Within my EA falcon lurks a demonic MPI 3.9L SOHC engine which refuses to show mercy to both my wallet and I. So the plan is to replace said 3.9L MPI engine with the lovely barra motor.

Patient : 1988 EA falcon S pac 5spd manual - 220xxx kms
Donor : 2005 BA falcon XT MkII Automatic - 144xxx kms

Current cash spent on conversion : $2000 CONVERSION COMPLETE

G'day fellas,

So i've been planning this conversion for a while now and i came across a bloody great deal, picked up a 2005 BA XT mkII ( 140xxx kms ) from a really nice bloke, for only $400! It appears to be leaking gearbox oil into the coolant some how. Seeing as it wouldn't take much to fix it and it looks rather clean, i've been torn whether or not to fix it up and sell it for 3 - 4k, or to just take out the motor and everything i need for the conversion and wreck parts and make quite a nice profit still.

Now the barra runs great, smooth and plenty of power even for the heavy BA falcon.
But i think it's a wiser idea to use the barra from this BA, to be on the safe side.
With this thread for the conversion project, i'll be adding in all the small details and maybe even asking for a bit of advice.

I'm aware of the costs and work involved with this conversion and i'll be mostly using BenJ's thread as guidance. But i am indeed looking forward to the conversion, as there's alot of hands on experience and learning.

Here's some photos of the BA falcon i picked up for $400

Stay tuned!

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Last edited by GrannyFalcon82 on Sat Jan 10, 2015 1:29 pm, edited 8 times in total.

fcuk me .... $400


think me EB has .... 265000 on the 3.9 . . . runs well

Whilst pulling the motor out i thought i'd take a few snaps, of what i found rather interesting.

Might i add the coolant milkshake is really damn messy stuff, had to scrape the stuff off my fingers.

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G'day,

So as it turns out as i had been draining the gearbox fluid, it came out bloody clear red... Not a trace of water ( I've yet to take a look at the TC ) No wonder the transmission had no issues driving around, i suspect transmission fluid has been deliberately poured into the coolant to trick the customer into thinking he needs to pay $4k to get it fixed. Anyway, my win!

Finally got the barra back home yesterday after pulling it out of the BA falcon, she's a beaut. Was a bit of a hassle getting it out due to bolts snapping and rounding off, but the battle was won, also if anyone is wondering what engine crane i'm using and you can't tell already, it's a SuperCheatAuto brand... Got it on sale for $200 a few months back.

If there's anyone following the thread for information and you're inexperienced like myself, you're in luck because i'll be sharing quite alot of that as best as i can.

So it was time to rip out the pedal box today, and grab that damn accelerator pedal for the conversion. This also was a hassle to remove ( I found it far easier to drop the steering column out of the way, four 10mm bolts ) Luckily the bolts for the pedal box are really easy to get to, 6 bolts that should be tackled with a 13mm deep socket or have a hell of a time using a spanner. Once the pedal box is out, have it sitting up on a bench and undo the 10mm bolt / Pin, that holds the pedal assembly in.

While i was at the car i decided to chop some wiring connectors out of it, for the 02 sensor, pcm connector, alternator and the entire relay/fuse box. ( Haven't taken out the obd2 connector yet, but i'd much prefer the AU connector )

Going to take a few pics of my 88 Falcon tomorrow, but for now here's some pics related to the above text.

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Right, time to start working on the wiring loom.

My plan is to utilize the existing engine side wiring loom, and add on other various necessities such as power, ground, 02 sensor connections, throttle pedal connections, obd2 connections ect... I shouldn't need the gearbox side of the loom as I'm going to run the T5 gearbox with AU bellhousing.

I'd say i'll run the fuel pump off of the EA ecu ( I'm guessing the ecu will want some basic inputs to keep functioning ) Tacho Interface Module should solve this issue? Though i'm unsure of how many inputs the EA ecu actually needs before going into lhm.

Time to start measuring and planning.

Wiring update 1

After spending a good half day researching, finding wires / pins and continuity testing, i've got quite a little bit done today. This is the secondary loom and wires have been tagged, to what pins / functions that they serve.

For any of you who are interested in what has been tagged on the secondary loom so far :

Power steering switch----- - PCM Pin B31..........................................PSP Signal
PCM Pin B33......................Signal Return (SIGRTN)


HEGO sensor----- - PCM Pin B8………..................... HEGO11(I6, V8)

PCM Pin B33.................…..Signal Return (SIGRTN)


Electronic throttle----- PCM Pin B17………….……………… PPS1
PCM Pin B18………….……………… PPS2
PCM Pin B19………….……………… PPS3
PCM Pin B20………….…………..…… PPSVREF1
PCM Pin B28………….…………….…. PPSVREF2
PCM Pin B21…………………………….PPSRTN1
PCM Pin B29……………………………. PPSRTN2

PCM POWER----

PCM Pin B9….……………………………… IGNSNS
PCM Pin B37….…………………………… PWRSTN
PCM Pin B34, B36…………………………… VPWR

OBD2 -----
PCM PinB13………………….… …..……. CAN-H
PCM Pin B14……………………………… CAN-L

There appears to be a few wires that travel from the primary engine loom, to the secondary connector.

B10 - CASEGND - 57DA
B15 - ACPT Signal - 440
B04 - Start Enable - 342
B42 - TRS-A1 Sensor - 1144

The earth i'm not concerned about, i assume two of those are related to the smart shield system? Hope they aren't necessary, seeing as smart shield will be bypassed.

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Wiring update 2

Everything is now tagged.... Things like coil / injector power, throttle pedal wires, obd2 wires, HEGO wires, power steering switch wires, ground wires, PCM power wires / ignition signal ect...

There's alot of unused wires that need to be trimmed down / pulled out of the connector to avoid any unwanted electrical contact during PCM operation ( that's the last thing i need )

I've already planned the power / ground operation for the PCM , injectors and coil...( Using similar setup to BenJ )
For anyone interested in the wiring planning i'll post the pic of that below ( Updates may occur ).

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Wiring update 3 - Unused wires are now capped



Right, so i've been planning to chop and cap the useless wires ( But have them long enough so any wire can be used if needed ) Rather simple really, just chopped the wires down to a short length so they won't disrupt anything. Slid over some heat-shrink and heated nearly to the point of melting i'd begin to bend the heat-shrink ends back over themselves and fuse it together by crushing with my fingers ( Little bit of a burn to it ) But this ensures they won't wander off and start shorting on things.

Also the bit of gear i purchased was pretty damn cheap stuff, but it'll do the job...

Heatshrink - $15 EBAY
500pc Crimp kit - $25 EBAY
10M long extension cord - $10 BUNNINGS
SCA Ratchet crimper - $19 SUPERCHEAPAUTO
SCA Wire stripper - $19 SUPERCHEAPAUTO
SCA Electrical tape - Four for $5
SCA Pencil torch - $6


Now i bought the extension cord purely for the purpose of this conversion being low budget. At supercheatauto i can buy 7 Meters of the same gauge wire for $8... The extension cord is 10 Meters long and has three wires... that's 30 Meters of wiring for $10 or 33 cents per meter.

Next i'll be working on the connectors / relay setup...

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Wiring the work of the devil. Enjoy caused the biggest f****n headaches when I did mine.

Cheers

Steve

Seems like everythings going along good so far, I'm planing on doing the same conversion to my own EA within the next year or so. Are you planing on using the ba dash? Ive been researching for a while but I'm yet to come up with a way to keep the ea air conditioning working alongside the ba ecu.

I'm not going to be running the BA dash, plan is to be a true sleeper. I'm keeping the car stock, which means using existing mounting points for everything too. I'm going to run the BA aircon compressor and figure a way to trigger the AC clutch with the EA switch, the biggest issue is the BA piping setup needs to be adapted to fit the EA piping. But once i get to that stage, I'll be posting up what I'm doing, so don't worry!

your plans seem really similar to mine, I'm planning on the sleeper look, (like most) but I'm too lazy to get it engineered so I'm going for the custom sump/hood option with no mods to the frame. I was hopeing that I could figure out a way to trick the EA ecu in thinking its working to control the Ac but its not high on my research list since my AC sort of doesn't work anyway (fans stuck on 24/7). I'll be keeping an eye on your build, should be useful as a guide for mine.

looking forward to seeing how this comes out . wish i had the time and space to do something similar to my EA.

Is the ea running climate control or normal aircon?

Mine's just running normal aircon mate.