1973 Grande Resurrection

[1973grandeklar]

With my son's 1972 Mustang running and he being now responsible for further financial fixings, I am embarking on the restoration of my 1973 Grande.

It is a H-code roller shell that needs a ton of work. I am crazy for even thinking of fixing this, but it is my car and I like crazy!

Here is how I found it and purchased it for $500:





Got it cleaned up and at home:



Then the fun started this weekend. I disassembled the interior, front sheet metal, and removed any floor patches. Those floor patchs were nothing more than aluminum flashing from Home Depot. What is with this stuff? Found this in my son's 1972 and now in this car!



So the floor pans are toast!





The passenger side frame rail will need a little work. However, both rocker panels are solid and are not rusted! Also note the crappy heater box held together with duct tape!



The heater box is actually worse than what I anticipated. It was not even being held in the car. I knew the cowl was rusted, but it evidently was so far gone that even the mountings were rusted gone! And then when I removed the dash and got to the heater box, I was horrorfied to find that the water lines for the heater were actually hooked to the evaporator of the A/C. Who does that?



At this point I have to give a great big call out and thank you to 7173mustang for the generous donation of a complete heater box (of course I am purchasing his Q code so he sweetened that deal). Great guy and couple of nice mustangs.

The only place that the front has rust, and I scoured the frame rails to make sure, is the battery box. This car is very solid upfront, not so much in the cowl area:



Then I cleaned up around the rear window and was even more disappointed, more rust. Sad thing here is this is not a reproduction panel and I will have to find a donor part.



So there is the car. Not pretty and will need a ton of work. In the end, I will never make back a fraction of the money and time that I will be investing in this car. But here is the most important thing, I enjoy it and it is mine. I cannot afford to go and buy a $5k - $10k car in better shape. I could afford a $500 car. I am selling my Pontiac to get a parts car. I can afford about $400 to $500 a month purchasing parts and sheet metal. I can do most all the work myself (including paint). I am patient and can wait for the good deal on items. I even accept the kindness of fellow mustang guys to donate their unused stuff (and I will be willing to pass along stuff I no longer need).

So let the fun begin!

Start with removing the windshield and stripping the cowl of the wipers and all attachments. Removed the cowl to apron extensions (think that is the correct term). And this is what I discover. Yes, more rust:





I continue to remove the upper cowl piece by drilling out about a bazillion spot welds (I counted over 125 and ended up just grinding the ends off since the rust hide them). Then I discover the source of the water leaks



And the reason why the heater box has no attachments:



And here is the two cowl panels pulled off the car:



Now that I got the cowl removed I can really assess what I need to seal this up and kill any future rusting potential. Looks like a few firewall patches and floor boards should cure this area. I ordered a new cowl from OMS (great deal with free shipping BTW). Now I have to clean and prep this area. Sand it all down to bare metal, patch the fire wall, and epoxy primer to seal it up.







That is where the car is at now. Sanding and waiting for paint supplies and the new cowl. Next I will purchase floor pans and get started on this.

Question: I see many of these Mustangs have a frame connector from the front frame member to the rear frame member, what do you guys use? Where can I find them? If the floor pans are out, I want to add this in. Do they interfer with anything? Exhaust? Parking brake cable?

Subscribe and watch the progress on this restoration!

 

[imusa76]

Looks like you have your hands full..

even the parts that are not reproduced can be fabricated, or as you said, Donor car parts.

keep us updated

 

[Steven Harris]

Talk about jumping in the deep end!

I love these build threads.

Are you sure you wouldn't just rather buy a "rust free" Arizona car?

 

[nailpounder]

an auto body teacher asked me. so what do you have more time or money? i hope you have a lot of both. good luck and best wishes .

 

[1973grandeklar]

Talk about jumping in the deep end!

I love these build threads.

Are you sure you wouldn't just rather buy a "rust free" Arizona car?

What! and short change all the fun I am about to have

I realize this car looks really bad, but all the external sheetmetal is in good shape. The quarter panels are solid, the front is good, and the doors are even OK. The only bad spots are the rear filler panel and the cowl. Because of these leaking, the floor pans and trunk need replacing. Funny thing is, prior to tearing this open and exposing this, one could crawl under the car and get the illusion that there was only some small holes and surface rust.

But I have been know to be stubborn and once I am told that it is impossible or not reasonable, I go ahead and do it!!!

 

[OLE PONY]

I think it's great you are going to save it from the crusher and have the skills to do it. Keep at it.

 

[Jeff73Mach1]

You have some work ahead, I applaud your energy!

To save you some bucks-if you want, you can look at these plans http://dazecars.com/dazed/sub-frame.html

They are very close to the tinman connectors

 

[1973grandeklar]

While I am waiting for the new cowl and some paint supplies, I decided to work on fixing the front grill. It has a few spot that are broken and I am going to attempt to repair this grill like I did on my son's 1972.

I start with Plastic epoxy:



The grill has a number of areas that need repair:









These are easy to repair as the crack just needs to be closed up and epoxy applied. However, these next series of shots require a piece of the grill be spliced in. I have the pieces for the mounting tabs. But I am missing the center bar and the big piece for the sport lamp mount:









I started putting the epoxy on the cracks to strengthen the part. I start with these first so that the whole grill is solid and reduce the risk of continuing the crack.





I like to try and place the epoxy on the backside surface. I do not worry about excessive as this stuff, once hardened is sandable. It is easy enough to sand the surface down and feather it out and smooth this out. I also use an epoxy putty for filler. I will show that process at a later date. Once all the parts are epoxied, I then sand the entire grill, spray a plastic adhesion promoter, and then spray with a satin black.

 

[jeff8877]

Great thread...love all the pics and commentary. Looks like your making great progress.

 

[mcline71]

Got one just like it.

Will definitely be following your progress.

 

[1973grandeklar]

Look what the Fed Ex guy brought! Thanks Don from OMS. Because you gave good insight into the subtle differences between a Nona/c cowl and A/C cowl I was not afraid to purchase this cowl.

Set it up on the car and it fits perfectly. Seems the car did not sag or move waiting for the cowl.



I can see exactly what I have to remove from the driver's side and weld a plug here. The top half of the cowl also seems to fit perfectly!



Now I have to hurry up and sand and clean up the area, drill a ton of holes in the new cowl halves, epoxy primer everything, and weld it back onto the car!

 

[1973grandeklar]

Waiting for paint and supplies to continue, I brought out the 351W that I have destined for this car (or my son's 1972 depending on a 351C-4V that I am getting from Mustang7173). We got this motor in a package deal when my son bought this 1972 Mustang (see that rebuild thread). The previous owner had told us it was out of a 1969 mustang. It seems the block codes are at least consistent with this:





How much HP would a stock 351W have if it was from a 1969 Mustang? It has the 4 barrel intake.

Got the motor up on the engine stand and started the inspection and disassembly. Notice the mouse droppings all over the engine!



Took the valve covers off and was surprised to see that it is fairly clean! Aside from the mouse droppings and dog food that fell into the open oil filler hole:









Then I took the intake off and found the lifter valley fairly clean as well:



I took the oil pan off (sorry no picture) and the bottom end of the motor looks very clean. The bottom of the oil pan had a little bit of oil sludge, but no metal detected. I did not get to removing the heads as it is hotter than blazes here and I can only work in the garage in the evening just before dark. Plus I have to get up for work in the morning so I try not to work late. But if the pistons look good and cylinder walls are clean, this is another candidate of just replacing the oil pump, timing chain, and the gaskets. Clean the exterior and paint it and run this engine as is. What would be the chances that both the 302 and the 351W are both in excellent shape?

As a reminder, this is how I got the motors when we purchased a 1972 mustang in WV: