Is this sacreligious?

Hey I had no idea anybody on here would remember me. I've been away from the board for a long time. I may wind up with just a nice black paint job only this time it will have all good metal underneath it. It won't be an Eleanor. I've replaced the pans and toe boards, installed new torque boxes, new subframe connectors, re-skinned one door, new deck lid, new rear quarter panel, new trunk drop down panel and new wheel houses. I also surgically removed about a 3 foot section of inner and outer rocker panel from a donor car, took it apart and welded it into my car. I had to re-work the floor supports too. I took off my drag strip bars and put Shelby under riders on it. I have 2 small metal patch jobs left to do. I got some very mild 1 1/2 inch fiberglass flares for the rear. They are just enough wider that I can cut back the fender lips and cram those 28 x 9 ET Drags back under there safely.

I haven't been in prison or an asylum or anything. I have had quite a bit of illness: partial kidney failure, eye surgery. I'm on 4 medications a day now. Hey, whatever keeps you kicking. I haven't been just lazing around but it has been a struggle to try and stay productive. I bought a new old house to fix up, got a dog and I've had a few other projects going on.

I bought this from a guy who was loading it onto a trailer to take to the crusher. It didn't look like this when I bought it;


Its a 79 F150 Custom Explorer affectionately known as The Ugly Truck. I had to restore everything, repaint the dash, all new interior, build my own kick panels and headliner, rebuilt the tranny and AC, body work and paint. Of course I also had to muck with the engine. It will do this(just look closely. Oh that was on a private road, yeah, ha ha);


I also found this old Kawasaki Vulcan 1500 and rebuilt it last year;


I've been working on a buggy all this year. It needed new pans welded in so I did that. I sandblasted everything and refinished the chassis. I just finished building a brand new 1641 for it.



My son gave me these 17 inch rims for it.


It came originally from the manufacturer with mustang tail lights which I will be putting back on it when I get the body finished. I'm also going to put mustang front turn signals on it.


Last but not least, I've been buying parts all this year to finish the mustang which I promised my 84 year old mom I would have done while she is still able to climb in it and go for a run.

Oh, I forgot my helper. I can't leave him out.

Make it straight and make it black!

OK, had to do it. Not the best photo's, but gives you the idea. Plain-Jane black, but subtle differences. Note that the side marker trim, tail light bezels, gas cap, antenna base and grill trim are all black as well. They are powder coated or painted. Not a big deal, but people really notice. Straight sheet metal is a must!

That looks really sharp. A good black paint job is hard to beat and the old mustangs have body styles with some character so black really sets it off. It doesn't need to be very fancy. You have that nice semi-glossy textured black vinyl roof too though which I think helps the black paint pop more. My car was originally a plain jane black like below;


The scoop is a functional fresh air set up that came from a 1977 Mustang Cobra II. I have a K & N filter including the top and it comes right up to the edge of the hood under the scoop for fresh air. I painted the hood scoop semi-flat. So why would I scrape what looks like a perfectly good paint job off? It didn't look so good up close. Those are the 20 foot paint job pics. I also found bondo zones 3/4 inch thick under that. I had some rust in the pans too and found some more rust down under. Thats all fixed now. I wanted all the metal to be right this time because I don't plan to do this again.

I'm sort of semi-committed so some sort of silver somewhere considering my seats. That is also my new leather wrapped steering wheel.


I had my door panels stitched this way too to match the seats.


I have deleted the mustang dash pad for all metal. It will be black on top with silver metallic on the front with black instruments and glove box door. The steering column will also be silver metallic. I also have stripped all emblems and the rocker trim panels. All that stuff was old, crusted somewhat and beat up. It would have had to be replaced but I like the clean look. I don't plan to shave the door handles.

I have some very mild flares only on the rear right now. I don't think these will look out of whack with the stock front fenders because they have a little flare on them to begin with. I also run much larger tires on the back and skinny's on the front so I think the mild flares will look totally natural with that. I don't think most people will even notice they are there. They give me about an inch extra which is all the 28 inch tires need and then I can lower the rear back down. These will be glassed into the quarters. The tires in this pic are 26 x 8 1/2's which won't stick off the line and I also run out of legs on the track with them.

I Love What You Have Done Looks Great With A Personal Touch Where Did You Get The Steering Wheel

My son lives up off the loop in Dallas so I swung by Dallas Mustang parts and got a new windshield, headlight extensions and the steering wheel while I was up visiting at his place. I live about 170 miles east of Dallas out in the booney docks but close enough to the Redriver Raceway. They call it Thunder Road Raceway now. Its north of Shreveport and a very nice track.

Once my car is all back together it will run in the trophy street class.

Thanks for the comments. Yours is a nice looking ride too. I like the stance of it with those big rear wheels and the vintage mags. I think silver and black go together VERY well, if you can figure out how to pull it off tastefully. Good luck!

Hottarod, that is/was one good looking car, nice old school stance with the huge meats - the flares will make that even better.
The black, without a whole lot of add on stripes, scoops etc is beautiful, I wouldnt mess with success - or is it dont mess with Texas?
The car just says badd ass, sitting still.

Gydyup

good memory n20mike. I think of that post and ride thru the traps couple times a year.