Solid motor mounts are no problem; as I've run motor PLATES (no block mounts) for eons now. Dad and I both have. It ties the engine to the chassis and helps stiffen things up a little. BUT what people fail to think about is the transmission mount. The trans mount MUST be flexible. The chassis flexes. This flex, combined with a solidly mounted crossmember and solidly mounted transmission will cause problems at some point. The GM guys know this. Their stock bellhousings are paper thin and will break quicker than a C4/C6 or any aftermarket housing will-as they are generally considerably stronger. Powerglides and THM350's are notorious for broken bellhousings. This is why I suggest going to an adapter housing (JW Ultrabell, etc) for doing a GM trans swap into a Ford, Chrysler, and even on a lot of GM stuff too. For the factory block mounts, you can pin them easily. A drill bit and a carriage bolt is all you need. If NVH is a concern, it's possible to run a limiter from a head down to the frame, install it for racing and remove it for street driving. Some guys have used turn buckles. I have used a piece of steel strap in the past; bolt it on, unbolt it later. As long as the engine's balanced fairly well, NVH isn't all that bad with a 90 degree crossplane V8. With a flat crank V8, almost any V6 or inline 4, it's a whole different ball game. I-6 is not too bad as long as the RPM is up above about 1500 RPM. My Maverick's obviously got motor plates (front and mid), and with the high compression ratio, you can feel each cylinder fire at a real low idle, similar to a V8 diesel. I say "low" idle....that is 1200 RPM and lower. Normal idle around 1400-ish. Lot of the fox body guys have gotten by with solid transmission mounts but we forget that the fox body's cross member is also mounted in rubber bushings and nowadays almost all of them are worn completely out (mine included). Lots of flex going on there and lots of NVH reduction too as long as they're not completely gone and the sleeve is resting directly on the frame/crossmember.
dan gregory said: ↑ AutoKrafters for mavericks has a nice torque brace for about $60 which I think I may eventually use on my car,bolts to the frame & mtr on the left side.What I like about it J is it has a threaded rod so it`s adjustable. ------ Bump. I've had the catalog for several years and have also checked through the new one. I have never seen the device mentioned by dan. This item may have been conflated with a Mustang product, as it doesn't seem to have existed for our rigs.
