Sorry for the REALLY long post, but I've been building all this stuff up for a month or so and I needed an outlet.
I feel I should explain my intentions before I continue. I am not a racer, and probably never will be. I'm not interested in building a drag car or whatever. I'm not even interested in how this would fare against others on the street. When I say I want a sleeper, I want it so I won't be noticed and bothered at stoplights. I drive solely for my own pleasure.. and my goals with this car are to build something that's pleasing to my eye, exciting for me to drive when I stick my foot in it, but still keep the kind of fuel efficiency to be expected from mixing a 2900 lb./25 year old car with more modern technology like EFI and more diverse gearing options.
I also absolutely love inline 6s. (the name isn't just a gimmick) I already have two vehicles with V8s.
I will under NO circumstances ever put anything other than an inline 6 in this car.
Now that that's out of the way.. (just trying to save possible frustration later) the car: As the title says, it's an '83 Fairmont 4 door.. 200 I6/C5.. 101,000 miles. A/C works and most of the A/C hardware was replaced recently. Only other options are PS, PB, and a rear defroster. Was owned by older men (50+) for its entire life, and I'm the third owner. Was garage kept or covered for most of its life. There's NO rust on this car aside from one spot on the left rear corner where it was dented. The first owner drove it after a stroke and had a minor fender-bender with it, so it has a few scratches.
He also drove it with the hood not latched properly and flipped it, (something I almost did the day I drove it home) hence the hood was replaced before it was repainted. The only problems with the car other than the scratches are a leaky heater core, (bypassed for now) and a need for new shocks & struts.
I've had it for about a month now, and I've already made decent progress on it.
I've done:
- Tune-up, of course. (new Autolite plugs, generic plug wires, cheap Accel coil, generic cap & rotor, PCV, all filters except transmission, 180 deg. thermostat and new housing, two cans of SeaFoam before plug change, Auto-RX added on oil change, two radiator flushes and refills, new battery wires and terminals, replaced all non-headlight exterior bulbs and one headlight)
- Painted the stock wheels low-gloss black with bronze centercaps.
- Painted the fake woodgrain dash pieces bronze. (eventually I'll do the door trim too)
- Painted the inner grille piece and taillight surrounds bronze.
- Painted the dash cover a light tan color. (needs more paint)
- Covered the rear package tray in some tan velour fabric from Wal-Mart.
- Added a (Proform, I think) 16" pusher fan on a dash switch and relay setup.
- Added a Sunpro mini-tach and set of 1.5" Sunpro mini-gauges.
- Added spare Grant GT steering wheel from parts car,
after I broke the trim off the stock wheel. Oops. Painted the wheel the same bronze as the rest of the dash, and used a lighter color on the horn button.
- Added the two-horn set from my Mark VII parts car.
- New floormats. (yawn)
My immediate plans for it (and likely my next Making Progress post) involve a set of Mustang 15x7 10-holes I picked up for $150 locally, and the Eastwood powdercoating kit I also recently purchased. I'm painting them Eastwood's
bronze metallic and high-gloss clearcoat. Here's a comparison between the original (sandblasted) wheel and the bronze powder: (not yet clearcoated)
(Click Thumbnail #7)
My long-term intentions for it include some kind of forced induction (leaning toward an Eaton M90.. I've always wanted a supercharged car) along with Classic Inlines' new aluminum head for the small-block I6. Mild cam, roller rockers, whatever else I need to do to go along with it. EFI conversion.. maybe a Megasquirt. My goal is around 200 at the rear wheels, from something that makes like 85 now. Since my fiance will also be driving the car on occasion, I'll probably want to use one of the MSD boxes that allows for crude traction control as well.
Anyway, I have a lot of details to work out about that yet, but I don't plan this for a couple years yet. (I wanna get the rest of the car to where it can handle the extra power first)
I'll also likely keep it an automatic, but I'm not sure which yet. I have a spare AOD, but I'm interested in the "Project Frankentranny" from some Explorer forum where they blended an A4LD with a 5R55E. (that depends on getting a certain bellhousing that I'm not sure I can find easily or cheaply) I'm thinking around 3.55s out back, but the big change out back will be if I can get my hands on a Cobra IRS setup. Need to look into whether an Aerostar aluminum driveshaft would fit.
Of course I'll be upgrading the brakes. I'm shooting for Cobra 13"s up front and maybe Mark VII disks out back.. whatever works with the IRS, pretty much. 17" wheels to fit all that, when the time comes. I'll also do whatever structural reinforcements I need to do.. subframe connectors, torque box reinforcement, strut tower brace, etc.
I'll be finishing it up with a nice paint job, but I can't decide on color yet. I'm fluctuating between deep jewel green, a nice dark blue, or the deep purple color from the new Fusion. (I've seen it up close, it's gorgeous) I'm thinking about blacking out most of the chrome. The interior will inherit the two-tone from the outside of the car.. I'm thinking deep brown carpet and headliner, and a dark brown vinyl for the parts of the bench seats that aren't normally sat on.. but the four main seating surfaces I'll redo in a tan cloth. I'll probably get the windows tinted long before all of that.
Finally, I think I'll be using the idea from this site to use a portable music player hooked to an amp, and build a decent stereo but hide as much of it as I can. I have three dash speaker holes, so I'm thinking about trying out some sort of center channel setup.. tweeters in the 3.5" dash holes, a normal speaker in the center.. 6 1/2" speakers in each door with the speaker covers painted tan to help hide them.. and maybe 8" subwoofers and small boxes for each mounted where the 5x7s normally go, via some fabricated adapter.
If you took the time to read all that, you may be eligible for a medal.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read all that. Hope to have that wheel powdercoating post up in the next week or so, with a brand new set of BF Goodrich g-Force Sports on them.
