Project T-67
 

Ok....I've been meaning to start this thread but just hadn't had the time...still don't seem to but I have to start sometime....plus we need some more Ford's in here ;)....so this may take me a few days to get caught up to current standing.

We are building this project for a customer and it is a classic snowball story. He wanted to build a '67 Shelby Convertible clone....they only ever made one real one.

So he went about searching for a rust free or decent car to start the project with. We found one that appeared to be exactly what we were looking for. The seller even had little refrigerator magnets stuck in key areas to show the lack of filler.

His original plan was to build a stroked 302 with a 5 speed and have a pretty standard Shelby Replica.....stay tuned...this gets good ;)

The deal was made and the car was shipped from South Texas to Birmingham and driven to our shop. Upon first inspection the car seemed pretty decent...an older restoration that needed freshening. The brake booster leaked and the trans slipped a little but it ran well and drove just OK...you could tell the suspension was worn out. The paint was shiny but it was that ugly Pond Scum Green color that those of us into Mustangs just can't seem to get away from....what were they thinking back then AND in '05?!?

Anyway....disassembly begins...pulled the engine and transmission.....then I start pulling out the interior and when I removed the door sill plate on the RH side I saw a welded seam.....crap! I had a feeling of what was about to reveal itself....pull up the carpet and the seam stops where a floor patch was put in....get to the transmission tunnel and the seam comes back....all the way across. What we have now is TWO cars put together! On top of that the floor had been covered with fiberglass reinforced body filler and ALL of the welding with the exception of the rockers was done with BRASS...this was done a LONG time ago from the looks of it. The rockers appear to have been stick welded but grinding down the exterior paint showed rust holes around near the welded area that had been filled with body filler. Of course the rockers were covered with a rocker molding and you could not stick a magnet there.

So now we have a car that has been previously sectioned....found a repair to the driver seat frame in the form of a brazed on lug nut to the seat back adjuster which suggests the car had been rear ended long ago and the seat broke on impact(typical for these seats).

Now on to removing fenders and doors to prep the car for mounting to a rotisserie and then soda blasted. I noticed the seam sealer around the cowl looks suspect....I start digging at it with a screwdriver and it turns out to be household latex Caulking! After digging at it for a short time I notice the entire cowl started to move.....Holy crap this thing is just glued on with caulk! In the end the 4 corners were pop riveted on and the rest was glued with white latex caulking! Someone had done a VERY poor attempt to fix the typical cowl rust found in these cars!

Next comes the soda blasting to find out what we really have here.....The quarters were in fact rust free and were original Ford replacement quarters....but the swiss cheese that appeared in the wheel housings had been packed full of filler and tar like thick black stuff and undercoating. The floor pans showed all the brass in all it's glory. The fenders were all metall too but they were pretty beat and had a lot of filler work up high hiding prior damage...no attempt had been made to do any metal work...just slap in the filler and smooth it out. The doors had rust on the inside frame and had filler in them in the corners...not sure how he got those magnets to stick there. So in the end it will be new doors and fenders. The quarters were kind of butchered up where it met the convertible top area so we'll replace those as well.

There was significant expense in purchasing this car but at this point what do you do?...kind of stuck here so it's off to put it on the frame table.

I was at the same point with my 65 mustang, and if it were me, then id go all out and put a custom frame underneath... it will propably end up costing the same Mint restoring all the sheet metal.. and them you will be back where you thought you started, and out alot of money.. rather spend it on somthing that makes a difference

art morrison chassis comes to mind....

I'd agree but there were changes in this project later...we are far past the point of putting a frame under it right now...I just have to get this thread up to speed as I can find time. Even at the point I have listed in the project he still planned an OE type of clone with a stroked 302. All that has changed since however....I'll try to get some more up this afternoon ;).

Next we just started removing bad metal.....the rockers were trashed inside, the rear drain channel for the convertible top was swiss cheese that someone tried to patch previously....the only thing good that we ended up with was 4 frame rails and a pair of shock towers. This car apparently sat wrecked so long that the battery tray and VIN stamped apron were rust free(shocking). The dash and A pillars and windshield frame were good but had to be removed to get to the bad. A true down to earth "Frame off" restoration on a Unibody car :lol:

At this point the owners intent was still to go with an original style, original suspension car so we brought in a bunch of Dynacorn sheetmetal to start the rebuild process.

By now I had regulars that would come by the shop weekly just because they couldn't believe what they saw happening.

The rear drain channel specific to the convertible was pretty much unobtanium and we had planned to just fab a new one....but after searching the owner located a donor car with a good drain channel.


We would have been Far better off finding this "donor" first and building it!

After much work the car was rebuilt and once again mounted to the rotisserie.

It was shortly after this time that things started to change.....I got a call from John saying "Hey, I found a 2004 Cobra motor on Craigslist for $3500...."....I told him to buy it and flip it for a profit...or he could always stick it in the Convertible. Then his wheels started spinning.....

He jumped on the engine....and even talked the guy down a few hundred...but good thing he was quick because the guys phone was blowing up! Here it is on the stand that even came with it.

Now that the wheels had started to turn we started taking a different direction and tweaked the plan for the car. He still wanted the same or similar look in the end but now it would get the '04 Cobra powerplant. Of course this meant the shock towers would not do and would have to be changed.

We came up with this rendering for the finished car and named it T-67 for the Terminator powerplant and obviously '67 Mustang but taking a take off the Terminator movie with the abbreviated name.

Wow, you never know what you're gonna get until you get into the core of the car. Looks good on the outside/inside, until the tear-down.
The rendering looks cool. Keep us posted!:thumbsup:

Cool, keep us posted. That going to be a tight squeeze.

Now with the change in engine plans we knew the shock towers had to be removed or seriously modified and we had to plan on suspension because we could not leave it stock obviously.

The Mustang II style front suspension is very commonly used and is relatively inexpensive but it is '70's technology and not the optimal choice if you want the car to actually handle and we wanted this car to be able to perform. So The Mustang II style was never even a consideration.

We ended up deciding to use the Griggs GR350 suspension system with an 8.8 axle out back with a Watts link.

The transmission for the project came from a 2007 Shelby and is a 6 speed manual.

The engine is a tight fit but not too bad....we tried out a pair of '03-04 aftermarket headers and the RH side fits fine but the LH side needed to have a couple of tubes moved(almost done with that now).

Alternator clearance is close but does clear....however we are probably going to modify the rail just to give a little more clearance. Oil filter will require a relocation kit.

Here we are setting things into place to set ride height and mock up the watts link for bracket placement on the housing. Wheels are temps only and the rear end once the brackets are set will be narrowed slightly.

We have not yet settled on wheels so the hunt is on there....

They do make the 67 style Shelby wheels in 17s now.budnik muroc 2 and 3 look close to the old magnum 500.Or http://www.specialtywheelsltd.org/ford-wheels.html .If you need any help on parts let me know.