 140 mph when I heard a load bang and saw smoke and flames in the rear view. Unfortunately I did not install the gauges I had planned this year so I had no warning. Car has been flawless for three years since the upgrades and tune that I have documented previously. Now it's decision time.
I would love to get the experience (ands cost savings) in removing the motor, tearing it down and rebuilding it but I would likely screw something up. The guys at Phoenix have a good, used Boss 302 motor available and just transferring everything over makes the most financial sense. I could upgrade the heads and valve train for reliability and HP while I'm at it plus anything else worthwhile (oil pump, oil crossover tube, Tremec maybe). Anything else I should be looking at???

Block pic.jpg
 

Dave_W

Cones - not just for ice cream
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Connecticut
Are you worried about originality? Coyote Gen 1, 2, 3 comparison
Personally, I like the idea of keeping an actual Boss/Roadrunner engine in it, but you might want to talk to @Fabman on how he put his new engine together. I think he started with a used Gen 2 truck engine, but did a lot of work on it. If going non-Boss on the replacement, I'd pay attention to computer control compatibility - lots of interconnected systems on cars these days.
 
Damn. What cylinder was it?
The pic is upside down. The hole is right above the motor mount on the left side so maybe 6 or 7

I kinda like the idea of having a Boss motor. Plus, it's going to work perfectly in my car. Sure I would also love an Aluminator or a custom built beast but I can't afford that right now. I would love to do the work myself and save some funds but unless I can get some great instructions with all the steps laid out I will have to pay someone to do the swap. At the very least I will disassemble my motor and drop it so I can see what happened and share with the tuner who installed the cams and did the tune. I have no data so it probably doesn't matter.
 
I blew my motor at the track a few years ago, put in an aluminator. But, if I had to do it again, I'd probably just put in an LS motor. Cheaper, lighter.....

I know everyone's gonna hate me.
Funny you mention that. I was also considering the LS route for the same reason. I would imagine you need a new driveshaft, ECM, headers.....probably more but I just think it would end up being more expensive and would require more custom work that I can't do.
 
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The Easy button would be to call Phoenix or Kohr and see is they have an old Boss motor sitting on the shelf that can be rebuilt, using the same electronics that are already in the car. The cost of an LS is not the only issue, the electronics are as expensive as the hard parts. Those IMSA Boss motors were pretty stout, change out the rods, valve springs, oil pump and let them eat for 50 straight competition hours.
 

JDee

Ancient Racer
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LS makes tons of sense, except economically. Smaller, lighter, same power, puts the weight in a better place, what's not to like? Except it's a GM motor and the cost of the swap is way beyond the cost of a new crate Coyote, especially if you can't do the work yourself.

It's kind of odd, I bought this car largely because of the sophistication of the motor vs the old school 2 valve pushrod motors. Now I kind of hate the thing a bit because there's too damn much that goes wrong. S550 has a fantastic chassis, the body design is spot on, the motor looks great on paper but maybe not so much in reality.

Now and then I think I should have bought a Camaro, then I look at one of them and realize that car has its own set of warts that just can't be fixed. There's no perfection in cars I guess.
 
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LS makes tons of sense, except economically. Smaller, lighter, same power, puts the weight in a better place, what's not to like? Except it's a GM motor and the cost of the swap is way beyond the cost of a new crate Coyote, especially if you can't do the work yourself.

It's kind of odd, I bought this car largely because of the sophistication of the motor vs the old school 2 valve pushrod motors. Now I kind of hate the thing a bit because there's too damn much that goes wrong. S550 has a fantastic chassis, the body design is spot on, the motor looks great on paper but maybe not so much in reality.

Now and then I think I should have bought a Camaro, then I look at one of them and realize that car has its own set of warts that just can't be fixed. There's no perfection in cars I guess.

True, I remember those LS motors coming to IMSA, they basically had to allow them to run a dry sump because they were blowing up left and right. I guess they finally fixed that.. I would hope, but every once in awhile I still see them grenade do to oiling issues. I know they are simpler, and believe me, I'm an old school pushrod guy, but IMO the horsepower potential of the LS will never be as great as the Modular Fords, sure you can point to 1 or 2 examples, (just like the 1K horsepower Honda crowd) but in general, not gonna happen, especially for the displacement. Allesandro was running almost 500HP in his car, and except for some bolt on items and an E85 tune, I don't think the internals were touched, he was running 170 top speed and the motor lived, I'm not sure I would bet on an LS doing the same thing.. at least not for long.
 
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I blew my motor at the track a few years ago, put in an aluminator. But, if I had to do it again, I'd probably just put in an LS motor. Cheaper, lighter.....

I know everyone's gonna hate me.
A LS swap will cost more than building and installing a fully forged coyote with Gen 1 cams and timing components. The PCM will need to be changed and other systems will be impacted. The PCM is tied into the CAN bus which is tied into a lot of other systems. Good luck finding someone competent to work on the car and maintain it post swap.

You will also find that an LS crate engine built with good rods, pistons, etceterra like what are used in the aluminator is more expensive than you think. A lot of the crate engines are warmed over production engines with powdered rods and cast pistons.

LS conversions in old cars is a bit different of a story. You only need to worry about basic engine management, not everything else like ABS, electronic steering rack, etcetera.

If Terry actually kept track of all the time in research, fabrication, etcetera with the LS Mustangs swap and actually charged a customer, expect that bill to easily exceed $30k just for the motor swap (assuming he got all of your factory subsystems to work properly). But, once everything is figured out and put in kit form, the swap might get a bit cheaper. Terry's effort goes well beyond just a motor swap. He is basically replacing almost all the exiting factory systems - which will cost a lot but is probably the way to go.

The OP's real challenge will be finding parts to build a motor. Gen 1 / 2 timing components are not available along with a lot of other stuff with no ETA's on the back orders. Gen 1 / 2 long blocks are not in the pipeline right now. The only new motors readily available are all Gen 3. Because of this, used coyotes have skyrocketed in price over the last 6 - 8 months.

If the Phoenix engine is actually a Roush built 302 engine, I would jump on it depending on the number of hours.
 
The one bright side to this problem is that I have some time. I will hopefully get to Phoenix this week to check out the motor. The LS option is not an option....just a nice idea. I really need to find out what happened and not repeat it.
 
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How bad are the heads? Its the heads that are hard to come by these days. There is plenty of options when it comes to the short block.
 
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Gen 1 / 2 timing components are a problem too (in addition to Gen 1 / 2 heads). For short block, Gen 3 production are available. He would need to look around for a Gen 3 aluminator shortblock - most shipping ETAs I see are late December.
 
How bad are the heads?
That's what I don't know yet. Since I will be taking the top end down for the first time and I have no guide at the moment it will be a while before I get there. I am really hoping the heads are ok.

There is plenty of options when it comes to the short block.
I could use some help on this. I saw the Gen 3 Aluminator 12:1 short block #M-6009-A50NAB for around $5600. If I can use my current L&M cams, CJ intake, Meziere water pump and heads then that could work. I can buy a used Boss 302 motor but I don't know the cost yet. Any other options?
 

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