GT strut tower brace installed

Hello all,

Figured I'd post about my experience with the GT strut tower brace on my V6. In my opinion it's not worth it and I would wait until a proper brace is made for V6. Here is why:

- Clearance - as is, the brace does not clear our intake manifold. After the adjustments below, the brace is still in contact with the manifold in the back part of the brace. Apparently out engine dips downwards under load so my friends say it's fine, but I'm not comfortable with that.
- Tower bolts (where the brace is secured) - you have to use spacers (found at a local hardware store) to raise the brace up in order to clear the intake manifold. I ran out of thread on the bolts when the brace "cleared" the manifold.
- Nuts - our cars only come with nuts on one side of the car. I bought the brace as is off some guy locally, so I do not know whether it comes with bolts or not. Another local club member told me he was not able to find these nuts at a hardware store so he paid $10 at Ford dealer to buy 2 nuts....that's nuts :cheers: I lucked out and got the 2 nuts off another club member with a PP GT that recently installed a blower so he can't use his brace (so ask around if you know other Mustang people with PP)

Point of this post: In my opinion it's not worth installing the GT brace simply because it sits so high up the bolt thread it practically eliminates the purpose of the brace, not to mention that it's still in contact with the manifold. Sure, you could modify the brace and shave it off where it still touches the manifold or leave it as is just for show, but it's not worth the money.

I'll post pics later.

Bonus: my pedals vibrate a lot ever since I put the brace on. It's weird.

Well I would think that it depends. But fellow forumer DR did good with his install of the strut tower brace. The way he did it is on my to do list. See his posts in the link:
http://www.mustang6g.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49102&page=5

Fuse said:

Well I would think that it depends. But fellow forumer DR did good with his install of the strut tower brace. The way he did it is on my to do list. See his posts in the link:
http://www.mustang6g.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49102&page=5

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Yeah I saw that before and that's why I did it. Went with the spacer only approach - not a fan. Motor mount idea is just too much for me.

THANKS for an honest review.

Maybe just get k brace

You should get the K brace with this any way. Or just the K. I have yhe the GT tower brace and K brace. No issues whatsoever. Everything clears and works fine.

Edit: I'm using washers between the 2 of course. Works great. Plenty of thread for the nuts too.

Absolutely should pair with the K brace.

I have a vert v6 rental right now and it has the k brace. I should atleast install that on mine. All mustangs should have come with atleast that

Just a few pictures of the spacers used when I installed my strut brace and cowl brace.

It doesn't look like there is space but there is actually space between the top of the intake manifold and bottom of the strut brace. I installed this Dec 2016 with about 5566.7mi and currently have 16772.9mi. I've driven over bumps and pot holes. It has stayed on and I have not needed to re-tighten or make adjustments. I've tried shaking the bar and it is solidly on there.

Fuse said:

Just a few pictures of the spacers used when I installed my strut brace and cowl brace.

It doesn't look like there is space but there is actually space between the top of the intake manifold and bottom of the strut brace. I installed this Dec 2016 with about 5566.7mi and currently have 16772.9mi. I've driven over bumps and pot holes. It has stayed on and I have not needed to re-tighten or make adjustments. I've tried shaking the bar and it is solidly on there.

Click to expand...

With just those small washers underneath, the brace isn't doing a ton, and is putting bending loads into the studs. You would need to have a piece that has the same contact area as the tower would to take the bending load off (keep it in tension) and adequately change the load path and stiffen the front end. A machined C shape plate the thickness of the washers you used would work.

BmacIL said:

A machined C shape plate the thickness of the washers you used would work.

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So uh [MENTION=6944]zackmd1[/MENTION]...how's that for a quick project? :shrug:
[MENTION=10281]BmacIL[/MENTION] would that be more of "extension" to the STB or to the cowl brace? Just thinking because if it matches up to the cowl brace shape it should still push through better, correct?

Well I guess the more direct thing to do is lower the engine. BMR has those motor mount brackets which they say work with the stock motor mounts. I might try those over adjustable motor mounts.

I added the cross brace to my vert that came with the factory K brace mounted to the fire wall. The used cross brace came with the a K brace also. I cut the k brace footing area and used it as a spacer stacking it on the the factory k brace. I have no clearance issues with the hood or the intake manifold.

^same type of thing I was thinking since it maintains the same shape, how'd you cut it?
[MENTION=10281]BmacIL[/MENTION] do you think that would work just as well to get rid of the bending load?

Nagare said:

^same type of thing I was thinking since it maintains the same shape, how'd you cut it?
[MENTION=10281]BmacIL[/MENTION] do you think that would work just as well to get rid of the bending load?

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Yes that would work much better.