302Rover
Member
I just joined the Classic Rover list a couple days ago and posted on the ‘welcome’ page, getting a number of very friendly and welcoming responses. Among other things I mentioned that my 1968 Rover 2000TC is actually a ‘resto-mod’ with a 302 Ford V8. A lot of the replies requested more information on what I did to make the engine swap so here goes with further details, in no particular order or coherency, for that matter;-)
In 1970 I bought the car and drove it until 1984 when I stored it, always intending to do a restoration but putting the project off while I was pursuing a career in the aerospace industry as a mechanical engineer. Finally, as I neared retirement I pulled the car out of storage in 2000. My wife was secretly hoping that it had rotted beyond being able to be restored but much to her chagrin it was still in quite good condition. The California climate had been kind to it and there was little or no rust, the interior was still OK but the rats had eaten the ignition wires plus peed and pooped all over the motor. Other than that, it was ripe for restoration. SWMBO resigned herself to me being in the garage for long hours stewing over the problems of restoration. I had developed an emotional attachment to the car so was not about to sell it or leave it to rot silently away. But more on that later.
I had the car transported back down to Los Angeles from Northern California where it had spent its storage years and began disassembling it. All body panels were removed, plastic media blasted, and primered to prevent surface rust. Panel by panel I began the body work, finally culminating in painting it myself in a home made paint booth. While the final appearance turned out fairly well I learned that I really don’t have the body and paint skills required to do a 100 point concours paint job.
But before doing the body and paint work, I first started on the mechanical stuff, removing both the front and back suspension systems, sand blasting and powder coating all components and replacing all bushes, ball joints, and other wear items. I always loved the feel of the Rover suspension, both comfortable and responsive at the same time.
The bulk of the project, however, was the engine swap. I had done research on various V6 and V8 engines and settled on the small block Ford 5 litre V8. Thanks to thin wall casting techniques employed by Ford in the mid 60s they developed a V8 that was the narrowest one available at the time and only weighed 415 lbs, not too much more than the Rover 4 banger. And with the V8 sitting further back in the engine bay with the cg further aft, the front end actually sits up a little higher than the stock car. The motor I bought was a crate motor from Ford Racing, advertised at the time at either 275 or 300 hp, I don't recall exactly. It came with GT40 aluminum heads, roller tappets, modified high lift cam, and a number of other mods, including a Ford Explorer front end which made the motor shorter than the stock 302.
To aid in the engine swap, I found a 14 lb. light weight plastic replica of the Ford motor, complete with threaded hard points that allowed me to bolt on an oil sump, valve covers, a bell housing, and an empty transmission case. I could easily lift this into place, resting it on a cardboard box, shimming where necessary, until I found a location that allowed the gear shift lever to come into the car in exactly the same spot as the original Rover shift lever. Furthermore I could then locate the locations for the new motor mounts as well as the transmission mounts. I had chosen a Tremec 5 speed transmission, a quality gear box.
The motor mounts required design and construction of a new front cross member which was fairly easy to do. But I left the original cross member in place because it is an integral part of the car’s structure. That decision, however, began a cascading series of requirements for design mods. The first thing was that the front of the oil sump interfered with the front cross member necessitating that about 2 inches be removed from the front portion of the sump depth for a distance of 4 or 5 inches aft. I cut, formed new sheet metal and welded it in place to reshape the oil pan. The next thing is that the original Ford oil pump, which is in the front of the pan, would no longer fit, requiring that I go to an external oil pump. Razor Performance of Canada supplied just what I needed but it is HD belt driven and required a new drive pulley bolted to the crankshaft pulley. I was still working at the time so asked the foreman of a small machine shop at our company if I could borrow his lathe during lunch hours to machine a new pulley. “Sure” was his reply “but just make sure you don’t get your tie caught in the lathe”. Tie off, I went to work, machining a new pulley and cutting out a bracket to fit the pump. The external pump required a hose running from the bottom of the pan to the pump, another from the pump to the remote oil filter (see photo), and from the filter to the block where the original filter was mounted. There was insufficient room to leave the original filter in place.
With the new cross member in place, a new transmission mount fabricated, the engine and transmission could be installed in the car. That being done, I could then begin the task of fitting the exhaust manifolds. With no room for headers, I found a left side manifold from a 65 Ford Falcon Sprint and fabricated a right side manifold by combining two different manifolds, cutting and brazing until I got something that fit. The rest of the exhaust system is fairly straight forward with dual pipes, an “H” crossover, and two 30 inch glasspaks and two pipes exiting where the original Rover single pipe exited. This is about the only external give away that something is not normal with this Rover!
Earlier I mentioned using a Tremec 5 speed gearbox. To complete the drive line I had a prop shaft built that would couple the Tremec output shaft to a Rover 3500S diff input shaft. The 3500S diff has 4 spider gears, rather than 2 and a strengthened case. Still it is the weak point of the driveline and the only thing that saves me when I dump the clutch is that the tires start smoking before the diff is ground to powder;-) The braking system remained the stock NADA dual servo system and as one can see from the photo there is scant but sufficient clearance between the right side valve cover and the servos.
To mount the single wire alternator, the power steering pump, fan, and the idler pulley I had to manufacture brackets to accommodate the Ford serpentine belt system. The radiator is alloy and supplied by BeCool (how’s that for a name of a radiator company?).
The induction system is an Edelbrock 600 cfm four barrel carb with Edelbrock air filter. There was insufficient clearance to shut the bonnet without interfering with the air filter so I had to modify the bonnet “X” member by cutting one of the channel sections, creating a doubler plate and riveting it in place.
The ignition is MSD, from distributor, to 9 mm wires, to the MSD ignition box. Plus MSD supplied a tachometer adapter box so the new 8 cylinder Smiths tach would function.
To gain some space I moved the battery to the boot, using a Rover 3500S battery box. I also fitted power steering, a hodgepodge of Rover 3500S box, Jeep pump with a Ford serpentine belt pulley, and Mitsubishi reservoir. However the reservoir will soon be replaced with the larger reservoir from a Jaguar Mk2.
With power steering I could get rid of the large 17 inch diameter Rover steering wheel in favor of a Moto Lita knock-off wheel from Germany. Since we take a lot of trips to Germany, my wife being originally from Germany and I attended an intensive language training school there many years ago, we often return to visit relatives, relive old memories, and pick up the occasional spare car part. I once brought back an entire front seat squab for the Rover, stuffed in the biggest suitcase I could find, but that is another story;-)
The interior was completely restored, most of the work I did myself except for anything that required stitching, something that is beyond my skill level. I also built a new instrument panel back in the early ‘70s using salvaged Smiths instruments. That is still in the car although, as I mentioned earlier, I did have to replace the tach and recently converted the speedometer to electronic. The old “FM radio” instrument panel is long gone.
I have the feeling that I’ve forgotten a few things but should anyone like to discuss this further, please don’t hesitate to contact me. As they say “you asked for the time of day, and I built you a watch” so this may be far more information that anyone desires and is perhaps overload for the Forum, I don’t know.
Back, for the moment, to fitting the V8 in the P6 body. Had I not had an emotional attachment to the car, I would not have done the swap in this car. Rather I would have chosen the P6B with its wider engine compartment, a more advantageously placed front cross member, a ‘ready to go’ instrument panel with 8 cylinder tach, power steering in place, and a good, stronger differential. But some cars have soul and I number some British cars in that category along with some of the early Italian cars such as Ferrari. Certainly, for me, my Rover 2000TC has soul and I couldn’t bear to sell the car. These are the kind of cars that I like and the cars that set me along the road of what I call Zen and the Art of Rover Restoration, a phrase that I clearly stole from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance but what the hell, I like the phrase and am sticking with it;-)
Cheers,
Tom
1968 Rover 2000TC
1960 Jaguar Mk2
1970 Jaguar E-Type FHC
In 1970 I bought the car and drove it until 1984 when I stored it, always intending to do a restoration but putting the project off while I was pursuing a career in the aerospace industry as a mechanical engineer. Finally, as I neared retirement I pulled the car out of storage in 2000. My wife was secretly hoping that it had rotted beyond being able to be restored but much to her chagrin it was still in quite good condition. The California climate had been kind to it and there was little or no rust, the interior was still OK but the rats had eaten the ignition wires plus peed and pooped all over the motor. Other than that, it was ripe for restoration. SWMBO resigned herself to me being in the garage for long hours stewing over the problems of restoration. I had developed an emotional attachment to the car so was not about to sell it or leave it to rot silently away. But more on that later.
I had the car transported back down to Los Angeles from Northern California where it had spent its storage years and began disassembling it. All body panels were removed, plastic media blasted, and primered to prevent surface rust. Panel by panel I began the body work, finally culminating in painting it myself in a home made paint booth. While the final appearance turned out fairly well I learned that I really don’t have the body and paint skills required to do a 100 point concours paint job.
But before doing the body and paint work, I first started on the mechanical stuff, removing both the front and back suspension systems, sand blasting and powder coating all components and replacing all bushes, ball joints, and other wear items. I always loved the feel of the Rover suspension, both comfortable and responsive at the same time.
The bulk of the project, however, was the engine swap. I had done research on various V6 and V8 engines and settled on the small block Ford 5 litre V8. Thanks to thin wall casting techniques employed by Ford in the mid 60s they developed a V8 that was the narrowest one available at the time and only weighed 415 lbs, not too much more than the Rover 4 banger. And with the V8 sitting further back in the engine bay with the cg further aft, the front end actually sits up a little higher than the stock car. The motor I bought was a crate motor from Ford Racing, advertised at the time at either 275 or 300 hp, I don't recall exactly. It came with GT40 aluminum heads, roller tappets, modified high lift cam, and a number of other mods, including a Ford Explorer front end which made the motor shorter than the stock 302.
To aid in the engine swap, I found a 14 lb. light weight plastic replica of the Ford motor, complete with threaded hard points that allowed me to bolt on an oil sump, valve covers, a bell housing, and an empty transmission case. I could easily lift this into place, resting it on a cardboard box, shimming where necessary, until I found a location that allowed the gear shift lever to come into the car in exactly the same spot as the original Rover shift lever. Furthermore I could then locate the locations for the new motor mounts as well as the transmission mounts. I had chosen a Tremec 5 speed transmission, a quality gear box.
The motor mounts required design and construction of a new front cross member which was fairly easy to do. But I left the original cross member in place because it is an integral part of the car’s structure. That decision, however, began a cascading series of requirements for design mods. The first thing was that the front of the oil sump interfered with the front cross member necessitating that about 2 inches be removed from the front portion of the sump depth for a distance of 4 or 5 inches aft. I cut, formed new sheet metal and welded it in place to reshape the oil pan. The next thing is that the original Ford oil pump, which is in the front of the pan, would no longer fit, requiring that I go to an external oil pump. Razor Performance of Canada supplied just what I needed but it is HD belt driven and required a new drive pulley bolted to the crankshaft pulley. I was still working at the time so asked the foreman of a small machine shop at our company if I could borrow his lathe during lunch hours to machine a new pulley. “Sure” was his reply “but just make sure you don’t get your tie caught in the lathe”. Tie off, I went to work, machining a new pulley and cutting out a bracket to fit the pump. The external pump required a hose running from the bottom of the pan to the pump, another from the pump to the remote oil filter (see photo), and from the filter to the block where the original filter was mounted. There was insufficient room to leave the original filter in place.
With the new cross member in place, a new transmission mount fabricated, the engine and transmission could be installed in the car. That being done, I could then begin the task of fitting the exhaust manifolds. With no room for headers, I found a left side manifold from a 65 Ford Falcon Sprint and fabricated a right side manifold by combining two different manifolds, cutting and brazing until I got something that fit. The rest of the exhaust system is fairly straight forward with dual pipes, an “H” crossover, and two 30 inch glasspaks and two pipes exiting where the original Rover single pipe exited. This is about the only external give away that something is not normal with this Rover!
Earlier I mentioned using a Tremec 5 speed gearbox. To complete the drive line I had a prop shaft built that would couple the Tremec output shaft to a Rover 3500S diff input shaft. The 3500S diff has 4 spider gears, rather than 2 and a strengthened case. Still it is the weak point of the driveline and the only thing that saves me when I dump the clutch is that the tires start smoking before the diff is ground to powder;-) The braking system remained the stock NADA dual servo system and as one can see from the photo there is scant but sufficient clearance between the right side valve cover and the servos.
To mount the single wire alternator, the power steering pump, fan, and the idler pulley I had to manufacture brackets to accommodate the Ford serpentine belt system. The radiator is alloy and supplied by BeCool (how’s that for a name of a radiator company?).
The induction system is an Edelbrock 600 cfm four barrel carb with Edelbrock air filter. There was insufficient clearance to shut the bonnet without interfering with the air filter so I had to modify the bonnet “X” member by cutting one of the channel sections, creating a doubler plate and riveting it in place.
The ignition is MSD, from distributor, to 9 mm wires, to the MSD ignition box. Plus MSD supplied a tachometer adapter box so the new 8 cylinder Smiths tach would function.
To gain some space I moved the battery to the boot, using a Rover 3500S battery box. I also fitted power steering, a hodgepodge of Rover 3500S box, Jeep pump with a Ford serpentine belt pulley, and Mitsubishi reservoir. However the reservoir will soon be replaced with the larger reservoir from a Jaguar Mk2.
With power steering I could get rid of the large 17 inch diameter Rover steering wheel in favor of a Moto Lita knock-off wheel from Germany. Since we take a lot of trips to Germany, my wife being originally from Germany and I attended an intensive language training school there many years ago, we often return to visit relatives, relive old memories, and pick up the occasional spare car part. I once brought back an entire front seat squab for the Rover, stuffed in the biggest suitcase I could find, but that is another story;-)
The interior was completely restored, most of the work I did myself except for anything that required stitching, something that is beyond my skill level. I also built a new instrument panel back in the early ‘70s using salvaged Smiths instruments. That is still in the car although, as I mentioned earlier, I did have to replace the tach and recently converted the speedometer to electronic. The old “FM radio” instrument panel is long gone.
I have the feeling that I’ve forgotten a few things but should anyone like to discuss this further, please don’t hesitate to contact me. As they say “you asked for the time of day, and I built you a watch” so this may be far more information that anyone desires and is perhaps overload for the Forum, I don’t know.
Back, for the moment, to fitting the V8 in the P6 body. Had I not had an emotional attachment to the car, I would not have done the swap in this car. Rather I would have chosen the P6B with its wider engine compartment, a more advantageously placed front cross member, a ‘ready to go’ instrument panel with 8 cylinder tach, power steering in place, and a good, stronger differential. But some cars have soul and I number some British cars in that category along with some of the early Italian cars such as Ferrari. Certainly, for me, my Rover 2000TC has soul and I couldn’t bear to sell the car. These are the kind of cars that I like and the cars that set me along the road of what I call Zen and the Art of Rover Restoration, a phrase that I clearly stole from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance but what the hell, I like the phrase and am sticking with it;-)
Cheers,
Tom
1968 Rover 2000TC
1960 Jaguar Mk2
1970 Jaguar E-Type FHC
