I should have done this from the beginning, but better late than never, I hope.
As many of you have seen in my posts of the past years, I've been workiong on a 65 fastback. It was pretty rusty and "only" a straight 6. Why should it be saved? Well it's kind of a family heirloom.
Here is the video the above was taken from, I'm the little one in the cap.
This car was purchased new for my mother by my father in 1965. It has been in the family all this time. I went over the car in 1979-81, and did the best I could with it as a 16-18 year old with no garage, or prior automotive experience. Most of the major work was farmed out, including the engine rebuild and the paint. I did the complete interior myself, with direction from my late grandfather, who was an experienced upholsterer. I still have the hog ring pliers he gave me, and I intend to use them again...
The car after the first "restoration" in the same spot, but shot from a different angle in 1981.
The car was never in a garage until I took it to my first house in 1992, when it was towed there, It had not moved since 1987. It was in pretty bad shape.
I moved to my new house in 1999. Many of the choices made on the house were related to the old 65 and the automotive interests it spawned. Basically I bought a garage with a house attached.
It took from October of 1999 until spring 2001 to get the garage ready for the restoration. I had a direct vent gas heater installed. I installed 16 2 bulb 4ft flourescent fixtures. I wanted to see what I was doing. The lights took 250 feet of wire to hook up ! I installed other little things like an 80 gallon vertical tank compressor, a hose bib( water), lots of air outlets, had the garage painted etc. I moved the car into position on Mothers day 2001 and started work.
Super Cool video man!! Thanks for sharing. I've never seen video of an original owner. Can't wait to see pics of the rebuilt engine. We have my father-in-laws 67 GTO he bought new, but we can't even find a pic of him and the car, let alone a family video. Really cool!! Your mom's hot by the way.
Super Cool man!! Thanks for sharing the pics. I've never seen video of an original owner. We have my father-in-laws 67 GTO he bought new, but we can't even find a pic of him and the car, let alone a family video. Really cool!! Your mom's hot by the way.
That's awesome, and a great story. Really gives the car a lot of personality. I love seeing/hearing stories behind cars like this.
__________________ "Natalie", '66 Coupe
Freshly Rebuilt 4-Speed w/ Hurst Performance Plus
289, Holley Carb, Edelbrock Intake and Water Pump, Tefba, Summit Direct Fit Rad
3.55 with Posi, Zoom Clutch
Next On the Agenda:
Interior - Replace floorpans (in progress), new carpet, tilt column, new steering wheel
Exterior/Body/Performance: Windshield (in progress), New cowl (in progress), weatherstripping, power steering
Oh yeah. Unfortunately it was so long ago, the repro tops weren't avail and I had to use a cobbled up used top to go back on. The original cowl grates were totally pitted.
Here are pictures from 10/1/01...Unfortunately the full floor pan wasn't available then either. Darn i really wish i had used one of those. If one existed that was correct for this car (With the parking cable humps and with the flange turned up coupe style, and the right size drain holes), I'd probably change it out.
The Left side shock tower and frame rail had some rust, I didn't realize how bad until I started cutting. At first I though I could just weld in some small patches at the base of the shock tower, pictures 2 and 3 show what I cut out initially. I then realized there was still some "packed in" rust between the inner and outer rail behind where I had removed, and the top of the frame rail was almost rusted through, see picture 4. I then noticed a swelled area at the front of the rail near where it meets the front crossmember. I knew from this there was rust in there so I cut in from the side to see what was salvageable. It was so bad I decided to replace the frame rail with a commonly available 28 inch repro rail. Picture 5 was taken after I removed the frame rail, the collapsed area happen during removal. The 28 inch rail did not reach quite far enough back to so I cut a good piece of the old rail (pic 6) to weld in further back than the new rail extended to (pictures 38 and 39 and 40). The marker line in picture 40 shows where the shock tower edge will be. I cut a piece from the bottom of the repro part and welded that in ( pictures 42, 43 and 44), so as not to disturb the upper part where the shock absorber, and upper control arm mounts. Pictures 45, 46 and 47 show how nice it came out after welding. I also cut off the rusted bottom of the inner apron shown in pictures 42& 43. I will weld in a portion of the repro apron here. This way I won't lose the sections with the date stampings and the VIN number.After reworking the repro frame rail (the upper 'sail" edge was at significantly different angle than it needed to be) and installing the LH rail in the right spot, I cut off the radiator support, lower front crossmember, rh inner apron, and RH frame rail. The battery exploded in this car in the late 70's, and the right front corner had patches welded all over, that had since rusted mostly away again. Pictures 48 and 49 show the light rust that is between every lap joint of this (and I'm sure every other rust belt car).
Picture 51 show the prize I drove from suburban Philadelphia to Muscatine IA (about 925 miles each way) to pick up, two NOS quarter panels. I found these on this board, the "Old" version. At the time, the one side has been obsolete for 8-10 years, the other for probably more than 15. They where hanging in a farmers heated shop since 1981 (thanks Mel for keeping them for me, lol).
Glad to see another one brought back from the brink of death!
__________________
1995 GT convertible - Laser Red
1995 GT convertible - Black (Son's ride)
1966 GT Fastback under restoration- Code T Red
with White LeMans stripes.
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11 Years Later, Project Albatross Build Thread...
68 Fastback. 351W/Toploader
