pakrat

Well, as opposed to my usual corporately sponsored save the planet community service deeds on Earth day I chose to take the day off last Friday and finish my tear down of the car. I'm finally starting to feel more good than bad about this situation now, it might have been decades otherwise before I got to know my girl so intimately.

I dubbed my experience the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. While I will say that the PO was as honest with me about the cars overall condition as I had hoped and always believed, I was PO'd at the PO on more than one occasion for the stupid corners he seemed to cut more often tha not.

The Good: Peeling back the original matting after removing the carpet and discovering that there was what I would consider to be the most minimal of surface rust on my original floor boards, the car is even more rust free than I had believed and so I defintitly feel that rebuilding it was the absolute right choice.

The Bad: The random use of various nuts, bolts etc. I can't tell you how many different sockets I had to use to take off parts that should have used the same ones. Giant lag screws forced into worn machine threads, new holes drilled to install panels instead of lining up the original hole, things like that.

The Ugly: The final step was front seat and carpet removal and I was shocked to learn that all this time I had only two diagnal nuts holding both seats in place instead of four. :shock: Considering how hard I got hit I am amazed that I wasn't thrown clear while still strapped in.

Fortunately when I strip the parts car down I should be able to replace all the correct or missing hardware and have some left over for the future as well so in about all ways the car should be better than ever when done.

Evil_Capri

Good stuff. And Good luck.

I like the two photos showing parts in your front lawn. And nice dog by the way.

Are you going to run into any more trouble with larger bolts/screws being worked into place over (or in some case not at all) existing mounting holes?

Big D

least urs came with the original stereo mine cam with a POS 50 dollar stock radio...its such an eyesore

montreal ponies

Good work Richard, it's nice to see all the parts gathered all around the lawn....i mean you really did some work on it....don't forget that 69hood.....oh by the way, your dog looks depressed....
Keep us up to date on the resto....

montreal ponies

Your floors look really good, no need to replace them....had to redo mine with new ones from FoMoCo.....but it looks new now.....

lilbossman

GOSH i hate seeing mustangs apart.

pakrat

Heh heh, that's nothing, you should see all the parts laying around one of the spare bedrooms right now. The wife is none too thrilled to say the least. I've got all the front end stuff layed out in order of assembly as well as the interior with all the hardware bagged, tagged and taped to the parts. Now I've got to start cleaning all the pieces up each night so they are ready to put back all at once, that won't be very fun. I'm defintily not replacing the floor pans, they should clean right up, very minimal surface rust. Same witht he cowl, I could not believe how clean they were. I kinda had to laugh at how simple it was to get to the cowl too, all those poor saps with pre 69' cars, lol.

Yeah, Bosco (my dog) would have rather been playing catch that day for sure or at least running free instead of being on leash but it was my day. Ah well.

BTW, the parts car is coming home this weekend for sure. I had a friend stop by the other nite for me and asked him to take better pics but instead he sent me an email with his opinion and no pics. All he said was "it was dark out but the whole front edge looks rusted to me". So basically he was no help to me at all. I need new friends.

montreal ponies

By the way Richard, where about in NH do you live....i use to have a friend who lived in Concord....
Rust on the hood doesn't scare me, as long as it's not holes he's talking about....

pakrat

I am in Exeter, right on the seacoast, what little NH has anyway. Definitly no holes in it, never had a scoop or hood pins, totally stock. Anyway, weekend is almost here, we'll know the conditon soon for sure.

Nathan_H

I just looked at your cardomain site. What a friggin shame. I cant imagine what that must of felt like. Anyways, best of luck to you.

67,GeArHeAd

nice

im in the same boat i am working on a 67, coupe

pakrat

Yeah, thanks. Undoubtedly the worst day of my life so far, let's just put it that way. At this stage I am feeling excited again at least but I was pretty bummed out for some time this winter. So many little things over the few hours prior to the accident that I could have done differently so that I would not have been at the place at that specifc time, a lousy minute would have changed everything, but I am done second guessing it all and I just thank God I didn't lose my temper and kill the punk or I might be staring at pics on the wall of my cell instead of rebuilding.

Nathan_H

Well, everything happens for a reason, maybe it was meant to be. although understanding is the difficult part. Anyways, glad to see your in good spirits. By the way, have you ever considered swapping over to a front disc setup? As said, keep us posted, and hope for the best!

pakrat

Oh sure I have considered it many times but my car was so original that I did not particularly care to change anything and I always found the drum brakes to be very adequate with the most minor of maintanence. With only 50,000 original miles on the car I used to only drive it about another 1,000 miles a year or so and I kept my distance for sure so they were never a problem or concern for me as I did not drive agressively. Now that's all over with and the modified days ahead of me will be seeing all kinds of stuff that I previously would have never dreamed of doing to the car, 4 wheel disc's are but the tip of that iceberg.