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  1. #1
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Default My turn! My new (to me) '82 Zephyr Z7 - future track toy





    Short version: Yesterday I drove up to Long Island to pick up a Z7 that I had found on Craigslist months ago. The intention is to make this into a track car (road course, not drag) so that I can stop beating up on my street cars at track events. Full cage, V8 drivetrain of some sort, MM suspension, possibly Cobra IRS, etc etc. I've already started accumulating parts, but it'll probably take a while for the plan to come to fruition - if I get it on track in 2019 I'll be pretty happy.










  2. #2
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Long version:

    I've been doing auto-cross and track day stuff since '99, initially in my Subaru, then eventually my CTS-V took over track day duty and the Subaru was the auto-x car. I've had an '89 Mustang all along, and it's fully prepped for road course duty (full MM suspension, Stoptechs, etc), but the engine / tune has never been right and I've never put in the time to really figure it out. Plus it's a convertible, so as track cars go, it's the worst of the Fox-body platforms, and safety-wise an open top car is not the best.

    For quite a while I've been thinking that a F/Z-based track car would be pretty sweet - all the Fox / SN95 performance parts underneath with a "plain Jane" wrapper on the outside. While I've never seen one in person, I've seen a few online that kept me thinking about it. Over the past couple years the CTS-V has had a few issues that have cut track events short, issues that I attribute to the mileage (it rolled 144k miles recently) and the abuse I subject it to on track. That got me thinking a bit more seriously about getting a dedicated track car. Of course, the smart thing to do would be to buy someone else's race car that they're selling off - a car that's ready to go, I just need to get a truck and trailer to tow the ready-to-run car to events. But where's the fun in that?

    If I was going to do this, I wanted a 2 door. My first choice would've been a boxtop, but the only one I've found anywhere close to me was at a shop that wanted about double what I ended up paying for this Z7. It was clear that they knew racers and rodders like the boxtops, and that they weren't going to flex much (if any) on the price. So I kept periodically looking on CL, searching around the Mid-Atlantic. Way back in late April I somehow stumbled across an ad for this Z7, up on Long Island - '82 Zephyr, 89k miles, $1000. I think at that point the ad was already a few weeks old, so I sent a note asking if they still had the car. They still had it, and we shot some emails back and forth, including some pictures (http://www.submariner.org/thepno95/P...le%20pictures/). I called and spoke to them, and got the back story, which is pretty interesting.

    I got the car from a young couple who got the car with their first house. Basically, they knew nothing about the car - they bought a property from the bank, and the car was in the garage as part of the deal. (AFAIK, the previous owner of the house (and car) had died, and the bank foreclosed on the house, then sold it to the new owners.) It has license plates on it, but the registration had expired in November 2003, so my guess is the car has been garaged for the 14 years since.

    So they've got this old car that they don't want or need, but felt it was in good shape so they didn't want to just junk it. The father of the wife rebuilt the carb, and they got the car to run, albeit poorly. Unfortunately, because of the circumstances of how they acquired it, in addition to having no history of the car, they also had no title, which makes it hard to sell (because whoever buys it is going to have a hard time trying to title it). How do you get a title of a car that you didn't buy or inherit? As far as the DMV knows, it's not your car! Local DMV office told them they'd need to talk to the State Police. State Police told them they'd have to talk to the DMV. Basically, they got nowhere with local resources, but then through the NY DMV website I helped to get them in touch with someone who was able to help them title the car in their name. (I think they essentially treated it like taking possession of an abandoned vehicle.) Part of the process was that the DMV had to send a letter to the previous owner - who is dead, mind you - to ensure that the previous owner didn't still want the car. The couple had to tell their mailman, "If you see a letter for the old owner of the house, please don't discard it! Let us know it showed up, then mark it DECEASED and return it to sender."

    In June, I was heading up to New England to visit family, and I swung out on Long Island to check the car out. The couple told me that they had had some interested folks, but everyone was low-balling them. They had gotten a couple offers in the $300-400 range because they didn't have the title and the engine ran rough. I told them I really didn't need another car, that I've already got 4, including a project car (the aforementioned Subaru) that hasn't run in 3+ years, but I was interested. At that point they were still working with DMV to figure out how to go about getting the car titled in their names.

    Fast forward a month or so, I check in with them via email. They still have the car, still working through the DMV bureaucracy to get the title.

    End of September, I'm still thinking about the car. I call them up to see if they still have it. Sure enough, they've still got it, and they're still working with DMV on the title. [I continued to periodically check Craigslist; to the best of my knowledge, they never advertised the car again after I went to look at it in mid June. I think they figured I was going to buy it; they knew me better than I knew myself.] In late September all the paperwork was finally sent in from the local DMV to Albany to get the title. I told them I would buy the car, but that it might be a while before I could come to get it, as I was going to be borrowing a friend's truck & trailer.

    October and November go by, we're into December. I had arranged to use my friend's truck & trailer on Saturday, Dec 9th. As the week progressed, the weather forecast was starting to look sketchy. My buddy actually picked up the trailer Friday morning (he keeps it at some storage facility), but by noon he waved off - the forecast had turned to snow up through NJ and onto LI, and he just didn't think it was a good idea. As much as I wanted to get the car, I had to agree.

    2018 rolls in, and finally this weekend was looking good - weather was OK (cold, but not supposed to snow), and I had a 3-day weekend, so plenty of time to get things taken care of. Unfortunately, my buddy's truck was going in for service. Doh! Friday I managed to arrange to borrow a co-worker's truck, and with that lined up I then got in touch with UHaul and arranged for a trailer. I left home at the crack of dawn, went to my co-worker's place (about 45min in pretty much the opposite direction from where I needed to go) and got the truck, then headed north. I ended up running ahead of schedule - traffic was nice and light all the way up - so I was able to make a separate stop on LI to pick up some parts and still picked up the trailer about an hour early. Good to go.

    As seen in the pics above, the car is pretty filthy right now. The heavy coat of dust is not a result of sitting in the garage for years, it's primarily due to lots of dust in the air from the previous owners having their driveway re-done at some point in the past few months. For now the car's going to stay covered in dust, but the forecast is calling for 50s next weekend, so hopefully that holds and I can wash the car. I need to pick up a cover for it, as it's primarily going to sit in the driveway untouched for the foreseeable future and I want to keep it clean and sheltered. The first "mechanical" work is going to be an oil change and pumping the 15-year-old fuel out of the gas tank (so that I can hopefully run the car off the gas tank rather than off a couple gallon jug of gas sitting in the engine bay, as seen above!).






    (I'm not sure anyone has ever sat in the back seat!)



    This is the only real boo-boo; I'm not even sure exactly how such damage would've happened.



  3. #3
    FEP Power Member 4-barrel Mike's Avatar
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    Suweet!

    Coupla things:

    1) "Any fool can race a V8." Be different: 2.3T.

    2) Track car won't need the door cards. Whatcha want for them?

    3) GO NAVY! (Retired CPO )

    Mike

  4. #4
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by 4-barrel Mike View Post
    1) "Any fool can race a V8." Be different: 2.3T.
    I'm not immune to 4cyl cars - I have 2 Subarus - but this car will have V8 power.

    Quote Originally Posted by 4-barrel Mike View Post
    2) Track car won't need the door cards. Whatcha want for them?
    Pretty much the entire interior will go up for sale eventually, but I don't think I'll be pulling anything for a while. I'll definitely keep you penciled in for the door cards when the time comes. If you really need them soon, shoot me a PM and we can figure something out.

    Quote Originally Posted by 4-barrel Mike View Post
    3) GO NAVY! (Retired CPO )
    What flavor of CPO were you? I'm a submarine occifer who is beyond the submarining portion of his career and into the desk-driving portion.

  5. #5

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    when you do yank the 3.3/200 six, if it's a low-mount starter, I'd be interested in buying the engine... PM me if you want
    Jim DeAngelis
    Cornucopia of Useless Knowledge
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    '83 GT hatch, currently under the knife
    '79 Capri 2.3L n/a, Medium Copper metallic, survivor
    (bought from MRausch82)

  6. #6

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    Congrats on the new toy. Where on LI was it? Looks a lot like where I grew up.
    -Randy
    '83 Mustang GL notchback - 351w - T5Z
    '84 Mustang GT350 20th Anniversary Hatch #2808 - 302 - T5
    ''92 Mustang LX Hatch - 2.3t - IRS (in progress)

  7. #7
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by FB71 View Post
    when you do yank the 3.3/200 six, if it's a low-mount starter, I'd be interested in buying the engine... PM me if you want
    I'm a total newbie on the 3.3 - how does one identify a low-mount starter (vs a high-mount, I assume?)?


    Quote Originally Posted by NY5speed View Post
    Congrats on the new toy. Where on LI was it? Looks a lot like where I grew up.
    It was in East Patchogue.

  8. #8

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    Quote Originally Posted by Patrick Olsen View Post
    I'm a total newbie on the 3.3 - how does one identify a low-mount starter (vs a high-mount, I assume?)?
    high-mount is above the pan rail, low-mount is below, same location as a small block v8.
    Jim DeAngelis
    Cornucopia of Useless Knowledge
    Connoisseur of Dearborn Ferrous Oxide
    '83 GT hatch, currently under the knife
    '79 Capri 2.3L n/a, Medium Copper metallic, survivor
    (bought from MRausch82)

  9. #9
    FEP Super Member xctasy's Avatar
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    Blue rocker Fox 3.3, High mount starter, non lockup C4 or French C3 or 3 on the tree or SROD or T4 manual transmission.

    Gray rocker, low mount C5 lock-up clutch auto, most 1982 Vin Code B 3.3's are high mount with a C3 auto, a small number are low mount with a C5.

    Rocker cover color, and its Emissions Calibration tell you what is supposed to be under the cylinder head.



    After 1981 to 1983, you could get two kinds of engine block, but Ford only made 1982's with C3's with the 2.73 8V axle and trans code high mounts, and the low mount only C5 got 2.73 "8" code axle and "W" code trans is what you look for.

    Might have been a 3.08 option for1982/1983 3.3's.

    No manual transmissions were available for the 1982 and 1983 model year 3.3's.




    Trans code on the Door Post tells you what is what

    High Mount E1 BE 6015 or D8 BE 6015 block, the suffix defines the starter motor position

    Low mounts were normally grey



    And had E1BE 6015 BB suffixes

    Quote Originally Posted by xctasy View Post


    The IJ204 Blue engine with high mount starter has a block like this





    It needs a specific Fox bellhousing to fit the SROD V8 gearbox, as the clutch operation changed from the earlier Toploader 3.03 and earlier 2.77 gearboxes. The diff may be a 6.75" Stirling, which leaves you with 3.08 or 2.73 gearing.


    If its low mount Gray CJ232, it was never a manual. To make it manual requires a redrilled V8 SROD bellhousing, with the top two bolt holes shifted downwards.

    1981-1983 Fox bodies were technically the only cars with big bell 200's. They had the football cat exhast with 4.5" outlet from 1980 to 1983, and B code VINS for 1980, 1981 and 1982, and then became X code for 1983.

    The 3.3 is the single most common 1978-1983 Fox engine, and they most often stay 100% stock plodders that racked up huge miles at 85 mph on interstates.



    Check for the CJ232AB front rocker decal, should be gray colored rockerand block.



    The high mount 4 speed factory options are numerous but the best two are the D9BC-6392-CA and E1ZR-6394-AA bellhousings, which were normal options on the 3.3 Mustangs. The first of the 3.03 bell housings, the common C7ZA-6394-A can be made to work, but the cable clutch quadrant means the engineering has to be specificly changed for that one to work well. See http://straightsixshootin.weebly.com/cable-bell.html

  10. #10
    FEP Super Member xctasy's Avatar
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    "best junkyard options for a fox body in line six"





    See the famous Silver Metallic Lincs 200 13.5 second 1984 Mustang 3.8 retrofitted to a 8.4:1 compression 1982 B code low mount 3.3 conversion to see how simple it can be. One 92 hp six and one 20 psi turbo boost killed the old girl, but it shows you what you can do.



    Just copied a Diesel's turbo, and he was off!





    http://fordsix.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=24859

    Post #6 by mike1157 » Mon Aug 12, 2013
    Quote Originally Posted by mike1157

    Thanks,...you did alot of work to offer up a very helpful reply. I appreciate it.

    The 200 turbo build of Lincs 200 was very inspirational. That guy probably has forgotten more than I'll ever know,...and he's 20 years younger than me. Reading that he was able to flog that high mile bottom end while he sorted out his turbo was what I was really looking for,...as I wanted to do a really exotic head mod first, to include building a tubular intake manifold that will allow me to port fuel inject it w/ the throttle body on the driver side of the engine, much like a 300 in the F150. The turbo,...the wastegate, the B.O.V. and I/C are all too cheap on ebay as long as you don't mind patronizing another Chinese company. That said, It'll still end up being fairly expensive, and very time consuming, considering I gotta build all of that stuff, but I think I'm up to the challenge.

    Unlike Linc though,...I'm not trying to use the stock log,or a 1 bbl carb sitting directly over the exhaust manifold. I'm looking at using an A2Water intercooler w/ meth injection activated at boost pressures above 7 PSI, /w timing pulled out as boost pressures ramp up all controlled by a Megasquirt ( that I'll also have to build myself) If that'll net me the 300 HP/350 TQ I can get as a result of dropping a stock 100k mile Chevrolet LS in the car instead,...I'll really give that a hard look. The primary attraction of the 200 being that it's in the car, it fits w/o any modification,...and it was made by the same company that built the car it resides in.

    But,....I'll turn coat and go to the dark side if I cant.
    $2500 spent on the Right Stuff always gets you 13.5 seconds, even with an old automatic 3.3 with a 400 dollar turbo. No intercooler, cast iron rods, stock 256 degree, 185 degree at 50 thou lift 370 thou valve lift cam.


    On 13 pounds boost, you can get 84.76 mph at 8.93 secs over the 1/8 th mile and 92.68 mph at 13.879 sec



    On 20 pounds boost 85.45 mph at 8.907 secs 1/8 mile with 2600 pounds makes 252.10 flywheel HP and 226.89 rear wheel HP from http://www.wallaceracing.com/hpcalculatoreigth.php
    .
    102.5 mph 1/4 mile with 2600 pounds is 224.62 rear wheel HP from http://www.wallaceracing.com/et-hp-mph.php.



    One US Borg Waner turbo, a rising rate fuel pump, an intercooler, and 3.3, you are golden. http://vb.foureyedpride.com/showthre...-turbo-for-3-8


    For the 1984, if its procured with an EFI 5.0, and you eliminate the cost premium over a junker 2.3, 3.3, 3.8 or carb 5.0, you can do the same with zero dollars, just the purchase cost of swap outs. The 3.73's and some of the parts taht allow it to gell together. Its just parts that make 300 hp are the upper intake and better long tunbe headers, and a way of dialing in the ECM.


    Down here, 325 hp can take a 2800 pound 5 speed car into the high 11's with ease.
    Well, 1157 Mike, aka Car Micheal Angelo did the 250 Maverick block with Aluminum Head and Turbo conversion, and he's just done a strip and rebuild to turn it into a 400 hp naturally aspirated streeter with M3 S52 BMW Independent runner EFI and he's just ditched the turbo because he figures he just doesn't need it on a 10.25:1 compression engine that pushes a more radical than E303 solid roller cam to over 6300 rpm, and pops insane wheelies on 315's and just 7 pounds of boost.





    Battle boxed underneath, the whole car is able to do any thing a Bent Eight can


  11. #11

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    Quote Originally Posted by Patrick Olsen View Post
    It was in East Patchogue.
    I knew it looked familiar, my first apartment was in East Patchogue.
    Last edited by NY5speed; 01-16-2018 at 08:50 AM.
    -Randy
    '83 Mustang GL notchback - 351w - T5Z
    '84 Mustang GT350 20th Anniversary Hatch #2808 - 302 - T5
    ''92 Mustang LX Hatch - 2.3t - IRS (in progress)

  12. #12
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    ^^^ Small world!

    Yesterday afternoon I was messing around a bit in the engine bay, pulling out the hole-y radiator. I did a little bit of poking around - pretty sure it's got a blue valve cover, and that the starter is up high, not down below the pan rail. That would seem to jive with xctasy's info. I'll confirm later - I was freezing my ass off, and it was getting dark, so I may not have seen what I thought I saw.

  13. #13
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    - Tried to pump out the gas tank the other day, I don't think it's as full as the gauge indicates. I fed the hose from one of those cheap siphon pumps in through the fill pipe and couldn't get anything out; the end of the hose wasn't even wet, despite me feeding in plenty of it. Sounds pretty empty when I rap it with my knuckle, so I'll probably see about just dropping it as-is so I can remove whatever fuel remains and inspect the interior to see if the tank is still good.

    - Replaced the radiator and hoses today. I had actually brought the parts with me when I went to retrieve the car, but we decided there really wasn't any need to swap it out for the sake of pulling the car on/off the trailer. The old radiator had a little bit of a hole in it .





    New one installed:


    (Gotta love that fan "shroud"!)

    The heater core is bypassed, as the previous owners weren't sure what condition it's in. I'll have to figure that out at some point and fix the hoses.

    - Installed new battery cables. The old ground cable was in really bad shape, insulation had flaked off in a few spots, and more was flaking off (without me even touching it) just as a result of me bending the cable while removing it. I had a negative cable on hand that will do the trick - it's not routed the same, but it doesn't need to be. I didn't have any short positive cables, so I grabbed a 12" cable at Autozoo to install on the positive side. It was starting to get dark/cold, so I didn't actually reinstall the battery and start the car; I'll do that this weekend.

    - Gave the interior a warm water wipe-down, just to remove the accumulated dust. In general, it looks pretty damn good for a 35-year-old interior. The dash cover has some cracking around the speaker grilles, there are some dark marks on the passenger seat (might come off with actual cleaning, as opposed to just water), a couple small splits in the vinyl on the seats.

  14. #14
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Parts that I've already got on-hand:

    - A complete set of '01 Bullitt spindles/hubs & brakes. Picked these up from a guy on CL who has turned his Bullitt into a drag car, so he had gone to lightweight front brakes, I think on Fox 4-lug spindles. Only 10k miles on the parts, so damn near new.
    - Semi-custom Roush/Alcon front brakes with 13.5" 2-piece Coleman rotors. Got these from a guy on Corral. The calipers are radial mount, and mount to the SN95 spindles with aluminum brackets that he had made. All the mounting points have steel inserts. There's an extra set of hats for the Coleman rotors, plus a set of C6 Vette Z51 package rotors, which happen to have essentially the same dimensions. Apparently the hat offset is a little different, but with a couple shims (which he included) the calipers will center over the Vette rotors.



    - Reman '03/04 Cobra steering rack (Cardone 22-2000).
    - Maximum Motorsports (MM) hybrid steering shaft to install an SN95 rack in a Fox.
    - MM K-member on back-order, should ship around the end of January.
    - MM front control arms (non-offset, Fox length, Delrin bushings).
    - MM front coilovers for Bilsteins. Haven't actually gotten the dampers or springs yet.
    - MM caster/camber plates.
    - MM full-length subframe connectors
    - Complete SN95 GT 8.8 rear end with 3.55s. I haven't decided if the car will end up with a TA/PHB rear, or if I'll do a Cobra IRS swap. 99% of my track time to this point has been in my Subaru or my CTS-V, both of which have fully independent suspension, so it might be easier for me to get up to speed with the new car if it's also got an IRS. We'll see...
    - A used set of 17x8" SN95 GT "split spoke" wheels. Another Corral find, they're not pretty, but they'll do to roll the car around on initially when I do a 5-lug conversion.
    - A used set of polished (chrome?) 17x8" '99/01 Cobra wheels. Found these at the junkyard, on a Crown Vic or Town Car of all things. I already had the GT wheels, so I didn't really need these, but they're in good shape, and everything was 40% off at the junkyard that weekend, so I grabbed 'em.

    All the MM stuff I picked up over the past couple months during their various "Deal of the Weekend" sales.
    Last edited by Patrick Olsen; 01-18-2018 at 06:40 PM.

  15. #15
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    - Took advantage of the warm weekend to wash the car.

    - Reinstalled the new battery with the new cables and it fired right up and settled into what felt like a pretty good idle. No tachometer, so I have no idea what RPMs it's running.

    - Changed the oil & filter. Drain plug looked a bit worse for wear, so I headed down to Autozone and grabbed a new drain plug and a couple drain plug seals. As part of the oil change, I ended up taking apart the air cleaner housing, since the crankcase breather hose got disconnected from the filter element inside the air cleaner. When I pulled off the top of the air cleaner housing, I found a couple of issues.

    First, regarding the crankcase breather element, it appears I'm missing a clip to hold it in place. And is there supposed to be a grommet on the air filter housing where the breather element pokes through? I had a generic PCV grommet that fit the hole, but with it in place the nipple on the crankcase breather element wasn't long enough to protrude out the other side so the breather hose could have something to attach to.



    Second, the base of the air cleaner housing is cracked in multiple locations. In a couple spots the cracks nearly come together to the point that a chunk of the housing would fall out - I could've easily snapped a couple sections off by hand, I could tell it was that fragile. Only thing I can figure is that at some point in it's life it had something too heavy put down on top of it. I can't really see any other way the thing would get such damage.





    I have some foil tape, so I used that to hold things together. Not terribly sexy, but it works well enough for now.

  16. #16
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    You need something like this to hold the breather to the air cleaner base (I don't know if this is the exact one, but this is the first picture I could find to show what the part looks like).
    https://www.ebay.com/itm/Dorman-4111...g/262761611378

    I don't think there is supposed to be any rubber grommet in the hole the breather goes through. Anything that gets in through the hole would have to go through the air filter before it goes into the engine so no worries.

    I've never seen an air cleaner base crack like that before.
    '89 XR-7 5 Speed
    '95 SC 5 Speed
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  17. #17
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Yeah, I figured out there was supposed to be a clip because a couple of the replacement options on Rock Auto showed a clip - hey, I don't have one of those! I've got one of those in my shopping cart.

    Thanks for the note on the rubber grommet. I was thinking it would be needed to hold the breather element in place, but I guess the clip serves that purpose, so no need.

  18. #18
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    Yeah the breather just kind of sits against the inside of the air cleaner housing and does its thing.

    That cracking air cleaner base makes me a little nervous, but I guess any broken off pieces would have a hard time actually getting into the carburetor.

    Are you going to go with the Bullitt/Cobra or Roush front brakes? What are you planning to use for rear brakes?
    '89 XR-7 5 Speed
    '95 SC 5 Speed
    '91 Crown Vic P72 351W
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  19. #19
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    - Following up on washing the car, Monday afternoon I put some wax on it. Well, the top part, at least. It kind of started on a whim - the paint is quite tired, particularly the lighter color. On the trunk there's a big stain/mark where I'm guessing something rusty (?) sat for years when the car was buried in the garage. So, I pulled out the clay bar to see if I could clean that up at all. And then after the clay bar (which didn't do much) I tried some wax. I'm no detailing expert, but I think what I had in the garage (some Meguiars NXT Tech Wax) is really not the right tool for the job, as it's not a polish or "cleaner wax" - the paint probably would benefit more from using something with more cutting action.

    Anyway, I hit that section of the trunk, again with no real effect, but then I figured I might as well do all of the silver, since that covers all of the horizontal surfaces that tend to take more abuse (either from the sun beating down, or from stuff being piled on the car). So, I did that - even pulled out my old Craftsman random orbital buffer. Meanwhile, my CTS-V (parked next to the Zephyr) stared accusatorily at me, and I think I could hear it muttering that the last time it received such attention was way too long ago.

    - Got the rear up on stands Monday after work in preparation for dropping the gas tank. Today I went ahead and removed the tank. It's probably 8 or 10 years since I last dropped the tank in my Mustang; I've forgotten what a joy it is to do that. And it's even more of a joy when the tank turns out to have 3 or 4 times more gas in it than you thought it did! It appears the gas gauge was actually indicating about the right level. I've pumped roughly 10 gallons out into two racing fuel jugs I had borrowed from my friend, and still have more in the tank. Gotta take the jugs to the dump to dispose of the gas I've already pumped out before I can finish the job.







    My initial look inside the tank was pretty promising, looks like it's clean / rust-free. The big fill pipe seal is in decent shape, but I'll look to replace it, anyway - I have a couple threads to go back and read for the details on that.


    Quote Originally Posted by KevinVarnes View Post
    Are you going to go with the Bullitt/Cobra or Roush front brakes? What are you planning to use for rear brakes?
    Perhaps both, but not at the same time, of course. The PBRs will fit behind both sets of 17x8" wheels I've got, whereas the Alcons are too fat to fit. I had kind of been thinking I wanted to do a 5-lug conversion sooner rather than later, in which case I would use these wheels that I've already got, and to do that I'd need to run the PBRs (and save the Alcons for later when I get different wheels with better spoke clearance). The rears will almost certainly be Cobra brakes, whether I run the stick axle or convert to IRS.

  20. #20
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    - Successfully delivered the old gas to the county dump for disposal. I loaded the 2 full 5-gal jugs, plus the gas tank itself (which still had probably 3-5gal in it), into my little Impreza coupe.



    I plugged the suction line from the tank and the purge valve; the fuel level was well below both of those, but better safe than sorry. I also brought the hand pump along - I wasn't sure how the facility would be set up, so I figured worst case they would make me pump the gas out of the tank into one of the jugs so they could then dump it. Best case, we could just dump from the tank into whatever disposal tank they had. Turned out it was the best case , so it was just a few minutes work to unload the car, dump the jugs and the tank, and load everything back up for the trip home.

    One mystery, as I'm buying some "tune up" parts online - where is the fuel filter? I expected to see one back by the tank, as it is on my '89 Mustang, but I guess that's the EFI configuration. On the Zephyr there's just a hose from the outlet on the top of the tank to a hard line on the chassis. I haven't traced that hard line the length of the car, but there's definitely not an inline filter at the rear of that hard line, and there's not an inline filter at the front of the hard line (where it emerges into the engine bay at the base of the driver side strut tower). There's a hose that goes from the hard line at the frame rail to the fuel pump - no inline filter there.

  21. #21
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    - Picked up an SN95 master cylinder, prop valve, and the left front brake line at the junkyard. May not really need any of them, but they were cheap, so no biggie if I don't end up using them. What I was really looking for was the section of hard line running down the center of the car to the bracket that mounts above the diff, but all of the SN95s they had were the later configuration with hoses connecting at either end of the rear.

    - Got some of my tune-up parts from Rock Auto today, but not enough to finish the job. Got the spark plugs replaced. Also received the plug wires, but not the cap & rotor; I figure it'll be easier to do those all together so I can match the new to the old, so I didn't bother to install the new wires. Waiting on a new roll-over / vapor valve - received the grommet, but not the valve - then I can reinstall the tank. Actually, before I do that, I need to give it a more thorough inspection inside to make sure it's all good. And if I was smart, I would clean up some of the exterior surface rust and hit it with some Rustoleum, but I didn't think of that until just now, and we won't have another warm day for a bit.

    Had a local cop stop by the house to do a VIN verification for some DMV paperwork on one of my other cars. He spotted the Zephyr and was like, "What is that? '78? '79?" Off by a couple years, but I was impressed nonetheless - not many people would recognize the car at all, let alone know roughly what model year it is!
    Last edited by Patrick Olsen; 01-27-2018 at 06:38 PM.

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    If you have a real radiator shop near by you could have them boil the tank to really clean the inside. Might be good peace of mind.
    '89 XR-7 5 Speed
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  23. #23
    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    - Bought a couple of the door striker plastic bushings, as both of them were falling apart or already gone. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the bushings can be installed - the striker has an integrated washer that doesn't come off, so there's no way to slip the new bushing on. Oh well, $6 wasted! The doors sound nice and solid when they latch, so it's not a big issue, just something I thought I could "fix" cheaply.

    Quote Originally Posted by Patrick Olsen View Post
    One mystery, as I'm buying some "tune up" parts online - where is the fuel filter?
    Figured this out with the help of a couple folks in the I6/V6 forum. I'm used to the EFI way of doing things, with the fuel filter well upstream. Turns out on the 3.3 the filter is right at the inlet to the carb. Got the right one from the parts store yesterday, but didn't feel like standing in the rain to install it, so I'll take care of that later.


    Quote Originally Posted by KevinVarnes View Post
    If you have a real radiator shop near by you could have them boil the tank to really clean the inside. Might be good peace of mind.
    Not a bad idea. Unfortunately, while there probably is a radiator shop around here somewhere, my recent attempt to find one came up empty. (Had a typical aluminum/plastic radiator leaking from where the upper tank seals to the aluminum core, and was going to see about getting that fixed rather than buying a new one.)

    I gave the interior of the tank a more thorough visual inspection yesterday and I don't see any issues. I'm confident it's good to go.

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    FEP Senior Member Patrick Olsen's Avatar
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    Bought an air cleaner assembly off car-part.com and got that in yesterday. Spent some time cleaning it up, getting the grunge and grime off it, then flipped it over and discovered I was wasting my time.



    I guess the donor car had swapped to a different carb, and the owner had butchered the opening in the base of the air cleaner to fit? Needless to say, that doesn't fit on the carb now, and there's no way to bend it back into shape - the pieces just snap off if I try to bend them back.
    Last edited by Patrick Olsen; 01-30-2018 at 11:56 PM.

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    FEP Senior Member BMW Rider's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Patrick Olsen View Post
    - Bought a couple of the door striker plastic bushings, as both of them were falling apart or already gone. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the bushings can be installed - the striker has an integrated washer that doesn't come off, so there's no way to slip the new bushing on. Oh well, $6 wasted! The doors sound nice and solid when they latch, so it's not a big issue, just something I thought I could "fix" cheaply.
    The later style strikers with the guard that wraps up off the washer do come apart. The older ones like yours do not. I wanted to replace my bushings as well and and found this out. I tried to get the complete strikes, but nobody had any stock for them and we wanted to get them installed and the doors aligned. I ended up grabbing a couple more used ones and cut the washers off then with a grinder, then cut the bolt off the get the washers from the original ones. Now I had two good bolts and two good washers. I just ran a tap through the washer so it could be threaded back onto the bolts with new bushings.

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