Project Ugly Horse alive and kicking at Road & Track

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project ugly horse ford mustang zach bowman road & track

The hallways of the Autoblog campus are much quieter now that Zach Bowman has taken his prose, along with his welders, wrenches and hammers, over to the digital pages of Road & Track, but that doesn't mean our favorite project Mustang is gone forever. Project Ugly Horse is still coming along, and Zach has gifted us another update on his unfoxy Fox Body.

Last we saw of the Ugly Horse, Zach was strengthening up the '89 Mustang's chassis as he prepares to stuff the turbocharged, direct-injected EcoBoost engine of a Ford Focus ST under the hood. First things first, the old mill must go. Head on over to Road & Track to catch the latest chapter of Project Ugly Horse.

Project Ugly Horse alive and kicking at Road & Track originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 29 Aug 2013 19:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Project Ugly Horse: Part VIII

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Now With More EcoBoost



There's an EcoBoost 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder in there somewhere, and it's headed straight for Ugly Horse.

For the second time in my life, I'm staring at an engine in the back of a truck with no concept of how to get it safely into the garage by my lonesome. The first time this happened, I dragged home a $300 International 345 V8 in the back of my Scout Terra only to discover that the bounds of my manliness terminated well before my ability to muscle that 800-pound cast iron block out of the pickup bed.

Now you know the story of how and why I bought my first engine puller.

Some six years later I'm playing out the same dance, though a Ford F-250 has stolen the Scout's starring role, and there's a towering pallet of thick cardboard boxes in place of the old International mill. It's not that the boxes are particularly heavy. They're just stacked too high to get in the garage. Each one is emblazoned with a massive Ford Racing Performance Parts logo and wrapped in enough plastic to keep both prying fingers and the persistent rain at bay. Good thing, too. There's an EcoBoost 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine in there somewhere, and it's headed straight for Ugly Horse.

Project Ugly Horse is an ongoing series. Need to catch up? You can find the previous articles here.

Continue reading Project Ugly Horse: Part VIII

Project Ugly Horse: Part VIII originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 17 May 2013 11:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Project Ugly Horse: Part V

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The Slippery Slope



I've had a healthy appreciation for cars that stop since one truly unfortunate incident with a runaway 1971 Lincoln Continental.

It's funny how quickly a party can turn from, "We're all having blast" to "What happened to the front of the house, and how many stitches do you think this is going to take?" Standing in a Mustang salvage shop in Kodak, Tennessee, I couldn't help but feel I had strayed into the latter territory with Ugly Horse. There was a supercharged 5.4-liter V8 plucked from a rear-ended Cobra sitting off to my left. The shelves were lined with second-hand Roush and SVT components galore, but I couldn't stop staring at a set of rotors with the approximate diameter of my chest.

Plucked from a 2003 Mach I, the package deal included a set of five-lug hubs, 13-inch rotors and dual-piston PBR calipers for the princely sum of $300. If you're paying attention, that figure is nearly 3/4 of what I paid for my whole Mustang. Still, I've had a healthy appreciation for cars that stop since one truly unfortunate incident with a runaway 1971 Lincoln Continental 12 years ago, and the hardware that was staring me in the face should be enough to pull the freckles from my skin should I get serious with the brake pedal in the Fox. I fished three slumbering 100 dollar bills from my wallet, laid them on the counter with a wince and walked out with a set of parts that set this project down an entirely different path.

Need to catch up on Project Ugly Horse? You can check out earlier posts here!

Continue reading Project Ugly Horse: Part V

Project Ugly Horse: Part V originally appeared on Autoblog on Mon, 11 Feb 2013 14:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Project Ugly Horse: Part III

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Now With More Manual Transmission

 Trans Swap

Trust me when I say there is no more detestable a sensation than being slowly overrun by cold tranny fluid.

This isn't my first rodeo. I have, in the past, pulled any number of transmissions, both automatic and manual, and no matter how many times I do the deed, I'm always astounded at the staggering preponderance of fluid a slusher can stash away in its unknown voids. I started the madness of converting this 1989 Ford Mustang from a four-speed automatic to a five-speed manual by dropping the pan on the old gearbox and letting the super-fried automatic transmission fluid bleed out into a drain pan.

Pulling the old box out of the car was as simple as keeping everything supported while I removed the driveshaft, unbolted the bellhousing from the engine block and sent the one crossmember that supported the transmission packing. But wrestling the contraption from under the car unleashed a small lake of brackish ATF that threatened to flash flood the basement. Trust me when I say there is no more detestable a sensation than being slowly overrun by cold tranny fluid. Please hold your "that's what she said" jokes until the conclusion of our program.

Project Ugly Horse: Part I
Project Ugly Horse: Part II

Continue reading Project Ugly Horse: Part III

Project Ugly Horse: Part III originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 13 Dec 2012 15:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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