motor work

hello, update!

went out to my dad's on friday night taking the train and shit. we went out to dinner but when i got back to his place i put in a little work refinishing and painting my oil pan and harmonic balancer:





the next morning we woke up early and got down to brass tacks, lifting the donor motor into the air and checking clearances in the engine bay for headers/etc...







what you don't see here is me telling my dad the headers wouldn't fit and we'd need to put them in from the bottom and then having to take them off and putting the motor into the engine bay. woof. we spilled tranny fluid everywhere in the process, but got the guts into there.







as you can see above, headers are right up against the shock tower, and thats with just one side in. oof. back to the drawing board!

below is my dad going "son of a bitch that isn't going to work!"



cassy got over and we lifted the whole car up in the air to get the front end off (next weekend)





next we went over to the motor and started changing freeze plugs. we got to the furthest back and as you can see from the next two photos (wesssssttttt siddddddeeeee) it was in need of some desperate attention:





one touch with a screwdriver and it burst. good thing we changed these now! note to anyone reading, ALWAYS USE BRASS FREEZE PLUGS!

we coated all of these with #2 permatex to ensure we got a great seal. there is no way in hell i want to see water running down my block.



next we scraped off the old junker gaskets, and then flipped the motor right side up:





we torqued on the cam shaft bolt, and i forgot the technical name for it, but the cam type deal that is responsible for powering the fuel pump. next we got the seal put on the timing cover, and #2 permatexed the gasket for it, and got that on the motor:



we also got new freeze plugs in on the other side, and began to install the oil pump:



and then the pickup tube:







following this we installed the oil pan (finally!) with a one piece steel reinforced dry seal rubber pan gasket. very nice!









once we got the oil pan on, we gave it a quick coat of ford gray, and i must say, it looks damn near brand new now!



next we got the redone harmonic balancer put on. i don't have pictures of it, but we picked up a shaft saver for the harmonic balancer to bring the somewhat worn down shaft back to normal:



next we started putting the intake manifold on using some nice looking grade 8 bolts, which i am glad we used for both strength and aesthetics, working as a welders helper for a few years, i began to learn an appreciation for that goldish hue you'd see on a grade 8 bolt.





after this we got the water pump installed after putting some more #2 permatex on the gasket. we ended up using a water pump for a 1970 ford mustang with an outlet to the driver side. the reason for this is to match our newer style harmonic balancer, as well as timing marker.





after we got this all done, i took some shots for the night









now while this was all happening, cassy shot the spackle paint into the engine bay. i took some pictures this morning but they don't really do it justice. next weekend we will shoot another layer and perhaps a clear coat:







next weekend:

remove and reinstall the new front end
install flexplate and other miscellaneous onto the motor
install motor mounts and drop motor and transmission into the engine bay! (yessssssssssssssssssssssss)

and we will see where we get from there.

daylight shots

UPDATEEEEEE:

last night i had to drive back out to my dads to meet him coming home from alaska, and also to drop julie off at the airport the next day. we shot a real quick test of spatter paint to see how it would come out in the engine bay/to see how our primer job was doing.







you can see how there is a textured look to the paint now. upon looking at it though, and i'm definitely learning, i need to take some light steel wool/sandpaper to the primer just to make it rougher/let the paint stick a bit better.

some better pictures (daylight!) of the car and interior:







this needs torn out/replaced badly (dash):



yellowing/cracked wheel. hopefully replace this with a nice wood grain wheel:



rear deck, messed up from taking speakers out/etc... back in the day. probably not going to change much, just get some speakers, clean it up, and put it back together.



inner door, hopefully going to make some clothe side panels. my dad was talking about using aluminum diamond plate, or something like that, but i'm really trying to stick with the "grocery getter" look. really clean and using the cars old aesthetics.



julie's great job of cleaning up the interior. she did such a great job.





last night i also shot some stripper on the oil pan to remove the gunky ass paint that has been on it for years:







i'll be sanding it down and stripping the rest this weekend and repainting with this hi temp engine enamel, which is ford gray:



this is a GM internally regulated alternator, which i'll be using on the motor, to avoid having to use an external regulator/etc...

plus i think it looks nicer than the ford ones. sorry ford!



i went ahead and took some pictures of the crank and rods/etc...

everything is sitting with oil on it and we've turned the crank a few times messing with the timing chain/etc... to keep it all loose:







you can see the gross looking block, which hopefully i'll be stripping/repainting this weekend as well, and also changing the freeze plugs/etc...

getting more excited every day!

engine bay work day two

another update. went out tonight with cassy and julie, and met up with my brothers while i was at it. we finished sanding and primering the interior of the engine bay.















julie also cleaned the interior a little more, and it looks almost brand new!





getting somewhere!