franktf

On the weekend of 1/4/13 thru 1/6/13 I ventured from Florida to New Jersey with a car trailer in tow, all to purchase 72 Mercury Comet that has spent the majority of it's life in an antique car meseum..... It currently has the original 200 I6 and C4 automatic in it..... It only had 15,052 miles on it when I perchased it..... It has a a couple dings and a few nicks and scratchs but the paint still has a shine to it, even though it was a little dingy looking when I picked it up..... The chrome pieces on the car are straight but not in the best condition, I am sure due to it's 15,000 mile in the NJ weather..... The car is very solid, it only has surface rust on the underside and has never had any body work before..... I cleaned it up really good today and I have to say it looks pretty damn good for it's age.....

It was running when I got it but not to my liking, today I changed the plugs, straightened out some vacuum hoses, replace a couple pieces of fuel line, added an extra fuel filter to it, set the timing - It is definately running better but not great yet, I think the gas is a little old(it is cloudy looking in the clear filter I put on) so I put some gas treatment in it and filled it up with 93..... We will just have to see what happens there..... I also found the water pump to be wobbling around(I have no idea why it didn't leak), so I flushed the cooling system and replaced the pump and thermostat(I think the alternator is making some noise too, guess that will be next)..... I am not going to use this motor but want to keep it running and dependable until I change it.....

Any ways the good stuff, here's some pic's of it after I cleaned it up.....

franktf

I had a chance to get it up on a lift at work.....

I can't believe the condition of the batery tray.....

franktf

This is the first mod on the car..... I had someone who wanted to buy the original steering wheel, so I put the new Grant wheel I have on.....

Here's the before and after pic's.....

franktf

I had been driving this thing around with am radio that I could only get talk/sports radio on..... I couldn't take it any more so today I put a new stereo in..... I could only find a head unit I liked locally so I put it in and hooked it up to the stock dash speaker and through a couple Pyle 4" speakers I had laying around in the corners of the package tray for now..... Just about everything I found for speakers locally look like a damn space ship or something, so I ordered some on line today that look and will work decent.....

Here I was cutting the radio mounting plate from the car out for a single din style head unit.....




Here is the modified bracket with the new head unit installed beside a stock am radio and bracket assembly.....




Here the new one is mounted in the dash.....

franktf

I have been looking for Maverick/Comet bucket seat tracks, and now I have a set of LDO style and a set regular ones..... I also got the subframe connectors fron Chassis Engineering this week.....

Today I removed the rear seat and interior quater panels so I could remove the pagkage tray panel to put speaker holes in it..... Man this thing is clean underneith all this stuff..... I have never had the pleasure before of working on a car this old that is this clean..... Anyways, got the package tray panel out and cut the speaker holes in it..... Then I got it back in the car and got the speakers mounted..... I still have to mount the front speakers and get the speaker wire run.....

Here's the bucket seat tracks, LDO's then the regular ones.....





Here's the subframe connectors.....




Here's what the rear seat area and inner quaters look like uncovered.....





Speaker holes cut in package tray panel, then installed in car with the speakers.....






Last but not least I picked up a decent set of 86 Mustang LX Low Back Bucket seats to use..... They will be reapulstered along with the stock rear seat to match.....

franktf

No real progress on the car today, I have been needing to clean/rearrange things at the shop so that's pretty much what I did today(should finish that up tomorrow)..... I did however take the car over to have it evaluated for a cage and we came to an agreement..... It will be getting a chromolly cage with swing out/removable side bars, it will also still have a back seat in it(the car will be 8.50 legal when done)..... I'll need to get to work next week, got to mount the seats and get the subframe connectors welded in(it will be going for the cage at the end of March).....

blacksheep-1

It needs one of these..............


Ford 427 SOHC Engine in action!! - YouTube

Na306StAnG

Its no longer 1976...


It really needs a boosted LSX and Frank knows it!

blacksheep-1

Ohhhh gawd.......just crush it now

OldMan

Clean looking ride Frank! Keep us updated!