I will never be done with my car.

Well bein military I have very little time to do anything to my car. All my car buddies have either left the military or gotten orders elsewhere, so I have little to no help on anything. If the stars and moon align properly I can get my wife to help me alittle.

I hear y'all! Eleanor's been dubbed "the forever restoration". We have an unoffical club locally, The forever restoration club because there's a group of us that have been working on our classics (not all stangs) for years now. We bought her in November of 02, and she's still no where near done. We finally bought a "new" 347 stroker and C4 to fix the reliablity issue and she prompty sheered a stud off the brand new B&M torque converter (we made it about 10 houses). So, the tranny is back out to replace the converter. While it's out, we're getting new headers, because the ones we have 9that came with the car) aren't split and are a @%#$^$ to deal with (and never mind changing the rear plug). We still need to get the roll cage in, then hopefully get the fiish bodywork and paint done (luckily we know a body guy that can do this-I think the motor will mysteriously not start when we have to take her for the cage install since we don't know that guy. NO ONE is beating on that fresh motor!).

I can't even recall every part and piece we've had to replace, it's easier to say this-when we're done, the roof, frame rails, firewall & drivers side shock tower will be the only original sheet metal left. This is motor #4 and the second tranny. We will be getting a built 9" and Denny's driveshaft to make a new shaft to be sure everything can stand up to the 347 eventually too. About half the interior pieces are new too, whether from other cars or actually new (like the carpet, dash pad, seat covers).

68stang351 said:

At least you have tons of money to do all this with. My main complaint in my o.p. was that I don't really have the money. Something else always comes up. I stretched it thin this week by buying a fuel tank kit that was 163$ after tax and shipping.

I don't even have a garage or carport to work in/under.

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Ahahahahahahaha...money...ahahahahahaha....

We've done most of the work ourselves because we can't afford to pay for it. We've had a lot of help from friends too-the paint will be done for the cost of the paint. The motor was paid for by money from my business, which I do in addition to a full time job. But, after three shot motors (original one=out of round piston. Second motor=ate the cam, pieces went throughout the motor. Third motor=broken rocker, studs backing out, wouldn't hold an idle even after we bought a new carb) we gave up and went for it. Took all summer to pay for though (and we didn't buy anyone including each other Christmas presents). The reason it's taken so long is because we have to do it as we can afford to. We bought a lot of parts used as we could, an off ebay. She still isn't drivable and certainly isn't a high dollar resto looking car, but we love her. We did get lucky in a sense as far as the year of the car. When we bought her, the big bodies hadn't started really rising in value, so a lot of the used parts we bought we got cheap compared to the earlier cars. It also meant repops weren't available, at least they made the floor pans though. Now that the 71-73's are gettign more popular, more repop stuff is being made-but even used parts are getting expensive now, because the cars are worth more so places can't get a parts car cheap anymore. I know it'll be a few years before she's "done" (as in reliably driven each summer).


Throw a coat of flat black primer on your car and rock it for a few years-enjoy the fact that you can drive it! A friend of ours has a 65 that he bought when he was about 14 and fixed it up so he could drive it when he was 16. Drove it in flat black primer for years until he could afford a single stage paint job. Funny thing is, I liked it better in flat black. Looked meaner. Now it looks like every other red Mustang. Classics are money pits, and projects get long and frustrating unless you have enough $$ to send them away to be someone else's headache to fix. But there's a reason you bought your car. Try to remember that when you're knuckles are bleeding and you can't figure out how you're going to pay for the next part you just found the car needed.

I don't have a garage or carport to work under either. That is my BIGGEST problem as well not enough$$$$$$$$$$$ to do much of anything. I would atleast like to be able to drive the car once before I've had the darn thing 10yrs

Damn that looks clean brotha!

Man be happy you are actually working on it slowly... I was doing VERY good and making good progress......

Then, we starting prepping for selling the house and moving, 9 months w/o work, get moved and moved in, clean up and prep for start working, 3 months... go on vacation and get back, 1 month.... start feeling bad, getting sick, feeling really bad...

End up at the doctor, get a biopsy, get diagnosed with brain cancer (July 07)! I am on the road to recover this spring and I hopefully will be able to finish this thing.... I promise to finish this before I cant.... I PROMISE!

I think I am actually going to start working on it this week... I have scheduled a windshield install, and then its not much from there. Believe it or not, it has given me hope and everything.

Sorry for sharing so much, but I will finish this car!

wow, I wish my car looked that good

These days - cost of gas being what it is - if you can't afford to finish your car, you won't be able to afford to drive it once you do finish.

Platonic Solid said:

These days - cost of gas being what it is - if you can't afford to finish your car, you won't be able to afford to drive it once you do finish.

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And yet again something else to piss me off ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ your probably right though. If I can get my brakes fixed and suspension redone I will atleast drive around a few times and say the hell with worrying about the interior,paint & new exhaust.

Red5oh said:

Man be happy you are actually working on it slowly... I was doing VERY good and making good progress......

Then, we starting prepping for selling the house and moving, 9 months w/o work, get moved and moved in, clean up and prep for start working, 3 months... go on vacation and get back, 1 month.... start feeling bad, getting sick, feeling really bad...

End up at the doctor, get a biopsy, get diagnosed with brain cancer (July 07)! I am on the road to recover this spring and I hopefully will be able to finish this thing.... I promise to finish this before I cant.... I PROMISE!

I think I am actually going to start working on it this week... I have scheduled a windshield install, and then its not much from there. Believe it or not, it has given me hope and everything.

Sorry for sharing so much, but I will finish this car!

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wow ... sorry to hear about the cancer. i pray it goes well for you.

a close friend of my wife's was recently diagnosed with stage 3 cancer. he is 48 years old. it has apparently spread alot. but they can do so much now that he actually has a pretty good chance of beating it. i have also heard that a good outlook helps alot.

back on topic ... the bay looks great. at least you can drive it. that is huge.

and fwiw, i have no garage or car port either. and my driveway is pretty steep. so i end up doing like an hour at a time on my lunch break at work. how pitiful is that?

spray bomb that thing flat black, it wouldnt take that much time and money to do it and it would look way better than it does now and give it some charachter and that mean ass look