Steering Column with Detachable Pantera Steering Wheel

I have been thinking long and hard about what I'm going to do about making my steering column do all I need it to do with turn signals, horn, etc. Frankly I haven't been too excited to take this project on.

One day I was at the local pick-a-part yard looking for something for another project when I came across a really weird looking two door hatchback. It kind of looked like a Mustang but not really. I couldn't find any badges on it (other than a Ford badge). I ran the VIN and found it was a 1984 Ford Escort made for sale in Canada.

I just so happened to look at the steering column and saw that the ignition had the key in it. Not something you see to often at this particular pick-a-part place. The turn signal and windshield wiper switch both felt solid, as did the ignition switch. I really liked how it was all built in a relatively compact way around the steering column. The other thing I liked about this set up was the fact that the horn is located on the turn signal arm itself. I really didn't want to try and figure out how to get a horn working on whatever steering wheel I ended up using on my car. I decided to take the assy apart and check it out as to how it might fit on the Pantera.

It came apart really easily. I took with me the entire plastic cover and the steering shaft itself. I ditched the steering wheel and all the couplings since I had plenty to choose from from the parts I have from the Pantera. Sadly I elected not to take the windshield wiper motor and before I could get back there the car was sent out to be junked. The entire steering column assy cost less than $45! I figure that if something fails to work it should be a part that can be purchased from the local parts store for a decent price.

I knew that the current steering shaft would need to be heavily modified to make this assy work if it was to work at all. When I got the parts home I started marking up what needed to be changed. I decided to use the steering shaft from the Escort and weld on the end of the old Pantera's shaft to enable it to be attached to the original couplers. Here's a couple pictures showing that process.

This first shot shows the two shafts. The Pantera shaft is the one on the bottom. If you look close you can see a black line showing where I need to cut the shaft to weld it to the bottom of the Escort shaft shown above the Pantera shaft.

This shot shows the two shafts welded together. I used angle iron to help center the two shafts together (with some shims since the Pantera shaft was about 0.030" smaller in dia than the Escort shaft) and to keep them as straight as possible. It came out pretty good.

By using the Escort shaft I was able to use the Escort's turn signal switch canceling feature. I had to cut the Pantera's steering shaft housing to fit the Escort's ignition switch internals. Basically two slots had to be cut into the housing to help secure the ignition switch. I also had to lengthen the steering column housing by about 1 5/8" to fit everything into place. Also, two sets of tabs had to be welded onto the Pantera's steering column housing to mount the assy from the Escort. It came out amazingly good. Here's a few shots of the assy with a Grant, quick release, removable steering wheel.

I then took the assembly and went to bolt it up into the Pantera. I already knew that my custom dash was going to have to be modified to make this thing fit. Turns out that the previous owner had mounted the steering column in a manner that made the steering wheel closer to the floor pan of the car. This in turn made me position my gauge holes and the entire gauge face too low for the car.

Out came the angle grinder and cutoff wheel. After a few whacks I had the assembly ready to fit into place. I will need to take out the dash face and relocate the gauge holes up at some time in the future. I found when I mounted the steering column assembly that the back end of the Escort electronics were hitting my dash and the wiper switch arm was way too close to the dash panel as well. I decided that I needed the steering column to come closer to the seat by about 1/2".

I welded some tabs to the back mounting holes on the steering column tube and drilled out new holes on the front tabs. This enabled me to shift the entire steering column assembly out where I needed it. Here's a shot of the modified steering column mounting assy.

After bolting it all up I took a long hard look at that Grant steering wheel and didn't like what I saw. I have an original Pantera wheel - in rough shape to say the least but still an original one. I really like the size of the original wheel and know I can get parts to make it look good from different vendors. I really like, no I think I really need the detachable wheel option that the Grant wheel offers given that I'm 55+ and 6'5" tall. Getting in and out of the Patera will really be expedited if I could remove the steering wheel.

As I sat there looking at the two wheels I decided to modify the Panteral wheel to make it detachable using the quick release mechanism from the Grant wheel. To modify the existing Pantera wheel I cut off the bellows part of the wheel that mounted to the steering column, leaving only about 3/16" of an inch protruding from the back of the wheel.

I then made a bracket with three holes to mount the quick release mechanism out of sheet steel. I used the existing quick release brackets as a template to lay out the mounting holes. I cut the sheet steel in a circle to fit just inside the remaining small piece of bellows on the back of the original Plantera wheel and welded it all up. Here's a couple shots showing the fabrication process.

The wheel now snaps in and comes out like a breeze. Here's a shot of what the wheel looks like attached to the shaft using the quick disconnect feature.

Here's a few shots of the entire assembly installed in the Pantera, with and without the Patnera wheel in place.

In that last shot you can really see how much adjustment I need to make on the holes I cut out for the gauges on my instrument panel. That modification will be discussed in a post later on.

OK - Here's an update on the column. As I was working on moving the gauge holes up to where they need to be (see post on dash manufacture to read that update), I saw that I needed to so something with the big open space behind the steering wheel. I just didn't want to be looking inside the steering column as I drive the Pantera. So - time to make something. Here's a shot of the problem.

The steering wheel just isn't big enough to cover all the stuff crammed inside the steering column. I started the process by cutting a piece of round metal sheet the size of the opening in the column. I put a hole in the middle of the round plate that enables me to slide the plate over the mounting nut of the removable steering wheel. The plate will be screwed into the cast and tapped guts of the column itself. Here's two shots showing the plate in place.

You can see that I tacked a piece of exhaust pipe to the plate so that it would mate up to the quick disconnect part of the steering wheel. Now I want to taper that insert so that it will look better when mounted in place. To do this I use a great tool - Great Stuff sealer. See the shot below.

I love using Great Stuff as a base for shaping parts that I'll be making with a fiberglass top coat. The Great Stuff expands and fills all the gaps on metal or wood. It also expands to where you can shape it when it dries. It takes about 3 hours to be ready to work with. When it dried I was able use my wife's good bread knife (shhhh - don't tell her) to cut it with the taper I wanted to make this hole in the column look right. Here's a shot of the part at this step in the process.

Now comes the messy part - fiberglass. When I first lay the glass it looks terrible. Here's a shot of the next phase the process as the glass dries.

With a little sanding and some bondo the mess above turns into something really different. Check out the shot below - doesn't even look like the same thing as above.

Here's what it looks like in place on the column.

After a little extra grinding to get it all to fit in place I was ready to prime the new part. This is a quick way to finish off parts that are being modified to fit something it wasn't designed for in the first place. Not a bad result, even if I do say so myself.

Clutch Master/Slave Cylinder Project

Because of the custom bell housing required to mount the ZF transaxle to the Coyote engine I had to make my own bracket to mount the slave cylinder for the clutch. I was able to catch three bolts on the bell housing itself to secure the slave bracket.

I made the bracket out of pieces of steel plate welded up and drilled to fit the space I had to mount the slave cylinder. I made the base of the bracket pretty big so that I would have some options to move the mounting holes should I choose a different slave cylinder.

I happened to have a perfectly good 7/8" CNC slave cylinder I used on my Galaxie for a short while. I made the bracket to fit that slave. Here's a shot of the slave cylinder attached to the bracket mounted on the bell housing.

I ended up using a clevis pin I had for the Galaxie as well to attach the slave cylinder to the clutch arm off the ZF. I adjusted the throw-out bearing  to be just a slight distance from the clutch itself and secured the slave cylinder to the clutch arm.

I ended up changing the location of the inlet and bleed valve from the position shown in the picture above. I will be using a -3an fitting and line to attach the slave to the master.

For the master cylinder I used a 5/8" Wilwood cylinder, again from the Galaxie. I ended up having to elongate the mounting holes on the bulkhead piece that holds the master cylinder. Other than that the cylinder fit in like a charm.

I routed a -3an line from the master cylinder to a -3an to barb fitting under the car. From there I clamped up a rubber hose that fit over the original steel line that ran from the front to the back of the car. On the other end I reversed the connection to go from the male steel pipe through a rubber hose to a barb/-3an fitting. braided steel lines were used from the connection from the master to the steel tubing and from the steel tubing to the slave.

After bleeding the system I quickly found that the 5/8" master is way too small. The volume of fluid just wasn't enough to give me the stroke necessary to release the clutch on the slave. After a bunch of calculations, I think a 3/4" master will give me the approximate travel necessary. More on how this turns out when I get this cylinder mounted.

Fuel Tank Fill Neck

August 2019 Update

I completely redesigned the fuel system for my Pantera. Although what I had done below was a pretty slick set up, I didn't like how difficult it was to do maintenance to the fuel system. I decided to move things to where it is easier to access the various parts of the system. Please see my post on the Updated Fuel System here (https://johnspantera.blogspot.com/2019/08/updated-fuel-system.html).

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After a lot of thinking about where to fill the tank I finally settled for the passenger side window. I will have to come up with some kind of scoop or door to hide the fill tube but for now this will do. Here's a shot of the finished fill tube from the outside of the car.

I pulled the actual fill nozzle from a pick-a-part in Oceanside CA. I believe it was from a 90's Ford Escape. I then cut out some cardboard to shape the sheet metal pieces I welded together to mount the fill neck. I ended up resetting the fill tube a bit to help hide it away inside the window. I left open the bottom 1/2 of the window hoping to be able to add a cold air intake inlet here to feed the Coyote I have mounted inside.

Here's a shot of what the fill neck looks like from inside the car.

I cut and welded up some 1.5" dia stainless steel tubing I had laying around to turn the neck down from the passenger window down towards the tank opening. I then attached the welded tubing using 1.5" fuel line with clamps to make it all snug. You can just see a vent opening I left in the top of the fill neck to help regulate tank pressure. I will attach a rubber tube to the vent opening and route it down behind the back wheels at a later time.

I'll make another post later showing the scoop ideas when I get going on that project.

Fuel Tank & Pump

August 2019 Update

I completely redesigned the fuel system for my Pantera. Although what I had done below was a pretty slick set up, I didn't like how difficult it was to do maintenance to the fuel system. I decided to move things to where it is easier to access the various parts of the system. Please see my post on the Updated Fuel System here (https://johnspantera.blogspot.com/2019/08/updated-fuel-system.html).

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After a bunch of looking around and major amounts of sticker shock, I found that a stock tank just isn't in the cards for 3854. I then eliminated purchasing any kind of universal fuel cell for the car based on the limited space available to mount a tank. I decided to make my own.

I started by roughing out a general size for the tank using cardboard. I decided not to go crazy and make it fit every nook and cranny just to keep the number of bends and/or welds to a minimum. I could have really gone crazy and made a tank that would have fit like a glove. That would have added a ton more work and opened the door to more welds to spring leaks in the future.

After a bit of work I decided on a tank that is basically triangular in shape with the two sides measuring approximately 19" (next to the fire wall) by 17" (on the side next to the outside panel of the car) and 13" deep. This gave me a tank that will hold just about 13 gallons when completely full. I also decided to move the tank to the passenger side of the car to help distribute weight better from side to side. This was also a help since it was easier for the Coyote to have the radiator fill tank on the driver's side anyway.

I decided to make the tank out of stainless steel. I found a good sheet of 0.090" think stainless at the local scrap yard for a decent price. This is way thicker than is needed but, heck the added beefiness will add to the safety factor. The added thickness does add to the weight - it probably comes in at just around 50lbs. Next time, I'd probably shop around for something a bit thinner.

Once the general shape was cut out I welded it up. I left off the bottom off until I was able to sort out the baffle situation and cut the hole for the fuel pump. Here's some shots of the baffles going into place. You can see the shape of the tank.

You can see from the image above that a hole was cut in the top for the fuel pump. I decided to use the pump from the 2012 F150 that the Coyote engine came from. I located a pump assembly from our local salvage yards for just $125. It needed some modifications to help it fit properly.

I had to lengthen the pump assy to get it closer to the bottom of the tank. Ford made the pump in such a way that it is kind of universal. It was spring loaded to let you insert it into any size tank and it will collapse to the right height for the tank so that the pump will be close to the bottom. My tank was a little deeper than the design allowed for. If I left it like it was I would have 2 or so gallons at the bottom of the tank when my gauge would have read empty.

To make the changes I needed to extend the rods to make the pump touch as close to the bottom of the tank as possible. I added about 3" of stainless inserts into the rods to make the entire assembly longer. Here's a shot of the extensions.

Nothing fancy but it will get the job done. Next I had to extend the wires going from the connector to the fuel pump itself inside the assembly. I carefully removed the pins from the wires and soldered them up to new wires so I could reuse the connectors. The wires for the float on the fuel gauge didn't need to be extended.

I then put a little tack weld on the ends of the extension rods to hold them at the further's length possible. I didn't want it creeping back up to a shorter position making me get false readings on how empty the fuel tank was. Here's a shot of the finished assembly. You can see the blob of weld at the junction of the lower part of the pump assy and where the rod goes into the assy itself.

I then located the pump in the tank so that the float would work properly and made a six hole steel ring that would lock the pump into place. You can see pictures of this on the final shot of the tank itself further down in this post.

When I went to test the fit of the tank in the car I ended up needing to have to do some sheet metal changes on the car itself. The lip where the various body pieces come together on the top (behind the passenger back window) and on the frame piece just inside the rear quarter panel in front of the back wheel well had to be modified. I cut out about 1/2" off the top and took a hammer to bend down the body pieces on the frame. I welded everything up to give it a nice clean appearance.

With those mods the tank fit very nicely. I then went to work making some mounting brackets. The first one is for the bottom of the tank and sits on top of the cross member running diagonally from the outside rail to the inside rail. There is a hole there I used to locate the bracket and it gave me a nice mounting point to boot. Here's a couple shots showing that bracket.

You can see on the first shot the big nut welded on the bottom fits into the hold on the cross member. The two smaller side nuts will hold a long piece of threaded rod to lock the tank into position. The second shot is kind of dark but shows the bracket sitting on the cross member in the car.

The second bracket will to on top of the tank and bold into the bracing running just under the rear window cutout. This keeps the tank from shifting front to back. When it is all mounted in place for good I will line all the metal to metal surfaces with rubber to help keep it from squeaking. Here's a shot of the second bracket.

I will post more shots of the installed product when I have them.

Coolant and Heater Plumbing

This is one of those jobs that takes a lot of time, effort and some expense but no one will really ever appreciate all the work. It just isn't one of those sexy parts of doing up a car. Just like so many other things in life, the time spent on this part of the project has to be done and will pay big dividends in the future.

My car was missing everything. There was one piece of cut off 3/4" tubing in the center console well for the heater piping. That had to come out and it was quite the job getting that thing to separate itself from old 3854. With this little project out of the way I could get on with figuring out how to best plumb the Coyote in the Pantera.

My first thing I decided to figure out was how to give myself more room where the heater hoses come in to and exit out of the Coyote engine. As I have explained in an earlier post the thermostat housing has a strange set of hoses that I don't think can be replaced with more conventional hose and hose clamps. Unfortunately the top radiator hose sticks into the passenger compartment. I have had to build an enclosure on the fire wall to take that into account. All I kept thinking was there has to be some way to give myself some extra space here.

I took off the upper part of the top radiator hose where it connects to the thermostat housing on the Coyote. This is one of those clip connections that are everywhere on modern engines. Nice design but not easy to modify. The female part of the connector has a grove that keeps it from rotating when attached to the housing. I noticed that if I made a new grove I could rotate the hose away from the passenger compartment and give myself a little more room. And, that's what I did.

Unfortunately I don't have the pictures of this modification but it is easy to do after you see the inside of the hose connection. I did have to remove a portion of the tab that goes into the new slot so that the connector clip would seat fully when snapped close. A really nice and relatively simple modification. You will be able to see some of the results from the pictures below.

With that mod complete it was time to figure out how to get it all plumbed up. I found a picture of the cooling flow from a Ford document on the Coyote.



This shot came from the following pdf.  http://www.fordracingparts.com/download/instructionsheets/FordInstShtM-6007-A50NA.pdf

Lots of other good info on the Coyote here as well. A good resource to keep around. 

After studying this diagram and comparing it to the flow of the original 351C I decided that I needed to purchase the Coyote radiator reservoir rather than using the original reservoir that came with the Pantera. Although the price was right - $60 on Ebay - the original reservoir is one of the few parts that came with 3854. I'm sure someone will want to purchase the original I have since it is in pretty good shape. 

With the flows all figured out I decided to take a run down to the scrap metal store and pick up some 1.5 OD stainless tubing for the lines under the car that run from the engine bay to the front were the radiator will be. I installed the tubing in 6' lengths. This is too long for the front but I will wait until I have the radiator to trim the length to where I want it. 

With the stainless tubing in place I needed to figure out how to get the inlet and outlet tubes (both 1.5" ID) to the underside of the car. For the inlet tube (the one running to the bottom of the thermostat housing) I used two pieces of pre-bent 1.5" radiator hose I got from my local part store. I purchased one P/N 22484 and one 21953. Both of these have two 90 degree bends that can be cut and used to get the water to flow around where I want it to go. Here's a shot of the two hoses I purchased.

I used the intact 22484 to go from the bottom part of the thermostat housing, around the alternator and it ended up just above the frame close to the stainless tubing running to the front of the car. I then cut one of the 90 degree bends out of the 21953 part and attached that to the stainless steel tubing. To connect the two pieces together I made up a nice 45 degree bent piece of stainless tubing. With a bunch of water hose clamps I was able to tie it all together. 

Here's a shot of the the amount of the 90 degree part I took out of 22484 and how it will connect to the 21953 piece. 

This is a shot of what the 45 degree tubing I made looks like. Notice the weld on the end of the pipe. I decided to weld a bead along all ends to give the tubing and hose clamps something to grip against. Don't know if that will make any difference to sealing but I thought it would be good idea. 

That finished up the inlet side. Now for the outlet side of the thermostat. For that one I used a piece of the original hose that came on the Coyote engine along with the rest of the 21953 hose. I connected them with an appropriate sized (about 4") piece of stainless steel. Once clamped together it connected right up with the other piece of 6' stainless running to the front of the car. Here's a shot of the upper piece from inside the passenger compartment. 

The heater hoses were a bit of a chore. I had a part of a 3/4" pipe in the center console that was left over from the original layout. Unfortunately someone had cut the pipe down for some reason. It took quite a bit of work to get that old pipe out. Once gone I used two pieces of new 3/4" stainless tubes to run from the back of the car up to the front of the passenger compartment. 

I purchased two pieces of 3/4" pieces of molded hose for the 90 degree bends. I figured that by cutting the 19604 and 19666 pieces I could get two 90 degree turns if needed. I ended up only using the 19666 piece by curing it exactly in two. 

In order to get the the heater hose turned up from the center console into the heater box area I made a two 45 degree pipe turns as shown below. Using a 3" piece of 3/4" tubing and two clamps I connected the 45 to the stainless pipe in the center console.

Using the two 90 degree turns cut from the 19666 piece of molded tubing I was able to turn the heater hose to the spot where I wanted it to come out near where the heater box will eventually be. In order to enable me to get the hoses exactly where I wanted them to be I decided to cut out a chunk of the center console as shown below.

I then cut a piece of 13 gauge steel to make a cover for the hole I cut in the console. I attached the plate using six sheet metal screws. A little paint and it is ready to go.

Here's what it looks like in the engine compartment. I still have to get some clamps on the heater hose connections. After that it should be good to go.

The coolant reservoir tank arrived from Ebay. Although it is plastic, it is a really well made part. I decided to mount the reservoir tank right above where the fuel tank would be going. I might relocate the fuel tank to the other side anyway so this space might is something I could use for something else in the future. I made a bracket out of 13 gauge steel to mount the reservoir. Here's some shots of the bracket and the tank mounted in place.

More to come on the radiator selection and connections at the front of the car. 

Headers

After borrowing a set of shorty headers to see if they would fit, I've come to the conclusion that custom is the only way to go. I priced out the various options of getting them made and felt the $1,500 to $2,000 is just too much for me to spend on this part of the build. I've always wanted to make a set of headers myself so here's my opportunity.

After a bunch of research on how to make them, I decided to just jump in. I closely read the information and watched the videos on this site.

http://www.stainlessheaders.com/mandrelbends

They have an amazing mock up system that they will loan out if you want to design your own set of headers that they will build for you. Check them out for yourself.

I found a set of header flanges for $60 for the pair. Here's where you can order a set of Coyote flanges.

http://shop.watsonracing.com/Coyote-header-flanges-p/wr-coyoteflange.htm

Don't make the same mistake I made - I assumed the quantity 1 was for one flange. I now have four flanges since qty 1 means a set. Wish it was clearer on the site. I'll be sending back a set after I do the build. Who knows, the extra set might come in handy if I mess something up.

I started the mock up by securing the collector where I think it should go. I consulted a ton of pictures online to see if I could get the collector to come as close to stock position as possible. The collector I used is an old set I had from my Ford Galaxie rebuild from many years ago. These parts didn't make the cut on the Galaxie due to clearance issues. I knew keeping them would come in handy someday. Here's a shot of the collector secured in place.

Not too high tech, but it gets the job done. With the collector in place I used 1 1/2 inch sprinkler PVC to help lay out each header pipe. I used 45 degree and 90 degree bends only since that is what I can find in header pipe. I will be using 1 7/8 inch header pipe. The 1 1/2 sprinkler pipe is almost exactly the same size OD as the header pipe I will order. Here's a shot of the first pipe done and the second one on its way.

After a few restarts to get the lengths as close as possible I ended up with the following. I decided to only do the passenger side for now just to make sure I can actually complete this project.

Not bad if I say so myself. With this mock up I was able to determine how many 45's and 90's I needed to weld up my own headers. I ordered the tubing from a company in Minnesota. I don't have the name or contact info for them right now. As soon as I receive the piping I'll update this post.

After I received my 45's and 90's it was time to see if I could match the mock up with actual steel. I started by checking out the fit between the header flange holes and the actual bends I ordered. It was tight to say the least. I decided that I needed to do a little grinding on the flange holes to make the pipe easier to fit. In the shot below you can see the differing appearance between the stock hole and the one I modified to fit the pipe better.

I also did a slight modification to the set of collectors I had laying around. The collectors were made for a 2" pipe, the Coyote engine uses 1 7/8" pipes. I took 4" long pieces of 2" pipe and put them into the collectors. The 1 7/8" pipe slips nicely into the 2" pipe. Once welded I think this will be more than enough of a fit to make the system work well. Here's a shot of the collector showing what I'm talking about.

Once all the flange openings had been modified it was time to see if I could make the bends I ordered match up to the mock up I made. It was surprisingly easy. I want one pipe at a time starting with the one that had the most bends to it thinking that I would need the most room to make this one happen. Here's a shot of that first pipe.

I lightly tacked up all the bends cut to fit into place. I continued one pipe at a time until I got three of the four exhaust ports piped up to the collector. I saved the fourth one to be done off the car so that I could more fully weld up the pipes to the collectors. That way only one pipe will have an incomplete weld at the collector. Here's a couple shots showing the other two pipes going into place.

Here's a shot of the finished product off the car.

There were only two places where I had to do a little custom bending. To do this I simply cut a V in the pipe, bent it to the angle I wanted and rewelded it up. This gave me room to tweak the pipe where I needed to to get it just right. One of the most important places I found this a necessity was on the port closest to the front on the passenger side. I had to sightly bend the pipe away for clearance for the A/C hookups off the compressor.

I also had to do some pretty bit weld fill ins at a couple mating junctions where some of the bends came together. This was due to some inaccurate and not so straight cutting methods I did on the bends. Not a big deal, just required a bit more time behind the welder.

Now all I need to do this make this same header in an almost mirror image for the driver's side. I'm thinking of just using the same mock up as my template as a mirror image. If anything comes up of this process I'll post it then.

This was my first attempt at making headers. I have to say I like how it all turned out. The pipes are close to the same length (within less than 2" from the longest to the shortest). I know this discrepancy in lengths could have been and probably should have been smaller, but for not ever having done this before I'm more than pleased with the results.