Stablemate…

Today is January 19th, 2017.  In my last post, I used the following paragraph to close my blog entry about the Mustang restoration activities of the week:

At this point, barring a miracle at the body shop I’ll be completely done with my stuff before the car comes home. I’m rather bummed about this, but life is life and I’ll find a way to keep myself busy.

Behold the way I found to keep myself busy:

That is a 1966 Limited Edition Mustang “Springtime” Sprint 200 Edition Mustang coupe on the back of yet another U-Haul trailer behind my Brother-in-Law’s truck.

About.com has a lengthy overview of what the Sprint 200 Edition was all about. In summary:

The year was 1966. Ford had no problem selling their 289 cid V8 Mustangs. In fact, the cars were so popular dealers couldn’t keep them on their lots. Of course, this resulted in more than a few disappointed customers. How to remedy the problem? Ford executives got creative. One car that was not selling that well was Ford’s 6-cylinder Mustang. The 200 cid powered inline-6 pony was in dire need of a kick start, and Ford had just the plan.

Enter the Sprint 200, a.k.a. the Springtime Sprint. This “limited-edition” 1966 Ford Mustang, which was introduced as part of a springtime sales promotion, consisted of an inline-6 cylinder Mustang equipped with a chrome air cleaner, special Sprint 200 air-cleaner decal, and painted side accent stripes. Ford’s demographic for the Sprint 200 was women. As such, the marketing tagline, “Six and the Single Girl”, was used to promote 6-cylinder Mustangs, including the special edition Sprint 200.

I first saw this car on Craigslist about a week ago for a very respectable price of $1850. A few days later, the price dropped to $1600 – less than half the cost of what I paid for my 1969 Mustang Coupe. By last night, I was asking for approval from my beautiful wife to go take a look at it.

The reason for the reasonable price becomes clear when you look at the top of the car:

That black spot is rust hole masquerading as a baby moonroof. Looking down through the hole, you can see the steering wheel:

There’s more damage to the roof skin out back:

The cause of all this rust was the vinyl top it originally came from the factory with. The top trapped water under the surface and held it there against the metal. The metal never stood a chance and just rotted away.

The rest of the car is pretty clean. The floor pans have no more surface rust than my other Mustang and the under body of the car is also in great shape. She has “good bones” as they say in the car restoration business.

Other areas that will need attention include the rear quarter panels. They’ll need patches as they have rust-through. The hood may need some attention as well since there are paint bubbles in a couple of areas. Lastly, the passenger side front fender will either need a lot of work or replacement:

The car is pretty complete. The interior (including all the glass) is present and accounted for with the exception of the carpet. You’ll note it comes with bucket seats, something that makes me happy:

The engine is all there as well – including the power steering (rare on the 6 cylinder Mustangs) and the California Emissions systems:

At the moment, I don’t know if the engine runs or not. It does enthusiastically turn over so we know the starter motor works. There’s no evidence of any coolant in the oil so there’s no reason to believe there’s a head gasket leak. I was also told that the engine had been rebuilt in the distant past. With all this, I’m thinking there’s a decent chance that with a little attention we’ll be able to get her fired up. My Brother-in-Law is coming over this weekend for our first attempt.

Why, you might ask, would I do such a thing to myself again? Didn’t I learn my lesson the first time?

Those are good questions. The answers boil down to two things:

First, I want to learn how to do more stuff – stuff like welding, body work and painting. My current Mustang is undergoing an “heirloom” restoration. I’m making that car as nice as I possibly can with the intent to keep it forever and hand it down to one of my children. For a restoration like this, I’ve had to trade off my desire to learn things with the reality that some things are best left to the professionals. For example, though I briefly considered it, I decided learning how to paint a car using my “heirloom restoration” project as a test-bed was probably not the wisest choice.

I will have significantly fewer trade offs fo that nature with this car. The purpose of this restoration project will be learning how to do stuff. The quarter panels need patching? I’d better learn how to weld so I can do that. Paint? Gunna do it myself. Basically, If I end up with a nice car at the end so much the better – but that is not the primary goal.

Secondly, I’d like to restore a car for my wife. When we first met, I had a little Mazda Miata that I drove around. With the arrival of marriage and kids, the two seater was sadly sold for more practical transportation. However, she’s mentioned many times over the last 15 years that “someday” she’d like to have a small convertible again.

Sadly, I’ve been looking for almost two years to find the right car with no luck. I thought I had found “the one” a couple of weeks ago, but the search collapsed when the seller and I couldn’t even agree on a “ballpark” price range.

When I saw this Mustang and it’s very reasonable price, a neuron or two fired and I started to look up what it would take to convert a Mustang coupe into a convertible. What I found was something called the Ronster Kit which takes a coupe and turns it into a topless roadster. It’s not quite  a convertible since there’s no top at all but it’s a start and something I’m considering doing to this car.

This Mustang would be an ideal candidate to make into a convertible for a few reasons:

1. The roof is shot anyway. If I turn the car into a convertible, the roof that has to come off anyway simply doesn’t have to go back on. The rusty roof that got me the great purchase price becomes totally irrelevant.
2. It’s a six cylinder car. Even with extra reinforcements, the chassis of Mustang convertibles are not as strong as their roofed counterparts. Having a lower-powered engine in the car would ease the strain on the unibody.
3. I already have a powerful V8 Mustang. I’m totally fine with a six cylinder cruiser convertible.

 

Another convertible option would be to purchase a 1966 Mustang convertible body shell and simply take all the parts off the coupe and bolt them on to the shell. Due to the costs involved, I’m not keen on that idea but it’s an option for consideration.

At this point, I’m content with not knowing what the future holds. For now, the Mustang is in my shop awaiting yet another shop refactor that will give both it and my other Mustang a permanent place to park:

This car will teach me a lot and for now that’s enough to make me happy. Beyond seeing if we can get it started and maybe tinkering with the brakes (whoopee), I don’t think I’ll do much with it until I’m done with my other Mustang. However, I will be purchasing a welding kit soon so I can start to learn that skill.

Something has to be done about that roof…