Tim's 1973 Mach 1 rebuild thread - it's done in 2023 on it's 50th birthday!

[73429mach]

Wow, I just went thru your entire thread. Amazing attention to detail, can't wait to see the end result. Keep up the good work. Ryan

 

[NOT A T5]

Once again...this is just my preference Tim. Bled my master on the bench cause the reservoir is 100% level. If you do spill brake fluid it's not so bad since it isn't all over your engine compartment. Bleeding from the bench is much easier than bleeding with the pump method which takes longer and may or may not work in the car that's most likely a 2 men operation. Much more controllable on the bench! Plus, that's how my Daddy used to do it!

 

[timachone]

Hey Tim, you're sure you're not restoring my car??? Amazing how many things are similar!

Yeah, we work in parallel, isn't it  :biggrin:  

But now you have passed me with suspension, brakes and anything, couldn't take my time in summer because of house projects although all the parts are laying ready for built-in on the shelves... But now I will try to follow up  :whistling:  

 

[timachone]

Wow, I just went thru your entire thread. Amazing attention to detail, can't wait to see the end result. Keep up the good work. Ryan

Thank you very much for your words, appreciate it very much. Me too can't wait any longer, hope to enter a representable car next summer  :wrench:

 

[timachone]

Once again...this is just my preference Tim. Bled my master on the bench cause the reservoir is 100% level. If you do spill brake fluid it's not so bad since it isn't all over your engine compartment. Bleeding from the bench is much easier than bleeding with the pump method which takes longer and may or may not work in the car that's most likely a 2 men operation. Much more controllable on the bench! Plus, that's how my Daddy used to do it!

OK, now I have your point, all good  :thumb:  

My car sits level on jack stands, without doors, hood open, towels under the master cylinder, so I chose the pump method in the car as a one man operation, which for me was much easier and mc was already built in after bleeding. 

 

[timachone]

In the meantime I went onto the front driver floor and addressed a big enough patch to get rid of all the rust and cut it over some frame lines so the visible spots from  underneath would be reduced at minimum. With a good sensible grind and some spritzzz of body primer and undercoating it will be undetectable, I think. But first drilling spot welds, cutting, welding, grinding, welding... 





































Now I have to close some spots with some additional welding, grind again, then done. With a good sealing of the surface it will last another 50 years 

 

[timachone]

To cool down I restored one original tail light out of two others and a new backing - looks almost like a new one again  :thumb:  

Required some hours of elbow grease, heat gun and different solvents... 

The old one: 



The process:  







Done



One more saved  :wrench:

 

[Stanglover]

To cool down I restored one original tail light out of two others and a new backing - looks almost like a new one again  :thumb:  

Required some hours of elbow grease, heat gun and different solvents... 

The old one: View attachment 56416

View attachment 56417

The process:  

View attachment 56410

View attachment 56411

View attachment 56413

Done

View attachment 56414

One more saved  :wrench:

View attachment 56412

View attachment 56415

It looks great Tim. Hard work always wins!

TIP for others; A trick I found when I did mine was to use brake fluid on the plastic. It will NOT affect the acrylic, but will dissolve any paint overspray or other grime. This is on just the acrylic, NOT the aluminum, so the the housing must be disassembled first. 

 

[timachone]

It looks great Tim. Hard work always wins!

TIP for others; A trick I found when I did mine was to use brake fluid on the plastic. It will NOT affect the acrylic, but will dissolve any paint overspray or other grime. This is on just the acrylic, NOT the aluminum, so the the housing must be disassembled first. 

Thanks Geoff for your words and thank you for the tip  :thumb:

 

[Kilgon]

Great to see that you are still making some good progress.  Nice work on your patch and the tail lights. 

 

[timachone]

Great to see that you are still making some good progress.  Nice work on your patch and the tail lights. 

Thank you very much for the compliments, I appreciate it!

 

[timachone]

Today morning - quite unusual time for me working in the garage - I found some time to work on. I finished welding the floor and now finished it for the whole car! I did a little patch on the front side of the floor, too. It was also a little thinned out on some spots. Now there are no more pinholes neither in the sheet metal nor the welds. Cleaned the welds on both sides and drilled the hole for the floor rubber plug. I am quite satisfied how it came out. Now it is ready for metal prep by some layers of rust proof primers and paint, will do the other floor pans as well. Luckily they only need some cleaning and paint. These steps will follow the next days. First I am happy to have managed this unexpected task  :wrench:

Marked the spots where some light from a flashlight came through to re-weld and close the line 





That's one nice weld, eh 



Finished 





Rubber plug hole 





The '70 Mustang Set have all plugs you need for our cars



Last patch 







Yessss  :dancebanana:

 

[timachone]

More progress, floors cleaned and the remained rust in the deeper spots was treated with Owatrol oil to seal it and prevent further rusting. Now to wait twice as long as usual to dry because of the cold weather here, about 32 degrees... After drying I will apply some black primer, then new seam sealer on the seams and final body color with a light sprizz clear coat as original... 

Underside finished, only missing some light undercoating... 

 

[timachone]

While waiting for further coatings I did and still do the right thing: wrenching, reassembling, the real nice work. So I started with the front suspension. First I had to install a 90 degree lube nipple kit on the upper control arms and it surprisingly went well with no problems. But then I recognized the upper control arms scratched on the back of both shock towers with their outer lips. So had to grab a hammer and massage the outer back lips of the upper control arms until they where with enough distance to the shock towers. A fact often occurs on the reproduction UPCs as I know. But with a good hammer dangling around and some black matte spray afterwards no problem at all. So the neighbours are knowing you are still working on... 

After that all went on within a few hours with no problems... 





























Now onto the steering parts this evening, an update will follow soon, my friends  :thumb:

 

[Stanglover]

Coming along nicely Tim. Looking like a real car again!

I notice you have chosen KYB Gas-A-Just shocks, on mine I find those a bit too harsh and I'm probably going to swap them out for Excel 2 (GR2) KYB (back and front) in spring.

 

[71ProjectJunk]

I installed those same Moog upper control arms on mine and they also hit the shock towers. I just put a couple of washers in the back to space them out a bit. The nuts that attach to UPC arms are also different from the stock nuts, so I needed to get new nuts too...

 

[Fabrice]

Dang it, you did a lot! You're gonna be done way before me at this pace!

 

[Klug]

Suspension looks like new...

 

[73MustangCoupe]

That's coming along nicely, Tim.  Keep up the good work.  

 

[timachone]

Thank you very much for the nice comments @all, I appreciate that very much!

In contrast to my announcement I took advantage of the nice weather and time with my little helper to install the rear axle with leaf springs and paint the floors with primer. 

After a few days of drying there will follow the final touch with gold. Although nobody will see it the next decades it's the feel about it that counts! 













Now with my little helper the axle went on again smooth, a next step forward in the right direction: 





























Now we will see what's next soon: rear shocks, front steering, front and rear brakes? Driveshaft? We'll see...  :thumb: