Wife's 66

[Matt_50]

Hello everyone. I hope you all can give me plenty of advice because I don't know much about Ford. Brought a 66 mustang home that'll be my wife's. It needs rust repair in a lot of the usual spots but that shouldn't be a problem. It's no where near as bad as all the rust areas I just repaired on my 50 Chevy truck project.

Factory 289, 3 speed auto, one with big dot little dot. 5 lug drums all around. It is missing the motor, but still has trans and a p/s pumping hanging under the hood.

What my wife wants.

Daily driver, a/c, and keep it automatic.


Any 302 will bolt up? Are some years better than others? Keep factory p/s? I plan to upgrade front drums to disc, install dual m/c and add a proportioning valve. Factory trans worth rebuilding?


Thanks!

 

[General karthief]

Welcome to stangnet, let me help you out here, I'll move this to the classic forums and I will add, look into adding a 5.0 roller engine and auto with over drive, it's pretty much a bolt in affair.
now a word from the experts.

 

[rbohm]

Hello everyone. I hope you all can give me plenty of advice because I don't know much about Ford. Brought a 66 mustang home that'll be my wife's. It needs rust repair in a lot of the usual spots but that shouldn't be a problem. It's no where near as bad as all the rust areas I just repaired on my 50 Chevy truck project.

Factory 289, 3 speed auto, one with big dot little dot. 5 lug drums all around. It is missing the motor, but still has trans and a p/s pumping hanging under the hood.

What my wife wants.

Daily driver, a/c, and keep it automatic.


Any 302 will bolt up? Are some years better than others? Keep factory p/s? I plan to upgrade front drums to disc, install dual m/c and add a proportioning valve. Factory trans worth rebuilding?


Thanks!

yes any pushrod 302 will bolt up. you just need to have the proper early front cover and oil pan.

and yes keep the factory power steering. you can have it rebuilt by this guy;

http://www.chockostangclassicmustang.com/

he does a lot of rebuilds, and he is probably the best. chocko also has front disc brake conversion kits as well at reasonable prices, and his customer service is very good.

the stock C4 is worth rebuilding. its a nice tough little transmission that does well for everything from daily driving to drag racing, and can be built to handle a lot of power. a suggestion though, if you plan on driving this car on the freeway long distances, step up to an AOD and set of 3.55 rear gears. this will give you better around town driveability, and still be able to cruise economically down the freeway. an AOD conversion is also quite easy, just remember to get the TV cable adjustment right or you will burn up the trans in short order. or you can install a constant pressure valve body available from either lentech or silver fox and then the TV cable just becomes a kick down cable.