Well then, today has been an exercise in self restraint. I was going to say futility but it's not, I made a lot of headway.
Started the day by trying to figure out how I could get more oil pump room.
I called Doug at Precision and asked him what I could do to get more pan room. He at first said that a standard pump is 1/4 inch shorter than a high volume pump. He also counter sinks the bolts on the bottom of the pump. Then he said I could take an 1/8th off the flange. Then I asked him if I could actually cut the section out between the flange and the body of the pump.
He thought about it for a minute then said it's certainly doable, IF, you can get it welded back together and IF you can deal with the drive shaft mis alignment as well as the gallery. Obviously you would have to re size the shaft.
Well, knowing that I have a disease I started thinking about how to get that done.
I went back over to the car and started to see what I would be doing to myself if indeed I could shove the engine back as far as I wanted. I was talking with my friend John (who I am renting space from) about it and we were starting to add up all the problems I would make for myself. One of the biggest was that I was starting to affect my drive line geometry. If I push the engine back it forces the trans down unless I cut the floor and raise the tunnel. Not to mention the oil pump rebuild and the possible problems that may bring up with the off center shaft even if I get it welded back together correctly.
I have also gone over the external pump scenario over and over and really don't want to deal with it in a street car.
So I put the pan back together as it's already pretty tight around the pump. Also if I was to modify the pan I don't know how the pickup would be affected (would there be enough room for all that piping).
I started fitting the engine and trans back in the car and saw that I could pick up a lot of room by rebuilding the racks exterior tubes to run around the pan (see pics).
So the upshot of this whole exercise is I believe I have reached the point of diminishing returns and I learned a lot. I set the engine back in the car centered it. Measured once, twice, three times (it's got about an inch and a half or two set back, however that's a bs statement because there really is no stock location in a '66 for an FE) then asked John to make me some tubular mounts. He's a hell of a lot better welder than I am. So hopefully the next update will be with the engine mounted in the car.
This is the section of the pump I was thinking of taking out. I could pick up almost an inch, but ……
This is how much clearance I am ending up with.
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