The Mach-A-Reina build thread

Thanks for the replies. Yeah, now that I've seen the extent of the rust on all my steel lines, I really regret not just buying a nice flanger and doing them all myself as opposed to buying pre-bent lines. Would have paid off by now, and I could make adjustments like this. As it is, I'm going to just keep it stock I reckon. If I ever pull the motor and media blast everything, maybe I'll rethink it then. God know it needs it. Lots of nasty metal in the engine bay. I'm splattering a little paint on sections that look bad as a preventative measure just to stop further deterioration.

Here is another question for yall, what the heck is this bracket coming off my steering column? It doesn't seem to attache to anything and I cant figure it out from the Ford shop manual:

You miss the rod connecting to the trans. When in P, it turns and it can lock the steering wheel. You need then the key in contact to unlock.

Hi, I'm just catching up on this thread.
Welcome from SW Ontario Canada and another 71 Mach 1 owner.
I bought my car in LA and totally rust free. I got very lucky, but still had a ton of stuff to fix or upgrade over the years, 16 now.
There is all the wisdom and knowledge you could ever want on here, so don't be afraid to ask away. There is no such thing as a dumb question, (but you may get a few dumb answers!! )

chuckludwig said:

Thanks for the replies. Yeah, now that I've seen the extent of the rust on all my steel lines, I really regret not just buying a nice flanger and doing them all myself as opposed to buying pre-bent lines. Would have paid off by now, and I could make adjustments like this. As it is, I'm going to just keep it stock I reckon. If I ever pull the motor and media blast everything, maybe I'll rethink it then. God know it needs it. Lots of nasty metal in the engine bay. I'm splattering a little paint on sections that look bad as a preventative measure just to stop further deterioration.

Here is another question for yall, what the heck is this bracket coming off my steering column? It doesn't seem to attache to anything and I cant figure it out from the Ford shop manual:View attachment 95059

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Here is a pic from my car when I stripped it for an engine rebuild.
You can see the trans rod on the manual trans. You can also see the weird rubber hose in question, red arrow. Green arrow ?, blue arrow is the rod in question.

Ah got it. I figure I don't NEED that piece. Too many darn things coming out of that transmission as it is. I'm dreading how the heck im going to route the rear brake and vent lines as it is!

chuckludwig said:

Ah got it. I figure I don't NEED that piece. Too many darn things coming out of that transmission as it is. I'm dreading how the heck im going to route the rear brake and vent lines as it is!

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May be easier just to drop the driveshaft to access the tunnel clips. Fuel line goes along the outer rocker, so that's easy..... er!

Thanks for the tips. Waiting for those parts to arrive today. Sounds like I may be dropping the driveshaft in the near future haha. Oh well, guess its another thing to learn how to do.

Spent the last few days cleaning and repainting things in the engine bay and in the wheel well. Nothing crazy just a little preventative cleanup and prettying up.

Reckoned it was easier to do while all the bits and bobs were out of my way. Unfortunatly in my haste I twisted off this stupid hose coming off the power steering line. That was a 60$ mistake. Yes...now I see there are two nuts. I couldn't see it because it was behind the PS filler tube and I was rushing like a fool.
View attachment IMG_6961.JPG

As I move into the next phase of this project, I have two questions I wanted to pose to the hive mind:

1) Which reservoir on the brake master cylinder is for the front brake and which is the rear?

2) My harmonic balancer is shot. I'm afraid to drive with it so out of wack. I know opinions vary, but does anyone have a recommendation for replacement? Rattler? Remco? ATI? And which one specifically. ATI and Remco both have a few that summit says will fit.

Thanks in advance. IDK how people worked on cars before these forums.

The fuel line is to accommodate the 6 cyl and V8 engines. The fuel pump on the 250-6 was about in the middle of the shock tower.

If you're just looking to protect the sheetmetal and not taking the entire front end apart, I'd skip the POR15 and just use a semi gloss black rattle can paint. If you decide to get in deep at a later date, that POR is going to haunt you as it is a mother to remove. TBH, what you're showing looks really good to my eye, since I'm in the Northeast and our cars never look like that. Grease in the pocket under the upper arm is normal, that means the car was lubed at least a couple times in it's life. The pocket should be filled level with seam sealer to promote drainage, but it wasn't always done correctly.

For a balancer, Romac 0203 is a really nice unit that's not huge money. I have one on my 351C.

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/...hivM48MWcxUEcuvaFx82WlI5JxeVn8DwY8qVgH1TW0Hz1

On the master the rear (large) reservoir is for the front and vice versa.

Hemikiller said:

The fuel line is to accommodate the 6 cyl and V8 engines. The fuel pump on the 250-6 was about in the middle of the shock tower.

If you're just looking to protect the sheetmetal and not taking the entire front end apart, I'd skip the POR15 and just use a semi gloss black rattle can paint. If you decide to get in deep at a later date, that POR is going to haunt you as it is a mother to remove. TBH, what you're showing looks really good to my eye, since I'm in the Northeast and our cars never look like that. Grease in the pocket under the upper arm is normal, that means the car was lubed at least a couple times in it's life. The pocket should be filled level with seam sealer to promote drainage, but it wasn't always done correctly.

For a balancer, Romac 0203 is a really nice unit that's not huge money. I have one on my 351C.

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/...hivM48MWcxUEcuvaFx82WlI5JxeVn8DwY8qVgH1TW0Hz1

On the master the rear (large) reservoir is for the front and vice versa.

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Thanks Hemikiller. I am ordering up the Romac. That's the last part that was really giving me pause to really drive the darn car. Are there any special tools I need to get to the damper? I have a puller, but wasn't sure if I needed anything else. Also, I have a Classic Auto Air AC setup I am fixin to put in this winter (So I can enjoy the car in the texas heat). I'm not sure if the kit comes with a 3 belt pulley, but I assume that is something I will need to install. Do you think this would be a good time to do that too?

FINALLY got some plumbing back in the car. This is just a small part of what I need to get done this week but dang it feels good to be putting parts back on instead of taking them off. There is something endlessly satisfying about stainless steel lines. One Q I have though: are there supposed to be brackets on the outward side of the calipers? I didn't see any on the existing brakes, but my replacement calipers did come with 4 brackets.


View attachment IMG_6962.JPG

The stainless lines look awesome on your car! It makes me wish that I didn't cheap out and get the steel ones, haha.

As far as the caliper hardware, there are supposed to be some brake pad anti-rattle retainer pins and clips on the outer pads, the pins come through the pads and caliper and are retained by the clips on the outside of the caliper, if that is what you are referring to. There are also the inner pad anti-rattle clips and the inner shield that I don't see in you picture. I don't have a great pic of the inner side of my car's caliper that would show the shield better, but you can see the anti-rattle clips in the pics below. I bought a caliper hardware kit from NPD for like $50 that included all of these parts.

https://www.npdlink.com/product/hardware-kit-caliper/148135?backurl=search/products?search_terms=front%2Bbrake%2Bcaliper&top_parent=200001&year=1971&year=1971

I included a pic of the kit from their website that shows the shield better, because I am not sure I got the link right.

tpj71mach said:

The stainless lines look awesome on your car! It makes me wish that I didn't cheap out and get the steel ones, haha.

As far as the caliper hardware, there are supposed to be some brake pad anti-rattle retainer pins and clips on the outer pads, the pins come through the pads and caliper and are retained by the clips on the outside of the caliper, if that is what you are referring to. There are also the inner pad anti-rattle clips and the inner shield that I don't see in you picture. I don't have a great pic of the inner side of my car's caliper that would show the shield better, but you can see the anti-rattle clips in the pics below. I bought a caliper hardware kit from NPD for like $50 that included all of these parts.

https://www.npdlink.com/product/hardware-kit-caliper/148135?backurl=search/products?search_terms=front%2Bbrake%2Bcaliper&top_parent=200001&year=1971&year=1971

I included a pic of the kit from their website that shows the shield better, because I am not sure I got the link right.

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Thank you! I do have the shields on it, just not the front clips, although my big dumb gorilla hands snapped one of the shield bolts off. Not sure how I'm gonna get that fix, but I reckon it will be okay with just one. Eventually I will have to replace the spindles I suppose. Maybe time for an upgrade?

Hemikiller said:

For a balancer, Romac 0203 is a really nice unit that's not huge money. I have one on my 351C.

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/...hivM48MWcxUEcuvaFx82WlI5JxeVn8DwY8qVgH1TW0Hz1

On the master the rear (large) reservoir is for the front and vice versa.

Click to expand...

I've been slowley plugging away at this car. Really hoping to get it going as the weather is nice. I'm working on the getting the harmonic balancer on. I went with the 0203, and boy it has been giving me problems. To begin with, the stock bolt that was on my existing balancer was probably half an inch shorter than I needed it. Then the bolts the connect the pulley to the balancer were a half an inch too long.

Now the issue I'm seeing is that with the pulley attached, it seems it is about 1/8" further out than the water pump pulley. Has anyone else with the Romac experienced this?

Did you install the balancer with an installer tool or just pull it in with the bolt? If you used a longer bolt to pull in the balancer it may have bottomed out in the crank and not have pulled the balancer all the way into position. If you still have the old bolt, try using it in place of the new one and see if you can get the extra 1/8".

Sheriff41 said:

Did you install the balancer with an installer tool or just pull it in with the bolt? If you used a longer bolt to pull in the balancer it may have bottomed out in the crank and not have pulled the balancer all the way into position. If you still have the old bolt, try using it in place of the new one and see if you can get the extra 1/8".

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I used an installer tool. I even put it back on to try to push it on a little farther today. It didn't seem to make a lick of difference though. Pretty annoyed with the Romac to be honest. Nothing but annoying little differences. If it wasn't so darn good looking I would have gone with a different option.

Got some other shinanigans done in the meantime. Took out the old heater unit and going to dynamat the inside of the firewall then install the my new AC unit. Us in TX get why that is high priority! Also found a weird issue with my PS pump: there was a HUGE dent in the side of it. I was gonna clean it and repaint, but I think with that dent im just going to replace the darn thing. Frustrating for sure, but I'm getting used to it with this car.

I haden't posted in a while, but I'd redone all my rear brakes and parking brakes (still need to get a switch and wire that up. No idea how that works.) My goal was to have the new Dakota Digital dash in by now but other things keep getting in the way. If all goes well this week and I get the dynamat and new AC in though, it's just a matter of wiring things up. I'm holding off on redoing all the wiring until I can at least get the car running and enjoyable.

There is still a fear the oil pressure is a bit low. That's my last big worry with the motor. I have a new pump and shaft but I'm nervous on how to actually do that job. I've heard I need to lift the motor to make it clear. Is that true?

midlife said:

Be aware that you should not replace your brake proportioning valve warning light nor the alternator indicator light with LEDs. The brake light has a peculiar ground, so that a polarity sensitive LED might not work. The alternator idiot lamp requires an incandescent bulb as it is part of the electrical circuit. If you use an LED, you run the risk of not charging your system.

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I'm finally getting around to wiring up my new dash, and I noticed that my gauge cluster does not have an alternator light. There are only 4 bulbs on the left side gauges. Did some cars not have this light as part of the circuit? Or was the light external to the cluster, as I think I heard someone once say something about. I'd hate to finally button this car up after having its guts all over my garage for two months only to have it not charge!

Those vehicles whose dashes did not include an ammeter always got an alternator indicator lamp.

midlife said:

Those vehicles whose dashes did not include an ammeter always got an alternator indicator lamp.

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Got it. Thank you! Any idea on the wire color? I found one PDF someone made where it says Black / Green and Green / Red. Also, is what is the lights function in keeping the system charging? Could I shunt it with a resistor instead?

There are two wires involved that go to the dash cluster: green/red and black/green. One of those lines has a 15 ohm resistor wire in parallel. The light is there to indicate a problem in charging; should the bulb be broken, the resistor wire gives a signal to the voltage regulator to engage.