Hello all,
too long between posts - I've been meaning to take time and share some results from my recent visit to Troyer.
Back in March our family took a cruise out of Florida and I dropped the truck off with Mike, Anita and the gang on the way. There is a long story about the trip back through Virginia - all good but for this post I'll leave it at things took a little longer than planned with the truck & there is nothing to the story I haven't told my wife ;-)
I drive a completely stock looking 2007 BLK FX4 sc long box... The truck started with a dealer installed Roush intcld sc, R off road cat back, Bilstien shocks, & the R front roll bar upgrade. My first upgrade was a mail order tune from Troyer that really woke up the R set up. The next step was the first trip to Mike's shop. We did what has become a well documented set of upgrades: E fan's, 2lb pully, coils and Dynatec long tubes. This hardware with some time on Mike's dyno created a whole new beast. I had the opportunity to take the truck out on a road course with this set up and we had a blast putting down better lap times than stock 07 mustang GT's (automatics) we had rented for some of our guests. The instructors couldn't believe how well the truck handled.
The factory brakes held up well on the track but there is no question, I took a year off them in a day... When they were eventually done I went with the full SSBC set up: 3 piston calipers up front, drilled / slotted rotors all around. Great stopping power and less dust than the factory set up.
I added a Hellwig rear sway bar at the time the brakes were done. This is tricky with a duel exhaust but I love what it's done for the truck.
All the above was done before I pulled up to Mikes shop in my salt encrusted black beauty back in March for my second visit to Troyer.
On the agenda for this visit

• a new exhaust set up: true duel with an x pipe & MagnaFlow's
• "SnakeBite"
• Troyer duel fuel pump up grade
• "A" pillar gauge pack - to make sure I don't blow up :-)
• transmission valve body

The results are above - I haven't had an opportunity to do any proper runs but I did set up my Iphone ap for a 2 wheel drive jump off the light at the start of the local toll route - zero to the legal limit (100km) in 5.3... traction is an issue as they say. :-) I'm thrilled with the get up and go for something this heavy. If you are considering the "SnakeBite" upgrade for your blower, you will read / hear about how hard and how fast the torque builds - it is true!
I mentioned a long story earlier - not everything went to plan with this project and I spent a few days in town on the way home from Florida while the team at Troyer worked out the bugs. Some of our troubles were related to the salt we have on the roads up here. But when you are taking a stock set up to where these mods do - things can go wrong. Mike and the team at Troyer are 100% good for their solid reputation - my truck was up on Mike's Dyno for three days solid, after I got there, while they worked none stop to get me back on the road. I know the work was piling up in the parking lot. It is also true that Mike won't let the truck go unless it is right.
I did have the opportunity to better understand than I normally would what we were doing and where some of the problems were coming from. This next round of upgrades was more than "bolt on" - the "SnakeBite" / port & polish of the supercharger is more of the same so to speak (a lot more - it is making over 12lbs of boost) but the fuel pump is a bigger deal.... Do your research - happy to answer any questions if any of the above is on your list. If you know what you are getting into - the results are a ton of fun.
I love my Ford!
cheers,

 

Wow, that sounds amazing. I always wanted to take our 05 roushcharged to troyer but i just never got around to it. Money was always a concern lol. But those are some real impressive numbers. So how can you shove that much boost into stock internals? I was told that 8psi or so was the "safe" limit. But obviously not, I really envy you and your truck. (i am driving a subaru outback now) So are there any more plans for the truck?

 

Sounds like it is on it's way to be a beast!

 

Hello F150 community,
well, it's been nearly 180 thousand kilometres and Dodge has yet to pass me ;-) but all good things must come to an end and my mechanic tells me the bottom of cylinder number 8 is gone. I understand 1 and 3 are also down on compression. I think I know when it happened - there is a new underpass / tunnel near my house and dropping to 2nd sounds fantastic... I did that about a month ago and came out limping - it was the beginning of the next phase of my 2007 FX4's life. This truck peeked at nearly 440 HP and 520 torque at the rear wheels... even a year ago she pulled 420 and 500 on a local dyno but alas, the end has come for gen 1. I drove this truck hard from day one. Originally a Roush stage 3, then a Troyer Tuning stage 1 followed a couple or years later with a snakebite / fuel upgrade, this truck never drove an easy kilometer (mile) and we had a ton of fun along the way. I hosted corporate track days and chased BMW M3's around a track and pulled stumps out at the cottage the next weekend - this truck did it all.
Now we need to make a a decision and I've decided to rebuild for the next level as they say. I will post here as decisions are made and hope to take my 2007 sleeper to a whole new level over the next few months.....
This will be a full rebuild and I'm looking for ideas, please share your thoughts and I will post updates as V2 comes together...
Thanks - B

 

Sad to hear, but I hope it'll come back bigger and better!

 

Sounds amazing and great to know about this!

 

We are underway.
McCulloch Engines

 

Some update photo's

 

Hello Ford Truck community, it's been a while again. I have a few updates on my 2007 BLK F150 that I have been posting about since new here. Before I do, I am curious, how many other Ford Truck community members still have there 2007/8 modified Roush / other F150 from new? My very forgiving wife thinks I am crazy, but I just cant give this truck up....

I don't think I've posted since we got back on the road with the remanufactured motor. Sitting on a lot for almost a year while the work was done, was not good for the truck. It was on gravel, but machines need to be used.

Couple of things I learned having a motor rebuilt for the first time.... (coincidently, and painfully for the pocket book, I needed to replace a motor in our RV over the same period - different experience - many of the same lessons) Patience is an absolute must when working with low volume / quality shops.
You can't assume "expert" knows what you want - research is a must
write everything down: scope, expectations, how changes will be managed, changes, warranties - everything... the more there is a "paper" trail, the better your relationship with the shop will be when "stuff" happens.
Patience...

The truck had been back on the road fighting through various electrical / other gremlins until last November.

I did get back to a dyno with the new motor and lower compression... we didn't get around to creating a new tune, but interesting, we got almost the same HP and toque numbers on the lower compression motor as we did when Mike Troyer did his last run with the Truck on the original block many moons ago.

Back in November 17 the truck was really running well - most of the gremlins we out and I was thinking about a new tune for the set up. The truck needed some brake work and when my wife picked it up from the shop she called me on the way home and said it was making a "clicking noise"....

If you follow the threads on this tuck way back you will find stories of my second trip to Mikes Troyer's Shop where we got the full treatment - including the "snakebite" upgraded blower. At the time Mike was working with Stiegemier porting to install "spun up" ported / polished Roush blowers. The "spin" was built into the nose of the blower vs smaller pulleys. Cool idea at the time that provided a bunch of boost while running all the accessories at normal speed.

The "clicking" my wife was hearing, was the gear set letting go.... like the motor before it, the timing sucked, but given how much fun we'd had, I could hardly complain.

I decided to ship the full blower set up back to Stiegemeier where it had originally came from and Bob / the team there were great.

I have a video to share but we are still tracking down some final parts before I can post final pics. The work from Stiegemeier looked so good I wanted to update my old thread....

 

some pics from the bench...

 

So we did hit a snag or two during the installation. The lighting plenum did not fit under the 2007 F150 firewall - it was close, but more than a hammer - see pics.

 

as my very patient mechanic said, we were past the point of no return...
some cutting, welding and good luck re the wiper arm and we sorted it out....

Waiting on a couple more parts - should be restarting next week....

 

The Truck runs again!
The fit took a little more work than planned, but when everything was cut, extended and routed as needed, the truck started up and ran remarkably well given the throttle body is from a GT500, with a Lighting plenum and the tune was built with standard Roush F150 parts.

(once again, props to Mike Troyer's tunes, years later, this is now a lower compression motor running a bunch of different parts - and it still goes. Mike and Anita, if you are out there somewhere, HELLO and I hope you are well).

We still have some bits and pieces to solve for. The reduction coupling in the JLT kit we ordered didn't fit right (Not JLT's fault, I don't think we were clear that it was a GT500 vs Lighting intake we were fitting up to). The kit also assumed we'd have the stock mass air flow fitting. As this was a Roush truck new from the dealer - I've never had that part. The folks at DaSilva Racing had some parts in the bin to get us going and we've ordered what's needed to clean up the fit and get the shield installed around the air filter.

Next step a tune - likely a couple of weeks to get time booked at DaSilva.

Thank-you to Bob and the team at Stiegemeier Porting Services - the fit work was a little more than "a message" ;-) but once in, the kit did "plug and play", and sounds great. Pending some driving / dyno time - feels great too!

Huge Thank-You to Troy and the gang at Marigold Ford service for sticking with the project, solving issues and getting my F150 back on the road.

I'll follow up with Dyno results etc in a couple of weeks.

 

 

Hello,
I will be putting the cold air box in.... we needed to have a new mass air fitting made that bolts up to the cold air box as part of the install. I will post another picture when we get finished. 2 weeks of driving on the old tune - no codes.... had to believe.