The big kick of parts came from Milodon, who took one look at our oiling system and decided that re-using any of the slop-covered parts we took out of the engine nothing short of an assured death for the 302. From the oil pump drive shaft to the bolts for the oil pan, they sent everything we would need.

And that includes this trick anodized pan, complete with a port that will house it’s own dipstick tube. No more guessing and hoping that I’ve got the right dipstick in the block. Seriously…the only Ford dipstick that isn’t an unknown in the BangShift Mid-West shop is in the 4.2 in the other Mustang.

With fresh Mahle head bolts, assembly could begin. There was no real trick to this engine, since we didn’t do any real replacements outside of the oil pump and the pushrods. Here, you can see the intake valley ready for the manifold, with blue RTV around the water jackets and a thick bead of black RTV at the ends of the manifold.

If there’s one thing I miss from the Chrysler compared to the Ford, it’s the rocker shaft setup. However, torquing the rocker arms individually isn’t bad. Acting on Luke (ThunderHead 289)’s advice, I rotated the motor until one valve lifted to full open…then tightened the opposite valve on that same cylinder. Repeat until you’ve torqued all sixteen rockers properly.

Our handshake-deal BBK 1 5/8ths shorty headers were fitted up with ARP bolts and they’ll work just fine. And unlike the last car I tried to put exhaust on, these headers bolted up with no real worry!

After dropping the old fuel tank out of the car, we removed the pump and sending unit and decided immediately on all-new stuff. Everything that came out of the old tank look deep-fried, it was that bad. So we hit up LMR and found a kit that got us the fuel tank, the fuel filler tube grommet, and the sending unit all-in-one, and scored the pump and hanger setup from Summit. All that’s left here is to bolt it back into the car, get a new fuel filter installed and figure out plumbing from the end of the hard lines at the firewall to the carburetor.

And speaking of the carburetor, here’s the beauty that’s going to sit on top of the 302: a Holley Brawler 650 CFM four-barrel, p/n BR-67318. A 650 is right at the big end for a 302, but it’s not radical overkill and we’ll put that extra fuel flow to good use. Black and red…hmm…guess I now have a paint scheme in mind now!

Another batch of parts that are way too good for this ride came from another of Holley’s divisions, Frostbite. Their p/n FB169 three-row aluminum radiator and FB500H Fan/Shroud package will be on duty to keep that SBF cool. Ignore the zip-tie hold-down around the inlet neck…stock “claw” mounts aren’t big enough to handle this thing. We will fix that before the radiator becomes permanently mounted.

And with this new system, it means that I work on the first electric fan in my background that didn’t come factory-installed. I’m looking forward to seeing how well this works, and I’m grateful to not be messing with a bolt-on fan this time.