Somethingclever's operation 65 Mustang DD - built and bought

[somethingclever]

With the body work finished on all panels and the car, it was time to move onto color.

Paint color wasn't a tough choice for me.

I wanted a car that was mostly period correct.

Wimbledon White base/clear got the call in PPG products.

Once again the car gets a crazy wipe down and his "booth" gets a cleaning as well.

[somethingclever]

Thankfully no clowns ever jacked the car up at the factory rocker/pinchweld area.

[somethingclever]

Here is the car rolled out and next to his 68 (not 67) track car. (which is a riot)

[somethingclever]

Then he proceeded to paint the rest of the panels and parts.

[somethingclever]

At this point I think he was around 1 yr from original disassembly and approx 350 hrs of time.

[somethingclever]

The idea was to have the interior and trunk sprayed in the same color and to buy an interior that didn't have mismatched whites.

[somethingclever]

I used TMI products for the seats and they sent me some swatches to use for color comparison after I told them the color I was needing to match.

I didn't want Wimbledon steel bits on the interior and bright white seats as well on the interior.

That would just be poor planning.

This looked like a pretty good match.

[Ares]

That is a nice shade of white. Any other colors being used on interior?

[07v6vistablue]

Looks Great so far!

[Dan B.]

I've got some faded road signs that would match nicely.

[PaxtonShelby]

The battery leaked at some point or over many years and ate through the battery tray and the 1 apron.

Probably could have gotten away with a patch piece but instead he welded in a new piece.

Additionally you can see he stitch welded the shock towers and front suspension (engine bay side and suspension side) to provide some additional rigidity to the car.

This is in case PaxtonShelby ever talks me into sticky tires and a track day.

I’m sure you won’t need much persuasion.

[PaxtonShelby]

He may talk you into a track day.......but his car will still be on jackstands.

Hey - she is only on jackstands during the winter when I pull the wheels off.

[somethingclever]

While he was doing body work I did some small projects...

Rebuilt/new HVAC box, ducting, cables etc. (original blower motor)

Rebuilt door hinges (this project was a good excuse to run some permanent compressed air lines and get my blasting cabinet operational)

Went over the wiring harness and repaired as necessary (like 8 circuits?...LOL)

[somethingclever]

pics....

BTW - once again the bullet style connectors between column and main harness are 64.5 specific as well as the rest of the harness and turn signal switch for generator cars.

Additionally that means the steering wheels are also 64.5 specific.

In hindsight, I would have converted the harness and switch to 65+ style and had better selection for steering wheels.

[somethingclever]

To clarify - i installed a new blower motor (Mexico) but the one in the car was original and made in the USA. (of course)

I will keep the original and have it rebuilt at a local shop in the event the new one fails in the future.





Since the car is a driver and a first gen mustang, luckily there is no reason to re-invent the wheel when it comes to brakes, steering or suspension....just get out the checkbook.

With the goal of KISS - the car has manual steering and manual brakes. You can't put alot of rubber under these cars and it will be pretty light when finished so I am not expecting any regrets there but we shall see.


I purchased a rebuilt manual steering gear from a gentlemen named Chockostang over on the VMF forums. It looks and feels to be worth every penny. (I also replaced the bearings in the steering column tube which support the steering gear shaft.)

I purchased a stage 1 suspension kit from opentracker performance which includes a complete conversion to v8 style steering components as the 6cyl cars are different. I upgraded to a roller bearing steering arm and the kit comes with roller spring perches, "blueprinted/greasable" upper A-arms, street-valved bilstein dampers, GT spec coils, 4.5 mid-eye rear leafs, 1" front sway bar kit and a 1 piece export brace.

It also includes replacement strut rod bushings but I will likely come back and buy adjustable rods at minimum for alignment time.

I also purchased from them a template to do a "shelby drop" of the front A-arm.

I don't have alot of pics of the new parts....

[somethingclever]

At this point it was around June of 2020 and parts started to become pretty scarce/back-ordered.

As you can see this was just a partial shipment of goodies.

[somethingclever]

I also purchased a complete brake kit from opentracker.

I needed everything from v8 spindles on outward. (v8 steering links have larger ball-joint pins and probably larger wheels brgs too)

I decided to go with a kit from CSRP through opentracker.

This kit utilizes a new spindle casting designed to work with PBR style aluminum dual piston calipers.

It's a very complete kit and went together without issue. I think the front rotors are 11.7" IIRC. (well can't say 100% without issue...one of the spindles had a QC issue that was ultimately recitified with a replacement unit.)

They are a cast iron 1 piece vented deal for street cars.

I don't think CSRP offers a manual master cylinder for F/R discs as part of their "kits".

Since I planned for an 8.8 with rear discs, the owner of CSRP suggested an MC he had with a removable pressure residual valve for the rear brakes...so I went that route.

Another benefit of running manual brakes is it eliminates concern for clutch cable clearance since there is no booster to deal with.


Not many pics to share but I made a trip out to OH with a truckload full of new parts and in a half day we got everything installed.

[somethingclever]

With the front suspension completed I was supposed to tackle the rear axle myself...and I was dragging my feet.


A common 8.8 swap for 1st gen mustangs is to use an exploder rear end from 95-01. (I think)


Advantages with these units: typically 31 spline, close to the correct width, 3.55, 3.73, or 4.10's and track lok's are common, rear disc, relatively cheap ($400-$500 I was seeing already pulled).


The pinion is off-center by 2", which is the right amount to cut down the long side such that the WMS-WMS is really close to factory 7.5 or 8" rears that came on the car.


Basically you cut the long side down to match the same length as the short side and buy a new short side axle and then voila...you are golden.


In hindsight, that is definitely what I should have done. LOL


Alot of explorers have had rough and salty lives...I went another route which worked out but it was the hard way.


First I wanted higher gears for this fuel miser - 3.27 sounded good....wanted to start with a good working dropout with fairly low miles if possible.


I didn't feel the need for 31 spline and didn't want to buy gears if i didn't have to.


Bring in new edge 8.8's as a donor.



After some research I found that 2011+ Ford Ranger axles are 8.8, 28 spline, have the correct rotor hat hub, and the correct axle bearing ID/OD to be compatible in the new edge housing. This means I can use a stock mustang 8.8 rebuild kit for bearings/seals/etc.

These axles were close enough to being the correct length but require that both sides of the housing are sectioned/shortened accordingly.

Note that these Ranger axles do not have ABS exciter rings where-as the mustang axles do.

This is not a problem, however.

Lastly, Rock Auto supplied 2 new axles for under $200 shipped.

Purchase price of the complete rear was $300 from Carlisle.

For reference, one can buy a ready to bolt-in rear axle from online sources for about $2500. too rich for my blood...

[somethingclever]

some pictures....

Also turns out I bought a bit of a turd 8.8....there was a small chip in the ring gear and the bearings were garbage.....

So now I will plan for a full rebuild of brgs/seals/clutches..etc.

[somethingclever]

POR15'd