[MuHííí]

So i was thinking about the project and how much time it will take/how fast i want it done. I wont do the swap thru the winter bcs i dont have access to big garage and i wont do it in freezing temperatures outside. That means, i have more time till lets say March - April. Bcs of this, i am thinking about rebuilding the whole engine block. I still want to do it on budget (engine wont be boosted) and all work that can be done will be done by me. What would be the best approach? New rings, connecting rod bearings, crankshatf bearings - thinkig about balancing the crankshaft too (found out its pretty cheap - around 100$) I hope i wont need cylinder honing - i heard new pistons are pretty expensive. Ofcourse, new seals everywhere. Anything else worth doing on block or something i shouldnt do?

 

[JScullin]

You could send the block off to get fully cleaned so it looks nice. If you're not going to be doing FI you could save money and inspect for leaks, make sure it has good compression, replace anything that can be wear items (pullies/gaskets/sensors) and run it as-is. I recall on CEG they said stock internals on the 3.0 are good for quite a bit more power than it'll see as a N/A setup. If it happens to fail down the road you can get a another junkyard engine cheap.

Once you crack the block open it will be a rabbit hole of may as wells that will be like buying a junkyard motor 3x over. But you'd hopefully have the peace of mind the engine will outlast the car at that point.

If you go with the prior you can put that money saved towards things you will want when doing a 3.0l. An LSD and a new clutch, flywheel & slave cylinder. Or if you're on an automatic, a bunch of spare ATX's.

 

[The 1982 EXPert]

At the very least new headgaskets in addition to every other gasket/seal on the engine, headgasket failure is becoming the norm for anything 20+ years old in addition to bad valve stem seals. Lapping valves at this point is highly recommended but not mandatory, but considering it only costs you a $25 lapping stick & compound plus your own free labor it's foolish to skip any time the heads are off.

Next step up would be new rings & honing all cylinders to ensure best possible compression - being pistons come out you need to have new rod bolts on-hand.

Next step after that would be new rod & crank bearings - not strictly necessary but the piece of mind is priceless if you're looking to do "once & done" because swapping in a dud of a motor is a poor way to waste two full days of labor. Not many out there need new bearings but if you got a 170,000+ mile used engine going in it's something to think about as that's where a well-cared Duratec starts showing bearing wear (not concernable wear but enough to finally be visual and measurable).

The beauty is you can take all winter to build the new engine (going to take you a long while, scrapping gaskets, cleaning carbon, lapping valves, etc takes forever so this is probably best) then install over a normal or extended weekend.

 

[MuHííí]

That valve lapping sounds so good! Didnt even know you can do it at home. Thats pretty good advice! Defintely will do it.

So far everything you said is on to-do list. Little bit worried about cylinder honing - hope i wont need new pistons - dont really know the price of new pistons but i can imagine it wont be cheap - you have any idea how much oversize pistons would cost in your country?

 

[The 1982 EXPert]

As far as honing goes you can do it yourself if you pick up a 320ish grit hone that fits your cylinder size (don't remember the 2.5 or 3.0 bore sizes) costing you $40USD or send the block to a machine shop who will charge you $10-$25 to hone each cylinder. Or if it needs to be bored honing comes free at the charge of $25-$75 per cylinder.

Pistons do get spendy depending what type & brand you want, some of the more affordable ones that rival OEM Ford quality is $25-$50 per piston but if you want something lightweight, custom compression, forged, etc you'll find them costing you $80-$120+ per piston

 

[MuHííí]

So some update on the build. Engine is opened and i was pleasantly suprised the insides looks pretty good. Honing marks are still visible, almost no glaze so i am really happy with it.

The question right now is about cams. I can get set of cams from mondeo ST220 for pretty good price. (Camshafts from motor i am rebuilding are extremly pitted) or i can use my ST200 (SVT) cams from my car. If i use ST200 cams, i dont think i can ever sell that engine for some cost return + i have to take my motor out, take cams and all timing gear out and put them in the 3.0 = more time to build. With ST220 cams i can finish the build and just swap the engines in 1 weekend.

I read somewhere, that 2004+ Escape had camshafts really close to SVT cams (same cams were used in ST220) - Can anyone verify this? If so, ST220 cams are the way to go.

 

[mmc757]

I thought the ST220 had VVT?

If you are using the PCM from the Cougar, than the 3.0l cams are closer to that baseline tune than the ST200 cams are. That would be the best choice.
If you are using the ST200 PCM, than the ST200 cams and injectors would be perfect.

 

[MuHííí]

ST220 are fixed cams. Jaguar had VVT and newer Duratec 30 models (2009+) had too. I will be using PCM from ST200. So far i found out that ST200 has little more lift but ST220 has more duration. So ST220 cams will have more turque while ST200 will get a little more power in high RPM. But the difference in lift is so small it wont be noticible/too close to redline. Down will be the info i have found:

1997-2000 Contour SVT/Mondeo ST200
Nominal lift: 4.79 Intake, 4.82 Exhaust
Duration: Intake 250 Exhaust 262

3.0L 2002 Mondeo ST220
Nominal lift: 4.74 Intake, 4.81 Exhaust
Duration: Intake 250 Exhaust 280

ST220 cams it is. I wont have to tear down another working engine and i can sell it. The duration will be nice, the car will pull much more from low RPM and some horses at redline wont bother me that much. If something is wrong, feel free to correct me. I personaly didnt do messurements of these cams, so it can be wrong but so far, lot of ppl choose Escape 2004+/ST220 cams over SVT cams bcs of price or bcs of more torque down low.

 

[mmc757]

The history of this forum and the Contour forums is littered with hundreds of threads debating cams, there is no clear winner either way.
At this point in time, tuning is our biggest hurdle. If you can install cams, PCM, and injectors that all match each other from the start, it makes everything much easier and gets you on the road much faster.
If you are relying on tuning to get you road worthy, you need to make sure you have a tuner that can do the job before you commit to that path.
If I were starting a new build today, I would either use Cougar PCM and injectors with the 3.0 cams or use all parts from SVT/ST200.

The idea of selling your engine sounds good on paper but they aren't worth much, and there's not much demand. Its probably more valuable to you as parts than as a whole, especially after you pull the parts you need for the swap off of it. I would even use the 2.5l crank if I were already replacing bearings.

 

[MuHííí]

So after some time, the build is still going. Last week full gasket kit from Fel-pro came. Didnt touched the engine for some weeks, didnt have time and i had some issue with IMRC in my ST200, so that needed fixing and i am still enjoying the good weather with my car so engine has to wait till winter.

But right now, i have a little dilemma about LSD. The cheapest i could find is around 1k€ (MFactory or from Quaife for the same price) + i dont think i could install it alone, so it would be another 100-200€ for transmission work. So it would be around 1200-1300€ for just LSD and i think its little too much. Is it possible to do it without LSD and swap it in later? I know diff in MTX75 is known to die even with 2.5l and torque from 3.0 would be best with LSD but it feels little too much for me. Any thoughts on this? Is it worth to swap in 3.0 with stock diff and send it? Or its absolutly not worth it to do without LSD.

 

[JScullin]

I would highly recommend an LSD while you have everything out unless you have intentions of pulling the engine again for other reasons down the line.

While I've never been in a 3l swapped car without an LSD I will say my M-Factory was well worth the extra hurt to the wallet at the time just comparing it to how it drove with the stock engine/trans setup. Oversteer is all but a distant memory and it puts the power down predicably.

Granted, good tires are going to help a lot so make sure you have those. Here's a video of me on a skid pad at a car correction day. I'm on/off throttle driving around and rolling into it during cornering to try and break traction. You hear the tires squealing but at no point did it care I was on a soaking wet surface, wheel cut and punching it.

 

[B3NN3TT]

Yep, agree on all counts.

LSD is not cheap, but it is a great step towards avoiding another transaxle removal or possibly getting stranded when the extra torque wipes all the spider gears in your stock differential.

Speaking of extra torque - without an LSD, you can't even think about adding throttle in a corner, because the inside tire immediately smokes whenever there is any steering input with throttle. The LSD keeps traction across both front tires to maintain control of the 3.0 output.

Not essential, but definitely recommended.