Progress Pictures - 65 Coupe

This is a followup on our 65 coupe project. You can see some pics of it after paint in our old thread:

http://forums.stangnet.com/showthread.php?t=701480

Engine is installed, should be able to start it up the 1st of December.

<img src="http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/1295/dsc02128qj0.jpg">

<img src="http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/9782/dsc02127ee0.jpg">

Shot of the hood and decklid.
<img src="http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/3748/dsc02129en1.jpg">

With the fiberglass decklid, we decided to use some gas struts instead of the torsion bars.
<img src="http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/7355/dsc02118sa3.jpg">

<img src="http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/3928/dsc02119rh9.jpg">

Heres a supplemental electrical panel we've made. Since we dont use the vent we cut it down and mounted a plate to it. Its only visible if you look under the dash. Includes a painless circuit, the remote actuator for keyless entry, the relays for the electric door locks, horn relay, and a circuit breaker.
<img src="http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/3584/dsc02121ez1.jpg">

<img src="http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/8866/dsc02122zs3.jpg">

SoCalCruising said:

I dig the gas strut for the trunk. Can you give details? Thanks.

Click to expand...

Glad too. We wanted to be able to add without welding or attaching anything to the fiberglass

For the bracket attaching the upper end to the spring:
We used a piece of 3/4" aluminum bar stock scrap we had laying around, cut it generally to shape and worked the final form with files and a small disc sander to get it to fit into the channel of the hinge, could probably use 1/2" minimum. With a snug fit, we drilled and tapped 1 hole thru the hinge into the aluminum block (5/16-18), It appears to work ok with only one screw as the block is curved and the sides are slightly beveled for a good fit into the hinge. On the side facing away from the hinge, we drilled and tapped two more holes which allowed for some minor adjustment, probably only needed one. These mnounting holes are tapped for a 8 MM course thread (the thread the ball studs come with).

Struts:
We used the "Strong Arm" brand of struts. If you go to their catalogue, they list several universal struts. We first started with 2 - 35 lb - 12 inch struts, these were not quite strong enough, so we used the 55 lb - 12 inch struts which did the job. If you wanted to move the lower mount more to the front of the car, you could go to a longer one, but you would have to experiment with the spring rate, the more the angle, the stiffer you would have to go. You would simply have to take a few measurements depending on where you want the lower mount. For our mounting position. the 12 inch, 55lb works nicely.

Lower Bracket:

Simply a scrap piece of 1/4" aluminum angle, without measureing, I believe it was 1 1/4" x 1 1/4",

Overall operation:

Works very smoothly with minimum effort. upon closing, the last few inches has no resistance due to the extremen small amount of travel of the strut. As the decklid is raised, the upper third of the travel, the deck lid tends to open itself. Remember this is a fiberglass deck lid which is a little lighter than steel. If we increased the spring rate, the opening would be stronger, also the angle of the strut affects the spring rate. Overall it was fairly easy and all accomlished with hand tools, It just took some time with the hand cutting

Hope this helps.

By the way, the color is Viper Blue Pearlescent, with Viper Silver Metalic