Updated <September 18>
<August 17, 1999>
Well, here we are a few months from Y2k and I'm tearing apart the only thing in our house that's guarenteed Y2k compliant! Just kidding - for the record, I think everything's going to be cool come January first. I'll probably be freezing my butt off out in the garage trying to reassemble Bloo before spring. You see, a friend at work challenged me that he could have his Triumph finished first, so now the race is on...
So, the plan is: to fix Bloo's rust problems correctly we must first find them all. The previous owner made this more difficult by painting over the rust to hide it in the floors and trunk. He also fixed the dents and dings with generous helpings of Bondo and painted over that. So I think the best way to find all the rust is to remove all the paint.
I shopped around and got an estimate of $2000 from the only place in town that acid-dips cars. Then I got an estimate of $500-$800 for media blasting. As you can guess, I decided to go with the media blasting. They're going to blast with a course baking soda to remove all the paint and rust and leave the surface ready for primer.
But first I have to take it all apart. The glass has to come out else the blasting will ruin it. So I'm taking everything out.
Pretty scary in there, huh? I haven't gotten the windsheild wiper motor and mechanism out yet, or the heater box, or the pedals. But otherwise it's pretty empty now. I think the floors are fairly solid except for right under the pedals.
I did get the gas tank out last weekend. What a messy messy job. I got gas everywhere! I siphoned out all I could and then disconnected the hose to the fuel line and let the rest drain into a bucket. I used a floor jack to lift the tank and break the seal where it was sitting on the trunk. When I finally poured out the last of the gas, there was a lot of crud in it. I sure wouldn't want that getting into my new engine! As you can see, the back end is stripped clean too. That was hard because the bolts where the bumper supports go were rusted pretty tight. It was a knuckle buster.
My current challenge is removing the glass. I got out both quarter windows and the driver's side window. I'm pulling the regulators too, because they need to be cleaned and freshened up. I'll take pictures when I do the passenger side so anyone who's interested can see how it's done. (See Window Removal page.) It's a little hard to follow the diagrams in the Ford Shop manual. The driver's side door has some rust inside. The passenger side door looks pretty good, and it has a sticker inside that says "Francis Ford, Portland, Oregon", so I guess Bloo got a new passenger door at some time.
It's scary to see the sheds filling up with Mustang parts. Oh well, I can always start a parts business if this doesn't work out. I can't believe I'm going to have to put all this back together.
So that's where it stands, I'll let you know when we get closer to going to the body shop. First I have to pull the engine, and I'm not really looking forward to that. Last time I had my mechanic do it for me. First time for everything.
<September 4, 1999>
With
everything out of the dash (finally), you can see clean, bare metal on the firewall behind
where the heater box was. How did that happen?
I pulled that engine myself! There she is just hanging in
the air! And don't I look a mess! Oh well, you can't have this hobby and expect to stay
clean and neat, can you? anyway, my husband helped a little, and we managed to coax the
engine and tranny back out of the engine bay. My only mistake was that as the engine
tipped to clear the radiator support while the tranny was still coming out from under the
firewall, and the angle was so steep it crushed my distributor cap against the arm of the
hoist (doh!). Otherwise, there was no visible damage.
We promptly pulled the 4 speed toploader off and took it to Vernon at Affordable Performance. He's going to sell it for me and find me a 5 speed T5 to swap in in it's place. I'll never have to adjust shift linkages again and I'll have overdrive for cruisin'!