The main reason for not posting is that the body work and paint process took a long time. I had more time than money hence four years on my small sized budget. There were continual improvements through the years but now there was some major progress made that I am pleased to share.
The big news is: the body work is done and it has paint!
The car came from the factory with the black exterior and red interior so I decided to keep that theme. What could be cooler than a black car with a red interior?
I did some time working on the car myself but the majority of the work was done by the genius madman whom I trusted my car with. It turned out stunning.
The following pictures will contain at the progress made in the past four years with some commentary. Here we go!
2013
As promised from the last post, here is the door patch.
Time to clean up the interior! In short it was not pretty.
A nice little note from the workers at Ford who built this Mustang. Not the exact thing you want to see when trying to restore.
Ew! Rust! Nothing that this little guy can't handle!
Bam!
The Cobra Jet scope mounted on the hood looks pretty good and I'm starting to get an idea of what this car can look like.
The master hard at work.
2014
Since I am getting all this work done on the body it was time to address the chrome and stainless trim on the car. Most of it had normal wear and tear but nothing catastrophic (for once). Some things were bent but could be saved. The biggest bent culprit was the front bumper, especially the right side.
I took these parts to Blairs Metal Polishing in Cerritos. The family business has worked with these guys before and they always deliver.
Unfortunately I forgot to take photos of the trim when it was finished. Most of it was wrapped up to keep things protected but let me say that they turned out beautifully. Everything was perfectly straight and shiny. I think I should have worn sunglasses.
Time to add a layer of primer on the car. Must close to paint now, right? Wrong. I may get some details wrong but this primer will help detect the subtle imperfections in the body. Since this car is going to be black it has to be perfect because black paint shows EVERY sin.
I find it frustrating when I purchase a new part and it has imperfections. The hood had to be modified to make it as straight and perfect as the rest of the car. I'm glad the imperfections were noticed and handled I just wish there no imperfections to start.
2015
BAM! Now that looks like a Mustang! I can now start to appreciate all the hours and work put into the body. Everything looks so good I can't believe it! But... this is far from being finished with more work to be done.
Summer of 2015: I had a lot of fun this summer. I spent quite a few weekends working on the car. Most of my work was sanding and sand blasting but I didn't care. I was there and I was working on my car.
It's not all about making sure the outside looks good but making sure the car is built properly with an eye on the future. Taking the fender reveals the inner fender which needed to be cleaned up and rust removed. I'd hate for this car to fall apart in several years.
From what I have learned from books and internet articles, this looks like a note from the factory. As of now I think it is a production date and that this was the fourteenth car off the assembly line that day. More research is needed but later.
This picture below shows the kind of work and attention to detail this car is receiving. The horizontal line on the fender starts at the headlight bucket and continues across onto the quarter panel. The line looks perfectly continuous from one end to the other.
These are the fins that can be found on the roof line, they are supposed to help remove air from the cabin. The top one was untouched while the other was sandblasted (I did this!) and will be painted black as well.
I also sanded down the scoop to get it ready for paint.
The front left fender got lots of attention since it is factory original.
2016
I'm not really into putting things onto that are not functional. Since I'm rocking the Cobra Jet scoop it was time to put a hole in the hood.
This picture (below) is one of my absolute favorites. The trunk was causing a lot of problems trying to get the left side to match the right side and have it sit straight in the middle. And to top it off, have the trunk match the roof line and the shape of the quarter panel. After working the metal and reworking it, it came out looking like a champion. The lines match up perfectly and it blows me away every time when I look at the car.
Since the car is getting closer to completion I decided to take an inventory of the parts I had. I purchased this interior years ago from California Mustang and left it in boxes so the parts would not be damaged or be exposed to sun fade. But when I decided to crack open the boxes and look at what I purchased I was furious. I ordered everything to be dark red to match the original interior but everything WAS NOT dark red. I got parts that were maroon, dark red, and red. What a disaster! I asked the owner of Mustangs and Fast Fords OC what was up with this and he explained that the different parts are made by different manufacturers and each one of them has there own definition of "Dark Red". And all the parts come this way whether it be red, blue, or green. Well that is unfortunate so I decided to sell the whole interior and try to think of a plan for the future.
Getting closer to completion but nor quite there yet.
How to make a parent upset: make a change to the car when getting close to completion, especially a performance oriented change. I wanted to have the inner wheel wells rolled to accommodate a larger wheel. During the rolling the fender cracked and had to be rewelded. Whoops! But it can be fixed and the picture below shows the patch work.
It has been a while so I do not know if I had discussed this in previous posts. It was decided to put a stripe on the car but I wanted this stripe to be different from any other striping I had seen before. The stripe was going to begin at the hood, go on the roof, then end on the trunk. I didn't want to have the stripe just stop when the metal ended, I wanted it to have a clear start and finish.
The trunk was going to have a rounded finish...
Paint purchased. This paint color is Black. This is not black with some sort of metallic or charcoal or any other derivative of black. This is just black. This is as dark a black that you can get. I think it looks absolutely evil and I love it.
The following pictures show how the metal seams have been sealed to prevent any moisture getting in the car and causing rust. This will help ensure that this car, paint, and body work is going to last for a long time.
Now that the exterior had its black it was time to address the interior red.
Or not.
We have had this can of custom red waiting in the shop to paint the stripe and we thought it would be really cool to have the interior with the same red. It looks magnificent.
December 31, 2016
Paint!! The car has paint on it!
Well not the whole car... BUT it does count!
When I actually saw the black on the car, I could not believe how it looked. I mean it is BLACK!!
And now I get to see how the black and red go together. I was very nervous that it might be too loud but I think that it looks just right.
2017
June 11, 2017: Christmas
Years of hard work and patience finally come together in just one weekend in the paint booth. The only thing I can do is say "wow" and keep staring.
