Ford Mustang 514ci Engine Build - Big-Block Power Swap

Sanderson Street Rod FF460 street rod headers work perfectly with the Heidt's Mustang II frontend. They won't work with a Mustang/Falcon/Fairlane frontend because they won't clear the shock towers.

Sanderson makes headers that may clear the shock towers, FF461 or FF462, which flow toward the rear of the engine compartment. These are designed for classic Ford pickups and may fit your Ford compact or intermediate. The ceramic-coated 171/48-inch tubes feed into a 311/42-inch or 4-inch collector, depending on side.

You can also just see the PA-Performance PMGR starter poking out from behind the passenger header.

The PMGR starter offers plenty of header clearance and airflow around the header.

Bassani Xhaust provided us with its street rod universal exhaust system for Classic Creations' sedan delivery.

The 2 1/2-inch plumbing and a pair of Quiet Thunder mufflers seem to work well. To keep the sound level down and improve flow, we opted for one of Bassani's patented X-pipe inserts. This is what's used in the narrow tunnel of late-model Corvettes and fit the bill perfectly.

The second picture shows the twin Flex-a-lite electric fans for quiet, effective cooling. The Flex-a-lite fan system was mounted with custom aluminum brackets and stainless acorn nuts from Totally Stainless for a clean look. Totally Stainless provided fasteners for much of the engine detailing.

Saldana Racing Products provided Classic Creations with a whole lot of heat sink in this huge aluminum cross-flow radiator. Also visible is the March Performance serpentine-conversion system already installed, along with Tuff Stuff Performance's power-steering pump and alternator, and the MSD Pro-Billet Ready-to-Run distributor.

PA-Performance set us up with this permanent magnet gear reduction (PMGR) starter for the 514. With today's technology, we can twist a powerful high-performance big-block with nearly half the weight of those old Autolite and Motorcraft starters. It's called reduction-gear starting, which nets us a whole lot of torque multiplication when it's time to spin the crank. PA-Performance offers PMGR starters, high-output alternators, and custom cabling solutions for just about any classic-Ford project.