83 Gl

[great white]

Hi All.

This is going to be a quick intro with a smattering of pics.

car is an 83 GL I've owned since new. Started as a 3.8/C5. Currently dropping in a 302/T5.

Pics:

From about 15 years ago:

Coming home after being stored in a friends field for about 5 years:

That's my old 62 TBird beside it. Sold it off earlier this year since new house didn't have the space to keep both. The TBird went because it had terminal rust. A guy bought it for the parts.

89 roller block, edlebrock Performer RPM air gap, holley 750, bbk longtubes and a few other bits and pieces:

3.8/C5 out:

Pressure wash:

302/T5 in:

picked up some used body parts cheap:

grafting 87 lower on to 83 upper:

Collecting more used parts:

Couldn't resist a quick visual of the SN95 16's:

Hard to believe 5 spoke 16's were the hot ticket back in the 80's/90's for these cars and now you can pick up a cherry set of OEM quality "cast away's" for 100 bucks. How times change....

That's pretty much where it sits today.

 

[great white]

It's just a 7.5 from a 1996 SN95 V6.

8.8's are as rare as hen's teeth around these parts. anything in the scrap yard has long since been crushed and guys don't part out V8 mustangs around here. Any that are left are garage queens for the most part. I'm in Atlantic Canada and cars that are used year round are rust buckets within 5-10 years here.

The 7.5 will do until I run across an 8.8 for a decent price. Good thing is the axles and brakes will swap over from the 7.5 to the 8.8, so I can use either a fox 8.8 or an SN95. Whichever shows up for affordable money.

Car will be a sunday cruiser and autoslalom runner (autoslalom is same as autocross here). I'll run the 7.5 until it pops. If I haven't found an 8.8 by then, I can just swap the stuff over to the 7.5 that is already in the car and run that until it pops or I hit on an 8.8 deal I can't turn down.

 

[Davedacarpainter]

Welcome to Stangnet brother!

Neat car, I have an '83 myself.

That sucks about not being able to find an 8.8. Oh well, patience I guess....

Why the 750 carburetor? Seems a little big. I guess you might have some supporting mods that need that much air though.

I really like the front bumper splicing. @90sickfox did something similar.

Your mustang looks remarkably nice considering where you're from.

We have a number of fellas from the frozen north, @Gearbanger 101 is one. The last time a Canadian joined I joked with him how all you Canucks knew each other. Turns out that guy lived ten minutes from him, proving me right, of course!

I'll move your thread to the '79-'95 general talk subforum since that's where most of us fox geeks hang out.

Glad to have you with us, look forward to seeing this build.

 

[great white]

750 came at a bargain basement price (30 bucks) and is in great shape. Even has the ford linkage.

It's vacuum secondaries, only come in when needed.

I've run 'em before. Works well on even a mild 302 after a little jetting and other assorted adjustments. Great thing about holley's; pretty much everything is adjustable and lots of info floating around on them.

It needs a drivers side floor pan. When it was sitting, plenum filled up with tree crap and rotted the cowl around the drivers side air horn. Carpet got wet and the rest is history.

Wish I had the foresight to put a car cover on it or at least cover the cowl vent. Had clean original floors in it when I parked it....

This winter will see the windshield and upper cowl removed, inner cowl repaired (needs an air horn and about a 6x6 patch job) and a floor pan is just an internet order away....

 

[Mustang5L5]

That's a very unique nose graft. I like it


Sent from my big ass iPhone 6 using Tapatalk

 

[Boosted92LX]

Nice car! Welcome!

 

[JD1964]

Nice. Just my opinion but I prefer the stock bumper on that particular car.

 

[great white]

Nice. Just my opinion but I prefer the stock bumper on that particular car.

no worries. Everyone is entitled to their opinion.

At the end of the day, doesn't matter if someone else likes or dislikes it. Only one that matters that likes it is me.

Every car isn't for everybody.

With this front end arrangement, I have brake cooling ducts already built in. That's what the fog light holes will be re-purposed for to help with brake fade on autoslalom days. Was one of my reasons for going this way in the first place.

I always liked the 83 nose (85/6 is probabbly the best looking fox overall to my eye) but the lower always looked like the car had an "overbite". Always looked like it was missing something to me and I never liked any of the aftermarket lowers that fit those years. The funny overbite look is probably why you can't give away a nose for an 83/4, but 79-82 and 85 up disappear from Kijiji (IE: Canadian Craig's list) in a flash.

It's also a bit of a cost savings for me too, as the rub strips are part of the 87 GT side pieces, so I don't have to go looking for replacement 79-84 moldings. My originals are not just curled, they're split down the middle on the edges. Now, all I need to find is door strips instead of all of them and 87-93 strips are easy to come by (they're even re-popped if I want to spend a bit more)

Then there's always the "plus" of not running into the same one every 5th corner or looking like everyone else at a car show/run.

If it all goes to crap, I've got an 85 nose and fender extensions up in the loft I was going to put on the car a few years ago.

I've never been much of a "follow the herd guy"....I'm the guy that is running into the danger while everyone else is running away:

 

[great white]

few other bits and pieces.

H pipe to go with headers, paid $150 NIB for both:

Hurst shifter, $50:

Shifter balls, ebay grabs, 15-30 bucks:

Ditching the Cobra emblems for:

Fenders:

Dash:

This is a non-A/C car (and not getting one) with manual windows. With no A/C I need to be able to at least open and close windows while driving, so:

30 bucks from an 84.

Oh, the T5 is from a 3.8 car. Impossible to find one from a V8 fox or sn95 around here. I found this one on kijiji for 75 bucks. The Sn95 T5 is rated what the v8 fox ones were, so it should survive just fine. The Sn 95 one is about 5/8 longer than the fox, but it still popped up in the transmission tunnel shifter hole just fine. I've got a shorter reach, so a little closer is OK by me anyways. Had to use an 89 F-150 flywheel/clutch to get the 11" pressure plate in the 28 oz imbalance (v6 trans needs the 11" plate for proper starter engagement). A 96 f-150 got me the right bendix depth.Had to dimple the crap out of the #8 primary tube for the shifter fork since the SN95 clocks it higher on the bellhousing. Same with the steering shaft, just smaller dimples. Also pre-clearances it for the SN95 steering shaft that will have to go in with the SN95 steering rack. Easy peasy.

In case you haven't noticed, I prefer to buy my parts used or as inexpensively as possible. I'm not "poor" by any means. I just can't justify spending, say for example, $160 USD (plus exchange, duties, taxes and shipping) for just rear brake brackets when I can grab a complete SN95 axle for $100 CAD that already has said brackets, plus the rest of the brake set up (and enables my 5 lug conversion). Or substituting those "uncommon parts" (IE: sn95 V6 Trans vs fox V8) that work just as well as "mainstream parts" if you put a little time and research into making it work.

Value for your dollar, that's me!

 

[Boosted92LX]

Might I suggest 5.0 badges for the fenders? After all, that's what came on a V8 car. Being that's what it is now it seems fitting. I think those badges are only $15.00 US, so it's not like it's a fortune, haha.

 

[great white]

Might I suggest 5.0 badges for the fenders? After all, that's what came on a V8 car. Being that's what it is now it seems fitting. I think those badges are only $15.00 US, so it's not like it's a fortune, haha.

nope, I'm putting the tri-bars on it or maybe even blank.

Car didn't come with a V8 and "5.0" on the fender seems to attract every kid within two counties with an import and a fart can when stopped for a light.

I'm a bit more "under the radar" at my age....got nothing to prove. Just want to do my own thing and be left alone.

 

[Boosted92LX]

nope, I'm putting the tri-bars on it.

Car didn't come with a V8 and "5.0" on the fender seems to attract every kid within two counties with an import and a fart can when stopped for a light.

I'm a bit more "under the radar" at my age....got nothing to prove. Just want to do my own thing and be left alone.

I can relate to that.. Haha.

 

[great white]

Just in case someone is thinking "oh no! you dented the crap out of your headers, that's going to kill flow!" (and I did dent the crap out of the #8 primary), have a looky here:



"we're going to answer that, right now, with violence"

Love it!

 

[Davedacarpainter]

I kind of dig that whole front bumper thing there myself. Clever idea.

We need to get @madmike1157 involoved in this conversation, he's of a kindred spirit as you.

If you want to see something funny, go to LMR looking for the mouldings for your car. They have one for the right door, that's it.

 

[great white]

I kind of dig that whole front bumper thing there myself. Clever idea.

We need to get @madmike1157 involoved in this conversation, he's of a kindred spirit as you.

If you want to see something funny, go to LMR looking for the mouldings for your car. They have one for the right door, that's it.

for the 83?

They've just started re-popping the 79-84 moldings this/last year so not surprising they're either sold out or not up to speed yet...

 

[Boosted92LX]

I kind of dig that whole front bumper thing there myself. Clever idea.

We need to get @madmike1157 involoved in this conversation, he's of a kindred spirit as you.

That's pretty much what @90sickfox did with his aero bumper/ terminator graft. Pretty neat. I need to go back and read that again, pretty trick car crafting!

 

[mikestang63]

SN95's came with a 7.5 rear?

 

[Boosted92LX]

SN95's came with a 7.5 rear?

V6 cars did.

 

[great white]

V6 cars did.

yep.

Far more common to find around here than a GT.

At least, wrecked or rusted out ones that is...

 

[great white]

That's pretty much what @90sickfox did with his aero bumper/ terminator graft. Pretty neat. I need to go back and read that again, pretty trick car crafting!

I can't take credit for the idea.

Saw an 83 with an 87+ lower grafted on somewhere on the 'net.

I think it was "motortopia" or something like that.

was bit "rougher" than what I'm going to end up with though....