Upper and lower intakes

Hey everybody this is my first ford truck.
Recently 3 months after I purchased my used 1998 ford ranger.120000 miles on it The motor lost oil pressure and locked up. After I pulled the motor and inspected the inside. Wow what a sludge monster. I removed two handfuls of sludge out of the oil pan. And lots of elbo grease to remove the caked on oil.
It's back up and running now fresh remanufactured motor.
Recently I went to our local junk yard to get some parts. I found a 1998 ford wind star with a push rod 3.0 same valve covers as the ranger. It has a different upper intake and the lower intake has bigger injectors. My question is would I be able to use this intake set up to achieve more HP. And would I need to do something with my compute to use the bigger injectors.

No, injectors are not the same as "jets" used in carbs.

So larger injectors don't add more fuel since computer controls the air/fuel mix.

Computer gets the air flow from MAF sensor, it then calculates gasoline's 14:1 air:fuel mix based on that amount of air.
It then opens the injectors for a specific length of time(pulse width) to add the calculated amount of fuel.
Computer then gets Oxygen levels in the exhaust from the O2 sensors to see if the air:fuel burn was lean(too much oxygen in exhaust) or Rich(too little oxygen in exhaust).
If lean computer increases pulse width, if rich computer shortens pulse width.

So larger injectors would just have shorter pulse width once computer adjusted to them.

Computer operates engine for best power and MPG so adding more fuel just makes MPG go down without adding much more power, if any.
Rich mix will cost you power, and of course money as MPG drops.

Increasing compression(turbo/super charger) or displacement(V8) adds more power because more fuel can be used efficiently.
These still run the same 14:1 ratio but they have the ability to use more fuel per cycle because they can pull in more air, so produce more power.


Stock Ranger has a tuned exhaust.
Tuned exhaust means at some specific point in the RPM range the exhaust will have it's highest negative pressure at the exhaust valves/ports.
This is where the "Back pressure" myth comes from.
No 4-stroke engine needs or runs better with back pressure, lol.
But people would install "free flowing" headers, larger pipes, and lose power...."WTF, engine must need back pressure", and there in lies the start of the myth.

When constructing tuned exhausts you want to create a high velocity in the header pipes, and when this high velocity gets to the larger collector pipe there is a sudden pressure drop, on a V6 the other 2 exhaust ports on that bank get this lower pressure because of this.
The lower pressure means the crank doesn't have to push as hard to get exhaust out so there is more power available for the rear wheels.
The diameter and length of the header pipes will put the lowest pressure at a specific RPM, just below and above this RPM is the power band for that header design.
Stock rangers are tuned for mid-range power.
Most after market headers are tuned for lower range power
Racing headers are tuned for higher RPM band power.

When the people added the larger header pipes they lost the velocity so they lost the negative pressure, and of course they lost the extra power it created, "WTF.........", lol.

So headers don't add any power, in the old days maybe, but not since fuel injection when auto makers added cold air intakes and tuned exhaust as standard features.
They are a good add if you want lower end power, but mid-range then drops off.

RonD said:

No, injectors are not the same as "jets" used in carbs.

So larger injectors don't add more fuel since computer controls the air/fuel mix.

Computer gets the air flow from MAF sensor, it then calculates gasoline's 14:1 air:fuel mix based on that amount of air.
It then opens the injectors for a specific length of time(pulse width) to add the calculated amount of fuel.
Computer then gets Oxygen levels in the exhaust from the O2 sensors to see if the air:fuel burn was lean(too much oxygen in exhaust) or Rich(too little oxygen in exhaust).
If lean computer increases pulse width, if rich computer shortens pulse width.

So larger injectors would just have shorter pulse width once computer adjusted to them.

Computer operates engine for best power and MPG so adding more fuel just makes MPG go down without adding much more power, if any.

Increasing compression(turbo/super charger) or displacement(V8) adds more power because more fuel can be used efficiently.
These still run the same 14:1 ratio but they have the ability to use more fuel per cycle because they can pull in more air, so produce more power.

Click to expand...

yes and no. injectors are like carb jets in some senses. the computer has an operating range....to small or too large of an injector could limit the computer out of range and it hits it limits. eec4 is much more limited then eec5 for most scenarios.


the computer dont know the pounds per hour that any old injector is rated to..it only assumes the ones it is programmed for are in there and squirting go go juice to a predetermined tables it makes decisions from...

and at minimal pulse... the injector if its a fat bastard injector... will let off a larger then expected amount of fuel and piss the computer right off if the engine can not use that fuel.

the windsor 5.0 is a classic case here. say you do a radical hci with bad ass exhaust and low restriction air filter and try to run it with 19 pound injectors. it will limit right out and tear your heads and pistons up. drop in some 30 pounders and its happy as can be. this is the old school method with no pcm tuning....you can work within the stock parameters and have a significant power increase with thhe right combination....this is partially how some of the old alphabet cams came to be.

bone stock, with 30 or 36 pounders it will never run right because the fuel delivery of the 30 pounder is past the limits of the factory tuning for the airflow stock hci can allow. 24 pound injectors it would live with somewhat ok though.

so.....in the case of this 3.0 with a larger intake and injector combination...you would want to run the whole eec system including exhaust manifolds if those are different....but the drive ratios and trans tuning are all gonna need changed as well. the front drive is all different in that light.

i dont recall the windstar having a 3.0 with bigger stuff then the ranger....but all the ones i worked on tended to be the 3.8. i cant see more then a few hp difference...might be worth looking into.


but for that trouble i would swap a gm 5.3 powertrain in long before i wasted any effort on a 3.0.

Thanks for the info. I'll post pics of the upper intake of the windstar the parts are cheap. So if it's not a big hassle I'm going to swap out the upper intake and see if there USA power gain. Only if it's not a big hassle. I would like to know more about the 5.3 swap.

theres some around this form with ls swaps.


these days if i wanted a gasser.....it would be my first choice. likely will be the most swapped engine ever if they leave it on its current production evolution 8 more years.


for a ranger they are logical. unless you bleed ford blue....

and i love my windsors....just not as cost effective.