[SN65]

Hi Reen,

Haven't seen any posts lately. Hope everything is going well. Do you think you will have the car finished by the end of Feb??? If so, maybe you could show it at the Autoramma. That is our plan. It would be nice to have adjoining spots.

Bob

[reenmachine]

Originally Posted by SN65

Hi Reen,

Haven't seen any posts lately. Hope everything is going well. Do you think you will have the car finished by the end of Feb??? If so, maybe you could show it at the Autoramma. That is our plan. It would be nice to have adjoining spots.

Bob

I've got this '68 fastback that I've got to get torn down and off to paint, then I'll be back on the convertible full time until it's done.

[reenmachine]

The '68 is almost ready to go off to the plastic media blaster and then to paint. I just have to gut and remove the doors, weld in the subframe connectors, weld in the Cobra IRS brackets, and do a few misc. other things first.

BTW, the rotisserie is from Auto Twirler and it is excellent. After finding the right position you can turn the car with one hand. Sure will make the undercarriage work easier!

[Route666]

How did mounting the rotisserie to the car go? Did you have to drill your own holes or anything like that?

[86bluecobra]

geez your vert is awesome i wouldn't mind having that 68 either. i admire body guys they do wonderful things with metal.

[86bluecobra]

BTW i forgot to congradulate you on the baby. we just had our 2nd girl 2 months ago. less cash for projects now.

[reenmachine]

Originally Posted by 86bluecobra

BTW i forgot to congradulate you on the baby. we just had our 2nd girl 2 months ago. less cash for projects now.

Thanks! She's about 3 months old already -- hard to believe.

[reenmachine]

Originally Posted by Route666

How did mounting the rotisserie to the car go? Did you have to drill your own holes or anything like that?

It was pretty easy, and there were no modifications to the car needed. The front mounts to the 2 holes on each side where the bumper brackets mount with two 7/16" grade 8 bolts per side. I had to drill an extra hole through the rotisserie arm for the second bolt. The rear mounted up through the factory hole through the rear frame rail into the trunk floor. I enlarged the hole in the rotisserie arm and used 3/4" grade 8 bolts (1 per side) with large washers on the trunk side and all-metal lock nuts. It's very secure all around.

[strange65]

WOW another long read, The talent that you apllied to this Mustang is amazing.
After seeing your Mustang and the SN65 project, I feel like an idiot for even comtemplating the granada disc brake swap and lost all motivation to do so.
Congrats on the new baby!
I do have one question that has nothing to do with the car.
With so many things that could have gone wrong, what motivated you to take this machine to this level of perfection?

[reenmachine]

Originally Posted by strange65

With so many things that could have gone wrong, what motivated you to take this machine to this level of perfection?

Good question! I guess the honest answer is that I plan on building several cars like this full-time for the foreseeable future, so I figured I'd gamble it all and jump in head first. There are still lots of things that can go wrong before the car is finished!

On that note, I just took the '68 fastback project off to the media blaster, and it will go to paint after that, so I'm back on the assembly of the convertible. Look for much more frequent updates of this thread.

I sure got a lot of stares going down the freeway with the fastback on the rotisserie!

[reenmachine]

OK -- back to the convertible. I got the headlights on order yesterday. Instead of having low beams on the outboards and high beams on the inboards, I'm converting it to high/low on the outboards and insanely high on the inboards, to be controlled by a switch on the console.

All four housings are Hella 5-3/4" H4 conversion lenses, with 60/55W hi/lo beams outboard and 100W high beams inboard.

I'll get my A/C condenser mounting brackets back from the powdercoater today. Then I can mount the condenser, the hood latch/inboard light support, and the buckets for the inboards. It'll look different for once! The oil cooler is also on the way, so once it's on and plumbed and I finalize the routing of the A/C lines, the fenders and nose can go on and it'll really start to look like something.

Pics later.

[Edbert]

Nice, I have to take exception with something you said though...

This car has BEEN looking "like something" since your first post!

[reenmachine]

Lotsa little stuff going on lately...power top motor/pump mounting, wiring, and plumbing, etc.

I came up with a way to do the windshield washer without the foot pedal pump assembly. There'll be a plastic reservior in the engine compartment with an electric pump, and a small pushbutton by the wiper switch. Pushing the button will run the pump as well as cycle the wipers, and the regular wiper switch operation will be unaffected. It's working on the bench right now, and I'll post a how-to when I put it in the car.

I got the A/C condenser mounted and then the hood latch support with the inboard light buckets. Every little thing with reproduction Shelby parts turns into a project as every single part typically requires rework to fit. The inboards were no exception, but they came out great in the end.

The inboards are 100W Hella halogens which will be controlled by a switch on the console as driving lights, and they have the approximate output of the Death Star.

[reenmachine]

BTW, I've been keeping a log of the progress of the fastback pictured above on my website here. Feel free to post comments, questions, etc.

[SN65]

Hi Reen,

Glad to see you back on the vert. I bet you long to see it on the road. We just took a 67 vert into the shop. The owner wants a stock restoration as far as the body work goes, but he wants a slightly modified drivetrain.

I told him to check out this thread and see what a real modified 67 vert looks like. :-)

How is all the wiring going. Wiring one of these from scratch has got to be a daunting project. Personally, I would not know where to start.

Good luck and hope to see you on the road soon.

Bob

[lauras70mach1]

Did you buy direct from Auto Twirler? What model? How much was shipping?

[reenmachine]

Originally Posted by lauras70mach1

Did you buy direct from Auto Twirler? What model? How much was shipping?

Yes, I bought direct, I got the Plus model also with the optional "off-road" wheels (great for the trailer and crappy pavement). Shipping was free -- show special at the SEMA show.

Everything about the rotisserie works great and I highly recommend it.

[mustbereel]

Hi Reen,

I've been following your project and must admit it's the reason I decided to put the Heidt's IRS in my car. You were right when you said it is very fab intense. I've got all of the brackets and links mounted where I want them and have realized how little room I have for the exhaust system. I plan to run dual 2.5" pipes all the way to the back and place the mufflers on either side of the fuel cell. This will mean some tricky routing of the pipes through the IRS. I will probably run the pipe between the axle and the crosmember but this will place it near the brakes. Where are you going to route the exhaust?

Thanks,
Brad

[1320stang]

Why not put the mufflers under the rear seat and run the exhaust under the IRS? I've seen streetrods done this way.

[mustbereel]

1320stang,

The forward locating struts on the Heidt's interfer with the under seat location (at least on my install). Plus the removal of the leaf springs opens a nice area for the mufflers like on the newer stangs. As for running the pipes under the IRS (which was my first choice) I think I would have a ground clearance issue. The Heidt's doesn't have those nice little humps like on the Cobra IRS so the pipes would have to sit below the lowest part of the differential.

Brad

[bnickel]

Originally Posted by mustbereel

1320stang,

The forward locating struts on the Heidt's interfer with the under seat location (at least on my install). Plus the removal of the leaf springs opens a nice area for the mufflers like on the newer stangs. As for running the pipes under the IRS (which was my first choice) I think I would have a ground clearance issue. The Heidt's doesn't have those nice little humps like on the Cobra IRS so the pipes would have to sit below the lowest part of the differential.

Brad

if you are going to run the pipes between the axle shafts and the crossmember i would suggest using an oval tube instead of round. check out www.drgas.com for some cool oval pipe, actually if use oval pipe you might be able to get away with running it under the irs, just a thought. either way i would use the oval pipe to get the max clearance possible.

[reenmachine]

Originally Posted by mustbereel

Hi Reen,

I've been following your project and must admit it's the reason I decided to put the Heidt's IRS in my car. You were right when you said it is very fab intense. I've got all of the brackets and links mounted where I want them and have realized how little room I have for the exhaust system. I plan to run dual 2.5" pipes all the way to the back and place the mufflers on either side of the fuel cell. This will mean some tricky routing of the pipes through the IRS. I will probably run the pipe between the axle and the crosmember but this will place it near the brakes. Where are you going to route the exhaust?

Thanks,
Brad

Brad-
This will happen fairly soon and I'll post pics of course. I have the custom exhaust guy coming over to come up with a game plan. Basically, I've been thinking the same thing as you -- if I can't fit Flowmasters in the original muffler location due to the forward struts then they'll go on either side of the fuel cell. I think the pipes can run between the axle and either the crossmember or the control arm no problem, the more inboard the better due to the smaller deflections of the suspension there, but not so close as to heat the brakes.

All of the street rod guys run the pipes under the diff, but this kills ground clearance to an extent I'm not willing to go, as this car will be driven a lot.

[reenmachine]

I ended up making quite a project out of the convertible top frame. We always used to scuff & spray the parts that would show when the top was on, grease the pivots, and go.

That just wouldn't fit with the rest of the car, so I went overboard . I'm trying to stick to the theme of having the parts that will never be seen again once the car is assembled be every bit as nice as the ones that will. I end up burning a ton of time this way...

I disassembled the top frame, bead blasted everything to bare metal, and sprayed it all with DP90 epoxy primer/sealer. All of the pivots received attention and I rebuilt the latches to work like new with no slop. The car originally had a manual top, so I converted it to power with all new parts.

[reenmachine]

I installed the rear power windows and ran them up and down a bunch of times with a car battery. This was the first sign of life! It's not much, but it's something!

[65mistress]

We have a twitching muscle... Soon there will be signs of brain activity and the heartbeat will be heard.