Fog Lights Mounted

Once upon a time I had a 1964 1/2 Mustang that I installed a set of '66 GT fog lights on. I removed those lights some time before I sold the car and those lights have been used on my older brothers '66 ever since. Recently they were taken off of his car and I decided to put them back on my "new" '66. I haven't purchased the fog light wiring kit yet, but I did spend about an hour or so mounting the lights on the Mustang.

'66 Mustang Fog Lights

I've got a little bit of work to do on the Mustang sometime in 2014 (as time permits) and that includes wiring in the fog lights. This is the list I've got going:

1. Fix power steering
2. Fix startup/timing issue
3. Replace oil pan with new pan (have)
4. Install emergency flasher kit (Done)
5. Replace upper shift boot (Done)
6. Replace driver sear rear panel (need)
7. Install fog light wiring kit (Done)

New 10.5" Ford Racing Clutch Installed

I jumped the gun a bit on the install since I wasn't planning on doing the project until as early as this coming weekend. With Lauren working and me having nothing else pressing to do I decided to install the clutch. I picked up the car from Darrell's garage and headed over to my parents house to get started. I pulled it onto the ramps and used a jack to raise up the rear of the car; ultimately using jack stands to hold up the rear of the car while my dad and I worked.

This sums up the order of the work we did:

1. Removed the Hurst shift lever inside the car.

2. Disconnected the (+) battery cable.

3. Removed the starter from the bell housing.

4. Disconnected the parking brake hardware and speedometer cable from under the car.

5. Disconnected the clutch cable from the throwout lever and bell housing.

6. Unbolted the exhaust from the headers. 

7. Drained the transmission from the lower fill plug

8. Removed the driveline.

9. Unbolted the bell housing from the motor (6 bolts)

10. Put a jack underneath the transmission.

11. Unbolted the transmission crossmember from the frame of the car (2 Bolts)

12. Removed the Reverse light wires (2)

13. Lowered the transmission while pulling it back off of the motor.

14. Unbolted the clutch pressure plate (6 bolts)

15. Removed the pressure plate and clutch (set aside)

16. Unbolted and removed the original 4-speed flywheel (6 bolts) and removed the pilot bearing from motor.

I had always had a problem with the clutch cables not reaching the throwout fork, and today I figured out what the problem was. I was using the wrong throwout bearing for the setup that I had. I was using a T5 with a 4-speed flywheel, clutch and pressure plate (10") while using a throwout bearing for a T5. The pressure plate for the 4-speed transmissions is about an inch taller than its newer T5 10.5" counterpart:

10.5" Left       --       10" Right

This explains why the throwout fork always sat at the very back of the bell housing rather than at some point in the middle.  Once we had everything out we started putting all of the new parts back in the car.

17. Bolted new Flywheel to the motor (6 bolts)

18. Installed guide pins for pressure plate with brass mallet (3) and installed new pilot bearing

19. Put new 10.5" clutch up to the flywheel and used the guide tool to hold it in place

20. Set new 10.5" pressure plate on the guide pins and threaded the bolts

21. Installed the new Ford Racing throwout bearing on the throwout fork and attached it to the bell housing.

22. Jacked up the transmission into place and slid the input shaft into the pilot bearing
23. Started all bell housing bolts  into the motor (6)
24. Jacked up the transmission and installed the crossmember onto the frame
25. Installed the driveline
26. Installed the parking brake, and reverse light wires (2)
27. Installed the speedometer cable
28. Installed high torque mini-starter

At this point it was time to remove the old clutch cable (from a fox body Mustang '88-'93) and re-install a longer clutch cable from a 96+ Mustang. When I had to do this during the Show and Go this spring it took hours to accomplish because it is inconveniently located under the dash. This time I wasn't going to spend that much time.

29. Removed driver's seat by removing 4 bolts from underneath car

30. Removed steering wheel (it hasn't been fully tightened down so I didn't need a steering wheel remover)

31. Removed gauges from dash and took off speedometer cable

32. Used alan wrench to remove clutch cable from Mustang Steve quadrant. 

33. used alan wrench to install/tighten new clutch cable from 96+ Mustang after feeding it through the firewall.

34. Routed the clutch cable all the way to the front of the car

96+ Mustang Clutch cable on '66 Mustang

 35. Installed the adjustable cable end on the throwout fork using two nuts supplied

36. Installed a C-clip on the backside of the clutch cable (backside of the bell housing)

37. Re-filled transmission with drained fluid

38. Re-connected the positive battery cable.

39. Installed the driver's seat

40. Re-connected the speedometer cable and installed the gauges

41. Re-installed the steering wheel.

42. Re-installed the Hurst shift lever (2 bolts)

The car drove great with the new clutch. The pedal was a little lighter to push in and I could even do it with my thumb (not quite two fingers like I've seen on YouTube videos.) While we had the car apart I tightened the bolts on the third-member since it has had an oil leak since we put it together. Hopefully that takes care of the leak. 

I've been having another issue with the car not wanting to start right up when it's hot. it has a new distributor (electronic), coil, carburetor, spark plug wires, and spark plugs. It is getting fuel and spark so I'm not sure what the problem is...maybe the timing? That is going to be my next research project since it sucks to have a car not start when you stall on the highway in traffic or at a light. For now it's driving great with the new clutch and clutch cable. I'm happy with the investment. The job took from about 9am-3:30pm with two experienced people (my dad and me) and no significant breaks.

Prepping to Install New Clutch

I haven't had the greatest experience with my T5 transmission to date and I believe the primary reason for that is due to the clutch. I bought a used flywheel, clutch and pressure plate from a 4-speed toploader off of Craigslist for $50 and I don't think it sat properly when it was installed. This caused the clutch fork to sit too far back and therefore caused the clutch cable to always have too much tension on it in addition to causing the clutch to always be slightly engaged. I know that there should always be a little pressure on these types of diaphragm clutches, but in my case something just isn't right if the clutch cable is 3" from reaching the fork.

I have decided to pull the transmission and install a newer 10.5" clutch and flywheel from a newer Mustang. Yesterday I ordered a handful of parts from Summit Racing's website including

1. 157 tooth, 10.5", 28.2oz Ford Racing flywheel
2. 10.5" Ford Racing clutch kit
3. Throwout bearing
4. Pilot bearing
5. Bolt and dowel kit
6. '96+ Mustang clutch cable

I have read that the clutch cables from the '96+ Mustangs are a bit longer and allow for better routing which in turn allow for less required pressure when pushing in the clutch. I'm planning to do this install on either September 7th or 14th. It shouldn't take more than a day if I have some help, but we'll see!

Show and Go 2013

I finally entered my car in a car show! This year was the 14th annual Riverside Show and Go put on by the local Rotary Club and the Old Farts Racing Team. I sent in my check for $60 a few weeks back and was mailed my entry tag which was #663. There were 1,000 cars that turned out for this years extravaganza in Downtown Riverside. I showed up on Friday night around 5pm and was able to get a parking spot on 12th and Market. Throughout the weekend I was able to stay in the same general area, but just worked my way right on the map below (towards Main St.)

 My car was looking pretty clean for the most part although I really didn't spend any time washing, waxing or vacuuming it. It's always parked in a garage under a car cover, so it really doesn't get too dirty. I was parked on a bit of a slope in the picture below so the rear drivers side tire looks nearly tucked in the fender while the rear passenger side tire make it look like the rear had a lift kit installed.

I was going to leave the show on the first night around 8:30 since I was going to be back early the next morning, but I decided to drive the cruise route on my way out. I was about a mile into the cruise route when I pushed in the clutch and hear a loud POP sound. Immediately I knew that it was the clutch cable. The transmission was now nearly impossible to shift between gears unless I had the clutch practically pressed through the floor and it was engaging at the bottom of the floor when I started letting my foot up. After what felt like an eternity of being trapped on a narrow cruise route, I found an exit and pulled off. Instead of trying to get under the car to see what was going on, I decided to drive over to my parents house which was about 5 miles from there.

I pulled out the car ramps and drove the 'Stang up so that I could get a good look underneath. My suspicions were correct.

Nobody likes a broken clutch cable. Fortunately this one was at least hanging on by one last thread which allowed me to get the car to my parents for repair. Most of the parts places (Autozone, O'Rileys) close at 9pm and by the time I knew what I needed it was almost 9pm. I called to find out who had the cable in stock so that at least I could swing by in the morning to get it. When my parents got home from a late dinner with some Chinese business people my dad told me that there was an Autozone that was open later than 9pm a few miles from the house. I called them and sure enough, they had the clutch cable in stock although it wasn't the adjustable one that I had installed in my car.

I picked it up and spent the next two hours trying to get it installed. I was having issues reaching up under the dash to release and then re-install the allen-head screw that holds the cable to the clutch pedal.  Once we finally got that tightened and I slid back under the car to hook it up to the clutch fork, I ran into the same problem that I had when I installed the first cable; the cable didn't reach the clutch fork. In order to get it up and running for the car show the next morning we cut off part of the old cable and used cable clamps to extend the new cable allowing it to reach the fork. We doubled back the cable on itself and used a second clamp although the picture below only shows one cable clamp.

I wanted to install the longer 96-04 clutch cable, so that I could better route it through the engine compartment, but no one had it in stock. I worry about this cable breaking just like the first one did. I'm tempted to spend some $$$ to install a hydraulic system because no one wants to get stranded due to a broken clutch cable. The transmission could stand to be gone through and have a kit installed too. 

I'm expecting my first child in October so if I'm going to spend any amount of money on this car, I should probably do it soon because once that baby is here, I probably won't be doing any major projects on the car (e.g. disk brakes, hydraulic clutch, rebuilt transmission, etc.)

Update 09/02/13: I installed the longer clutch cable,a 10.5" Ford Racing clutch, Ford Racing flywheel, and Ford Racing pressure plate. As it turns out I had been using the wrong pressure plate all along! You can read about it HERE.

Billet Parking Brake Handle

I took out the Mustang for an afternoon/evening drive last Thursday to keep the oil flowing through the motor nicely. When I backed out of the garage and set the parking brake, the handle snapped in half like a toothpick.

Broken '66 Mustang Parking Brake Handle

I was pretty sad that the part was made so cheaply. This was a brand new parking brake handle and although I don't remember the brand, it shouldn't have broken after less than a year of using it less than once a month. At any rate I knew I was going to need to buy a new handle to replace this one and I didn't want to have to go through the same thing a few months down the road so I started looking up metal handles. There were a couple on the market, but the one I fancied the most was the one that looked most like the original black handle which was sold by Mustang Plus. The other one they sold looked more modern and I just didn't like it. This is the one I bought:

Billet Parking Brake Handle

One of the things I like about this handle is that instead of it having a pin that is just knocked through the handle and into the rod (which makes it very difficult to take off later.) This particular handle has a threaded stud that is tightened using a small Allen wrench The threads are in the handle itself and the pin goes into the rod just like it would have with the original handle.

Installing a metal handle will prevent me from ever needing to change it again. On the off chance I want to change the handle in the future, all I need to do is get an Allen wrench, back off the pin and pull the handle off.