williamggruff

I can't comment on Ford V8 head rebuild costs, but I can say with some certainty that you would be very hard pressed to get a 300 hp S14 in any kind of usable condition for $10k.

Have you spoken with a Ken Blasko at a Vintage BMW Racing in LA?

Accusump is overkill for a street car. We've run over twenty 24-hour endurance races in a tii without an oil cooler or Accusump. If your cooling system is up to snuff, you're good to go. An oil cooler is one piece of road debris from being an oil sprayer. An Accusump requires frequent maintenance and attention. It's very useful in a racecar, but a racecar receives maintenance and attention each time it goes on the track. That's a nuisance that will soon be ignored on a street car, or it will likely become a reason not to drive your 2002. Been there, done that, strongly recommend against it.

Sadly, I didn't photograph my process. I performed it over the course of several weeks in fits and starts. The end result looks like this.

When you remove the big bumpers, you're going to have to fix the paint where the rubber parts of the 76 bumpers touch the car. No way around it. If you want to go with the simple hole filling method, you can use painted press-in grommets, and you can fill the bumper shock holes with either modified grommets or rubber, taking care to bond them using a product like Marine Goop to keep water out. Or you can weld them up and repaint as Ken suggests. I like Ken's method best, but my welding skillz aren't as good as Ken's, so I went with the painted grommet approach for the small holes, and made covers for the bumper shock holes out of painted steel plate, which I then screwed into the stock rubber grommets that surrounded the bumper shocks, and bonded them in place with Marine Goop. I repainted the rear panel as part of the bumper conversion.

As Toby notes, there are many variants of DCOE 40s. Some of them were developed specifically for 1500-1600cc motors. Some of those were developed for motors that rev higher than your stock 1500cc M10. The volume of air through the carb, and the vacuum signal from the motor that pulls air through the carb, play significant roles in how well the carb feeds the motor throughout the rev range. You might learn that you don't want DCOE 40s, but DCOE 38s. There are several great books on tuning Weber DCOEs. Three of my favorites are: "How to build & power tune Weber and Dellorto DCOE and DHLA carburetor" by Des Hammill; "Weber carburettors tuning tips and techniques" by John Passini; and "Weber Carburetors" by Pat Braden. All are valuable resources, and each will present you with critically important insights into how to select, jet and tune DCOEs. Other resources to consider include: Pierce Manifolds--a purveyor of Weber carbs and parts. They may be able to recommend one or more DCOE bodies to look for. eBay merchant alfa1750--sells Weber and Dellorto parts. Based in Italy, and seems to have broad knowledge of, and access to DCOE bodies and parts.

Peter, Sadly, I won't be attending the Vintage this year. I've had a few too many vacation outings already this year, including 23 days of big mountain skiing since January 1st, eleven days in Hawaii in April, and a hiking trip to Big Bend National Park from which I'm currently returning home, and as I plan to be rock climbing in Kentucky next weekend, and hiking in Puerto Rico the following week, I need to spend some time this weekend around home. But my offer stands, and I'd welcome your company and the opportunity to get my knuckles greasy on your ti ;-) Grice

If you're driving down the east coast en route to the Vintage, my home is just east of DC. I have a large 2-car garage and every tool necessary to solve any problem you could encounter short of converting your ti motor into a tii. I also have a shit ton of parts and beer. And several spare bedrooms.

Also, check your motor mounts. If one or both of your motor mounts die, the motor will tend to rotate, banging the distributor cap against the firewall, and that can shatter the cap.

Being able to rotate the distributor shaft a bit is normal, as there's a spring in there to deal with mechanical advance. The shattered cap seems worrisome, but could have been the cause of the stumbling and run on symptoms. Replace the cap, (and preferably the rotor as well), and at least check the rotor for a tight fit to the distributor shaft and clean contact points. Check the spark plug wires for wear, and the connections from the wires to the plugs. If necessary, I probably have a distributor or three with new rotors and caps that I could overnight to you. All the best, Grice

For 2002 Euros, you might get a pair of frame rails.