Who's ready for Summer?

I'm hoping to get the ole Mach 1 out of the garage this summer and do some cruising! She's been sitting too long and needs a set of tires and a new carb put on but otherwise, she should be ready for some summertime fun! Not much of a winter here in Southwestern PA but I still want to wait for all the salt to wash off the roads!

I'm with you on that one, except my ol' girl is ready to fire up. We too, have had no winter to speak of, but "they" still dumped tons of salt on the roads. April is usually a high rain month (if we don't get snow), to wash the roads off.

Heading towards winter here in Australia

But it doesn't snow here, winter's are fairly dry and sunny, so I'll keep on'a cruising like normal, just with the heater on

Beat you to it Rocketfoot! He, he.

As Flatback said, we've just had our Summer Season, and are just starting to head into Autumn.

And to add insult to injury, i live in a sub tropical climate, so i get to cruise around, top dropped, pretty much all year 'round. Oh yeaaaaaaaaaaaaah.!

Don't you just hate me?

Greg.

Austin Vert said:

Beat you to it Rocketfoot! He, he.

As Flatback said, we've just had our Summer Season, and are just starting to head into Autumn.

And to add insult to injury, i live in a sub tropical climate, so i get to cruise around, top dropped, pretty much all year 'round. Oh yeaaaaaaaaaaaaah.!

Don't you just hate me?

Greg.

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Greg, I am assuming you have a banana daiquiri permanently installed in your drink holder, as mandated by state law for all convertible owners in sunny Queensland?

I'm ready but let there be Spring first!

I'm with you as far as getting the car out and doing a little cruising. I plan on changing the oil next week and tidding up a few things and then will be ready to hit the road.

Down here in GA, I've been driving my mustangs all winter long. No heat or AC in either of them, though. So that rules out the extremely cold days and most of july and august unless I want to have a sweaty back when I get where I'm going.

I had my Mach out last Sunday for the first time this season. The car ran great, the skies were blue, and all was right with the world. Two days later , Ol' Man Winter visited us again. It snowed today. I found the perfect day to drive it. During the winter months when I garage it, I start it up every other week for 30 minutes at a time, so it stays in running mode. Come on Spring! Oh yeah, I am getting my car photographed next week too.......if weather permits.

Up here in Snow Country (Rochester, NY) we are now about 2 weeks from car Season. We had one rain the other week that flushed salt off the roads from winter. One more good rain will flush away any remaining salt residue. Then, once the roads are clear and dry it is time to enjoy the next 7 months - finally. We have the 73 Mach 1 on the ramp of a 4 post life, suspended over our 1997 Honda Del Sol SI sports car. In the next stall over the 73 Mustang Convertible has a battery tender "keeping the battery 'warm' and charged" for the day of its release. At Casa De Shelby we have both the 1969 and 2020 GT500s connected to battery tenders also, and ready to fire up in order to get some more road time.

This weekend I am going to inventory our AmsOil Z-Rod 10/30 oil, and Motorcraft FL-1A oil filters to make certain we hav4e enough to kick off the season with the annual oil and filter changes. The 2020 GT500 goes to our dealer for its change, despite me being plenty qualified to perform the work myself (I do not want to to do anything that may compromise its extended factory warranty). This is the year I plan to replace all fuel lines and fuel filters, except for the 73 vert (I changed its fuel line last year). And it is time to pack the front bearing on the 73 vert (packed on the 69 GT500 2 years ago, and replaced & packed the bearings on the 73 Mach 1 last year). I will also be lubing the various front suspension locations on all of the vehicles.

I pretty much have the two 73 Mustangs all done with the carious changes I wanted to do. I may add a 2nd variable temp thermocouple and relay to the upper radiator hose to trigger a set of red amber LED lights in the event of the engine temp hitting 240 degrees - just to have done it. As it is both 73 Mustangs already have their aluminum 3 row radiators, dual electric fans, and a variable thermostat and thermocouple with relay to control the cooling fans to come on when the coolant temp hits 200 degrees. And when their relays send current to the electric fans an amber set of LED lights come on to alert the driver the cooling fans's circuit has been activated. The LED light array I selected has both an amber set of LED lights, and an as yet unused red set of LED lights. That little feature for the amber lights to come on was a lot of fun to put together, and the lights can only be seen by the driver as the lights are mounted at the far rear of the hood's underside. The dual electric fans was a good step, but the amber lighting causes me to smile more than just the electric fans alone. Well worth doing. If anyone would like to see how it was done, I have a YouTube video showing how I did it for one of the Mustangs (the other was already done):

https://youtu.be/ErDOMJ1hOnA

I may evacuate and recharge the factory A/C on the 1969 Shelby GT500, just because. Then again, it is working well and there is an old saying about not fixing what ain't broken. So, we will see...

Other than that, unless something breaks or fails, I think this is going to be a nice, quiet Car Season where we will spend more time than usual driving them around - just because we can. Oh, and to car shows also...

Still waiting here too! Come on Spring........ and lots of rain to wash tons of salt off the roads. I won't take it out till I'm good and ready and the roads are back to, well, road color.

Stanglover said:

I'm with you on that one, except my ol' girl is ready to fire up. We too, have had no winter to speak of, but "they" still dumped tons of salt on the roads. April is usually a high rain month (if we don't get snow), to wash the roads off.

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Salt is an issue here in RI as well. I feel your pain. We have had substantial amounts of rainfall which also includes tonight's rain. All the salt will be gone by Sunday.
Ron

Ron Tanzi said:

Salt is an issue here in RI as well. I feel your pain. We have had substantial amounts of rainfall which also includes tonight's rain. All the salt will be gone by Sunday.
Ron

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Optimist! Hope so for your sake.
I know we all want to get out asap, but too soon could bad news if there is still salt residue on the roads. Any salt 'dust' can get blown into all the little gaps in the frame etc. and later, if we do get caught in rain, will start the rust process. I'll wait awhile longer.

Like Geoff up in Canada, I'm still waiting for spring here in North Idaho. Not much snow this year but the hill I live on is still covered with the road dirt/sand the county puts down. At least no salt, but until the sweeper shows up I am garage bound.

Beyond me and my wanting to drive my car everyday in the good weather months, local car guys here in Idaho, use the good weather to hold parking lot car shows darned near every weekend, all over the area. In Los Angeles, you can drive your car year round, so you tend to see cool cars on a daily basis, but here, everybody has had enough of winter and, after garaging them for months, these guys are dying to drive 'em and show them off......which I think is cool. For me, there's another reason for looking forward to the weather change. As a California native, born and raised, my wardrobe has always tended to be just jeans and t-shirts, with casual button-up shirts thrown into the mix. Here, I've had to adjust to heavy flannel ( Pendletons ), layers, and heavy coats during the winter. I am SOOOOOO glad the weather is changing. I'm over winter. Like the song says, " I'm going to where the weather suits my clothes".....and that would be Spring and Summer. Maybe I can instigate getting a "Cruise Night" happening once a month, with some of the car clubs here ... there's a couple.