Before I found my wagon I was going to covert my other ED wagon into a V8 as it was very difficult to find a V8 in a wagon. Back then it was quite expensive to source the V8 and the gearbox on their own so I nearly bought a NC2 fairlane with the V8 and all the other bells and whistles and swap over everything. At the end I would've had a V8 wagon with ghia specs, a GLi fairlane that I could sell cheap, and finally, I would've had ALL the parts available for this conversion in my shed.

On the other hand, I guess that conversions are a lot cheaper now so you could just buy the engine and gearbox with the loom/ECU and TCM. Make sure you get all the easy to forget things such as power steering lines, EGR bits etc. Personally, I would lose the sentiment and just buy a good low kay EL ghia. Less hassles then and there are heaps around.

Some more digging has uncovered more facts to keep me awake at night...
- EL ecus are incompatible with the EF BEM without modification (and vice versa).
- EF 5 litre Fairmont engine harness (part # EF14K011C) is most likely the same as the XR8s however the Fairlane/LTD harness has extra connectors (possibly for premium sound etc). Still not sure about EL harnesses.

Also EL Fairmont ECU's are speed sensitive steering compatible, just gotta run a wire to the steering rack!!!

Also just as a note, xr8 dismantler was correct... no EF had speed sensitive. Only the 6 and 8 cylinder EL Fairmont Ghia, Fairlane Ghia and LTD models had the speed sensitive power steering. Most people that have driven cars with this feature believe its pretty crappy anyways..

very nice

Anyone else with suggestions or comments?