More Disassembly of the Body and Documentation

It's been a busy 2 weeks.  The week leading up to Easter went by rather quickly but all was good.  Of course, Easter was the pinnacle of the week for the Christian community with the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus.   I made sure I had all plans in place for my departure Easter afternoon for a weeks vacation and headed out with my wife to west Iowa about 20 miles south of Omaha to my daughter and son-in-law's to complete my "daddy do" list of ceramic tile in 2 baths and laminate flooring and trim in their lower level family room.   4 days of work later, all the work was done just in time for me to leave to go back home.   I left at 6 AM Saturday morning to head back to Indy and beat the bad weather storming through the midsection of the country.   So today was technically my last day of "vacation" be it a working vacation for the most part.

I got my wife out the door to the airport for her trip to San Antonio, Texas.  Then I caught up with some of my chores around the house...like cutting the grass that hasn't been cut in 8 days.    Afterwards, it was time to hit the garage and do some work on the fastback.   There are more bits and pieces to take off the body still.  Before I took them off, I took a bunch of documentation photos dividing the car into a grid on the underside.  The rotisserie made this an easy task.   Even with factory manuals, there's nothing like a picture to show you where the part and all its hardware went.

So after soaking a myriad of nuts and bolts with PB Blaster I started taking parts off and stacking them in piles so I could bag and tag them.   I removed the fuel line, all the hydraulic brake lines, exhaust hangers, among other parts.   Here's the pile....

The underside of the car is pretty much stripped of parts.  I need to remove the rear leaf spring shackles with my "wheel of death" but that will be done during the next work session.

Here's the underside of the car.  I love the rotisserie for the access I have to just about the entire body.

I didn't get everything off today, but I'm hoping I'll get some time an evening this week to remove the vents, back seat belts, and the shackles.   Then it's on to finishing up the floor pans next on my list and getting the driver's side seat riser in.   After that?    I have that passenger side toe board to replace and finish up the firewall around the steering column.  The strut rod plug welds need to be finished up.  And then I should be close to prepping the underside for paint.  That will be a milestone in itself. 

One Year Later....

It's hard to believe, but I started this blog one year ago yesterday.  I had no idea what I was expecting or how this whole blogging thing would work out.   There was the hope that it would give me some motivation to get working on the fastback.  Well, I can say one year later that the fastback has made more progress in this past year than in the previous 5 years.  So I guess that answers that question, especially considering I started with this a year ago...

The only metal work I'd done was the passenger floor.  I'd pulled the engine and transmission in August of 2009, but after that, the project stalled for countless reasons, motivation being one of them.  Now the 'Stang is actually on the rotisserie and ready for the next step of metal finishing on the floor and firewall.  I am amazed at the progress, which leads me to the second part of how the blogging thing has worked out.

I never expected to garner the support and encouragement of fellow Mustang enthusiasts.   A handful of you, such as Sven, RJ, James B, LeLu, Alex, Mike and others have helped and inspired me more than you know.  If I keep up this pace, I may actually have this beast together by the 50th anniversary celebration of the Mustang.  I'm looking forward to more work on the fastback and sharing it with you all.  Thanks much!

Work on the car has taken somewhat of a pause.  However, on Friday, my friend Glenn and I made a trip to Dependable Sandblasting on the south side of Indy.  I picked up two 100 pound bags of extra-fine "black beauty" media for the ridiculously low price of $13.26 a BAG!!!   I could get 2 or 3 more bags if needed and still be under $75 total.   This should work well for the underside and tight places.   Here's a couple of pictures of some of the media in the bag and 5 gallon storage bucket...

In the picture below, you can see how fine this is.  I'm going to have to do the blasting on a day when there isn't much wind as it blows around easily.  This extra-fine media will not build up heat and cover a little more surface area in the "blast zone" than a more coarse media.   I'm anxious to give it a try.

On the way home, we swung by Harbor Freight and I picked up a deadman's valve for the pressure blaster to make it easier and safer to operate. 

On Saturday, I did some major garage cleaning and parts boxing and labeling.   I've had a bunch of stuff I'd taken off the car and had it sitting in piles.  I got those safely put away.  Then I had some parts I needed to get on Craigslist and eBay (from my truck and Fusion) which I will do the week after Easter since this week is the busiest week of the year for me due to my "occupation" as a pastor.

With a cleaner and more organized garage, I put together my Harbor Freight pressure blaster with the deadman's valve.    I also got a package of ceramic tips.

I filled it with about 10 pounds of media hoping to give it a try, but by this time, it was close to tip-off of UK / UL final four basket ball game.  It was a bittersweet game to see my alma mater UL fight and scrap their way to keep up with those monster UK forwards of Davis and Kidd-Gilchrist.   Kansas will have their hands full tonight.   Anyway....

I'm not sure if I will get to work on the Mustang this week with church, spring yard duties, and getting ready to go to the Omaha area the week after Easter to help my daughter and son-in-law with "nesting" work on their home including finishing out their basement and ceramic tile in 2 bathrooms.  They're expecting their first child the end of May and want the house in order as much as possible.  This will be the number #3 grandchild...and this one is a boy.   I'm hoping I can introduce him at an early age to Mustangs.   I'm looking forward to the day when little Judah is sitting next to me and says, "Floor it, Grandpa!"   You can be sure I will too.