Will I keep air conditioning?
It would be nice to have, but it seems like such a pain for now. I think I will lose it but try to do it in a way that I can add this later if I want. I need to get the quick disconnect tool to disassemble this any further. I borrowed the Harbor freight one from a neighbor. The sizes are off a little. Not sure if that is a ford thing, or HF thing. The reviews suggest it is a Ford thing and the plastic ones will work better. I'll have to see if I can get over there some time soon.
Will I keep power steering?
I looked at the Kugel website and they use a mustang rack in their build. I have a mustang rack. What's even better is that I have a power steering pump on the engine, so keeping power steering may be a no brainer. I also have the mustang control arms and hub carriers. I will have to see how much of that stuff lines up. I want to avoid an epic investigation into suspension and steering geometry. Actually it isn't the investigation I want to avoid as much as the mistakes that will come from my ignorance.
What electrical systems do I need?
EFI and electronic ignition are gone. So the PCM can go too. But not so fast! The radio is keyed into the computer to prevent theft (The radio's ugliness and odd size are apparently not enough) so if I want to keep the radio, I may need the PCM. If I keep that, is keeping the airbags an option? I don't know yet. I found the pin out for the PCM. Most likely I will do nothing with this info for now to avoid taking the whole dash apart until I have to.
I did a lot of clean up in the engine bay. Here is where we are now:
I still have air conditioning nonsense, and big pieces of wiring harness hanging in the wheel well. I could also cut away some bracketry that I don't need, but for now I am ready to turn my attention to the Mustang when I get a weather window. Also, here is the front subframe from the Focus:
I removed the shifter from inside and the heat shielding under the car to make room for the new shifter. I will have to cut a hole. Notice the silver module under the E-brake lever. This is the sensor for the airbags. Makes a lot of sense it would be here instead of somewhere near the front of the car like I expected. Here it sees the same accelerations as the seats. Also, it won't see thermal shocks, and since you don't go poking around your center console often, you are unlikely to whack it fooling with something else.
I had a friend who missed a shift road racing and blew an engine. He was trying to figure out a good way to prevent hooking the wrong gear. I always thought the reverse lock out is clever on Fords where you have to lift a collar to get into reverse gear. The collar lifts on a spring and allows a little mass of plastic lower down to clear a gate. Probably could use this concept with a lever or some other way. Here is what it looks like:
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