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'66 Mustang Coupe


99StockGT
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Remember when you were 15 years old and had a dream car? Well for a customer of ours that car was an old '66 Mustang coupe he saw languishing on the back lot of a local car dealership. Taken in as part of a trade on a new vehicle by the previous owner somehow it slipped through the cracks for months. With some luck and determination, possibly a bit of quick witted talk, the young dreamer and his father were able to purchase the car at an excellent price and take it home as the boys 1st car.

 

With dreams of a father/son restoration the car began to come apart, plans began to form of what the car would become. Unfortunately as things in this car world often go, life gets in the way, and now torn apart the machine remained in limbo. The dreamer grows up, buys another mustang as a Daily, and joins the Navy.

 

Fast forward nearly 15 years and our dreamer is out of the Navy, however his prized Mustang is still in 1000 pieces across the garage and in boxes stored all over. Driving by our shop one day he notices the constant stream of classics and old muscle cars that are in and out of our facility, eventually deciding to stop by and have a conversation.

 

Over the next few days we stay in communication over the car, learn the back story and the future vision, this dreamers ride needs to come together! And so, after several trips to load and tow the vehicle plus all the boxes of parts to our facility it sits here on our shop floor.

 

With all original body work and floorpans we have a solid base to build from, and build it exactly to how our dreamer wants it. The parts collection process begins! Our next ground up build, a '66 Mustang Coupe.

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/20160202_111229_zpseisjll3u.jpg

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/20160202_111208_zpsioen8lr1.jpg

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/20160202_111203_zpsq2ra32sx.jpg

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/20160202_111220_zpshaurg9ip.jpg

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/20160202_111216_zps2dgup2gn.jpg

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Unfortunately as is common with these sorts of things the project got started and blown apart then the time to put it back together never showed up. Takes far more time to build one than it does to tear it down. Which is what we are here for!
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Original floors are perfect, body is in damn good shape as well. The customer bought it literally when he was 15 drove it home and it came apart. Been sitting in garages ever since. He and his dad took it down to bare metal, primed and repainted it. UNfortunately it was done in a garage with not a lot of experience so there are certainly some imperfections. It was also done several moves ago from what we know so it's picked up some extra blemishes along the way.

 

Working on something like this versus a total clapped out rust bucket or something with bolts stuck stripped broken is soooo much better but it's still a TON of work. We brought 8 boxes of "stuff" with the car out of the garage so just the time in sorting and figuring out what we have/need is daunting.

 

It's funny when you look at the finances of a shop, you make far more money on turning small little brake and suspension jobs all day than you do on the big stuff. Killing a lift or spot in a garage for a month+ is big time money as it can't be used on the daily stuff.

 

However seeing something like this come together and knowing it's been his dream car since before he had his license is pretty damn awesome. Even his wife is getting excited just seeing things starting to move forward.

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Original floors are perfect, body is in damn good shape as well. The customer bought it literally when he was 15 drove it home and it came apart. Been sitting in garages ever since. He and his dad took it down to bare metal, primed and repainted it. UNfortunately it was done in a garage with not a lot of experience so there are certainly some imperfections. It was also done several moves ago from what we know so it's picked up some extra blemishes along the way.

 

Working on something like this versus a total clapped out rust bucket or something with bolts stuck stripped broken is soooo much better but it's still a TON of work. We brought 8 boxes of "stuff" with the car out of the garage so just the time in sorting and figuring out what we have/need is daunting.

 

It's funny when you look at the finances of a shop, you make far more money on turning small little brake and suspension jobs all day than you do on the big stuff. Killing a lift or spot in a garage for a month+ is big time money as it can't be used on the daily stuff.

 

However seeing something like this come together and knowing it's been his dream car since before he had his license is pretty damn awesome. Even his wife is getting excited just seeing things starting to move forward.

 

I agree and glad there are still some shops like yours that are willing to assist on these types of projects.

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Unfortunately due to the vast amount of time investment we can only do so many. I think all of last year we only completed 4 of them. A lot of ordering parts, waiting, ordering more parts, waiting, test fitting, ordering more parts...

 

Unfortunately also cuts into the free time to get our OWN project cars... which is why I have 3 of mine currently sitting waiting on wrench time and rich has... uh... 8? lol

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Always liked the looks of the first gen Stangs and as mentioned above getting this clean example (50 years old) is crazy lucky. Most have about 4 pounds of bondo on each side or the second or third set of quarter panels welded in.

 

GL with the build and post up some periodic updates (Pics or build details)..

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It's definitely motivating me to possibly build something for myself on the first gen platform, though with my own interesting twist of course. We are still in the parts sorting/checking/acquiring stage which will unfortunately last quite a while. However as new parts and pieces show up there will be lots and lots of updates.
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have you guys run the vin yet? Is there anything special about the car? Is it a K-code car? what was the original configuration?

 

here is a vin decoder if you need it:

http://mustangattitude.com/mustang/1966vinmatrix.shtml

 

here is the data plate info:

http://averagejoerestoration.com/1966-mustang-vin-and-data-plate-decoder-sheet/

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Nothing special about the car unfortunately, just a random good find. Was initially a non A/C inline six car with a stick painted in good ole Mustang red. Don't have any photos of what it looked like in its stock status as that was back 15 years ago.

 

Likely it will be going back on the road as something sort of Resto-modded

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So as the parts acquiring process continues of course as many of you may have noticed in one of the earlier photos I posted there's a V8 sitting on the floor next to the Mustang. That we will call an "organ donor" :) With some refreshing/remachining and upgrades that will become the heart of our new Dreamer car, currently it's a low mileage but seasoned late model Ford 302 that had been switched back to a carb setup.

 

Full serp belt setup, Edelbrock intake manifold, headers, couple other small upgrades but a great place to build from. So this next week or so it will come apart for some major surgery as we start sourcing our transmission/rear end.

 

Couple of photos as it sits before being torn apart.

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/IMG_20160205_223929_747_zpsdr6utzyu.jpg

 

http://i1045.photobucket.com/albums/b452/LucoreRacing/IMG_20160205_223922_084_zpsx3uzhg67.jpg

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Well, starting to go through the 8 boxes of "stuff" we pulled out of the garage along with the car for a change it looks like someone OVER kept things. Down to all of the original bolts and washer, impressive! One thing that makes this sort of process insanely more smooth is keeping all the little stuff.

 

To feel like we have accomplished something we resurfaced and polished the rear quarter windows and got them mounted. Progress!

 

 

https://youtu.be/4QwSyyHaElc

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