After I finished painting the dash I was torn between re-assembling it or applying some sound proofing and heat barrier to the interior.  I decided to continue with re-assembling the dash so as to get the car back to a drivable condition as soon as possible.  The plan sounded good on paper but things don’t always go as planned.  The real hold up is that I am waiting on some parts.  I could put the dash back together and then remove the instrument cluster again after the parts come in.  But I have plenty to do in the mean time so I decided to wait for the parts before I install the instrument cluster.

Of course the instrument cluster didn’t prevent me from installing the rest of the dash.  I installed the dash pad and trim, the knee kick pad, the heater control panel, and the dash trim panels on the passenger side of the dash.  The fit for some of the pieces was extremely tight.  I’m attributing this to the new dash pad, which looks nice but doesn’t quite match the original.  It is thicker and the embossed trim on the edges is a little bit different.  But since I’m not building a concours restoration this pad will work OK.  While I was assembling the dash I realized that I needed to order a few items.  I thought I had screws for the instrument cluster but I didn’t.  The new dash trim panel that goes over the glove box was missing a small running horse.  And the glove box rubber bumpers had crumbled and fallen apart.  I also wanted to replace the dash clock in the instrument cluster.  Both the clock and the screws are on back-order which is why I haven’t been able to finish up the dashboard yet.

While I was working on the dash I received a delivery with my Quiet Ride AcoustiShield kit.  This kit contains sound damper and heat barrier to do the interior, roof, and trunk of my car.  Since the dash was on hold I decided to try and tackle this kit.  The installation isn’t that difficult, but there are a lot of pieces and it is time consuming to install.  Today I worked on the interior floor.  I removed the seats, seat belts, shifter boot, and dimmer switch.  Then I cleaned up the floor as much as I could. The kit uses Dynamat and contact cement, neither of which will adhere to dirt.

Next I laid out the pieces of Dynamat according to the instructions.  The kit comes with pre-cut pieces of Dynamat and a diagram that shows you where to place them.  After I had laid them all out I peeled off the backing from each piece, exposing the adhesive.  Then I stuck down the Dynamat and pressed it on to the floor using the roller that was supplies in the kit.  Not very difficult so far.

The next part, applying the thermal barrier, was a bit more challenging.  I laid out all the pieces on the floor of the car to see where and how they would all fit.  I ended up with a couple of small pieces left over.  I’m hoping that it will become evident where they fit after I install the remaining parts of the kit.  For the big parts I could identify I sprayed contact cement on the floor and the back of the heat barrier and glued the pieces down.  The last step was to seal the seams and edges with the supplied foil tape.

The end result is not quite as perfect as I would have liked, but it came out pretty well.  Tomorrow I plan to install the AcoustiShield kit for the roof of the car, and any parts of the trunk and body kits that require access through the interior.  They will be much easier to install while the interior is removed.  I also plan to post some pictures so you can see how it turned out.

Next on my list is to repaint the dashboard.  It doesn’t look too bad but could definitely use some sprucing up.  I went right to work stripping off all the trim panels, the defroster controls, the instrument cluster, the knee kick pad, and the dash pad.  I also removed the headlight switch, the ignition switch, the seat belt warning light, the fog light switch, the parking brake handle and the vent control.  Finally I pulled the steering wheel, turn signal lever and emergency flasher switch.  Then I dropped the steering column and removed the rubber bumpers for the glove box.  At this point I did some looking around and noticed that the one of the defroster hoses had a tear in it.  So I removed the defroster vents from the dash and replaced the hoses with a pair I had on the shelf.

Here are some pictures of the stripped dashboard.  The paint is really much worse than it looks in the pictures.

I spent some time looking over some of the old parts and comparing colors with the new parts.  I decided to keep the steering wheel pad and the knee kick pad.  I gave them a thorough cleaning and then used some vinyl paint to make them look a little bit newer.  I also did some scrubbing with 0000 steel wool on the ash tray compartment.  It cleaned up quite a bit but still isn’t as good as new.  I’ll probably use it for now and think about replacing it at a later date.  The defroster controls could also use some cleaning up.  The chrome is a bit pitted bit I think I can make it look passable with some more cleaning and polishing.

Update: Today I scuffed up the dash and steering column.  Then I cleaned everything carefully with mineral spirits and masked as best as I could.  After two coats of primer here’s how everything looked.  I will admit that I got a lot of over-spray on the heater and defroster boxes.  That was because I forgot to pull the drop cloth I was using to cover the floor far enough up under the dash.  I’ll have to try and clean up that mess after I finish with the painting.

I let the primer flash for about 30 minutes.  Then on to the actual painting.  I used two light coats rather than one heavy coat.  The first coat just barely colored the primer.  After the second coat everything was covered fairly well.  I’m not ready to reinstall all the dash parts yet because I’m still waiting for my acoustic and heat shielding to arrive.  Some of the shielding will go on the dash so I want to keep everything as open as i can until after I install the shielding.  It should be here in the next few days.  In the mean time I can clean up the over-spray mess I made as well as cleaning up any of the old hardware I need to reuse.

Here’s some pictures showing how the paint on the dash came out.

The car is now sitting safely in the garage and I’m rested up from my vacation.  Time to get back to work.  The job that I had set for myself to perform next was painting the interior and cleaning and lubricating the window and door lock mechanisms.  Val had done some work on one of the rear windows, but the rest of the car hadn’t been cleaned and lubricated in a very long time.

I decided to tackle the interior one part or section at a time.  This would permit me to keep the car drivable while I was working on it.  This decision would force me to perform tasks in an order that wasn’t the most optimal, but would help prevent the car from being disassembled and then risking having it sit for a long time.  So I chose to work on the interior prior to painting.  This is in contrast to dissembling the entire car, painting it, and then reassembling.

The paint on the interior of the driver’s side door had some rust poking up through the paint.  The most likely cause was from the sweat of a person’s arm resting on the top edge of the door while driving.  This rust has been peeking up through the paint for as long as I’ve owned the car.  I tried to repair it years ago with a wire wheel and some paint.  The end result was some remaining rust and paint that was so thick it was starting to fill in the grain in the metal on the door.  I decided that the best fix was to completely strip and repaint both doors.

Step number one was to take off the door handle and window crank.  The door panel and arm rest were already removed.  Then I removed the vent window assembly.  It was pitted and the weatherstrip on it had hardened and was falling apart.  Finally I pried out the door run weather stripping and scraped off the lower door opening weather strip.

The next step was to apply paint stripper and try to get the many layers of paint off of the door.  It took several applications and scraping sessions to remove some of the paint.  Then I spent about two hours with a drill and a wire wheel to remove the rest of the paint and the rust.  The metal on the door was looking nice and shiny at this point.  There were a couple of very noticeable dents in the lower part of the door.  I used a hammer and dolly to try and knock the dents back out as much as I could.  I’m not an experienced body man, and I couldn’t use any filler as it would fill in the grain in the door.  So it didn’t come out absolutely perfect, but the dents are much harder to see.

Here’s a couple of pictures of the passenger door after stripping.

Now I was ready to paint.  I taped up the areas I didn’t want to paint and cleaned off the metal with mineral spirits.  I started with a coat of self etching primer.  That went on nice and smooth, and the door looked pretty god after the primer had flashed.  For color I used a can of interior paint I purchased from one of the mustang parts vendors.  It is supposed to match the original paint used by Ford at the factory.  To my eye it matches pretty well.  I applied a very light coat for the first coat.  Not even enough to completely cover the primer.  I let that dry for about 15 minute and applied another very thin coat.  The idea was to cover everything but not fill in the metal grain.  It probably isn’t show car worthy, but I think it came out pretty well.

Next I disassembled the vent window, removed all of the weather stripping, and cleaned it thoroughly.  The chrome was a bit pitted and scratched.  I cleaned and polished it the best I could, but it still looks a bit shabby.  I decided to live with it and spare the expense of replacing both vent window frames.  I hope i don’t regret that decision later.  There are several pieces of weather stripping on the vent window.  There is one that goes along the side of the frame, One that goes on teh front of the frame, one that surrounds the vent window, and the front door run.  I replaced all of them since none of them were in serviceable condition.

Here’s a picture of the door after painting and reinstalling the vent window.  The light isn’t the best in my garage but hopefully it shows enough detail.

This evening I made the almost two hour trip via public transportation to pick up my car.  Val picked me up at the subway station and drove me to his garage.  There were a couple of last minute items to address before I could test drive the car.  Val had me install the driver’s seat belts and a shifter boot that I brought with me.  He installed the rear end bump stops.  The parts I supplied didn’t fit correctly so he had ordered a new set that fit.  He also did some repair work on one of my rear quarter windows that didn’t roll up and down.  Some bending of the arm and some lubrication fixed it right up.  Val pointed out that the engine oil dip stick was reading over full, so he drained some oil out of the motor.  I’m pretty certain that I didn’t over fill it, but the dip stick reading said otherwise.  I’m going to check again after my next oil change and see if I need to re-mark the dipstick.  We also tried to center the brake pressure differential switch, but it didn’t want to move and we didn’t have a lot of time.  So for now that remains to be fixed.

Val added some gas to the car.  Then we confirmed that the gas gauge was working.  It may have had a bad connection at first, but it started working fine.  I took the car for a test ride around the block and everything seemed to be working fine.  The steering was fairly tight (for an old mustang) and the car tracked straight.  The brakes weren’t as sensitive as before the power booster was replaced.  The new exhaust sounded louder than I would have liked, but I will reserve judgement until after all of the sound deadener and interior have been installed.  And the clutch worked fine although it engaged a lot higher than my other car and took me some time to get used to.  When I finished my test drive I got settled in with my directions and phone charger and headed for home.

For the ride home I selected a route with a mix of city, back road, and a bit of highway driving.  The entire route was close to 70 miles.  I started out pretty slow on the back roads until I gained confidence in the car.  That didn’t take very long as the car was handling and riding better than it ever has.  I stopped and filled the tank.  At the gas station two people came over to admire the car.  During the drive home I got several waves from other muscle car drivers.  I really enjoyed that since the car doesn’t look like much with its’ black accented with multiple types of primer custom paint job.

After a stop to get some quick fuel for the driver I took the car for the 12 mile highway portion of the drive.  It ran pretty smooth on the highway except for the fact that I kept wanting to shift the car into the non-existent fifth gear.  I varied the speed a bit and the car had pretty decent acceleration and braking.  But I still didn’t have the confidence to push the car too hard yet.

The next part of the drive was the around town segment.  This gave me a chance to get used to the clutch.  I started getting the hang of it and my confidence was growing.  I was also driving on roads that I had driven this car on many times, although not for many years.  The engine was idling very rough at this point and the idle speed was a bit too low.  I tried accelerating a little bit harder and after a couple of times it smoothed out.  At idle it settled into a kind of droning noise that although very smooth was actually kind of objectionable due to the droning.  Maybe after I install the interior it won’t be as bad.

The final leg of the drive covered some back roads that I had driven back in the day and that I still drive today in my 1997 Mustang Cobra.  The old car handled surprisingly well.  It was much better than it was back in the day.  I also tried stepping on the gas a bit harder and was pleased with how much power the engine had.  Apparently sitting for 15 years didn’t do it much harm.  This leg also required driving on some highway entrance and exit ramps with some very long sweeping curves.  Again the car surprised me and permitted me to take the curves at greater than the speed limit.  I was also getting braver with the gas pedal and the engine had quite a bit more power than I was expecting.  It isn’t a race car engine by any stretch of the imagination, but it has more than enough power for street cruising.

I finally arrived back home and parked the car in the garage.  I’m going away for a week long vacation starting tomorrow.  When I get back I’ll post some detailed pictures showing some of the work that was done.  I also plan to clean the car up and begin painting the interior.  After I complete that and a few other prep items I can start getting estimates for bodywork and paint.  I have to make sure I keep the project moving so that the car doesn’t wind up sitting for another 15 years.

Today I received a message from Val saying that my car will be ready to be picked up tomorrow evening.  He sad that he still needs to test drive the car to make sure everything is working OK.  He wasn’t able to do that today because he still needs to buy and install the exhaust clamps that hold the exhaust tips on.  He also needs to see why one of the backup lights isn’t working but he doesn’t expect that to be a big issue.

The message also said that he needed to pull the transmission and bell-housing to do some work on the clutch fork and bell-housing that required a bit of welding.  I don’t know the details on what needed to be done.  I’m not all that surprised that there was an additional problem in that area.  I was just unaware of the issue.  With everything in the clutch linkage that was replaced it should work better than it did when I bought the car used in 1974.  It may also explain why I went through so many clutches over the years, although that could also be due to the “loose nut behind the steering wheel”.

I hope that everything on the car works fine on the shake down drive tomorrow.  If all goes well I will be driving the car home tomorrow night.  The pressure is on Val right now to wrap things up because I leave the day after tomorrow for a week long vacation.  And I know he doesn’t want the car to sit in his shop taking up valuable space for another week.  I’m a bit nervous about driving the car home because it is a 1.5 hour long drive on the highway.  And timing is going to place me out on the road at rush hour, which can get ugly with the D.C. traffic.  I may try to plot a non-highway course back home, but that will turn it into a 2 hour drive.  I also need to find out if there is a break-in procedure for the new ring and pinion in the rear end.  I have heard that some have a break-in which includes driving at normal speeds for a short time and then allowing the gears to cool off for 30 minutes.  But those questions will have to wait for tomorrow.  If I do get the car back I won’t have time to post anything until after my week at the beach.  But I will try and take a lot of pictures for that post.  Stay tuned until then.

Yesterday I had an opportunity to make the trip out to the shop to see how my Mustang was doing.  When I arrived Val had just removed the instrument cluster in preparation for repairing the power brake booster and clutch pedal assembly and linkage.  Before I left my house Val had called and asked me to bring my new instrument cluster housing and lenses.  Once he had removed the old instrument cluster from the dash he handed it to me and said I should get busy replacing the housing and lenses.  So I sat down with the cluster and my new parts and began dis-assembly and reassembly.

Everything came apart easily enough and while it was apart I checked all of the light bulbs.  They all worked, but i replaced one as the socket was coming loose from the bulb.  The I removed the old lens retainers from the old housing.  One of them had rusted, so Val glass beaded it and repainted it flat black.  Everything else went back together with no issues except for the speedometer lens.  My instrument cluster had the speedometer with a trip odometer.  However the lens was for a standard speedometer.  Val drilled a hole in the new lens using the old one as a template.The only difference between this modification and the correct lens is that the correct lens has a shoulder for the reset button.  The shoulder isn’t visible unless you dis-assemble the cluster and everything worked OK without the shoulder.

When I arrived Val had already removed the transmission, bell housing, clutch linkage, and old exhaust system.  The rear end and springs had been installed, so I could get a feel for the ride height which is fine for now.  I can revisit the ride height after the car has a full interior and the springs have settled some.  Val said he drove the car around the neighborhood and the ride was very stiff.  So there may be more suspension work ahead of me.

While I worked on the cluster, Val removed the power brake booster and clutch pedal assembly.  He replaced the spring and pedal bushings and then reinstalled the pedal assembly.  He also did some adjustments on the parking brake assembly which was not bolted on tight when he received the car.  He also showed me that the under car clips and hangars for the parking brake had not been installed in their correct locations when the previous shop had replaced the floor boards.  They would need to be re-positioned, which will require cutting and re-welding them in the right place.

At that point Val went to reinstall the rod that goes from the clutch pedal to the clutch z-bar.  One end was so badly worn that the rod was not usable.  It should have had a bushing to prevent that wear, but the bushing was missing.  Also the boot that goes over that rod was torn and needed replacement.  So the day pretty much ended at that point with a few more parts on order.  But Val expects that he should have the car buttoned up and ready to get back to me some time next week.

Clutch Release Rod

Clutch Release Rod Boot

This morning I received an email with some attached pictures showing some additional rust that was discovered on the rear frame rail.  It was covered by undercoating and not visible, but turned up when a clamp was put on the driver’s side rear frame rail.  This obviously meant there was structural damage that had to be corrected.  Apparently the repair wasn’t a big deal as the first I heard about it was after the repair job was finished.  Below are some pictures showing the damage and the completed repair.

The rear differential was dropped off at the driveline shop for a rebuild.  They made quick work of the dis-assembly and inspection process.  Unfortunately they immediately noticed that the housing had a crack.  I later learned that this is not all that uncommon with the standard  versions of the Ford 9″ rear end.  Ford used a housing made of nodular iron on their differentials used behind their higher performance engines such as the 428 Cobra Jet or the Boss 429 to resist this cracking problem.   But mine was cast iron and needed to be replaced.  Val did some quick checking on the Web and found a complete differential, rebuilt and ready to go.  That lead failed to pan out as it was built for 31 spline axles and my car had 28 spline axles.  Next he located a used housing on Craigslist.  There are also several vendors that sell new housings that are much stronger than the stock original.  In the end he found somebody that he knew in the local Mustang club who had one for sale.  He picked it up and dropped it off at the driveline shop so that they could continue with the rebuild.

***Update***

Several weeks later the differential is still in the driveline shop. First Val had to order the clutches and metal washers to repair the traction lock.  Then there was a mix up regarding who is ordering the rebuild kit.  Val ordered that as well and delivered it to the rebuild shop.  The person performing the rebuild was unavailable for a few days due to a family emergency.  When he returned to work he spent some time trying to get a good gear mesh pattern on the ring and pinion, only to discover that the ring and pinion needed to be replaced.  So Val ordered a new ring and pinion.  It’s been almost another week since I last heard the bad news about the ring and pinion.  Hopefully the differential is almost complete.

In the mean time Val has been working on some rust repair as well as cleaning and repainting the rear end housing.  He sent me some pictures which I am posting below.

Cleaned differential housing

Painted housing, axles, brake drums, and backing plates.

Rusted trunk drop off

Repaired trunk drop off

Rusted rear floor cut out

Patched rear floor

***Update 2***
I heard from Val and the differential is back from the driveline shop. That means that next week he will finish up the rear end rebuild and move on to the clutch, subframe connectors, and the brake power booster. If all goes as planned the car should be completed in about one more week. I’ve got my fingers and toes crossed, but I won’t be shocked if if ends up taking two weeks instead of one.

Here are some additional pictures of the rebuilt and painted differential

Rebuilt and installed differential

Cleaned and painted brake backing plate (rear view)

Cleaned and painted brake backing plate (front view)

My car was in the shop being worked on, but I was not doing much more than ordering parts, cleaning , and painting some of the old interior parts.  I had also recovered some of the seat cushions so I wasn’t completely idle.  But I wasn’t particularly involved with the mechanical work being done.  That was about to change as I had the opportunity to spend a day at the shop my car was at and help with some of the work being done.

I made the drive out to the shop which took about an hour and a half.  Once I arrived we got right to work.  First Val showed me a fixture he had welded together that mounted in a floor jack and was designed to hold the rear differential securely so it wouldn’t roll around while being lowered out of the car.  It was a pretty clever idea and we would have the opportunity to test it out that day, as the first job was removing the rear end. After admiring the fixture we got to work removing the rear end.  Or more accurately, Val got to work removing the rear end and I got to work observing and helping whenever he needed an extra set of hands.  That wasn’t very often as he is used to working by himself.

The first order of business was to remove the rear differential housing.  Val made quick work of disconnecting the brake hoses and the parking brake cables.  Next up was the U-bolts that hold the differential housing to the rear leaf springs.  These were a mismatched set of too long and short parts that will probably end up being replaced.  An air powered impact gun got these off without too much drama.  The rear shackles were next on the list.  They were fairly rusted and did resist being removed.  The exhaust system was in the way, but since it is scheduled to be replaced The tail pipes were sacrificed to make some additional room around the rear shackles.  With quite a bit of persuasion the rear shackles came off.  We were then able to remove the differential housing from the car.  It was pretty well caked up with 45 years of leaking fluid, mud, dirt, and road salt.

Next Val showed me how to remove the differential from the housing.  The first step was to drain as much fluid out of the housing the we could by removing the filler plug and turning the housing so that the filler was pointing down into a drain pan.  Now he could proceed with removing the differential.  This involved disconnecting the brake lines from the wheel cylinders.  Then he unbolted the rear axle retainers and used a slide hammer to remove the rear axles on each side.  After removing the nuts and copper washers that hold the differential to the housing he was able to remove the differential from the housing.

Here was the part where I had the opportunity to get my hands dirty.  Somebody needed to scrape away the 45 years of caked on dirt, and that person was going to be me.  After about 30 minutes with a putty knife and a small scraper I had chiseled away the majority of the caked on gunk and you could actually see the differential again.In the mean time, Val had been working on unbolting the front leaf spring bushing so that we could remove the rear leaf springs.  I had a new set of springs that we wanted to install when the new differential went in.

Unfortunately the front bushing were firmly rusted into place.  The first bolt had snapped cleanly off.  A sledge hammer and punch couldn’t dislodge the bolt.  Val turned to an air chisel which also failed to make the bolts come out of the bushing.  Finally Val resorted to the Sawzall to cut the bolt out of the bushing.  After some maneuvering and a few choice words the leaf spring came free.  One spring down, one to go.

The second spring started out being a bit more cooperative, which ended up making it more difficult to remove.  The nut on the spring eye bolt came off without snapping the bolt.  Unfortunately the second spring bolt was as rusted just as firmly into place as the first.  This meant that Val had to use the Sawzall to cut both ends of the bolt off.  That meant that this side required twice as much cutting as the first one.  But in the end the spring did come out.  That marked the end of the rear differential and spring removal job.

It was too late in the day to tackle the transmission which was next on the agenda.  Instead, Val offered to show me how to install the outer door handles and locks. The previous shop that had worked on the car had installed a set of metal rods that extended up out of the door handle holes so that the door could be operated without the door handles and locks in place.  These rods always snagged on my clothing and cut into your hands when opening the door.  I had a bag of parts with the original handle and lock parts.  It was easy to identify which side of the car the door handles fit on.  The door locks were trickier because there was nothing on them to identify which side they fit on.  We took an educated guess which ended up being wrong.  Val demonstrated on the driver’s side door by installing the door handle and lock.  After a bit of adjustment everything appeared to be working and it was my turn to do the passenger side door.

I got the door  handle installed and with a bit of adjustment it was working fine.  Now it was time to move onto the door lock.  I dropped it into place and connected it, but the rods inside the door seemed to be interfering with the door handle rods.  Turning the key to lock and unlock the door resulted in a limited range of motion where the key would only turn one quarter turn.  After some head scratching and experimentation we determined that the door locks were installed on the wrong side of the car.  After we switched the lock mechanisms to the opposite sides the passenger door worked fine and the driver’s side door required some tweaking of the rod inside the door to get a fuller range of motion.  In the end both doors were working fine.

After that work was done for the day.  Val showed me some rusty spots on the car that he planned to tackle.  There was nothing major and were areas where most Mustangs of that vintage have issues with rust.  He also showed me that he had a new power brake booster to install.  One recommendation he made was to install sub-frame connectors to try and regain some of the chassis stiffness that had been lost over time with all the patching that was done to the floor pans.  I agreed and he will order and install a set of the connectors.  After that I made the long drive home.  That was enough dirty hands for one day.

Val contacted me to let me know that the steering and brakes were working fairly well and that he had test driven the car.  The ride was rather stiff and he wanted me to drive it myself and see what I thought.  He also wanted to hear my thoughts regarding the car’s ride height.  If we were addressing the ride by replacing springs that would be the best time to address ride height as well.  Val noted that the rear springs have an issue with spring wrap up on hard acceleration.  This came as no surprise to me as spring wrap up has been an issue with this car since I have owned it.  I already had a new set of springs ready for Val to install.

I looked my schedule over and chose a day to make the trip out to Val’s garage, which is about a 1.5 hour drive from my house.  After finishing with my appointments for the day I made the drive.  It ended up taking 2 hours because there was a traffic accident that stalled traffic for about 20 minutes.  By the time I arrived I was hot, sweaty, and tired.  Val was in the process of aligning the front end for the test drive.  The rims on my wheels were so bent up that he had temporarily installed another set of front wheels so he could get a fairly accurate alignment.  He told me that the camber on my car was way off.  Somebody had set the toe-in on the car without setting the camber.  This resulted in one tie rod shortened about as far as it could go and the other lengthened an equal amount.  He straightened out the alignment and installed my wheels back on the car.  He started the engine and backed the car out of his garage for me to test drive.

The first thing I noticed is that the steering wheel was a bit too close to my stomach.  Seems like I’ve gained a few pounds over the years.  Val had also warned me that the clutch was chattering and would need to be replaced.  I started the car forward and the clutch chattered like crazy.  It was hard to get a balance between not stalling the car and moving forward without shaking me to death.  But we were off.  The engine ran pretty well.  Val had fixed some vacuum leaks, and had warned me that the power brake booster sounded like it had a leak as well.  I could hear what sounded like the booster leaking a bit.  Looks like I will need a new booster as well.

I approached a cross street and tapped the brakes to stop.  Wow, those brakes are really sensitive.  The car had no problem stopping, but it required an extremely light touch on the brakes.  Time to turn on to the cross street.  Since the car has manual steering I knew my arms would be getting a workout.  There was a bit of play in the steering but it didn’t wander around.  I got a bit of speed up to see how the car was riding.  I didn’t want to go too fast as there were people walking around the neighborhood.  The street was fairly smooth so I couldn’t get a good feel for how stiff the ride really was.  And since the car has no interior there were all kinds of squeaks and rattles.  Since the car didn’t have much gas in it I headed back to the shop.

When I returned Val asked me how the car drove.  My response was that it was not that great and that I couldn’t believe I used to drive the car like that.  My answer was really more in response to the chattering clutch, touchy brakes, whistling brake booster and all the squeaks and rattles than to how the car drove.  I think that after Val has made some progress I will try another test drive and try to look past the squeaks and rattles.  I think I was just overwhelmed and tired from the long ride out to the shop.

After my test drive Val and I looked underneath the car for rust.  There was a strange hole cut in the frame that neither of us could explain.  Val pointed out a few areas that would require patching.  The exhaust system was rusted and would need to be replaced, which I was aware of.  We decided to install the springs I provided and address the ride height after the car had a full interior installed, as that would affect the ride height anyway.  Val agreed to look the car over some more and prepare an itemized estimate of what needed to be repaired and approximately how much it would cost.  I went ahead and ordered an exhaust system and new exhaust tips in the mean time.  Progress is being made, but there’s still a ways to go before I get the car back.