After 138 hours I finally have the T-Bird down to bear metal.
With all the paint off I can see the amount of body damage there is on both sides of the car that was covered up with Bondo and gold paint.
The under side of the hood and trunk is also striped.
Next I was going to repair or replace the vacuum lines that are mostly on the A/C system
You can see from these two pictures that there are a lot of vacuum on this unit including a very complicated vacuum switch that rotates to select the correct vacuum port to be operated (above in the middle). The old system was removed and a new one bought with no vacuum control.
I looked on line and found a company,Classic Auto Air, that makes a A/C system for non A/C Thunderbird's. I called to see if it could be used in a car with existing A/C and they said yes with some modifications, the control panel had to changed out for a heat only T-Bird that I bought on E Bay, a adapter, that they make, must be bought to use the original dash lover and I would have to make my own plate on the fire wall to cover up the old holes and allow the new lines to come through.
Above and below is the new A/C system unit. It came as a complete system with new Sanden Rotary Compressor, condenser, drier, evaporator and heater core's and all the hoses and fittings.
Below is the new unit in place under the dash.
The fire wall was filled (welded up) where all the old hoses and lines came through and a new plate made for the new lines. The rest of the engine compartment was sanded down and will be painted the new color of the car.
I purchased a powder coating system and set it up in the RV shelter. I had to run air and power to the new location. Above is the controller and below is the gun.
I built a spray both out of PVC pipe and plastic sheeting
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A negative wire is connected to the piece and the gun shoots a positive charged powder.
I bought a oven for $25.00 on Craig's list.
A rack was built for the inside of the oven to hang the coated parts on. The coated parts are baked at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.
Coated parts are then hung out to cool.
The instrument panel will be sent to Dakota Digital and converted to digital gauges.
The color of the dash will be changed to the new color of the car so I took it apart for the paint work before it go's to Dakota Digital.
All the chrome parts were set to Sherm's Custom Plating in Sacramento CA for new chrome.
The engine has been rebuilt with all the powder coated brackets and parts fitted.
New manifold, compressor and water pump installed and the valve covers have been stripped to be painted the same color as the car.
Be sure to take a look at Hackberry Auto Body blog to see the Mustang that is receiving final paint, gun metal gray, and should be back to me next week. Then the T-Bird will go to Hackberry for the engine compartment, gauge panel and engine parts to be painted then back to me for engine installation and get it running before body and finish paint work.
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