Harristotles SGT2849

[harristotle]

I decided that for general updates on my car, I would consolidate it into one thread so I don't clutter the board up with my posts. Feel free to hop in and share your thoughts!

 

For those interested, I'll give a little history of my ownership..

 

I was very blessed to take ownership of SGT 2849 almost exactly 2 years ago. She was originally bought in Texas and from the sound of it, sat in a barn for 2 years not being driven. It was during this time that the SLP Loudmouth exhaust and GT500 spoiler was put on her. It was sold to a gentleman in Utah after that, and was only driven on clear sunny days. It was from this man who I got it from 2 years ago. When we got the car it seemed that all the original paperwork was gone. Almost a year afterward I was looking for the license plate wrench and dove into the spare tire well. It was there that I found ALL of the original paperwork and the original Texas plates too!

 

We found that it was cheaper for my Dad to fly to Utah and drive it home. Below is a picture he stopped to snap on the way home at the promised land. I've got one hell of a Dad!

 

I had my first 2 modifications bought before I'd even seen the car. The first was replacing the gawd awful space communication antenna with a shorty antenna. The second was replacing the Faux gas cap. This car isn't a GT, it's a SHELBY GT! Unlike a lot of people who look for ways to differentiate from the GT500, I like to draw connections between our beefier big brother. I went with the Ford gas cap with the Cobra logo, minus the GT500 writing.

 

The next major addition didn't come for a few months. I needed a car cover as classy as the car to keep her clean in between my weekend cruising...

 

I will keep updating this thread as I have time, but for now thanks for looking!

[stewarbc]

Very nice Shelby! Love all the flags in the garage too!

[IASHELBYGT]

Great story! Car looks good.

[harristotle]

Very nice Shelby! Love all the flags in the garage too!

 

 

Thanks! I have a small American flag collection. The one on the far left of the picture is an original 48 star. I have an original 49 star and 46 star in my office as well as a replica 13 star and Bennington flag.

 

I knew I would be doing mods, so my next purchase was based on preparing for that. Every Ford I've owned I've tracked down the dealership service manual and the Shelby wasn't going to be an exception to that!

 

I then started pursuing the actual mods. I ordered the Charge Motion Delete plates, but to this day I haven't installed them yet. I'm waiting till I get a tuner, and that's still a little ways away.

 

With the delete plates I also ordered the inlet tube. Like the antenna, I absolutely hated the look of the stock piece. I didn't notice a performance gain from this (nor was I expecting one), but it looks way nicer and you could hear the intake a little more with this hose.

 

That's all for tonight, not much more and I'll be caught up to present day lol

[REDTAIL]

you plan on painting the steeda air tube

 

JIM

[harristotle]

you plan on painting the steeda air tube

 

JIM

 

 

No, I plan on keeping the whole engine bay either black or polished. I want to kind of emulate the look of the 65 Shelby's with the engine, I've always thought they had a very clean but aggressive look to them. I'm keeping the stock intake manifold and putting on the IMRC deletes, replacing the throttle body with the polished Ford Racing unit, and adding black Ford Racing valve covers when I do the cams. Plus the ceramic JBA shorty's that I just put on.

[AstroDan]

Very nice car you have there.

A lot of us got the "Berg" cap... I'm sure they're still available.

 

[harristotle]

Thanks Dan! I like the Berg snake, but I much prefer the traditional snake logo. I just make sure nothing says GT500.

 

I got extremely busy for quite a while and didn't get to do much with the Shelby, but finally in the past month a number of events happened that woke up the cobra venom you could say...

 

It started with pre-marital counseling with our pastor. After our session I got talking to my pastor for almost an hour about cars as he's a big car guy as well. The following weekend I was visiting Ca for a close friends wedding. My parents have a neighbor who used to have his and hers Factory Five Cobras. He sold his, which was a blown 5.0, and they kept hers. All the donor parts were off a bone stock 90 GT. Well, we were driving past their house and I hadn't seen them in years and not only were they out but he had the Cobra out too. I hopped out of my Dad's truck before he even had a chance to stop and ran over to talk to him. After talking for a bit he agreed to take me for a ride (the last time I had a ride in a Cobra was for my birthday 15 years ago in his other Cobra that he sold). That sealed the deal, I knew I had to make the car thing a priority again. Once getting home I not only reworked my budget to accommodate car parts, but also started laying out plans for my own FFR Cobra that I've dreamed of for years for when I'm done modding the SGT.

 

Well the results were fast and furious (no pun intended ). I found a local performance shop and took the SGT to do a few dyno pulls to get a good baseline before I start really modding. I'd like to try and get dyno pulls for each mod I do, just to see how it impacts peak horsepower and the power curve. Below is a copy of my best dyno run... I was pretty happy for what was basically a stock SGT.

 

Here's the video of the dyno run. I couldn't believe how flipping loud she was at full throttle! I never get to stand behind her as I'm always driving, sounded awesome in person.

 

The next step was shorty headers. I went shorty's instead of longtubes because I want a 50 state legal car without having to rely on on backdoor handshakes or whatever to pass emissions. I went with the JBA since they are equal length and were the only set that was port matched to the heads on the 4.6. Decided if I was going to shell out that much for the headers I might as well suck it up and do it right by getting the ceramic coated ones. I had every intention of taking pictures along the way, but it ended up being just me at the shop for most of the time and I was more concerned about getting finished before the shop closed than getting WIP pics. Anyways here's pictures of the finished product...

 

I have only put about 30 miles on since the swap, but I'm happy. I wasn't expecting a big difference without a tune or supporting mods and them not being longtubes. She's a little louder, starts from a dead stop easier, and seems to have a little smoother power curve. Definitely revs a lot faster too.

 

I just added the billet Ford Racing oil cap cover and got the billet Shelby GT license plate frame in the mail, but I haven't uploaded those pictures yet.