Post #56, 6/28/15 Shock Tower Mod & Suspension Assembly

 65 Mustang Restoration

Now that we got the partial car back, what's first?  Well, last winter while looking for items on Ebay,, I came across a gentleman selling shock tower strengthening/repair plates,, thought those looked like a good addition to my car so I purchased a set of them. Now that the car is back in my hands for a bit, it's time to see if they're worth the time to install. 

Since I already did a bit of repair & strengthening to a thin area of the tower, I figured why not make it a bunch stronger,, and if nothing else,, at least dirt & debris can no longer collect in that area. The plate was approx 1/8" thick & had a couple lumps on the ends,, so like usual, I decided to improve on the design a bit.

After it was all welded in, I buffed all of the loose stuff off with a brown roloc disc,,, then knocked off the loose paint with a wire bit in the drill & then repainted everything,, 

And here's the finished product. Though you can't see it in these pics,, on the front of each tower inside the engine bay,, just below the plate I just welded in, I drilled a 1/2" hole which gave me access to the underside of that plate, and I used the special Eastwood flexible tube with a multi directional spray nozzle to coat that new cavern with some Encapsulator so it won't rust from the inside. I have new rubber solid grommets to plug the 1/2" holes.

Now the real fun can commence!  

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                      Suspension Assembly Time

Before I go crazy installing everything, just wanted to make my work area a bit nicer to be able to work on the car in,, so we went & bought a nice 12' x 9'  piece of cheap carpet ($45 at Menards) & rolled it out under the car so i don't have to roll around on the cold floor.

Here's a tip,, if you can afford to do a rebuild,, by all means, get one of these Awesome COMPLETE new bolt kits for your car. This one is the Chassis Bolt Kit,, and it comes with every bolt you will need. This is such a time saver, and it's just nice to have new bolts rather that old rusty 50 year old bolts. I got this one from CJ Pony,, the invoice says $380 regular bolt price,,, but the Package price is only $260,,, and I probably bought it during one of their 30% off sales.

I also bought their Body Bolt Kit & their Engine Bolt Kit,, I have over $600 in bolts,, but it's well worth it.

The first items to install, were the New stainless steel 3/8" fuel line & stainless brake lines. This installation required a new Clip Kit for all of the lines. You'd think this was an easy thing to do,, but when you've never done it before & it's been many years since you took it apart,,, I had no idea what went where. After several trips back to the computer (looking at all of my pics), I found a video on CJ Pony's sight for installing a new brake line, and it showed right where everything went.

The lines fit pretty well, but there is some tweeking needed, but overall, very nice. 

Now it's time to get serious,,, here's a bunch of pics of the finished product. Putting it together is a cake-walk for me,, the time consuming part, is the cleaning, prepping, and painting part. Everything you see in these pics has been prepped in some way,, even the new tie rods have been cleaned & painted with Eastwood's Satin Diamond Clear (though you'd never know it by looking at them).

Notice the new & improved heavy duty lower cross member.
 

I rebuilt the steering control valve,  and pretty much everything you see is brand new. And since I plan to run headers, installed an aftermarket steering control valve bracket which lowers the cylinder a bit. 

 And even though the springs are new,, another 3 hours went into stripping the chipping paint off of them & then re-coating them.

Another $550 was used just over 3 years ago to get the new upgraded CSRP Disc Brake Conversion. These are 4 piston calipers, and all of the things you need to make them work on your v8 spindles are included in their kit. They went together very easily,,, and yes, you're seeing correctly,, green calipers,,, that's just how they come, or at least they use to. As long as they work properly,, I'm happy,, my wheels aren't see through anyways.

I also upgraded the pads to some nice new Raybestos Brake Pads.

And again,, on the rear of the car,, Everything is new.

Isn't it pretty,, can't wait to drive it.

It's those little detail parts that you forget about.
 

The nice $.99 swimming noodle from Menards makes for a nice protector!

Well that was a fun couple of weeks,, wonder what will be next,, till then,

Cya!

Post #55, 6/14/15 We Be Jamming & Rear End Rebuild

65 Mustang Restoration

Where to begin,, quite a lot has been accomplished over the last couple of weeks,,, but the biggie has been moving the car from Waldo's garage,, to the shop's paint booth. Waldo did a bit more on the seam sealing, and then proceeded to get the jams painted.

 Let the papering begin!

And then the paint,, sorry for the grainy pictures,,, it seems to be very hard for the camera to capture this particular color. The color changes drastically in different lighting conditions,,, from black to extremely bright metal flake,,, and under certain lights it's a very deep candy blue. Seems like every time we've taken painted parts home, it's been cloudy,,, one of these days the sun may appear at the right time for us.

Waldo also got the test coat done on the dash,, it's a semi gloss black paint that that the guys up at Sherman Williams made up on their own for a local hot rodder,, and that we weren't 100% sure about,, but now we are,, very good color & sheen to it,,, and it's very smooth & durable feeling. We like it so much that I think we're going to shoot a coat of it on the engine compartment,,, if for no other reason that it seems to be a ton easier to clean. I really like the Eastwood products,, but their "Top Coat" is very porous & dust seems to really cling to it.

 And after nearly 11 months,,, she's finally back home,,, at least for awhile anyways.  It's getting close to assembly time,, but not quite yet,,, a few more tid-bits to get done 1st.

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 Rear End & Smalls

And while all of that paint work was being done by Waldo,, I was busy working on all sorts of items,, mostly small parts,, cleaning, prepping & painting,,, bunches of sand blasting! 

The new Scott Drake Leaf Springs are really nice,, but they're terrible looking,, I tried to blast them, but that seemed hopeless,, so I switched to the DA with some 80 grit & smoothed down most of the areas I could get to,,, that worked pretty well.

This is after all of the parts(except sway bar) have been painted with several types of Eastwood's coatings,, Spray Grey, Brake Grey, Detail Grey, Extreme Chassis Black, Diamond Clear, Rust Encapsulator,, etc,,,, not sure what color the sway bar will be yet.

And then there's the rear end,,, it was needing a bit of attention. This 8" third member is definitely the older style,,, no plug in it & is why the plug is in the back of the rear end.

 The gears & bearings in this center section look very good,, may have to clean her up & list it on ebay. I assume they're the 2.80's,, haven't looked yet.

 

As I tore it apart, I was surprised at how whimpy the axles were & how bad their bearings were, so I took them up to the shop & removed the bearings. It was nice to find out that some yahoo had changed one of the bearings before,,, With a Torch,,, and as you'd expect, he cut into the axle,, in 2 places. Well, decision made,, time for a new set of axles. So I did my normal 2+ hours of searching & and once again,, my rear end guy on ebay came through again. "staticz2229" (ebay store: Quick Performance Racing) set me up with a beautiful pair of axles, cut to the lengths I told him,, with new bearings and seals,, new studs,, and with the large hole on the face,,, all for only $350 Shipped to me,, approx. $90 less expensive than any where else,, and these were customized to my wants/needs. 

The new axles are so much stouter than the factory axles,,, which should help when we bump up the horse power & torque. 

I went to our local swap meet last fall, and a gentleman had a nice pair of 8" Ford backing plates sitting in his pile,, that were all nice & clean and he told me that they had been nickle plated & that he wanted a whole $20 for them. It was hard for me to get the cash out of my pocket fast enough. 
  

I got bored & decided I might as well install the new Scott Drake Parking Brake Cables along with all of the new brake parts. I blasted the PB arms & spreader bar and coated them and the new wheel cylinder housings with some Brake Grey,,, can't wait to get them installed.

I started to mess with the power steering assembly since I had everything to rebuild it,,, found out the center link portion was bent where the control valve slides inside,, so I had to order a new one of those,, yippe. I got most of the control valve cleaned & rebuilt,,, but I got the cylinder and new hoses all put together.

 

Now I have to figure out what's next to do,,,  till next time,, cya!