I run into this all the time at work (Parts man at a Ford dealer) People confuse production year with model year. In a lot of cases the parts change from year to year production.
Wow, great to meet all of you.! Thank you for your condolences. It has been a tough week for our family. But everyone in the family and all his friends are glad I'm keeping the Maverick. My wife is pregnant with our first...a boy! I figure its my job now to 1. keep the car in the family 2. keep it in good shape, and 3. incorporate those "horsepower upgrades" I mentioned! The car runs well, but appears to be a bit mismatched in the drivetrain? All I have to go off of are the recipts he kept and the things I remember about it when he was building it. Right now the car is still at my Mom's in Valparaiso but I plan to bring it to Indy this coming summer. The car has the 351 Windsor I mentioned (I believe from a '79 thunderbird?), but with stock heads (he and I ported/polished them a little), stock crank/rods, iron exhaust manifolds and dual exhaust. But, it has the Edelbrock Performer RPM intake and Camshaft with only a 600cfm Holley (I believe with vacume secondaries). The trans is a 4-speed but I dont know what model and the 9" rear has 3.50 gears with 26" Micky Thompson Indy Profile tires. Like I said, its driveable and pulls pretty hard but seems to run out of steam at ~5000 rpms. What do you all think? I figure it needs headers, but what about the powerplant? Go smaller with the cam and keep the rest the same or go for broke and build the block up and get better heads/carb to match the cam/intake combo? The budget is tight (say, new baby???), so maybe I've answered my own question here... I appreciate all your input! Thanks edit: The block was rebuilt, but not balanced and has cast pistons. The heads also have Crane 1.6:1 full roller rocker arms.
I was able to "downsize" a digital photo of the Maverick. So, I'll try to post it here. Hope it works...
Well. first of all, Congrats on the new baby! That will definitely be your priority when he gets here. It's great the car has had so much done to it already. You're way ahead of lots of the guys just getting into Mavericks. That 351/4spd combo should be pretty potent just as it is. Of course if you're like some of us it's never enough. I think I'd take it one step at a time though. Get the new baby settled in, get the car down, drive it a little bit, then decide if you need to make any more improvements. Oh yeah, keep in mind that everything you do to the car will actually be getting done for the new sons car so you might now wanna make it too radical at first unless you do like some of us, get Mavericks for the entire family! Yep, time will go by so fast, he be driving before ya know it. Good luck!!!
He's spot on there- the 351w in my car fit w/o modding the towers... but now that I've cut them, EVERYTHING is easier, headers, changing plugs, etc etc. Welcome aboard, nice to have you here!
The car look s great. Mine is a 73 and my first car. I got it in 1987 when I was 17. OK now I feel old. My 5 year old son is already asking me if he can have the car when he gets older.bananaman:bananaman. Like many have said before me, You have a great head start coming into this hobby. Welcome to the board and a bunch of great friends.
The Maverick has BOTH exhausts routed out the back next to each other My Dad said thats only how it would fit but when I looked under the car it looks like there should have been room to rout them out each side of the back. ??? With the crome tips on there it looks like one single big exhaust from the angle in the picture.
There is definitely enough room. I believe you'll see that everyone else has theirs run down both sides. I would certainly have to change that in the near future.
