’71 Mach 1 Resto Project

[tpj71mach]

Yesterday I "finished" my speckle painting the trunk project and also continued prepping and painting interior panels. I stripped and refinished the upper dash panel. Once it has cured, I will join it with the new dash pad and install them. For now, I laid it in place on the dash for safe keeping. It actually looks a little blotchy in this pic. I took this pic before it fully flashed, this morning it looks much better after curing over night.



As far as the spatter paint project, I know it is the "wrong" color but I could not find the black/gray anywhere. Except of course on eBay where someone has listed four cans of Dupli-color black/gray for $1039.00, F-ing unbelievable. There is an Eastwood store about 30minutes from my house and they had like 30 cans of Black/Aqua (textbook GM, so no good for me) and only two cans of gray/white. I thought that the gray/white might look good with my white car, and it was all I could find other than black/aqua anyway. Now that it is done, I actually like it better than the correct black/gray for my white car. IMO, it looks cleaner and brighter. I laid my rear quarter trim in for a visual on the cutoff and I think I need to bring the fade up a few more inches on the inner and outer wheel wells. Also, I need to fade it more gradually, I painted too close to my masking and formed a hard line with the Matte clear. Once it has cured for a week or two I will scuff that mask line down and fade it out a few more inches up, that will be a project for another day. Of course, that is if I can find one more can of the gray/white spatter paint, I used all of both cans. I bought the last two cans left on the shelf at the Eastwood store and they show out of stock on their website.

 

[Cleveland Crush]

That trunk really came out nice!

 

[tpj71mach]

That trunk really came out nice!

Thanks I think it looks a little better, LOL

It is taking a little longer than I had hoped but it is getting there.

 

[PoFoMoCo]

That looks great Tom. Well done as usual.

 

[72MustangSprint]

Hmmm I don’t know what original stock trunk paint looks like maybe Stsnglover can swing by Jacks house and snap some pics of his trunk

 

[tpj71mach]

So, I called Eastwood customer service today and found out why no one has trunk spatter paint in inventory. They told me that all of their trunk paint is manufactured in Germany and that the factory where it is made burned down last winter. They said it has been rebuilt and it has now started production again but they expect it to be some time before they get stock again. He also said that he believed that Dupli-Color's trunk paint is also made there and that's why there is no Dupli-Color trunk paint available anywhere either. He said he didn't know that for sure. but that's what he had heard. Hopefully inventory will fill back in and I can blend that line up a little further on the wheel well some time soon, and mark that project completed.

 

[ponypastor]

So, I called Eastwood customer service today and found out why no one has trunk spatter paint in inventory. They told me that all of their trunk paint is manufactured in Germany and that the factory where it is made burned down last winter. They said it has been rebuilt and it has now started production again but they expect it to be some time before they get stock again. He also said that he believed that Dupli-Color's trunk paint is also made there and that's why there is no Dupli-Color trunk paint available anywhere either. He said he didn't know that for sure. but that's what he had heard. Hopefully inventory will fill back in and I can blend that line up a little further on the wheel well some time soon, and mark that project completed.

Thanks for posting.

 

[tpj71mach]

I had to travel for work this week and didn't get home until last night, but my friend Mike block sanded the Slick Sand that I sprayed a couple weeks ago on the hood. He also sprayed the final coat of primer on my hood yesterday morning, now the hood prep is all done and it is ready for paint, woo-hoo!

I really appreciate him helping me out while I was out of town, as the next few weekends getting time to work on the Mustang is going to be tough as we go into the holidays.

Damn, I do love the lines of that hood! The closer I get, the more excited I am getting about it being done and driving it. The hood is one of my favorite things about the car since the '73 I had when I was 16.

I can't wait to see it painted white with the black up the center and the hood locks installed!



Next, I have to block sand the roof and quarters, and spray the final coat of primer on the body and then everything will be ready for paint. I can't wait to start spraying some Wimbledon White on the body parts. Hopefully that will start in January and maybe by end of February it will be painted.

 

[PoFoMoCo]

It looks great! All of your efforts paid off and the body work, admittedly the part you enjoy the least, is the key to your cars incredible transformation! I can’t wait to see it painted.

 

[tpj71mach]

It looks great! All of your efforts paid off and the body work, admittedly the part you enjoy the least, is the key to your cars incredible transformation! I can’t wait to see it pa

Thank you! You are right it is just about my least favorite part of a restoration (only behind installing coil springs, lol, I hate coil springs) but you're also right that the body work is an essential step. I need to reign in my ADD and keep myself focused on it and be thorough with it, to ensure that I end up with the results I am striving for. I credit my friend Mike's assistance with doing this, he is an expert painter and holds the body work to a high standard. He is not willing to lay out paint on meatball body work, he holds his body man/prep man (me) to doing quality work or I have to do it over. I can't wait to see it in color either!

 

[tpj71mach]

Now that Christmas is over and New Years isn't for a few days, I thought I would get back to work. I got out to the garage last night and finished assembling the tilt steering column that I bought a few weeks ago. I disassembled and prepped and painted it before Christmas and started to reassemble. I replaced or cleaned and lubricated everything mechanical so it should work well for years.

Here is a pic of the column and wheel as it was in the donor car.



The Column was from a blue interior Sprint and was painted blue, but as I stripped it down I realized it was originally Ginger. Maybe the owner of the donor car up-optioned or the column might have been peeled in a theft attempt like so many were back in the day and a used column was sprayed and installed. In the 80's at the dealership I worked at, we usually replaced bowls and damaged parts on theft repairs. If the column was badly damaged or if the insurance company wanted, we might go with a complete used column if we could find a good one.



I wiped it down as soon as I got home, overall, it was a really nice core to start with.
I disassembled and went though and cleaned and lubed or replaced all mechanicals and replaced ignition and turn signal switches. I stripped and painted all of the bowls while they were apart, unfortunately, I didn't think to take any pics of that stage of the process.
It's a shame that no one sells a turn signal switch for tilt columns with the connector already on them, at least that I could find. I had to reuse the original connector, at least I tried to do a better job on the wire repair than whoever installed the last T/S switch in this column. I wish I took a pic of that before I took it apart. They just twisted the wires together and wrapped the twisted "connection" in electrical tape, that mostly was just falling off.



I am glad the column is completed and ready to install. Now I need to start on the rim-blow steering wheel restoration. Fortunately, PoFoMoCo/Chris was kind enough to give me some tips on how he did such a nice job on his. Hopefully, that will help me not screw mine up too badly, LOL.
I have discovered that the steering wheel was originally green, so that must not have been original to the donor car either. The center pad seems to be originally blue though, so maybe the Sprint had the rim-blow wheel from factory and just the wheel had to be replaced. The PO might have been able to reuse the blue center pad. I enjoy deducing the history from the clues that I find as I tear parts down, to try and put together a time-line of events just for fun.

 

[Stanglover]

Interesting thread. I've not really been following, but boy, that looks like some awesome work you've done, congrats.
Looking at the rag joint connector, it looks to be no different from the fixed column (from memory). I know there is a difference, why I don't know, but that's Ford for you. Did you change the bottom connector? I've not personally seen the tilt column rag joint connector to know.
Also 72Sprint mentioned me posting a pic of Jack's car trunk, which is absolutely original 71. It's not going to show too much other than the color, which is darker than yours. Perhaps trunk splatter paint was like the "slop grey", whatever got mixed was good enough.

 

[tpj71mach]

Interesting thread. I've not really been following, but boy, that looks like some awesome work you've done, congrats.
Looking at the rag joint connector, it looks to be no different from the fixed column (from memory). I know there is a difference, why I don't know, but that's Ford for you. Did you change the bottom connector? I've not personally seen the tilt column rag joint connector to know.
Also 72Sprint mentioned me posting a pic of Jack's car trunk, which is absolutely original 71. It's not going to show too much other than the color, which is darker than yours. Perhaps trunk splatter paint was like the "slop grey", whatever got mixed was good enough.

Thank you for noticing my work, I did purchase a new rag joint for the tilt column. It had a different part number than a standard column joint, but to me, it looked the same as my new standard column joint. I always prefer to err on the side of caution, so I bought the new one. I compared them all and the new one matches the one that I removed from the tilt column and the diameter is the same as the steering gear so I am expecting it to work. I just realized the pics I posted were taken before I installed the rag joint and the under dash mounting pads. They are installed on the column now , but weren't when I snapped those pics.
Thank you for the pics of Jack's original trunk(I wish I was aware of Jack's car before I bought this one, his car is stunning). I knew my trunk was going to be lighter than the correct color at least partially because I painted the whole interior of the car Wimbledon white. It might be the white base coat or just the wrong paint causing the difference, LOL. I may leave it like that though, for now at least it has to stay. No one has any spatter paint available, Eastwood told me there was a fire at the only manufacturer and they just now are getting up and producing again. Besides it looks brighter and cleaner to me, and it isn't the only "incorrect" thing about the car, by far.

 

[Stanglover]

Thank you for noticing my work, I did purchase a new rag joint for the tilt column. It had a different part number than a standard column joint, but to me, it looked the same as my new standard column joint. I always prefer to err on the side of caution, so I bought the new one. I compared them all and the new one matches the one that I removed from the tilt column and the diameter is the same as the steering gear so I am expecting it to work. I just realized the pics I posted were taken before I installed the rag joint and the under dash mounting pads. They are installed on the column now , but weren't when I snapped those pics.
Thank you for the pics of Jack's original trunk(I wish I was aware of Jack's car before I bought this one, his car is stunning). I knew my trunk was going to be lighter than the correct color at least partially because I painted the whole interior of the car Wimbledon white. It might be the white base coat or just the wrong paint causing the difference, LOL. I may leave it like that though, for now at least it has to stay. No one has any spatter paint available, Eastwood told me there was a fire at the only manufacturer and they just now are getting up and producing again. Besides it looks brighter and cleaner to me, and it isn't the only "incorrect" thing about the car, by far.

Thanks for your comments.
The rag joint difference is something that just doesn't make any sense to me, I mean why not standardize that part as it's the top end that tilts I assume. As said, I've never actually seen one to know for sure, so speculation on my part.
As for splatter paint, I bought the last can NPD had in Michigan a couple of years back. I also have a can that doesn't work, it won't spray, nothing comes out!! NPD used to sell dark and light splatter paint, but the dark (if I remember) seemed to always be "out of stock".
I look forward to seeing this one done.

 

[tpj71mach]

I had to replace the rag joint it did not come off in one piece, or even a few pieces.



And I couldn't have used it even if it was in good condition, because the coupler i.d. diameter was smaller than my steering gear input shaft o.d. diameter. The i.d. of the new coupler measured out same as the o.d. of the input shaft on my steering gear, so it should work. The donor car was a 302 sprint coupe, I assume the Mach 1's must have had a different steering gear than other Mustangs, that would explain the shaft being thicker on the steering gear in my car.

 

[bishoppeak]

The cars with competition suspension came with variable ratio power steering, which would probably account for the difference.

 

[72MustangSprint]

The cars with competition suspension came with variable ratio power steering, which would probably account for the difference.

My 72 Sprint coupe was the donor car for this tilt column and as Tom points out the column came out of another car. My Sprint coupe should be a package A car so it would not have competition suspension from the factory but maybe the original donor car did have competition suspension.

 

[tpj71mach]

I found some time this morning to install the tilt column that has been sitting on my tool box for a few weeks since I tore it down and restored it. I included a pic of my pretty new rag joint.



I have a nice standard steering column with two spoke deluxe wheel if anyone needs one. It has new turn signal switch and ignition switch. The horn pad is nice the grain is a little worn on the left, (see in pic) the wheel is cracked though not bad but a couple cracks. Maybe someday, I will get around to repairing the wheel and list it on eBay (probably not, lol).



I also started to work on the rim-blow wheel. A few weeks ago I carved out what was left of the dry rotted chrome strip and sanded the wheel down. I also painted the channel where the chrome strip goes black, so I could apply the chrome pinstriping and lay in the clear epoxy. I wanted to paint the channel first (because the wheel was originally green) and let it cure for a few weeks so the sides of the channel would look black through the clear epoxy. Today, I masked off the woodgrain area, added the 1/8" chrome pinstripe and applied the clear epoxy. I will let that cure and then sand that down. Then I will paint the whole wheel black and paint the woodgrain effect and clear the whole wheel. Hopefully it will all come out as I am envisioning it.

 

[PoFoMoCo]

Very, very nice! The restoration work you did on both, the tilt column and the RBD wheel, look great. Both started as great cores and the results are top notch. I can’t wait to see the finished RBD wheel.

 

[72MustangSprint]

How much for just the steering wheel?