65 Mustang Restoration: Post #1, 4/12/10 Picked up the new project.

65 Mustang Restoration

I hope everyone will bare with me here,,, I'm new to the blogging scene, but I figured I'd give it a try for this project. I welcome everyone to join us in our little adventure,,, I will probably be requiring some of your help with some of the details. One of you may even be the lucky new owner of this car when it's done,, because most likely, it will be for sale once completed,,, since neither my son or me fits into the car very well (our heads slightly touch the head liner)(may have to correct that situation). If you'd like,, make sure to tell your friends about this blog.

Over the next year or so, depending on time and funds, my son & I are hoping to do a total restoration of this car,,, hopefully it'll be better than it was when it was new. Though there are a lot of things we could do to hot-rod it up,,, this will be built back to close to factory specs. However, being a mechanic/fabricator/chassis builder/racer for the last 30 years, and with all of the improvements in technology since this car was first built, it's hard for me to build a car like this without improving certain areas. To 90% + of the people that look at this car,,, it'll look completely stock,,, since most of the improvements will be very subtle or hidden from view,, only the hardcore Stangers will notice certain areas right away. I guess I'll just have to start a New Mustang Classification called "Factory Stock Enhanced".

Here's the 65 Mustang that I recently picked up by Kansas City(735 miles, round trip). You may have noticed that it's going to need a bit of work. It was just what we were looking for. Most of the parts came with the car,, but I had to load them into the trailer, back of the truck, back seat of the truck, and into what was left of the Stang's trunk.

Though it's hard to see,,, this car actually has very little rust on it,, mostly the lower quarters, LR frame rail, lower wheel houses, a bit on the trunk floors, and slight amounts in the battery box area. One of the nice things about this car is that most of the dis-assembly of this car has already been completed & it's previously been blasted in most areas.

I've spent most of the winter searching for manuals,, and many parts new & used, on Ebay, Craigs List, at auctions, swap meets(another one this weekend), and by word of mouth,, and have accumulated several items. It can save you a fortune when you're patient,, sometimes you just have to pick & choose when the right time is to get something. For example, CJ Pony had a special this winter,, Free Shipping on ALL of their items,,, this even Included Truck Freight Shipping on all of the large parts,, so I bought (2) new floor pans, (2) full quarter panels, (2) front fenders, radiator support, front & rear valance panels, and a couple of other items. Since they're in Pennsylvania and I'm in Iowa, this saved me several hundreds of $$ in shipping which can be used for other items. Since that time,, they now offer Free Shipping on all of their items that don't have to be shipped by truck,,, which is fine with me, because we have all of our large parts.

We spent last Saturday cleaning up the garage,, it's amazing how big of a catch-all a hollowed out Mustang can become over the winter. Space is a bit limited,,, but it's what we have,, so we'll deal with it somehow. Here are some more pics of what we're starting with.