If you've been following our...
If you've been following our little stock-to-rock buildup on Chad Kolakowski's '93 LX, you've seen us make huge leaps in power using a stock 5.0 LX short-block. We started out with the basic bolt-ons and tuning ("Fox Flashback," Jan. '07, p. 50), added a high-rev heads/cam/intake package ("Reach for the Sky," Feb. '07, p. 112), and now we're taking the next logical step-nitrous! With any luck, that stock short-block will live to star in our final segment next month, when we make the move to a supercharger.
In the early days of Fox-rodding, nitrous was one of the first modifications added to a street/strip Mustang. After the homemade ram-air, underdrive pulleys, Ford Motorsport H-pipe, and 3.73 gears, there wasn't much else to do but make the power adder move. You can spend a lot of time deciding whether or not to start with the foundation of a built engine, add the bolt-ons, or add a power adder to the stock engine. You'll eventually end up with all of the above, but choosing where to start isn't as simple as the days when choices were few.
If you've been following this Fox buildup story, you know we opted to take the budget route and make the most of a '93 LX with a stock short-block. This is the most tempting path because we already have an engine. Why not add all the fun stuff until it blows up and you have to buy a new one? It's not the logical path, but it's the way these cars always come together. Fortunately, Anderson Ford employee Chad Kolakowski was kind enough to let us take his '93 LX back to pure stock form so we could start from scratch, move to bolt-ons, then heads/cam/intake, and finally power adders. This month, we're taking the next logical step by adding a dry EFI nitrous system from Nitrous Express.
We added 100 hp with heads, cam, and intake, so let's see what happens when we let the nitrous genie out of the bottle.
Horse Sense: Rick Anderson is a stickler about grounds. He says it's not good enough to run a screw into sheetmetal; you really need to run grounds to the chassis, block, or battery. The more electrical gizmos you add to the car, the more important the grounds are. If you don't have your nitrous solenoids properly grounded, they won't open when they should.
No big, bolt-on package this month-just a nitrous kit with all the extras. The kit in question is Anderson Ford Motorsport's 200hp dry EFI system for Programmable Management System-equipped cars (PN NX-AFD1; $489). This kit is designed as a bolt-on solution for up to 150 more horsepower. While the kit is designed to make said power, it always helps to have a few optional accessories to maximize that power, make it more user-friendly, and of course, keep it safer. As such, Chad also added NX's GENX Accessory package (PN GENX; $310.64), which includes a Throttle Position Switch (PN 15961), Automatic Bottle Heater (PN 15940), EFI Fuel Pressure Safety Switch (PN 15718), and Nitrous Pressure Gauge (PN 15508).
Nitrous applications and lean conditions are an expensive mix, so having plenty of fuel volume available is critical to your engine's longevity. This is especially true when you are running a "dry" EFI nitrous system, meaning the nitrous system does not supply any additional fuel. Instead, the system relies on an ample supply of fuel from the fuel injectors. Anderson Ford Motorsport has a new solution for power-adder Mustangs with stock return-style fuel systems: the aptly named Big Pump (PN AF-628; $288). When used in conjunction with a 255-lph in-tank fuel pump, the Big Pump is said to support up to 61 gallons per hour on 60 psi, or enough to support an octet of 50-lb/hr injectors.
Provided you have a mass air meter calibrated to match the larger injectors or some sort of tuning device such as AFM's Load IO, swapping injectors is a simple matter of removing the upper intake, loosening the fuel rails, and swapping the injectors. It's a good idea to use the Schrader valve on the factory rail to blow off some fuel pressure into a rag before you pop out the stock injectors.
Fortunately, Chad's car already has a 255-lph in-tank pump, so he need only install the Big Pump to support those 42-pounders. The Big Pump kit comes with a handy template used to mark and drill mounting holes in the hatch/trunk floor for the pump's brackets. Here, Chad uses a center punch to mark the spots and provide an easy starting point for the drill.