The short-block comes with...
The short-block comes with an oil pump.
Our installation and subsequent dyno testing took a few days. The engine was yanked, and the Fox Lake-ported heads, TFS intake, cam chains, cam gears, and front-engine dressing were removed and bolted on to the new short-block. A new set of AFM camshafts was added--F-72 cams to be exact. They carry a valve lift of 0.576 inch on both the intake and exhaust lobes. We sealed the powerplant with gaskets, an oil pan and oil-pump pick-up tube, as well as timing and valve covers that we sourced from Imperial Ford in Milford, Massachusetts.
Our first dyno runs after installing the Aluminator short-block were performed with an identical blower combo (P1SC with 3.2 blower pulley). Output jumped by 13 rwhp with the new cams--a nice improvement thanks to more aggressive lobes. Boost peaked at 11 psi; it was merely lightly breathing into the manifold. We decided it was time to swap over to the larger and more efficient D1SC unit from ProCharger. We added the company's new eight-rib pulley conversion as we swapped over the front-engine dressing to the new engine. All testing was accomplished using straight-up 93-octane gasoline from the fossil-fuel giant Exxon.
We pulled the heads off of...
We pulled the heads off of the old engine. These are Fox Lake-ported Two-Valve heads, with a set of AFM F-42 camshafts bolted on.
The D1SC offers both a larger inlet and outlet, as well as a different impeller, but it's based on the same housing as the P1SC, so the unit fits in the stock blower brackets. The AFM Power Pipe fit just fine, despite the larger inlet hole. Knowing the blower offers greater airflow, Dez chose a 3.50-inch blower pulley. It's slightly larger than the 3.20-inch pulley we used on the P1SC, meaning it will have slower impeller speed. Thanks to efficiency, the D1SC will move more air even though it's operating at a slower impeller rpm. Dez ran Johnson's Stang on his in-house DynoJet chassis dyno, and it produced an amazing 596 rwhp at 6,700 rpm. The Auto Meter boost gauge read a rather mild 14 psi--nearly 600 at the tires and the Aluminator was more than capable of holding that type of power. We essentially added 112 rwhp with the larger blower and larger AFM cams.
At this point, Dez concluded that more boost would be better. He added a smaller 3.40-inch pulley to increase blower speed, ultimately increasing boost. A few more runs were made, and the belt kept slipping. Dez felt he needed more time to sort out the idler pulleys, belt size, and the smaller 3.40-inch setup. Naturally, as with almost every other tech article, time was not on our side due to publishing deadlines. Dez slapped the 3.50-inch pulley back on, made some back-up pulls, and worked on the computer tune. A bit more timing--still within the safe range for pump-gas use--yielded 604 rwhp and 492 rwtq.
The Aluminator is one bad dude. We beat it up with countless dyno runs to back up our 600-plus rear-wheel-horsepower reading. "Aluminator engines are ready to ship, and our pricing is very competitive," says Jesse Kershaw of FRPP. He also informed us that the Aluminator is available in short-block form for all 4.6L modular engines and complete long-blocks as a Terminator crate engine. It's perfect for those with a project Stang converting to a Four-Valve combo, or for someone looking to replace the fragile bottom end of their modular-powered Mustang or Ford.
Readers are familiar with...
Readers are familiar with Nick Sevigny's hands from previous tech stories. Here, he puts some parts on the Aluminator short-block, getting it ready to be dropped into the engine bay of Keith Johnson's '00 Mustang GT.
Victor-Reinz provided us a...
Victor-Reinz provided us a set of its new multilayer head gaskets.
These are standard-thickness...
These are standard-thickness head gaskets, which gave this engine an 8.5:1 compression ratio.
We used ARP studs this time...
We used ARP studs this time around, which are perfect for this application. Keeping the heads clamped down properly is critical when running higher boost levels. Our goal was to go over 600 rwhp, which we achieved, and proper cylinder-head sealing starts with the ARP head studs and bolts.
Sevigny lowers the head onto...
Sevigny lowers the head onto the engine block.
We're getting closer!
Sevigny torqued down the heads...
Sevigny torqued down the heads using three steps, in sequence--35 lb-ft, 55 lb-ft, and 75 lb-ft. He backed off the bolts and retorqued each one to 75 lb-ft, in sequence. The term in sequence means you start with the middle bolts and work your way out.
Apply a bit of lube to the...
Apply a bit of lube to the cam bearings before placing the camshaft on the heads.
Larger AFM F-72 camshafts...
Larger AFM F-72 camshafts replace the F-42 sticks we used with the stock short-block. By just upgrading to the cams and the new bottom-end, we saw an increase of 12 rwhp over the smaller F-42 units.