Dragon Slayer - 1995 Mustang GT Build Thread - Now With 100 Percent More IRS

[nitroram33]

Since Photobucket murdered all of my pictures, here's everything in no specific order in a Flickr album instead:



https://www.flickr.com/photos/87683219@N04/sets/72157712657827192/



So I'm currently helping a friend, as he is not very mechanically inclined though eager to learn, get his 1995 Mustang GT back on it's feet after a decade of neglect. His dad bought the car for him back in '03 when we were both in high school and it ran for about a year before things started acting up. First the trans starting leaking fluid out out the front seal, the steering column was starting to act up, and then it managed to blow a head gasket and got parked sometime in mid '04. Fast forward a couple years and he's wanting to get it running again and we start to tear it down and diagnose what happened. Nothing was too out of the ordinary other than a few bent pushrods and the blown passenger side head gasket, but when we went to pull the trans out one of the flex pate nuts rounded off. We called it a day and meant to get back to it the next weekend (I live about half an hour away and didn't have most of my tools with me). Somehow things kept coming up and the Mustang was put on the back burner as life got in the way.

Jump up eight years to this June and he finally decided it was time to get moving on the project again. By this point the car had sat without heads on it for years and his dad had used the interior as storage after he moved out and sometime during the period it was sitting his little sister managed to lose the keys. My friend also decided he wanted to convert from an auto to a manual as well and with all the other random little things the car needed it was decided that the best route would be to grab a parts car and go from there. So I hopped on the ole interwebs and found a wrecked '94 5.0 5-speed that was coming up for auction via Copart and snagged it for a little over a grand after all the fees, taxes,etc. It had been hit in the rear driver's side quarter, but since we didn't need anything from back there and the interior was in pretty good shape and the engine trans only had 107k on it, we came out pretty far ahead. Enough with the words, here's some pictures.

Here's the parts car on the way back from China Grove:

Massive sub enclosure discovered when we opened the trunk:

No time wasted gutting the interior:

And finally the Red car that everything will be going into shows up:

More in the following posts.

 

[nitroram33]

So while we were waiting on parts, we started tearing down the red car. First up was the engine/trans combo. The motor mounts kept hanging up on the headers so I just chopped the front primaries off each side since they weren't going to be reused:

Engine and trans out of the car:

Suspension was the next thing to come off the front:

Suspension came off because I thought it would be the best time to get the new UPR K-member in that we were going to need in the future and it gave a good opportunity to freshen up the front end a bit since it had been sitting so long as well:

UPR piece ompared to the stock K-member:

We decided to steal the rack off the parts car as well and replaced the inner tie rod ends because the passenger side wound up getting u-shaped during the accident. No damage to the right front wheel or sheet metal so I've still got no idea how this happened:

There was a mouse living in the car during it's slumber and it ruined the carpet, so new carpet goes in as well as the manual pedal assembly with MM billet quadrant and firewall adjuster, and the heater (A/C and smog pump are being deleted) box from the parts car with a new heater core:

My poor garage...:

Dash and console reunited with the car:

Seats and column back in as well:

 

[nitroram33]

Now where I/we got to through this past weekend up to yesterday. The balljoints were junk on both cars so I snagged a set of MOOG arms with new bushings and balljoints from Rock Auto. Turns out they don't fit so well out of the box with the UPR K-member. The front of both arms hit the main piece of tubing of the K-member and required a lot of clearancing, enough so the I broke through the corner of the stamping and had to weld in a reinforcement plate from underneath on the driver's side:

After patching it and smoothing things out:

Compared to the passenger side arm with no clearancing:

Got the arm on, spring in, and the knuckle bolted up to the strut last night, but the car doesn't have enough weight on the front end with no engine/trans in it to keep the balljoint from turning in the knuckle so we're going to have to finish the swap before I can get the front end put back together. I'll get more/better pictures later, ran out of daylight.

8/2/14

Started to put the front end back together a few days ago and figured out that without the engine/trans in there that there isn't enough weight on nose of the car to hold the ball joint still when I jack up on the control arm before the car starts to come up off the jackstand. No bueno. So we decided to just go ahead and get the engine and trans in, but mother nature didn't like that idea and the rest of the week it stormed just as it was getting cool enough to work on the car. One of the castle nuts for the outer tie rods ran away as well and I couldn't find one in the right size anywhere that didn't have a crazy wait so I just ordered up a new pair of Moogs instead. Anyway, here's a few pictures.

Suspension partially reassembled. Springs actually went in somewhat easy:

Empty engine bay with an okay view of the new UPR K-member. It somehow went in square on the first shot...:

Donor engine with the upper pulled and the radiator out so it can come out the top when it cools off this afternoon with the help of my handy dandy Ford EFI lift plate:

Donor on the left, patient on the right:

 

[nitroram33]

As we left the engine last night where it tried to run away:

Forgot to take a picture of the engine once we got it back up top, but we wound up getting a couple of my friend's cousins and one of their friends to help us pick the two of them up and slide the now ruined hood off the parts car under it then pulled it up the bank with my SuperCrew.

The two of them having an identity crisis:

And finally, though a terrible picture because it was getting dark, the engine and trans in their new home:

8-18-2014
Time for another update. Mother nature has not been kind lately and we've only had a couple days to work on the car per week since the last update. We've managed to get a decent amount accomplished though despite the limited time. The engine/trans are completely hooked up and bolted down with the exception of one stubborn collector bolt and the battery (waiting on a new tray mount kit to get here today). Drive shaft is in and just needs to have the bolts torqued down and the trans filled with fluid. Found out the nipple on the back side of the PS reservoir was broken off when I went to hook that line up so had to toss a new reservoir on as well. New brakes are on the front and hopefully the rears get done today. Anyway, here's some more pictures:

Actual jackstands on the left, redneck jackstands on the right (actually works better for that one since it's on a bit of an incline and the blocks have more area in contact with the ground):

What your rotors will look like if you leave your car sitting for a decade. Also, you can sorta see in this picture what I hadn't really paid attention to/noticed before: the car apparently already was upgraded with some sort of aftermarket lower control arm by the previous owner and the quad shocks are gone.:

Speaking of quad shocks, the one on the parts car on the side that got hit has seen better days. Also, anyone notice anything wrong with the rotor on that side? :lol2::

Blurry picture of the vacant engine bay of the parts car:

Not a whole bunch left on the inside either:

New pads and rotors done upfront on the '95 along with some very dirty Cobra Rs:

Engine bay pretty much done for now:

First time the front wheels have been on the ground in over a month:

8-23-14

So today makes 2 months exactly from when we purchased the parts car from Copart. It's also the day that we finally got this thing running again for the first time in a decade. After an initial no go due to a bad starter relay, the Mustang lives!

[video=youtube;F66Qp7N4fvs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F66Qp7N4fvs[/video]

 

[nitroram33]

Reserved 4.

 

[nitroram33]

Reserved 5.

 

[WhiteFaleen2001]

look forward to seeing the progress on this

 

[nitroram33]

That makes two of us. I guess I should have mentioned the plan for the car as well. Eventually it will get a full MM coilover/torque arm setup, Cobra brakes, T-56 Magnum swap, and a 427W with F1-R on MS-Pro. The plan is to do the suspension/brakes and maybe the six-speed conversion this winter and get it running on Megasquirt as well so we can get all the bugs ironed out on a stock engine before the 427 goes in hopefully during the winter of 2015 with the Procharger getting installed June-ish of 2016. That assumes everything goes according to plan, and you know what happens when you assume...

 

[ElrodKTPQ_89]

Sounds a lot like how my project started off...say forever, blown head gasket, horrible interior, no top end on the motor, then a mess to get back together. But it's all worth it in the end. Keep up the good work and I'll be checking back in on this for updates!

 

[nitroram33]

Sounds a lot like how my project started off...sat forever, blown head gasket, horrible interior, no top end on the motor, then a mess to get back together. But it's all worth it in the end. Keep up the good work and I'll be checking back in on this for updates!

That sounds eerily familiar right now. Waiting on a new reciprocating saw to get here tomorrow right now, O2s are rusted in on the parts car so I can't get to the passenger side bolts especially well so I'm just going to chop off the exhaust below the cat and take the collector bolts loose when it's out and I have more room.

 

[nitroram33]

Updated post three with a few new pics and info. Hopefully the engine and trans make their way into their new home this evening, only the trans crossmember and shift cable left to remove.

 

[nitroram33]

Well, good news and bad news. Good news is the engine and trans are out of the car. Bad news is that they took advantage of the slight slope the the car was sitting on to try and make a run for it after they were just barely clear of the front end and we were about to set them down. Luckily the hoist acted as a giant anchor and they didn't make it very far over the bank. Looks like the only damage is a slightly dented valve cover and oil filter. Will inspect further when we can drag it back up top tomorrow. :deeplist:

 

[Musturd]

I can't tell in the pics but how do the front coils work with the tubular k member

 

[nitroram33]

I can't tell in the pics but how do the front coils work with the tubular k member

I probably should have included that. You use a pair of the bolt on spring perches that use the same holes as the upper mounting bolts for the K-member and then you can use stock style springs and arms:

http://www.uprproducts.com/mustang-pro-series-k-member-spring-perches.html

 

[Musturd]

Ok it all makes sense now ,At first I was like how'd he do that

 

[nitroram33]

Magic.

 

[Musturd]

The shinoda wheel well flares are titties

 

[nitroram33]

I'm on the fence about them myself, but my friend likes them and it's his car so they'll probably wind up staying... :laughing4:

 

[nitroram33]

Updated post 4. Engine and trans are in, EGR and smog pump have been deleted, new shift cable and firewall from MM are in to go along with the billet quadrant. Supposed to rain tomorrow, but we should get started on getting everything back together Tuesday after it cools off a bit in the evening.

 

[nitroram33]

Mother nature has not played nice the past week or so. Finally didn't rain this afternoon and we took advantage of it to finish assembling the front end and getting everything torqued down and a few other little things like the coil, etc. done as well. If all goes well we should be able to take it for a quick shakedown spin this weekend...