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Prepping for an engine swap. Newbie to the 5.0 world :)

Ross

New Member
Hey everyone

I'm very new to the American Muscle scene, but after living in the US for a while now, my Brit genes are desperate to get some of that V8 rumble in my euro. I'm not sure if this is heresy for you guys or not, I hope you're okay with it.
I have an old 92 BMW 325i that I will be swapping one of your 302's into. It's got to be between 1987 and 1993, with EFI.
Since I'll also be needing the T5 transmission, the ECU and a bit of the wiring harness as well, my plan was to just purchase a wrecked, or old/cheap mustang and use it as a donor car, parting out what's left when I'm done.
Can you guys suggest anything in particular I need to watch out for when buying a used car for this engine. Are there any problems that tend to occur that I can look out for or test for before buying the car?
Also, I'd really like to have one of those top mounted intake/filters. Are those only used on carb'd engines, or is there one available for injection? If so, are there drawbacks or benefits to it? I'm not a fan of the look of the square looking intakes.

Thanks in advance :D
 

Blown347

Moderator
Staff member
Welcome. Only a carb setup has a top mounted filter, unless you run an aftermarket EFI setup that is made for a carb style manifold, such as the holley EFI, quickfuel QFI, MSD atomic EFI etc.

If you're going to buy a used setup, number one is do a compression test. Ideally you can find a running, driving donor and that would put your mind at ease about a lot of potential problems. But if it's not running, provided it turns over freely and the compression test is good, any other reason it's not running it's probably a simple fix (I.e. fuel or spark problem which is simple enough to track down later)
 
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