Follow along as I prep my 2001 Crown Victoria P71 to smash through the so.cal desert with my crazy friends. I needed something to replace our thrashed ford Thunderbird. Here's a pic from when the Bird was looking and running much better.
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Sending the Brown Vic .. Gambler style
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I knew I was looking for a crown vic, the full frame really swayed me. Found a 2001 P71 very local to me with fresh trans, current smog and new plates. The only kicker was it sounded like a diesel.. the chain guides were BAD. Even with 225k on the clock it was alot of fun, the cop cage and plastic seat made it fun to drop the kids off at school. I wasted no time sourcing parts. Ended up using some spring cups for some Donk kit and shock extensions to gain some clearance for bigger tires.
2 PhotosLast edited by GEARHED73; April 6, 2020, 05:57 PM.
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I really drug my feet on the chain guides, came to a point where I had the parts and a free day.. All in it took me about 8ish hours.
Was also pouring over the interweb looking for rolling stock, came across a set of jeep wheels and BFG M/T. Not new, but plenty of life left. Three bills for all 5! I did have to run adapters but they have held up much better than expected.
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These mod motors are famous for worn timing chain guides. Mine were really, really bad. If you look at the pic, notice how the chain has worn the nylon guide rail, the metal saddle and even the pistons of the hydraulic chain tensioners. It wasnt that bad once I started. Yes these are single cam/head.
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My short term goal was to get this bucket together for the Hooptie X that was going down on the ultra 4 course at KIng Of The Hammers. With the lift cups in, and some sheetmetal trimmed I turned my attention to the traction department. This fine example of a P71 has a 3:27 open diff. Would really like to have more gear but really need them both to put power down. I rolled out the mig, got everything oped and clean and burned some wire. Couple days later we were packed up and headed out to Johnson Valley. It rides like a bucking board, but screw it... handle that later.
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After a full day of hanging in the dirt and watching every form of legit off road racer have their way with it, they gave us the green light. It was awesome, the guys were having a blast. There was a good size table top towards the end of the course, I couldn't tell how hard my friends were hitting it. I finally got the okay, I was beating the hell out of this car! Every time it came on power it wanted to go sideways, I just kept it hammered and tried to keep it pointed in the right direction.
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