I haven’t posted anything for close to a month.  The main reason is that I haven’t accomplished much on the car due to the cold weather.  Maybe i need to get a garage heater.  But I haven’t been completely idle.  It’s been a sort of one step forward one step backward type of project right now.

I went to install the license plates and license plate frames on the car.  I found the plates to be straight and unbent, but the paint on them was in pretty sad shape.  I also discovered that the rubber bumpers on the front splash guard are missing and the back ones have been painted over.  I had a license plate installation kit to replace the fasteners, but I will need to order the rubber bumpers. Not a big issue and I can work without them for now

I made a trip to the local Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA) and returned home with a pair of new historic tags which I put on the car.  I also sent a pair of 1967 plates I had to be restored.  That process will most likely take 2 or 3 months.  Once I receive those tags back I can license them under Maryland’s Year of Manufacture (YOM) regulations so that I can display those tags on the car.  I will post pictures of the restored tags once I get them back.

While I wasn’t ready to tackle any of the glued in weatherstripping, I started tackling the belt line weather strip and upper door opening weatherstrip.  To install the belt line weatherstrip I needed to remove the window lower stops so that I could drop the window down into the door for access.  One of the stops came right out but the other one crumbled and fell apart.  I have since ordered two new stops but haven’t installed them yet.  I was able to get the belt line weather strip installed OK.  After I installed the rear quarter belt line weather strip I found that the passenger side quarter window wouldn’t roll up and down anymore.  I need to take that part of the interior back apart and fix the window once the weather gets a bit warmer.

I continued on with the weather strip and installed the channels in the door opening and the associated weather stripping.  That took a while but went in OK.  Then I finished up with the door post and rear quarter end seals.  I’m not 100% happy with the fit of those parts and may revisit them.  But for now I can work with what I’ve got.

The last piece of weather strip that I installed was the seal that goes at the rear of the hood.  It is held on by clips that press into the weather strip and then into the cowl at the back of the hood.  The clips were a pain to press into the weather strip because I had to make holes in the rubber for them.  That required some measuring using painter’s tape and some careful work to make sure the holes weren’t too big.  Otherwise the clips wouldn’t stay in the weather strip and just pull back out.  I spent quite a bit of time making sure I didn’t go overboard on making the holes.

I still had a bit of trim to install on the hood so I went to work on that next.  The hood has letters spelling FORD across the front edge.  They normally attach using letter with pins that go through holes in the leading edge of the hood.  My hood didn’t have the holes for the pins so I cut the pins off of the letters I had and used 3M emblem adhesive tape to attach the letters.  That required some very careful trimming of the tape to make it conform to the shape of the letters.  I found an article in Mustang Monthly that specified where the letters attach, marked my hood with painters tape, and pressed the letters on.  Once that was completed I attached my new hood lip molding.

My old drip rail moldings where fairly beat up so I did a but of work straightening them.  They didn’t come out great but I have been told that it is better to keep the old moldings rather than use the reproductions which apparently don’t fit very well.  The old moldings snapped right into place with no problems at all.  They still have a few dents and dings but you don’t see them until you look closely at the car.

After all this work the car is getting very close to being completed.  I began to worry about my insurance since it isn’t really designed for classic cars.  My coverage was for the actual cash value, which translates to the book value of the car less any depreciation.  A car as old as mine wouldn’t be worth very much using that valuation methodology.  But my insurance company is affiliated with a company that specializes in classic car insurance.  I contacted them and their policies are based on an agreed value for the car.  That means that the insurance company and i agree on the value of the car up front, and if anything happens to the car that is the value they will use when settling a claim.  They have some restrictions on how the car is used, how many miles a year it is driven, and it must be parked in a locked garage at my home when not in use.  I sent them some pictures of the car and the valued it at $24,000.  The premium was less than I am currently paying as well, so I made the switch to the classic car insurance on the spot.

I keep watching the weather forecast for some warm days, but there don’t appear to be any coming within the next week.  I’ll continue to chip away at the car during the next few weeks or even months.  If I get anything accomplished I’ll post a new blog entry.  But it may not be anytime soon depending on the weather.  Up next I want to finish with the weather stripping and then finish up the interior by fixing the rear quarter window and installing the headliner.

We had another nice weather day and I had some free “away from family” time.  I decided that I could get the most “bang for the buck” by working on the trim for the front of the car.  The car’s “mouth” looked pretty lonely without a grill or trim.  I had already refurbished most of the parts and purchased  new mounting hardware so I was able to just jump right in.

First up was the wide trim that is installed in front of the grill.  I still had some original Ford pieces that I had repainted.  The plasticized chrome portions were a bit scratched  but overall they looked OK.  They went on fairly easily and I was ready for the next pieces of trim in no time.

Next up was the narrow chrome strips that cover up the screws for the wide trim.  My old trim was pretty bent up so I had purchased new trim and mounting clips.  I was very careful to position the mounting clips so that the chrome strips lined up with the wide trim and the headlight buckets.  Unfortunately several of the new mounting clips broke during that process.  Luckily I was able to salvage enough used clips on the old trim I was discarding to make up for any that broke.  Other than the broken clips there were no issues installing this trim and I was now ready to move on to installing the grill.

I took the old grill that I had repainted down off the shelf in my garage where it had been sitting for about 15 years or so  I brushed off the cobwebs and carefully dropped it down into place.  After that it was a simple job to bolt it into place.  The pony and corral and fog lights were the next parts to come down off the shelf.  They had even more dust and cobwebs on them but they looked OK for 47 year old parts.  I had installed fog light support brackets on the grill when I repainted it so the new fog lights bars slid right into place.  I bolted it all together and connected the wires. Then I stood back to admire my work.  I don’t have any pictures right now but as soon as I back the car up out of the garage I will take a few and post them here.

A quick test showed that the fog lights functioned perfectly.  I have to admit that I doubt they will provide much value as far as lighting goes.  They are more for show.  I just happen to like the way they look on the car, even though technically they aren’t correct for a non GT car.

My last job of the day was to tackle the front bumper guards.  I had requested that Herbie install them when he painted the car, but he forgot to do so.  From talking to Herbie and from reading online it sounded like it was possible to install the bumper guards without removing the front bumper.  A quick survey under the car revealed that it was an extremely tight fit.  So I crawled underneath and spent what was probably the next 2 or 3 hours attempting to insert and tighten down 4 bolts, two per side.  Looking back on the job now I would have to say that it would have probably been faster to just remove the bumper for the install.  But I was able to finish the job without damaging the new paint job so I’m happy with the results.  A little hard work can be good for the soul sometimes.

Work will probably slow down or even stop for a while until either the weather begins to warm up or I obtain a heater for the garage.  But I’m sure I’ll find some Mustang related work to do inside my house.  And when I do I’ll post it here.

At 7:30 AM this morning I heard a package being delivered.  Could it be the tail light housing being delivered this early in the morning?  I went down stairs and opened the front door in anticipation of seeing a box of dried fruit or a fruit cake.  To my delight I instead found a package from the Mustang parts vendor.  Upon opening it I found the tail light housing I had ordered.  I was anxious to get to work installing it but it hadn’t warmed up outside yet and it was raining as well.  So of course that meant that I went out to the garage and got to work anyway.

The tail light housing was the first item I tackled.  I had new gaskets for it as well.  I polished up the original lens and it came out OK so I put the housing back together.  Then I placed the housing inside the trunk and inserted the new bezels to hold everything in place.  A set of new bulbs went in and I was then ready to test both lights out.  I flipped on the emergency flashers and walked around the car to check all the turn signal lights.  They all were working fine so I moved on to the next project.

Since I was working on lighting and was at the back of the car I chose to tackle the backup lights next.  I had new housings and attaching hardware all ready to go.  I had also installed new LED bulbs in the housings and tested them on my bench using a 12 volt power supply.  I learned that the bulbs were polarized and would only light up if they were inserted the correct way.  I’m glad I decided to test them before installing them on the car so that I could get the polarity correct and prevent me from chasing my own tail attempting to diagnose some non-working backup lights.

I found it a bit challenging getting the backup lights installed with the rear splash pan installed on the car.  There was very little room to maneuver around the rear leaf spring shackles and the exhaust tips.  I eventually decided to unbolt the ends of the splash pan to gain some additional clearance.  I was concerned that I might scratch or chip the paint but in the end everything went together OK.  A quick test of the backup lights showed that they both worked.

I was on a roll and didn’t want to stop just yet.  So I removed the rear bumper and rear quarter end caps so that I could install the end cap molding.  I had new hardware and gaskets for the end caps so I installed them as well.  The molding fit fine and everything went back together with no new scratches or paint chips.  I was careful to try and line everything back up the way it was when the paint and pin striped were applied.  I think it came out fairly well.  Here are a few pictures so that you can judge for yourself.  Try to ignore the dirty license plate and messy garage.  I’ll try to address both of those issues later.

At this point I put away the tools and took a break.  I may take a shot at installing some of the weather stripping later today.  If not it may be as much as a week before I have an opportunity to continue working on this project.  I’ll just have to wait and see how things work out with family time over the holidays.  So until then…see you later.

It was a cold, foggy, rainy day today but I just really wanted to get some more work accomplished.  I decided to start out with something easy, installing the rubber bumpers under the trunk lid.  They popped right into place and the trunk lid closes a bit tight.  It looks like the lines for the rear chrome trim aren’t going to line up quite as nicely as I hoped.  I may have to do a bit of tweaking on the trunk lid alignment later on.

After the bump stops I moved on to the passenger door.  I installed the lock and door handle and checked to ensure that they both operated correctly.  I’ve done that job several times now so it is getting easier.  The best tip I can offer is to make sure you are wearing long sleeves so that you don’t scrape up your arms on the door.  I have an old sweatshirt that I wear just for these occasions.

The Scott Drake fender letters were next on my list.  I was a bit surprised to find that the inserts that press into the holes in the fenders and hold in the letters were made of metal.  All the ones I’ve used in the past were plastic.  I think I like the metal inserts better, although they can tear up your fingers a bit when you press them in.

I was running out of time since I started late and only had a couple of hours to work with.  For my last feat I installed the rubber bump stops that go in the fenders along the sides of the hood.  The new bump stops were all the same height, but I strongly recollect the originals as being two sizes, long in the back and short in the front.  I need to do a bit of research and possibly change the rear bump stops.  But for now the short ones will fit.

My new tail light housing should be arriving tomorrow afternoon.  The weather is predicted to be warmer, but it has a high probability of rain as well.  Hopefully I can squeeze in some more work tomorrow and at least get the tail lights installed and working.  If the weather permits I will also install the back up lights.  If so I can see how I like the new LED back up light bulbs I’m planning to install.

Until tomorrow.

It wasn’t really all that warm or nice of a day today, but I couldn’t keep myself from starting the reassembly after paint.  I started at the back of the car because it was facing into the sun.  That at least gave me a little bit of warmth.  I felt that the most important things to address first were the trunk lock and fuel filler.  Without the trunk lock the only way to gain access to the trunk was using a long screwdriver.  After finding the new gasket in my parts inventory I made short work of the trunk lock.  The gasket made it a much tighter fit but perseverance and some pressure locked it into place.  The fuel filler was another easy job.  As a temporary install for painting I had it installed inside the gas tank with a spare gas cap.  I simply removed the filler neck, put on the gasket, and inserted it through the hole in the tail light panel.  A little WD-40 helped the neck slip inside of the rubber tank inlet hose.  Then I screwed on the pop-open gas cap.

My confidence was building so I decided to continue with the tail light bezels.  I had new gaskets and bezels ready, so I removed the left hand side housing and disassembled it for cleaning.  Most of it looked pretty good, but there was a bit of rust in the bottom where some water must have collected.  I scraped off the rust, reassembled the housing using the new gaskets, and then installed the housing and bezels.  Then I started on the passenger side.  It also had a bit of rust.  When I scraped it away I was left with a hole in the housing.  I had to leave that tail light for another day after I get a new housing, which is now on order.

At this point I was energized and didn’t want to stop just yet.  The trunk lid molding looked fairly easy to install.  It turned out it was a easy as it looked.  Then I put on the MUSTANG letter that go across the trunk lid.  They don’t line up quite as nicely as I would like.  The holes in the trunk lid were made by the factory so either the reproduction letters are a bit off or the assembly line worker didn’t make the holes quite straight.  That’s OK, it will be good enough for my purposes as I’m not building a show car.

The running horse fender emblems were next to go on.  It took quite a bit of force, but I was finally able to get them installed without breaking them.  I haven’t installed the MUSTANG fender letters yet, but i have them ready in my parts inventory. I also decided to install the hood mounted turn signals.  That was a really easy job, but I still need to check and make sure that they still work.

Next I turned my attention to the driver’s door.  I installed the rear view mirror, door lock, and door handle.  I made sure the lock worked and that the door opened correctly.  I wanted to start on the passenger door, but it was getting late and I had other things to do.  I compromised by installing the passenger side rear view mirror.  Then I stood back and admired my work.  One thing that stood out to me was that the rear view mirrors and door handles have been sitting in my garage since the late 1980’s.  They fit OK but I wonder whether newer reproduction parts would look or fit better.  That question will most likely go unanswered.

The weather forecast for next week includes a couple of warm days.  Hopefully I will find some time to continue the reassembly process in the next few days.