FRPP Hot Rod cams INSTALLED!
Thread Starter
5th Gear Member
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 3,925
From: Deep in the <3 of Tx
FRPP Hot Rod cams INSTALLED!
I am now "cammed!" 
See this thread for my ordeal a few weeks ago: https://mustangforums.com/forum/2005...-got-cams.html
We did the install the day after Thanksgiving. That was a better idea b/c there was some family down that was only here on Thanksgiving so it would not be good to be out working on a car half the day ignoring them.
The install took close to what I estimated, about 4.5 hours.
It went very well. I had my uncle who's a certified tech help me who's been doing car work all his life. There's nothing he can't do and every thing he does is done right. My dad was also there helping. I bought the valve spring compressor only, but ended up not using it. Right before we did the install, we watched the Ford video on installing cams (http://www.fordtechservice.dealercon...evepisodes.asp video 17). They mentioned that when the spring is compressed, it only takes a small jolt to knock the retainers off and drop a valve in the cylinder. My uncle already knew this since he's done cams many times in the past and was nervous about compressing the springs to remove the followers. So instead, we "inched" the cams off and on without using the spring compressor. We just made sure No 1 cyl was coming up on the exhaust stroke and left the engine there. No turning the crank 180 degrees or anything. That was not necessary since we were not removing the followers like Ford says.
Inching the cams off and on mean slowly loosen/tighten the bearing caps a little at a time evenly across the cam. So that way, you do not have un-equal pressure on any one part of the cam which could bend the cam or damage the bearings. Since there was more spring pressure on the hot rods, smashing it down was necessary and made installing the caps a little more difficult, but was not too bad. The roller followers, to our surprise, are only sitting on there. The slightest bump will knock them off. They don't snap on like I thought and are not bolted down to anything. They just lay there. So in the process of doing this, we kept knocking the followers off several times.
I did not buy the timing chain wedge, although in hind-sight I think THAT should be what you buy instead of the compressor. Instead we used a pole and some tie wraps to hold the phaser up in addition to ramming a garden hose down there. I also held on to the phaser and chain while my uncle did the swap to be extra safe. When it comes to this timing chain, you can't be TOO safe. That's the part that made me paranoid. Jumping a tooth and not knowing it can mean an engine.
Here's some pics of our redneck "chain wedge":
The problem with using a hose, a stick, or whatever is you can get bits and pieces of that material in the engine. I did get a few very tiny pieces of rubber hose lodged in the timing chain, but they're small and the filter should hopefully get them.
I also installed the FRPP chrome valve covers. These things, while expensive, look KILLER! I have some pics, but the sun was behind clouds (it was overcast the whole day) and my engine bay is REALLY dirty so I'll show pics of that later this week when I get a chance to clean the engine bay and it'll be sunny then. We have rain for the next few days.
Now on to the tuning.
I have a Brenspeed 93 tune and two Bamachips tunes (91 race and 93 torque). I first loaded the Brenspeed tune. When first starting, the RPMs jump up kind of high to about 1500 or so. It's way too much. Then the idle, both in P/N and in gear is about 1K. When in P/N, it lopes nice but put it in gear and I can feel and hear the engine "gas up" and hold at 1K. The lope completely goes away and when I left off the brake, the car accelerates A LOT faster than it should. Then to stop, I have to hold the brakes pretty hard. [edit: see post 30 on updated Brenspeed tune impressions]
My Bamachips tunes, surprisingly due to others experiences in the past, was pretty good. This tune (I only tried the race) feels good all over. I'm sure there's more to squeeze out on the dyno of course. The idle in P/N is about 1K which is fine, but I may lower it a tad. In gear, it drops to about 750 and sitting there holding the brake feels normal and lopes real nice. When I start to move and the RPMs are around 1K or less, the car kind of surges forward a bit. That is expected with a lumpy cam and it's kind of cool. But those wanting a smooth drive like stock will want to stay stock, lol! When I got out on the road, I nailed it and the car felt strong in every RPM. Up high felt a lot stronger and I can tell these cams are doing their job. Next week when I go to work, I'll have a much longer drive and I'll be able to judge everything better then. When going up a steep hill (which is all over the place in central Texas) in O/D it feels like I may have lost a tiny bit of low end. [edit: I forgot but this is how my Bama tunes always have been. See post 30 for update on that.] The only minor issue I have with the Bama tune, is when I'm coasting slow, like < 30 mph or so, the idle hunts between 500 and 750. It might be a smaller gap than that but it does hunt around a little. Not a big deal, but I'm sure Doug can work that out over a little time. [edit: This is a bigger deal that I thought b/c it makes the idle dip way to low at times almost killing the motor and causes the trans for freak out with the hunting idle and cause the O/D light to flash making the shifting totally wonky.]
I don't know anything about MPG yet as that'll take me a week or two since I just installed the cams and I need to give the PCM time to learn everything and tweak its fuel trims and stuff. I will report this later.
So finally, here's my video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WT6X7dOtgao
These cams are great and I'm glad to have finally done it. I wanted cams ever since I bought the car in late 2006. These sounds KILLER and actually have good performance even though some say they don't. Don't listen to the haters, these cams DO give power like ANY other NSR cam and sound killer to boot. Ford would not put these in their off-road racing baja trucks if they were just for sound.
BTW, I'd like to thank hammeron for this excellent write up and pics. Those were very helpful in getting to know the valve-train and cam install long before I actually did it and is a good thing to read to prepare.
See this thread for my ordeal a few weeks ago: https://mustangforums.com/forum/2005...-got-cams.html
We did the install the day after Thanksgiving. That was a better idea b/c there was some family down that was only here on Thanksgiving so it would not be good to be out working on a car half the day ignoring them.
The install took close to what I estimated, about 4.5 hours.
It went very well. I had my uncle who's a certified tech help me who's been doing car work all his life. There's nothing he can't do and every thing he does is done right. My dad was also there helping. I bought the valve spring compressor only, but ended up not using it. Right before we did the install, we watched the Ford video on installing cams (http://www.fordtechservice.dealercon...evepisodes.asp video 17). They mentioned that when the spring is compressed, it only takes a small jolt to knock the retainers off and drop a valve in the cylinder. My uncle already knew this since he's done cams many times in the past and was nervous about compressing the springs to remove the followers. So instead, we "inched" the cams off and on without using the spring compressor. We just made sure No 1 cyl was coming up on the exhaust stroke and left the engine there. No turning the crank 180 degrees or anything. That was not necessary since we were not removing the followers like Ford says.
Inching the cams off and on mean slowly loosen/tighten the bearing caps a little at a time evenly across the cam. So that way, you do not have un-equal pressure on any one part of the cam which could bend the cam or damage the bearings. Since there was more spring pressure on the hot rods, smashing it down was necessary and made installing the caps a little more difficult, but was not too bad. The roller followers, to our surprise, are only sitting on there. The slightest bump will knock them off. They don't snap on like I thought and are not bolted down to anything. They just lay there. So in the process of doing this, we kept knocking the followers off several times.
I did not buy the timing chain wedge, although in hind-sight I think THAT should be what you buy instead of the compressor. Instead we used a pole and some tie wraps to hold the phaser up in addition to ramming a garden hose down there. I also held on to the phaser and chain while my uncle did the swap to be extra safe. When it comes to this timing chain, you can't be TOO safe. That's the part that made me paranoid. Jumping a tooth and not knowing it can mean an engine.
Here's some pics of our redneck "chain wedge":
The problem with using a hose, a stick, or whatever is you can get bits and pieces of that material in the engine. I did get a few very tiny pieces of rubber hose lodged in the timing chain, but they're small and the filter should hopefully get them.
I also installed the FRPP chrome valve covers. These things, while expensive, look KILLER! I have some pics, but the sun was behind clouds (it was overcast the whole day) and my engine bay is REALLY dirty so I'll show pics of that later this week when I get a chance to clean the engine bay and it'll be sunny then. We have rain for the next few days.
Now on to the tuning.
I have a Brenspeed 93 tune and two Bamachips tunes (91 race and 93 torque). I first loaded the Brenspeed tune. When first starting, the RPMs jump up kind of high to about 1500 or so. It's way too much. Then the idle, both in P/N and in gear is about 1K. When in P/N, it lopes nice but put it in gear and I can feel and hear the engine "gas up" and hold at 1K. The lope completely goes away and when I left off the brake, the car accelerates A LOT faster than it should. Then to stop, I have to hold the brakes pretty hard. [edit: see post 30 on updated Brenspeed tune impressions]
My Bamachips tunes, surprisingly due to others experiences in the past, was pretty good. This tune (I only tried the race) feels good all over. I'm sure there's more to squeeze out on the dyno of course. The idle in P/N is about 1K which is fine, but I may lower it a tad. In gear, it drops to about 750 and sitting there holding the brake feels normal and lopes real nice. When I start to move and the RPMs are around 1K or less, the car kind of surges forward a bit. That is expected with a lumpy cam and it's kind of cool. But those wanting a smooth drive like stock will want to stay stock, lol! When I got out on the road, I nailed it and the car felt strong in every RPM. Up high felt a lot stronger and I can tell these cams are doing their job. Next week when I go to work, I'll have a much longer drive and I'll be able to judge everything better then. When going up a steep hill (which is all over the place in central Texas) in O/D it feels like I may have lost a tiny bit of low end. [edit: I forgot but this is how my Bama tunes always have been. See post 30 for update on that.] The only minor issue I have with the Bama tune, is when I'm coasting slow, like < 30 mph or so, the idle hunts between 500 and 750. It might be a smaller gap than that but it does hunt around a little. Not a big deal, but I'm sure Doug can work that out over a little time. [edit: This is a bigger deal that I thought b/c it makes the idle dip way to low at times almost killing the motor and causes the trans for freak out with the hunting idle and cause the O/D light to flash making the shifting totally wonky.]
I don't know anything about MPG yet as that'll take me a week or two since I just installed the cams and I need to give the PCM time to learn everything and tweak its fuel trims and stuff. I will report this later.
So finally, here's my video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WT6X7dOtgao
These cams are great and I'm glad to have finally done it. I wanted cams ever since I bought the car in late 2006. These sounds KILLER and actually have good performance even though some say they don't. Don't listen to the haters, these cams DO give power like ANY other NSR cam and sound killer to boot. Ford would not put these in their off-road racing baja trucks if they were just for sound.
BTW, I'd like to thank hammeron for this excellent write up and pics. Those were very helpful in getting to know the valve-train and cam install long before I actually did it and is a good thing to read to prepare.
Last edited by SirKnightTG; Nov 30, 2009 at 08:15 PM. Reason: Retracting my incorrect tune statements.
Thread Starter
5th Gear Member
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 3,925
From: Deep in the <3 of Tx
Oh yeah, I also want to mention that ebay sent me the $600 for the cams I was scammed with.
The seller (camthumpinstang) would not accept the package after three UPS attempts at delivery so UPS is sending them back to me. I informed ebay of this and they transferred the $600 to my paypal account.
I hope ebay goes after this guy for their money and at the same time bans his account. For what the seller did, he could get jail time and it would be great if he did. There's no excuse for doing that, especially near the Holidays.
I wonder if BBR would want to buy this extra set of stock cams I now have for their re-grinds? It would be worth looking into I think.
The seller (camthumpinstang) would not accept the package after three UPS attempts at delivery so UPS is sending them back to me. I informed ebay of this and they transferred the $600 to my paypal account.
I hope ebay goes after this guy for their money and at the same time bans his account. For what the seller did, he could get jail time and it would be great if he did. There's no excuse for doing that, especially near the Holidays.
I wonder if BBR would want to buy this extra set of stock cams I now have for their re-grinds? It would be worth looking into I think.
6th Gear Member
Joined: May 2006
Posts: 11,883
From: Nicely done
SirKnightTG, the car sounds killer and congrats
on a successful install.
there was a period of time when i thought the
cams were never going to happen, but i'm glad
they finally did and that your happy with them.
hopefully you'll get on a dyno, i would love to
see your car in the 330-340rwhp area.
on a successful install.
there was a period of time when i thought the
cams were never going to happen, but i'm glad
they finally did and that your happy with them.
hopefully you'll get on a dyno, i would love to
see your car in the 330-340rwhp area.
2nd Gear Member
Joined: Nov 2007
Posts: 329
From: Gainesville GA
Wow finally SirKnightTG you got your cams! I have been watching your threads over the past few months about cams and am glad you finally settled with the Hot Rods. Enjoy all the looks you get when you pull up at a red light bro! Congrats!
