Shifting Our 1963 Ford Falcon Into Hyperdrive

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If I'm on fire, there's a big problem.

Today on Blacktop Speed Shop,

we're finishing up our transmission and getting everything hooked up so we could try and run our 363 small block

and our Ford Falcon Futura.

Oh yeah, this is gonna be great. I could see this already.

This engine and trans may not fit in this Ford,

but with a little bit of elbow grease and some luck,

we may just be able to make it work.

Can we get everything dropped in so we can finally say we gained over 500 horsepower?

This is our 1963 Ford Falcon Futura.

When we pulled it in the shop,

it was in such good condition

you'd think this bird could fly,

but a quick look under the hood revealed that this was never going to be fast enough to lift off.

With a tiny 144 inline six,

we wanted to see what it would run on the dyno and if it was indeed the weakest engine if we've ever pulled.

Yeah,

47.29,

79.5 pound feet.

We tried to free up some horsepower,

but somebody decided to make it

too free.

Hey,

uh,

that's what I was gonna tell you.

So we added

500+ horse

with a 363 small block and gave this Falcon a real set of wings.

That's a whole lot of motor for a small car.

That's a huge motor.

I guess we could lower the car down some more

and put this block under the front of it.

How far can we go before the control arms set?

Maybe 3 or 4 inches.

Squeezing all that power under the hood wasn't easy, but we got it to fit, and today this engine is gonna run.

The next step to moving forward with our Falcon is putting the engine back in.

In order to do that, we have to install the clutch so we can put the trans on it,

get the drivetrain mocked up,

and get it ready.

So the biggest difference between these two is that this is a twin disc and this is a single disc.

Twin discs are great when you need

twin disc clamping,

but we don't need that because we're not drag racing. The car's not heavy.

So we went with a single disc aluminum flywheel

to reduce weight

and to make it simpler.

Also,

single discs are a little bit cheaper as well.

The biggest downfall

with this is that

the single discs are a metallic puck style where the twin disc is an organic fiber style which has a little more give to it than these,

so.

This clutch is gonna feel more like an on-off switch than the twin disc,

but

this is a lot lighter and a lot better for spirited street driving,

if you will,

than it is for a twin disc.

But since for this application we don't make the torque and we don't have a super heavy car, we're gonna stick with a single disc

and we're gonna use an aluminum flywheel.

So

this is what we're gonna go with.

Oh.

Big mistake number one, don't forget this.

I totally haven't forgotten this already, I promise

this is.

This is all part of the plan.

This is for manual transmissions. If you don't have this on,

the bottom of this is wide open.

You can get dirt, debris,

your fingers stuck in it while the flywheel's spinning.

That's not good.

We're using this aluminum flywheel that we got from SummitRacing.

Your flywheel here,

one of these bolts will be spaced differently from the rest of them,

so if you put it on and something's not lining up,

don't freak out,

just spin it a couple of times, it'll line up, I promise.

Now that I got the flywheel sitting up here,

we have to install the bolts, and this is your Summit Tech tip.

Before you install the bolts, you have to put Teflon tape

and you have to put ARP lube under the head of the bolt.

So I'm gonna get this one screwed in for you and I'm gonna show you how to do that on the last one here.

Super simple, super easy, but it is necessary.

When you Teflon a bolt,

it's directional,

so you wanna lay it on,

it's gonna feel backwards at first

and you just roll it onto the bolt.

You don't need a lot,

just a couple layers.

Enough so that oil can't get through.

And leak out of your bolts, and then you just.

Rip it off

And then the loose end

here

goes with the threads

so that when you tighten it,

it just tightens it down onto the threads more, it doesn't roll it up,

doesn't ruin anything.

That's a good way to test it if you did it the right way or not.

Just hold your finger on it, screw it like you're tightening,

righty tighty,

and nothing balls up.

You did it right.

Before you do install the bolt, you have to put a little lube under

the head of the bolt.

The bolt should go in smooth

You just want to get them started.

These bolts

go into an oil gallery in the back of the crank,

so if you don't seal the ends of the threads,

it'll leak oil out from right here.

And if you get oil on your friction surface, your clutch will slive, you junk everything,

not good.

So

seal it up good.

Boom, it's broken.

It's gone.

In a star pattern.

You're a star in my eyes.

One.

2.

3.

Or

I

6,

hooray.

Am I done now, sir?

Yeah.

You are done,

sir.

Thank you.

Would you like for me to go fetch you some brake clean,

please? I'll be in my trailer.

I have to go next door because we're out.

Up next

we finished mounting the transmission

and we're gonna see if this TKX is gonna fit.

Now that we've got the flywheel installed, I got the bell housing put on, I got the clutch put on,

we're getting ready to make up our transmission.

Before you put your transmission in,

you have to measure and make sure your spacing for your throw-out bearing is correct.

When you buy a trans from American Powertrain, they send you pretty in-depth instructions. I'm gonna kind of gloss over this and give you some

general information on when you're doing this.

But

it's pretty simple, it's pretty straightforward.

It's nothing hard.

With the instructions for American Powertrains TKX, it tells you

the shim spacing for your throwout bearing. It tells you what each one is, it tells you the math equation you gotta use, which you just subtract your numbers. It's nothing crazy.

You want to get at least 3 measurements to get a median, that way you can have an average

in case one finger is different from another one.

Same thing with your throw-out bearing.

You measure from the face of the throwout bearing

to the face of the transmission itself.

You do 3 measurements in 3 different places to get a median.

When you get those,

American Powertrain tells you

to take

the one from the transmission

and subtract it from the one from the bell housing.

They even give you

an example

to help you.

American powertrains spec for the air gap

is no less than 100,000 and no more than 200,000. They say they want it at about 150,000 of an inch.

Our math,

which I have

wrote down

right here,

came out to 151,000 with 4 of their shims.

Each of their shims is 57,000 thick, which they put in here.

This is what it looks like.

Since we're putting this in a Ford,

we ordered a Ford throw hydraulic throwout bearing kit. They call it the,

the Hydromax throwout bearing kit from American Powertrain. That's for a Ford.

So when you get your measurements for your clutch to your bell housing and from the trans to your throwout bearing, you got to subtract them and that gives you a number.

Ours was 379,000.

American Powertrain tells you to subtract the.

Thickness of your shim

as many times as it takes to get between 100,000

and 200,000.

For us that was 4, and that left us with 151,000 of an inch for air gap,

which is right in the middle of the spec where they want it.

But now that we're in spec

and we're getting ready to put it in the car,

I need

Brian

to come help me make these two together and we'll go drop it in the car and

Maybe start it.

Hopefully,

if Dad lets me,

we'll start a.

Make sure you pull your alignment tool before you try to put the input shaft in though

it's a good rule of thumb.

That probably wouldn't work very well,

no.

Man, I wish they made like a, a jack for this.

What they say like a bull in a china shop

or a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.

Do Southerners say anything that makes sense?

Hold on,

I'll put this bowl in, Jackson.

So it should already be lined up.

Look at that, dude.

Well, we got a problem.

No pressure.

What's the problem is if it's not

lined up right now and it's sitting in there like that,

we have a problem.

Should we put thread locker on this?

I did in the bell housing. I don't know about these.

Guess we can

later.

Later,

later,

when it comes off,

that'll happen

100%. That'll happen. I think it'll be just fine without it, dude.

What's the torch spec, you know.

That much that much sounds good.

I figured aluminum to aluminum would be 45.

Or I just ruined it and it's gonna blow up now it's gonna explode,

it's gonna spontaneously combust because I over torqued it.

So this is

a thing of beauty,

yeah,

because it's a 5 speed and it's complete,

not a slush box

as much as we can complete it up to this point.

So while we had the engine and transmission already out of our Ford Falcon,

we wanted to dress up the engine bay as much as we could.

Uh, we really thought about leaving the traditional black like.

Most cars come from the factory,

but we wanted something a little different.

So

interior on our car is Ford Rangoon red, which is a common color for a sixties model Ford.

So we wanted to dress it up and we painted the engine bay that color.

Couple things to note though with that color.

Uh,

the inside of the vehicle is all red, red dash carpet seats,

door panels,

everything,

and the windows are currently tinted on this car as well,

so it makes the red look more dark than what it really is once the door opens.

So I did a spray out panel,

some scrap metal that we had around the shop.

The red is still gonna be red, but you could change the lightness or darkness of the color

by the base.

You put it over

so

this side

right is the white side,

this side is the gray side, and there's a black strip that's separating it down the middle.

Well now our paint's in

everything is dry,

everything is cured, um, now we're ready to sit the engine and transmission in it, but

we gotta be extremely careful not to scratch and tear up our brand new paint job in here,

so it's gonna be a task for two people for sure.

Hold on, we're,

we're slipping,

careful,

that leg just lifted a little bit.

All right, hold it right there,

Kemosabe.

It's like wasabi but different.

Oh yeah, this is gonna be great. I can see this already.

All right,

stop right there.

Can you start to let it down a little bit,

keep going.

I wonder how much fluid's gonna leak out of this transmission if I pull this yoke out.

Probably a lot.

I'm just giving the action cam

a bath.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, it's great.

Somebody planned that out really well.

We never remember

to drain the transmission.

One day we'll learn,

but that day ain't today.

So instead we're gonna do some natural rust prevention.

It's steady puking.

Oh God.

Don't worry, the yolk's puking out too.

Oh,

my gloves filling up as we speak.

This is what two guys would do in their garage though,

make a mess.

If you're putting a new transmission on, usually it's not full of oil.

Well,

it's just idiots. It is backwards. It's new,

new to us transmission.

Can it angle anymore?

Is that all it's got?

Where's your gun at?

I got you on there.

Which one angles it more, righty tight here, lefty loosey? I think it's

right.

Coming up

is back to square one as we change gears on our trans install.

All right, so

par for the course for us in the Falcon project, we've run into another issue.

Uh, we're trying to make or try to put the engine and transmission in together as one.

Uh, we don't have enough angle on the dangle to get it to Dolphin enough to go underneath

the transmission tunnel, so

at this point we're gonna have to split it.

So we'll pull the transmission off,

leave the bell housing attached.

We know our spines and everything are good,

so it should go right back in and we'll just install it from underneath the car.

Uh, not ideal,

but we don't want to scratch up our paint and tear up anything either,

so.

Change of plans.

Why do it once when you can do it twice? Correct?

Can you

never mind.

Oh,

is it in gear?

Can you ungear it?

Neutrale neutralis,

I guess I could put the yolk back in here too,

make it easier to turn.

No, it's fine. I already got it.

Don't worry about it now.

So, uh,

The old throw out bearings on your side.

I can hold

this steady while you slip that back on.

Uh,

I'll have to get out

because I won't be able to reach it from over here.

Which way do you hold it to go steady?

I'll hold it back here.

OK.

I gotta get out anyway.

Do you wanna put the throw out bearing on it since I had the tail shaft of the transmission?

I don't care.

That way I've already got it.

OK,

that'd probably be easier.

We worked in a gravel driveway.

Me too.

All right,

now.

This time.

Slow,

yeah,

yep,

just a little bit.

A little more.

Put it on the right way.

It won't do that.

You have to go backwards. Yeah,

yep.

Hold on, hold on

which way you need to go? I don't know.

It's just, I'm on it. I just gotta line that O-ring up and it's,

it's fragile, so you can't just rip it.

I got a window

in the side of the bell housing that's the perfect size

of my hand.

Ain't that crazy if it's so tight in there like that?

Yeah,

it's ridiculous, honestly.

The side of this bell housing needs a window that's like

a half inch wider.

Put a manual in it.

It's a great idea. It'd be fun.

Put a manual in it. Let's put that Ford Amatic from 1960 in there.

Easy.

Got it.

Whatever you do,

push really hard,

pull it back out.

I think,

yeah, you're lined up too,

you jack it straight up and it should,

it should just slip right in.

I'll try to hold the throat bearing on without

smashing my finger.

Silly fluid.

You're supposed to stay inside the transmission.

That them holes are lined up

back here.

Now go back to where you were.

There we go.

Ta da

I don't think it's gonna go more than that.

No, that's good though.

Up next,

can we take this Falcon from 50 to over 500 horsepower,

or is it going back to the drawing board?

Well, we're finally here.

It's finally time

to see what our hard work has done,

you know, up to this point

we've got our engine installed,

our transmissions installed,

everything is hooked up,

definitely not the final look that we're going for,

but

we want to fire the engine

because we can.

Now it wasn't easy stuffing this in here.

Being a small car, we had to split the.

Trans from the engine. We had to put the engine in first,

get under it on our backs,

make a huge mess,

put the trans in from the bottom.

After we got those in,

we had to lift the engine back up to shove the headers in.

Even though they're low profile headers, there's still not much room.

We went to AutoZone.

We picked up a Durlas gold battery.

We have

everything wired

temporarily

so we can start this

because I want to hear it

and he wants to hear it, and I know you want to hear it.

So we got it rigged up

safely

so we can start it and we can work out some bugs if it has any.

Now, we don't have a fuel system hooked up,

so I'm gonna use my handy dandy squirt bottle here. I'm gonna fill each bowl up just so it can run for a couple of minutes. We're not gonna run it forever.

We don't have a cooling system hooked up.

We're gonna run it for just a few seconds. It won't hurt anything.

Is that how you fed your guinea pigs in school?

This thing has some pretty big bowls on it.

That's a huge bowl, man.

Now that I've successfully made a huge mess,

there's nothing dangerous about this at all.

I really hope we're not 180 out.

We're about to find out.

Damn right, boys, and it's out of fuel.

Yeah,

is that 47 horsepower?

Probably at idle.

It was firing on all 8.

No, I can't believe it idle the way it did

right off the bat. First start.

Now keep in mind we have not started this prior to this.

This is it.

What you see is what you just got

47 horsepower to over 500

in our '63 Ford Falcon Futura.

I'm at a loss for words, man, honestly,

and.

It's 2800 pounds.

Over just over 500 may not sound like a whole lot to some people,

especially in today's world,

but in 2800 pounds with the 5 speed behind it,

it's gonna be fun.

You know, we still have some other things to do.

We still

got exhaust to do,

interior on this car,

cooling system,

fuel system up and coming,

but once we get it done,

straight to the track is going,

and we're gonna let her rip.

Speaking of let her rip, can we start it again?

Let's go. I wanna do it now.

Today we were able to button the car up just enough to get it to start.

Before anybody freaks out, it's a quarter inch drive

impact driver

drill,

whatever

it's like maybe 20 ft pounds, it's OK.

Not everything was a plug and play,

but once we got it all together,

we were able to make it all work, and now we're rocking over 500 horse with a 5 speed manual.

Woo!

Go baby.

Oh, I can't wait to drive it.

I'm driving it home tonight.