I will start by introducing myself as I haven't ever posted much on here. I'm a senior at the University of Iowa, finishing up my last semester and graduating in May. I am in the Air Force ROTC and will be heading to Pensacola NAS for CSO training in August and can't wait for some warm weather!
I have been a member here for quite a while and have always loved the 03/04 Cobras. I picked up an 03 back in January with 59k miles on it. The only mods were welded in Flowmasters and a cold air intake. The previous owner also had a thing with orange as you can see from the vinyl stickers, which will be getting removed in the near future. Since then I have been trying to figure out what I wanted to do to the car with the budget I had. I ended up with the following things getting piled up:
-Bassani O/R X
-Borla Stingers
-MM FLSFC
-FTBR FT5000 IRS kit
-Ford Racing Diff Cover
I finally got a few free days to get some work done on the car and decided to take some pictures. I apologize for the extremely dirty car, thats on my to do list as well.
I fist started by removing all of the old exhaust as I would be replacing it anyways.
Next was to get it up on stands and get the rear end out of the car.
While it was out I cleaned it up a bit.
Removing the old bushings was pretty straight forward with the use of the rental tools from FTBR. I used a torch on the subframe bushings which made it pretty easy.
Drilling and tapping the grease fittings can be kind of difficult, but if you take your time you shouldn't have any problems. I used a drill press which definitely helps out. Make sure to use some cutting oil or some type of lubricant while tapping the holes.
While I had everything apart I installed the Ford Racing cover using Motorcraft Gray sealant
Let this setup for a while while you are reassembling everything else. Once you are finished get it back in the car and take it out for a drive! The instructions that come with the kit are pretty good, but the pictures and videos on the FTBR site are great. The kit that Bruce put together is fantastic and the customer service is even better! I can't say enough about how well everything worked and fit. While I had it all apart I also decided to cut 1 coil off all of the springs and leave the isos in place. I know this isn't the best way to lower it, but it fit well in my budget for the time being. I'll likely change it down the road.
But before I could go out for a drive I had to get the MM Subframe connectors installed. This way pretty straight forward and didn't take too long. I had the unpainted ones so I painted the topside with some primer/paint before installation and then coated them with 3M undercoating once they were welded up.
Next up was the exhaust. I decided I might as well polish it while it was new, always thought it looked pretty great on all the cars that had it done. I followed some of the other posts I had seen on how to do this and ended up with pretty good results. The second pipe took me about 2.5 hours from untouched to completely polished so it will certainly take some time but well worth it in my opinion.
After all this work I was finally ready to start it up and enjoy all the hard work. All I can say about the exhaust is wow. I had watched plenty of videos trying to decide what combo to go with, this is definitely the one. It sounds simply amazing. Then it was out for a test drive to see how everything felt. Between the subframe connectors and the kit from FTBR it feels like a completely different car! I didn't have any wheel hop, car is much more predictable and feels so much better, and got rid of the typical cobra clunk. I didn't notice any increased noise from the bushing as some had noted, not that it was important to me either way. All in all I am extremely pleased with everything and can't wait to get started on my next round of mods here in a couple weeks which include:
-2.76 pulley and idlers
-Amazon tune and remote tuning
-Wideband 02
-Full paint correction
-Rear tires (likely Toyo r888's)
I spent about 2.5 days from start to finish with the help of my dad here and there. It's really not that difficult, just a bit time consuming. I've got more pictures and if anyone has any questions I'd love to help!
Heres the exhaust video, doesn't do it justice, but no bad
[youtube_browser]DNuSoiXQGD8[/youtube_browser]
I have been a member here for quite a while and have always loved the 03/04 Cobras. I picked up an 03 back in January with 59k miles on it. The only mods were welded in Flowmasters and a cold air intake. The previous owner also had a thing with orange as you can see from the vinyl stickers, which will be getting removed in the near future. Since then I have been trying to figure out what I wanted to do to the car with the budget I had. I ended up with the following things getting piled up:
-Bassani O/R X
-Borla Stingers
-MM FLSFC
-FTBR FT5000 IRS kit
-Ford Racing Diff Cover
I finally got a few free days to get some work done on the car and decided to take some pictures. I apologize for the extremely dirty car, thats on my to do list as well.
I fist started by removing all of the old exhaust as I would be replacing it anyways.
Next was to get it up on stands and get the rear end out of the car.
While it was out I cleaned it up a bit.
Removing the old bushings was pretty straight forward with the use of the rental tools from FTBR. I used a torch on the subframe bushings which made it pretty easy.
Drilling and tapping the grease fittings can be kind of difficult, but if you take your time you shouldn't have any problems. I used a drill press which definitely helps out. Make sure to use some cutting oil or some type of lubricant while tapping the holes.
While I had everything apart I installed the Ford Racing cover using Motorcraft Gray sealant
Let this setup for a while while you are reassembling everything else. Once you are finished get it back in the car and take it out for a drive! The instructions that come with the kit are pretty good, but the pictures and videos on the FTBR site are great. The kit that Bruce put together is fantastic and the customer service is even better! I can't say enough about how well everything worked and fit. While I had it all apart I also decided to cut 1 coil off all of the springs and leave the isos in place. I know this isn't the best way to lower it, but it fit well in my budget for the time being. I'll likely change it down the road.
But before I could go out for a drive I had to get the MM Subframe connectors installed. This way pretty straight forward and didn't take too long. I had the unpainted ones so I painted the topside with some primer/paint before installation and then coated them with 3M undercoating once they were welded up.
Next up was the exhaust. I decided I might as well polish it while it was new, always thought it looked pretty great on all the cars that had it done. I followed some of the other posts I had seen on how to do this and ended up with pretty good results. The second pipe took me about 2.5 hours from untouched to completely polished so it will certainly take some time but well worth it in my opinion.
After all this work I was finally ready to start it up and enjoy all the hard work. All I can say about the exhaust is wow. I had watched plenty of videos trying to decide what combo to go with, this is definitely the one. It sounds simply amazing. Then it was out for a test drive to see how everything felt. Between the subframe connectors and the kit from FTBR it feels like a completely different car! I didn't have any wheel hop, car is much more predictable and feels so much better, and got rid of the typical cobra clunk. I didn't notice any increased noise from the bushing as some had noted, not that it was important to me either way. All in all I am extremely pleased with everything and can't wait to get started on my next round of mods here in a couple weeks which include:
-2.76 pulley and idlers
-Amazon tune and remote tuning
-Wideband 02
-Full paint correction
-Rear tires (likely Toyo r888's)
I spent about 2.5 days from start to finish with the help of my dad here and there. It's really not that difficult, just a bit time consuming. I've got more pictures and if anyone has any questions I'd love to help!
Heres the exhaust video, doesn't do it justice, but no bad
[youtube_browser]DNuSoiXQGD8[/youtube_browser]
