Caroline - My 86 T-Top mustang

[joetemus]

I''ve been lurking on here for awhile and figured it was about time for me to make a post about my mustang.

I purchased this car around May 2013 and daily drove it during the summers of 2013 and 2014. It was everything I wanted, t-tops, v8, manual, 5lug swap, lowered suspension, bigger brakes, wide tires, and of course 4 eyed.

Here it is with my gray 86 at the time, which I sold shortly after this picture. That is another thread entirely with a 4 year build.


Back to Caroline, this mustang was a blast to drive, quite reliable, and got almost 24mpg! Unfortunately the day came where I wanted to propose to my now wife, so being a broke college student I sold mustang to be able to afford a ring that fit my spiraling out of control proposal plan. (https://imgur.com/a/3Mu8J) So the car was sold in the fall of 2014. Last summer my wife found out why I sold the mustang and convinced me to try to hunt it down and buy it back. Luckily it was registered in a town of ~700 people nearby, and after a few messages to people I knew in the area I was able to track it down. It had been abused by 3 owners in the 1.5 years since I had sold it and was in rough shape. The engine burned a quart of oil every 100 miles, the floorboards were rusted through, 100% bald rear tires, and the interior was in pieces. I was able to convince the guy who owned it to reluctantly sell it back to me, but not for cheap. I ended up paying ~$1500 more than what I sold it for 1.5 years prior when it was in nice shape.



But I didn't care, I had my car back. One of the only cars that I've owned that puts a smile on my face every time I drive it. I immediately put the car back together as much as I could, and just started driving it. Throughout the summer I replaced the floor pans, put sub frame connectors in, got new seats, new sticky tires, and basically got the car as close as I could back to where it was when i sold it. I drove it every nice day to work, and autocrossed it as much as I could. This last fall/winter I bought a 99 explorer 302 and did a complete rebuild on the engine. The engine didn't really need it, but I had always wanted to learn how to rebuild a engine and what better time to do it? I prepped the engine as best I could for a turbo system in the future with a f303 cam, better gaskets, and a pimpxs (megasquirt 3) ecu to be better prepared for boost. Dropped that motor in this spring after I finished my dads 68 f100, and now I'm at the point where I am dialing in the tune. I have drove it 5 of the last 7 work days with the ttops out and the music blaring.




Next steps are to get the tune right NA, modify my hood a little bit to clear my intake (which is currently rubbing), possibly graft on a 01 cobra bumper that I have to the lower half of the bumper, and hopefully someday build my own turbo kit.