Mustang Comes Back, Work Begins

In early October the Mustang came back from the paint and body shop.  Our guy did an excellent job and included a lot of body work that he hadn't expected to have to do.  For example, the car had been in an accident and was hit from the left front, pushing the entire front end out of alignment.  This was pulled back.

Some cracks were revealed  in the body where the roof meets the rear fender on both sides, and these cracks were welded up and smoothed out.  This is apparently a common weak spot on the Mustang coupes.  The floor pan on the passenger side was also rusted out and a new section welded in. 

We temporarily stored it in the shed and covered it with moving blankets while Brian and I started cleaning and repainting parts

My friend Orv loaned me a bead blaster which made the process much easier.



After blasting old paint and rust off, parts are primered and painted:

Most of the above parts are from under the dash.

After I had cleaned and painted all the parts I could, Carolyn pulled the car over from the shed to the shop:



While I steered:

To make it easier to work on the suspension and install body parts (less bend over work), I decided to put the car up on jack stands.

At the recommendation of the body shop guy, and to protect the new paint from getting chipped I taped all the horizontal edges:

Brian and his family are coming down over the Thanksgiving weekend  and we will install headlight and taillight shells, and front and rear valances plus some grill components.  The car should start looking less like a hulk.