Step 53 - Front Marker Lights

Installed Front Marker Lights.  Lenses are original, bezels (too pitted to salvage) and retainers (rusted to pieces) are new reproductions.  Used a little strip-caulk to reduce metal to metal contact between the bezels and the fenders.

Parts: original lenses, reproduction bezels and retainers, bolts from AMK

Step 52 - Hosed

Installed new radiator, heater, AC and power steering hoses.

Radiator Hoses:  Upper and lower radiator hoses and clamps from Marti AutoWorks, lower radiator hose spring from NPD and radiator overflow hose from Dead Nuts On Restorations.  Everything fit perfectly - no issues.

Heater Hoses:  Water tube, hoses and clamps all from NPD - the position of  Classic Auto Air's AC/Heater assembly made it necessary to use two hoses with a 90 degree bend at the firewall vs. just one that comes with the kit - yep had to buy two kits - anyone need some heater hose?

Power Steering Hoses:  Borgenson did not test their hoses in a '70 - they do not fit on the pump side.  So I engaged a local hydraulic shop to make a custom set of hoses.  They run along the top of the engine vs. underneath.  Borgenson gave me the okay to return the pair that comes with their steering box.

AC Hoses:  Classic Auto Air's hoses fit pretty good.  We had to shorten the lower condenser hose by about an inch, other than that, no issues.

Step 51 - Hood

Installed the hood on those freshly refinished hinges.  Required tweaking hinges, fenders, doors, etc...  Cowl positioned for reference only.  Now on to figuring out how to plant the shaker on that Air Gap Intake.
Parts:  original hood, NOS latch, bolts from AMK

Step 50 - Unhinged

Normally I don't blog about about what goes into or onto the parts and systems that are going back into the Mach during its reconstruction - but this step had some pretty cool stuff behind it.

Freshly refinished hinge

The original hinges were in good condition with some light rust and a couple of coats of black paint.  I did not want to repaint them, so when I read Jerry Heasley's article in March's Mustang Monthly I decided to try to put the original phosphate and oil finish back on.

I started with some paint remover followed with some time in the media-blaster to remove all rust, paint, primer and grime.  I safety wired the hinges closed (using stainless steel wire) to expose the inside of the spring's coils.

Manganese Phosphating in action

This is the stuff.  I used a turkey fryer with a 30 quart stainless pot.  I had to use 4 gallons of water to fully submerge one hinge.  14 ounces per gallon heated to 200F - the propane burner had it to temperature in about 30 minutes.  Drop the part in for 10 minutes then hose it down with WD-40.  Just follow the included instructions and it works awesome.  Note that you do not have to remix to treat additional parts - after I cooked one hinge - I just dropped in the other one.



Following the three prescribed WD-40 wash downs, the hinges looked great.  In my opinion, there is no way to emulate this finish with paint on a part that is as dimensionally complicated as this.  After everything cooled off, I filtered and stored the leftover solution in plastic containers - who knows what other Steps will require some more backyard chemistry.

Step 49 - Radiator and AC Condenser

Before

Installed the Radiator, Fan Shroud, AC Condenser and Hood Latch Support Brace.  All parts are new reproductions - and they all actually fit!  The Mach was not graced with factory AC, so all cooling components had to be updated from the old 20 inch radiator, 5 blade flex fan and missing shroud.  The original support brace was mangled on the bottom, too far gone to restore.


Parts: new radiator, new upper and lower radiator brackets with inserts, new shroud, new support brace, new condenser from Classic Auto Air, nuts and bolts from AMK body kit.

Step 48 - Door Latches and Striker Plates

Installed Door Latches and Striker Plates. Latches are original, spent some time with the parts washer and they cleaned up great. The original strikers were a different story. I found a set of NOS ones (thanks Roger...again). Driver's side still needed a little tweaking to get the striker's backing plate in the correct position to preserve the doors lines.
Parts: original door latches, NOS strikers, screws from AMK

Step 47 - Fan and Clutch

Since the Mach is getting some A/C and I live in Florida - I replaced the original 351C-2V flex fan with a 7 bladed clutch fan from a Cougar (part number: C9WE-C).  Clutch is new.  
Parts:  fan, clutch, bolts from AMK.

Step 46 - Carpet

Got the carpet in from Auto Custom Carpets - Wayne did the install - made it look easy. 
I chose to go with ACC's 'Mass Backing' option, which is a thicker backing then their usual 'poly' backing material.

Step 45 - Sail Panels

Time to revisit the interior.  The original Sail Panels had suffered water damage during storage - so I purchased some reproductions but they did not line up correctly on the front edge.  So I called in Wayne (he does more than just carpet).  Wayne recreated the original panels with all new materials.  We lined the area behind the panels with some DynaLiner vs. using jute.  Installed some new reproduction lights to finish it off.

Perfect Install

Step 44 - Fenders

Installed splash shields and fenders.  Both fenders are new reproductions since the originals were beyond repair.  Thanks again to David for some expert panel alignment.  Bolt kits from AMK.

Step 43 - Doors

Hung doors and installed handles.  David (the car-body genius) lined everything up.  These are new reproduction doors from NPD - both doors required some 'adjustment' to the sheet metal during the paint stage to get the panel lines straight.  Handles are new too - the originals were too pitted to use.  Hinge/door bolts from AMK.

Step 42 - Accessorize

Installed the Alternator, Power Steering Pump, and A/C Compressor.  I had all of the brackets powder coated.  Everything bolted right up except the A/C compressor bracket - it needed some work.  It did not have enough room on the bottom to clear the power steering pump and the holes did not line up with the bolt holes in the head - grind, grind, grind...  Be aware that the hoses that Borgeson sells for a '70 will not fit a '70 style pump.

 

Parts:  Brackets - original, Alternator - original (rewound for high current), Power Steering Pump (original - paint from NPD matches the original 1970 color), A/C Compressor (new from Classic Auto Air), all nuts and bolts new from AMK.

Step 41 - Starter

Installed RobbMC mini-starter.  Adjustable solenoid is pretty cool - fits well with FPA headers and much lighter than the original.

Step 40 - Transmission

Installed a Lentech Street Bruiser AOD.  This was a big-long step with the usual complications of updating a major component.

Starting out, we left the RMP mounts and FPA headers loose - this allowed us to wiggle the AOD in from underneath and get the bell housing bolted up.  Next came the mount and cross-member installation and some issues.

I tried three different cross-members before finding one that fit the car.  The Summit 'brand' cross-member worked with some minor modifications that allowed us to shift the transmission to the right so the headers could clear Borgensen's Steering Box.  We also had to slightly curl the rear edge of the pan to clear the cross-member.

Steering box clearance

After securing the cross-member we tightened up everything and ended up with about a 3/16 gap between the headers and the lower part of the steering box.  We achieved this with a 3/8 inch offset to the right on the engine and about a 1/2 inch offset to the right on the transmission.

Other Notes:  longer bell housing bolts are required, FPA Headers are awesome - a shift in cylinder #7's tube would allow us Cleveland types to clear the Borgensen box without hacking on the transmission mount, RMP mounts worked great, don't get your cross-member from Ebay and don't buy the one made by JBA - they don't fit.

Parts:  Lentech AOD and torque converter, Summit cross-member, mount from NPD

Step 39 - Engine

Hooked it up and dropped it in.  Took three of us - one manning the hoist and one on each side to guide the headers (thanks Bob and Tom).  RMP motor mounts made alignment easy.  Bolted on the flywheel and called it a night.

Step 38 - Prep for Engine Install

Finished prepping the engine bay - installed battery hold-down strap and battery wires, caulked around AC and heater hoses, adjusted steering lockout arm, plugged all firewall and body holes and detailed everything. 

Cleaned up the Cleveland and installed Ron Morris motor mounts.  This is the original block - its been updated with the following (back in April '10): bored .030 over, new pistons (KB Hypereutectic 177), roller hydraulic cam (Crane HR-224/339-2S-12), roller lifters (Crane 36532), roller rockers (Comp Cams 1130), stock rods, stock crank, Trick Flow heads, Air Gap intake, Holley 670, aluminum water pump, blue-printed Melling oil pump (not high volume), MSD distributor (8577) - all that good stuff dyno tuned to 445 HP back in May '10.

Step 37 - Windshield Washer Reservoir

Installed new reservoir and washer pump.  Originals crusty - replaced with reproductions.

Step 36 - Trunk Weatherstrip

Still trying to find a dash pad that fits - even drove up to NPD in Ocala and checked the four they had in stock - no joy - so instead of moving ahead with the dash - we installed he trunk's weatherstrip.

Step 35 - Gauge Cluster

Installed the original Gauge Cluster.  Spent some time plastic polishing all of the lenses and repainting the housing.  Swapped out all the original 194 bulbs with LEDs (no burnt diffusers) and replaced the voltage regulator.  Replaced the original speedometer cable with a new one from Virginia Mustang (for some reason the cable in this car was a 4-speed cable vs. the correct FMX cable). The obvious next step would be to finish up with the dash installation - but I had to send the dash pad back to Dashes Direct since it had some quality issues...
Parts:  original cluster, new LEDs, new voltage regulator, new speedometer cable and clamps, cluster hardware from AMK.

Step 34 - Front Speaker

Don't buy a cool dual-voice coil front speaker if you're retro-fitting AC...you won't be able to attach the duct...oops, bad Plan A.

Plan B:  Buy a pair of good 3.5 inch speakers that can handle a peak of 50 watts.  Next you'll need a mount - do not buy the plastic one...once you put a little torque on those screws the 'not made in USA' plastic will shatter - not crack - but shatter.  Higher quality coaxial speakers will weigh more than cheaper less power-capable ones - this mount is not up to the task.

Plan C:  Break out big tools and fabricate.  I used 1/4 inch aluminum - plenty of room for the duct and it should last a long long time.