MissionGarage
Member
- Joined
- Oct 11, 2018
- Messages
- 23
- Reaction score
- 0
- Location
- Mexico NY
- My Car
- 1971 Mustang fastback. Aborted resto mod attempt. Trying to repair and finish the car.
Hello, I am new here. My name is Bob, and my business is called Mission Garage. I specialize in buying, selling, and servicing collector cars of all brands.
This week we took in a 1971 Mustang fastback that is the victim of an amateur “restorer” that was working way out of his skill level. The car was brought to him, apparently in rough condition, by a widow who wanted to have her late husband‘s pride and joy restored. The car has all new floors, rockers, trunk floor replaced; new quarters and wheel housings, and replacement doors. I consider the work to be decent amateur. The car is painted and 3/4 assembled. The work is what I would call decent driver quality.
The problem area – The guy talked her into upgrading to a newer drivetrain, citing better power and drivability. He ended up buying a 2002 Mustang with the 4.6 and five speed and set about putting that in the car.
I was referred by a friend, because for six months the guy has been promising to get it running, and finally admitted defeat. What I have found is a car with the engine installed and massive gobs of wires going in all directions. Once it was inside my trailer, I lay down to strap it in and I saw a poorly welded crossmember made out of square stock with a rack and pinion bolded to it. The strut rod‘s coming from the lower A-frames to the front most crossmember were gone because this crossmember was in the way. Upon further examination, the strut rods are now running towards the back of the car, bolted to some handmade ears that he welded in. WTF. The transmission mount is fabricated from various pieces of scrap steel and angle iron.
Under the hood, it gets even worse. There are various harnesses laid wide open and cut up. There is at least one ECM laying loose against the firewall. I haven’t measured anything, but the engine appears to be slightly cocked. He put the newer car’s radiator in with electric fans. They aren’t connected, and the upper mount is a piece of bare sheet metal tacked on and flashrusted. Inside the car dashboard is incomplete and laying loose. In the passengers foot well is another loose computer with a huge harness running somewhere. He mounted the battery in the trunk and ran cables, but I can’t see that work yet because the car is full of boxes of loose trim and parts. Everything is pieced together with Miss matched screws and bolts.
The situation is, the lady has spent a ton of money on the car. She is heartbroken and asked me if there was anyway you could be saved, or if she should just sell it for parts. Of course, anything can be saved with the right amount of work, and I have been down this road before. The question will be if she wants to commit to the time and the cost it will require. The guy that did the work is now fighting cancer; so I doubt she will have any recourse there.
This car is so bad that my preliminary game plan would be to find a parts car were they stock front crossmember and put everything back; ditch the modern engine and wiring, and go back to a 302 or something. We can straighten out the wiring and get it running and driving right, but it remains to be seen if she wants to eat that kind of a bill.
So, here I am doing some initial research. Any thoughts that any of you want to throw my way would be welcome. Also, any line on a parts car, somewhere reasonably within range of the Northeastern United States.
I do have pictures if anyone is interested.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
This week we took in a 1971 Mustang fastback that is the victim of an amateur “restorer” that was working way out of his skill level. The car was brought to him, apparently in rough condition, by a widow who wanted to have her late husband‘s pride and joy restored. The car has all new floors, rockers, trunk floor replaced; new quarters and wheel housings, and replacement doors. I consider the work to be decent amateur. The car is painted and 3/4 assembled. The work is what I would call decent driver quality.
The problem area – The guy talked her into upgrading to a newer drivetrain, citing better power and drivability. He ended up buying a 2002 Mustang with the 4.6 and five speed and set about putting that in the car.
I was referred by a friend, because for six months the guy has been promising to get it running, and finally admitted defeat. What I have found is a car with the engine installed and massive gobs of wires going in all directions. Once it was inside my trailer, I lay down to strap it in and I saw a poorly welded crossmember made out of square stock with a rack and pinion bolded to it. The strut rod‘s coming from the lower A-frames to the front most crossmember were gone because this crossmember was in the way. Upon further examination, the strut rods are now running towards the back of the car, bolted to some handmade ears that he welded in. WTF. The transmission mount is fabricated from various pieces of scrap steel and angle iron.
Under the hood, it gets even worse. There are various harnesses laid wide open and cut up. There is at least one ECM laying loose against the firewall. I haven’t measured anything, but the engine appears to be slightly cocked. He put the newer car’s radiator in with electric fans. They aren’t connected, and the upper mount is a piece of bare sheet metal tacked on and flashrusted. Inside the car dashboard is incomplete and laying loose. In the passengers foot well is another loose computer with a huge harness running somewhere. He mounted the battery in the trunk and ran cables, but I can’t see that work yet because the car is full of boxes of loose trim and parts. Everything is pieced together with Miss matched screws and bolts.
The situation is, the lady has spent a ton of money on the car. She is heartbroken and asked me if there was anyway you could be saved, or if she should just sell it for parts. Of course, anything can be saved with the right amount of work, and I have been down this road before. The question will be if she wants to commit to the time and the cost it will require. The guy that did the work is now fighting cancer; so I doubt she will have any recourse there.
This car is so bad that my preliminary game plan would be to find a parts car were they stock front crossmember and put everything back; ditch the modern engine and wiring, and go back to a 302 or something. We can straighten out the wiring and get it running and driving right, but it remains to be seen if she wants to eat that kind of a bill.
So, here I am doing some initial research. Any thoughts that any of you want to throw my way would be welcome. Also, any line on a parts car, somewhere reasonably within range of the Northeastern United States.
I do have pictures if anyone is interested.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
