Paint correction is done, got a coat of Collinite on it last night.
Not the greatest pics, sun was setting fast. Unfortunately the car show tonight was cancelled due to rain, but that's ok. Now I have the weekend to work on a few things, like that wiper motor... Looked at it last night and going to take the hood back off to better access everything. The process continues.
Oh btw paint correction turned out to have to be a two step process, the M105 definitely needed a polish afterwards. Extra night that really didn't have trying to get ready for Friday night, but that's what it took...
Yes, the fuel pressure regulator is unbolted and laying loose in order to get the valve cover off. I'm not wild about that aspect but I haven't seen a better solution yet.
Combat,
Thank you, I appreciate it. I got the whole car polished out last night so hopefully after work I can get it washed and waxed.
Still making steady progress but not so photogenic. Have the brakes working better although they're still not as firm as I would like, thinking I need to take a look at the rod from the booster. Have the interior completely back together (guess should get a photo), got the car inspected this weekend and taking short shakedown drives. There's a car show this Friday night that I'm planning on loading up the family and going to so trying to make sure every thing is good.
Drove it over to my parents this weekend.
Had a couple of rockers loosen up so went back through all of them and changed process on how I cinched them down.
Then started in on paint correction, not going all out because before long going to have to get some things redone but getting the big stuff out.
Kind of hard in the lighting to get a good photo but you can see the before and after line more or less centered on the phone. Finish up the correction tonight, then get it washed again then waxed tomorrow, just about there...
That's great information, thank you. I've been looking at updating all those parts myself once the car is fully on the road again. (The other night my wife asked "it has ac, right?" Er well the compressor is still there honey, just not hooked to anything) Is there anywhere that the mustang lines might foul on? I have a 351W based motor with a Victor Jr intake so I imagine there's more clearance than the EFI intake.
Friday evening I made the charcoal canister and painted it. It's 2" pvc with a bulkhead fitting coming in, steel wool followed by activated charcoal followed by steel wool, going out a removable cap with holes drilled in it.
Unfortunately USPS didn't manage to deliver the two fittings I needed to actually connect the thing Friday so that was at a standstill.
Saturday I completed that last bit of sensor wiring under the hood, then started on the fenders. I think all told that day I made 5 parts store stops at varying locations to piece together all the new bolts/clips/screws etc that were needed. At the end of the day the two fittings showed up in the mailbox but we had to go to a family gathering so that stopped progress.
Sunday morning I built the vent line, dropped the gas tank (the final time I hope), and hooked in the vent. I also installed a new fuel filler neck seal, bit of a pain but not as bad as I feared. Of course I had to run back to lowes since the conduit clamps I used to mount the canister above the tank needed longer bolts to be able to go around the PVC pipe. Got the tank bolted back up with no major issues, then started the rest of the body assemby.
I should have taken more photos during disassembly, I barely remembered the big yellow piece and did not remember the metal piece at all.
All in all though, it went back on really smoothly. Didn't even have to go get any parts.
At this point got my dad to come over to help hang the hood. We broke out the playdoh to check air cleaner clearance, was pretty tight on the front lip. Did some cutting on the bracing, it clears comfortably now but I'm a little worried about as the motor rocks around. Cowl hood is definitely on the horizon.
Next up is getting the brakes bled and the car back down on the ground again, then start incrementally longer shake down drives. Have an oil leak at the rear of the motor that I'm afraid is the rear seal (about the only thing I didn't change out), so probably this upcoming weekend I'll drive it over to my dads and use his lift to check it out and pull the transmission if needed. Then the next thing to mess with is that wiper motor.
Been chipping away at things but nothing very photo worthy. Turns out still had two exhaust leaks, my dad had some header gaskets that he had had some good luck with that I had put on, but they didn't seem to work well here. I've always had no real problems with basic felpro 1415s so I switched them out the other night, looks like it's taken care of.
I took it on a very brief shakedown run around the block this weekend, nothing fell off or refused to work, so that's positive. It's astonishing how light the clutch is compared to the cobra. Also astonishing how loud the car is off idle, I'd kind of forgotten. Definitely need to bleed the brakes again, so this weekend back up on jackstands it goes. Also going to drop the tank down and install a fuel filler neck seal, and add a vent line to the fuel hat. I have the stock line hooked up but since I've moved back to an intank pump and a lot of stuff went away under the hood with the old four cylinder I want to make sure it has adequate venting. Have the AN fittings coming in this week to hook up that vent fitting to a canister I'll build this weekend.
After those two things get done it'll be time to hang the fenders and nose back on, then see if the hood still clears.
Wound up going home for lunch, it ran out of gas almost immediately after firing up but everything worked, keyed hot is good, exhaust leak was gone, so let the reassembly begin.
We swapped to a distributor that does not require an external ignition box. While dad was stabbing the distributor I made a new line from the regulator to the rear bowl, the previous one was a little tight and as much as this motor moves around it needs a little slack.
We just ran a jumper wire from the coil to the solenoid instead of tracking down a keyed hot, pressured everything up, and gave it a shot. It tried to fire almost immediately but wasn't quite catching, adjusted the distributor a bit and boom. Within about two minutes of fiddling had it idling like a champ.
The items that came out of the first fire up were a small coolant leak at the hoses going to the heater core, dumped coolant out at the radiator because someone forgot to screw that cap on, and a large exhaust leak. Dad headed out, and I went in for supper. Afterwards, I pulled the MSD out and traced out the wiring, ran a new wire to where it had picked up the keyed hot and took it to the coil, hooked the tach wire that had been going to the MSD to the negative side, reran and heat shrinked the wires from the distributor to the coil, tightened all the header bolts and checked the collector bolts, and tightened down the coolant line hose clamps. By the time that was done, it was 930 or 945, so too late to start it back up.
If everything checks out this evening, it'll be time to start putting body panels back on.
Cranked but did not start. MSD 6A is DOA. Made good progress though.
Saturday morning finished connected all the fuel lines and reinstalled the tank.
Unfortunately turned it on and once it pressured up gas came running down from the top of the tank. Dropped it down, saw it dripping from the supply fitting to the hat, redid the fitting, tried again. Nope, was actually coming from the hose itself, about 8" up. That braided ptfe hose was the one that has been on the car since 2012ish, dunno if that piece had been up against something hot (I pulled it off and rerouted everything since not using a sump anymore) or what was going on. Dug around in the stash and turned out to have a union, so pulled that hose back out (ugh), cut it off, redid the end and built the piece to replace the bad section.
Got it back on, pressured everything up again. Once it pressured up, carb sprung about 8 different leaks, all the gaskets had gone bad. At that point had been going 13 hours straight without eating so cleaned everything up and called it a night.
Sunday morning got up, moved all the vehicles out, and spent a couple of hours sweeping, mopping, putting all the tools away from the whole process, sorting through leftover bolts clips etc, and generally organizing everything that's acspoogeulated.
I'd had the false floor out of the trunk to access the fuel pump wiring so got it all put back in and cleaned up.
Then pulled the carburetor off and went over to my dad's to go through it.
Back together.
Had one hiccup with one of the needle valves sticking and gas fountaining up about 4 inches high out of the fuel vent, got that fixed, then the clear sight plugs in the bowls both broke off from age so replaced those, and were ready to give it a shot.
We pulled a valve cover, primed the oil pump, and gave it a shot. Cranked fine but didn't try to fire. We played with the distributor, then checked spark and nothing. Like so many other things, guess sitting hasn't been kind to the MSD.
Tonight we'll pull it and the MSD distributor and swap to one that doesn't use an external box and give it a shot again.
Got the lines under the hood done, lines to the tank are connected to the bulkhead fittings in the fenderwell and the fuel filter on the frame rail. Tomorrow morning I'll get the tank in position, run the lines to it and mark them, cut and terminate them, re run the fuel pump wires, and hook everything to the tank. Shooting for Sunday morning startup.
Plug wires need some organization, I moved them around to bolt down the valve covers.
Sorry, need to pick the timeline back up. Fingers crossed on it fitting, the air cleaner is basically the same height as my old one, which did clear, but it comes a little farther forward.
Some time ago I had had the fuel tank sumped by a local guy who is a well known racer and originally a welder. Unfortunately he did an awful job and I had to seal it up. From there it went to a Mallory 110 external pump. The gerotor was stuck and the brushes were disintegrating (not the first time I've changed them). I've never been happy with the setup, and was actually getting some fumes from the tank when I added gas a few weeks ago, so when the gerotor still wouldn't turn after replacing the brushes I decided to s the whole thing and start over.
I ordered a new fuel tank, aeromotive phantom 200 retrofit kit, aeromotive regulator, and lines and fittings for a return line (I already had PTFE braided line for the supply, deadheaded at a holley regulator. Not great I know). I wanted to start over with a new hat versus trying to modify the factory one. Turns out that it takes very little work to get it in the stock location.
After test fitting it I pulled everything back out, then undercoated the tank the last two nights. Next couple of days will be finishing the fuel system (have a few last fittings coming Thursday) and hopefully trying to fire it this weekend. I'll fill in the gaps as time goes on, this was kind of a broad strokes start to the process.
There's also a decent bit of electrical troubleshooting still to be done, I've been working my way through that. Ignition switch was bad, looks like I have a bad driver side power door lock switch, the wipers aren't returning to the park location so it buzzes when the wipers are turned off... Definitely a work in progress.
