the bionic doghouse

[birdman1]

Great shop--I know why the dogs are there. They can help you wife find you in the huge space, otherwise she might be wandering around for days, looking for you.
Mike

 

[e-tek]

Here is a couple finishing touches to the man cave bathroom.

[/QUOTE]

While I love it, ya gotta admit the women-folk must think we are HILARIOUS!! I don't know why I keep seeing it from their POV: knowing they kicked us to the shed and we "decorate" like we're 8 year-old car freaks!

Now where did I put the Snake-Mongoose colouring book??

 

[mustangmccance]

sadly my whole family know I am a little off. and the decorating is only the tip of the iceberg lol.

 

[mustangmccance]

Great shop--I know why the dogs are there. They can help you wife find you in the huge space, otherwise she might be wandering around for days, looking for you.
Mike

when I have both my trucks in there the place is pretty full. I think I need to build an addition. the wife says the kitchen or bathroom renovation have to be my next priority though. I guess she has put up with my craziness long enough I probably owe it to her so I guess the addition will have to wait, although I may build a carport to park the skid loader in because I don't want snow melting all over the garage.

 

[mustangmccance]

It was 10 degrees here yesterday and my daughter and her friends were working on there school project in the garage in shirt sleeves all day. so the heating solutions are working so far . it is great to be able to work without being cold. and the concrete in front of the shop door makes it easy to clear the snow. between that and the loader, this winter is looking to be much less miserable than last winter.

 

[mustangmccance]

I spent some time with dad and the kids this past weekend. We were building the engine for the 67. I had my 12 year old daughter and my 17 year old son doing as much of it as I could. I was impressed that my little 12 year old could torque main bolts to 70 foot pounds. it was about all she could do, but she did it.

I asked my daughter to take pictures when my son was working. she took pictures of the engine but not one picture where you can see his face lol.

they sent me the wrong pushrods because I am using a roller cam so I did not finish it then. I got the pushrods in last night and the intake manifold I will install tonight. then wrap it in plastic until it is time to install it in the car. hopefully this summer. I still have to finish the front suspension and new wiring harness before I will drop in the engine.

 

[mustangmccance]

the engine is finished and ready to install except I still need to install the distributor. It is on backorder. next step is to rebuild the automatic transmission. I have never done that before but I bought a video and I will watch it several times and see how it goes. wish me luck.

 

[shopnut]

That engine looks SWEET! It's nice that it was a group build. Good luck on the ******.

 

[mustangmccance]

thanks shopnut. watched the video last night. man I knew intuitively that there were a lot of parts in an automatic transmission but wow. I need to watch it a few more times. fortunately my Dad has rebuilt automatics before. never an AOD, but c-4's and c-6's he says we can do it so I will just have to watch closely and pay attention when I take it apart.

 

[mustangmccance]

well the skid loader has definitely earned its keep so far this year. It took me an hour to clean my drive this morning but I was able to do it. I would have been walking to the main road, about 3/4 of a mile to get a ride if I had not had it.

btw 3/4 of a mile is a nice short walk in the summer with the dogs. I do it for fun several times a week. in the winter, during a blizzard, through snow my 3/4 ton truck can't drive through and wind blowing so hard you feel like your face is being sandblasted, 3/4 of a mile is a long dang ways so very happy to have the skid loader today.

 

[ed_v]

Very cool that you get the kids involved. I have a 7 year old nephew that loves spending time with me in the garage. I have already bought him some craftsman tools

Ed

 

[Jack Olsen]

Great pictures of the family and the Ford!

 

[woodwelder]

Great job on a nice shop!

 

[dlenkewich]

Awesome garage, and awesome mustang - Love that body style.

Have to commend you, you spend quality time with your kids teaching them things they otherwise would not know, very good of you, "Dad"!

 

[shopnut]

thanks shopnut. watched the video last night. man I knew intuitively that there were a lot of parts in an automatic transmission but wow. I need to watch it a few more times. fortunately my Dad has rebuilt automatics before. never an AOD, but c-4's and c-6's he says we can do it so I will just have to watch closely and pay attention when I take it apart.

Just wondering MM, do you think the ****** How-To video is worth it? I have a good book on the Chevy TH350's that I've been studying. There's a lot of info in there and I think it might suffice, but I'm curious if I should invest in a video as well to make it a bit easier.

Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[mustangmccance]

Very cool that you get the kids involved. I have a 7 year old nephew that loves spending time with me in the garage. I have already bought him some craftsman tools

Awesome garage, and awesome mustang - Love that body style.

Have to commend you, you spend quality time with your kids teaching them things they otherwise would not know, very good of you, "Dad"!

Ed

Thanks guys.

I am definitely trying anyway. I told my daughter I would build this car for her but that she had to help. so far she seems to be enjoying it and with luck as we get more done she will continue to do so. my son for some reason requires a lot of encouragement and pushing to get him out there but he seems to enjoy it once he is.

one of my biggest problems is selfishness I guess you could say. I want to do it all, lol, so I have to keep reminding myself to get the kids out there to help.

Great pictures of the family and the Ford!

thanks Jack.

Great job on a nice shop!

thank you as well.

Just wondering MM, do you think the ****** How-To video is worth it? I have a good book on the Chevy TH350's that I've been studying. There's a lot of info in there and I think it might suffice, but I'm curious if I should invest in a video as well to make it a bit easier.

Thanks in advance for your input.

honestly I really like the videos for some things. since I have never rebuilt an automatic transmission being able to see how they remove a particular servo, or part is useful to me, not just a diagram and instructions to remove it. I am still waiting for the weather to warm up a bit so I can get the ****** over to the car wash and clean it up before I tear it down so i haven't started yet but I will let you know how it goes. so far as far as the video goes I think it will be very useful to me.

 

[mustangmccance]

I did some rearranging yesterday. I am getting ready to do some major work on the 67 mustang. I ordered some parts today. I need to have the 67 in the shop so I can work on it so I put it in the bubble and parked the 65 in my big haulmark enclosed trailer. it makes for a nice one car garage in a pinch. I have it all blocked up nice so I can drive in and out when I want to take the stang for a spin. and now I can push the 67 out to work on it.

first step is to finish the front suspension. I just put the old stuff back on it to get it moved on to the trailer, now I will replace the whole front suspension and install the rack and pinion steering. then the brakes and electrical. My plan is to get the engine in and running this year. after that it will just be finishing up the interior and exterior trim. cubic dollars that's all it takes, but I am financing this as I go. no borrowing, no credit cards so it will just have to come as finances allow.

It has been a long process but I paid off the body shop last month. I told the guy I wanted to pay as I go and if I get behind let me know so I can pay more so I don't end up with a big bill at the end. well that didn't work out so well. he did not have it figured right so I still ended up with a good sized bill at the end. anyway since I told him from the beginning how I wanted to do it and it was his mistake, he was good about letting me make payments until it was paid with no interest. and he did such an excellent job on it even though it cost way more than I thought it would I am happy. but now that bill is paid so it is on to the next installment.

since I don't have any pictures of the 67 in the shop yet and I wanted to put this picture in my "garage blog" I will just add this bit of gratuitous mustang garage photography.

taken while getting the stang show ready. it is really nice to polish the wheels and tires, clean the undercarriage and polish the rocker panels up on the lift.

 

[MartyO]

Lucky dog!!!!

 

[mustangmccance]

well we rebuilt the 'AOD this weekend. It seemed to go very well. the video was very clear, and with the specialty tools I bought for the job I think it will work great. the transmission seemed to be in excellent shape. in retrospect I think I would have been ok to just install it. but with a junkyard transmission you just never know. anyway since I bought both the engine and transmission for 450 dollars I think it was a great deal. It would have been even better if I was just looking for a swap since both were in pretty good shape.

so the tally for cost was about 150 for the transmission. 255 for the rebuild kit. 100 dollars for the spring compressor. another 100 for the lip seal installing kit and 40 for the video. total cost for the rebuilt transmission minus the torque converter is 650 dollars. not much less than I could have bought one for, but I had the satisfaction of doing it myself and I get to keep the tools and video. all in all a fun project.

 

[mustangmccance]

we got a lot done the last few days. we still have a long, long way to go, but big progress nonetheless. here are some update pictures.

Christmas comes early to the mustang

garage.

here is a look under the car after we pulled all the old front suspension off. as you can see the underside has been coated in rhino-lining for sound suppression and to prevent rock damage.

after the new upper and lower control arms, shocks, and rack and pinion conversion were installed. I pulled the truck back in, with the car lifted I can still park both my trucks in the garage.

after all new suspension is on.

ok. yesterday we installed the pedal support, the powerbrake booster and master cylinder. modified and installed the steering column. installed the lokar gas pedal. and put the march serpentine setup on the engine.

today we put the rear main seal in the engine and installed the engine and transmission.

Now don't laugh. this is my redneck transmission jack. a little funky and clunky but it did the job. actually it did the job very well. the big rolling casters on the table made positioning it very easy. My Dad's old snapon floor jack needs some tlc though. it kept leaking down on us.

There's Dad telling my Daughter how it's done..

big steps. we also mounted the new fuse box so I have a massive pile of spaghetti inside the car now.

and there she is sitting in place at last. a long way to go till it's ready to fire up, but dang it looks good in there.

heres my Dad enjoying a job well done.

I also did a lot of little projects along the way. powdercoating the shock mounts and the tie rod adjusters etc. etc.

what a great feeling, and a little shop kudos. My Dad said "man it is great having this shop. If I had had a place like this back when I was wrenching for a living I would have thought I had died and gone to heaven. I have to agree. the shop works well. the tools are well organized, we have pretty much everything we need and it just makes very difficult jobs so easy.

I mean like I can remember just struggling to get the stupid starter installed on my 65. today it was just not even a challenge. It is so nice having the shop I have always wanted.

 

[mustangmccance]

got a lot done today. I put in some pavers from my driveway around to my man door so it is easier for my dad to get around. also leveled the ground. which was made much easier by use of my skid loader. I ran the braided steel fuel line from the gas tank to the fuel pump. got some of the wiring ran and also got the new stainless steel brake lines installed on the axle. still have to run the rest of them. Sadly my vacation is over and I have to go back to work tomorrow. so progress will slow down again for a while.

 

[mustangmccance]

yesterday I had a new section of concrete poured in front of my other garage door. My garage sits on the back edge of my property, about 100 yards from the main gravel road. I will probably never have it all paved but I did want to put a parking area in front of the garage and possibly use it to wash cars etc. anyway here are some pictures of what it looked like last night.

next year I will concrete the last "third" I plan to run the concrete out to my little white shed and make a nicer parking area for my trailer.

 

[mustangmccance]

last month we had our first child graduate. we decided to have the reception in the doghouse. so I pulled several cars out, and we cleaned the place up. made a table out of the lift and brought in some folding chairs and a picnic table and it worked wonderfully.
these are while we were decorating

and this is the graduate. :thumbsup:

 

[ToolBoxTavern]

We are so not gonna talk about how jealous I am.

Sweet shop it even comes with a Ford inside.

 

[Resolute]

Just read through your whole thread - Love the progress and the result so far! I enjoy living vicariously through your "doghouse"

 

[427cobra]

Great shop and I really lie what you are doing with the 67 Coupe. I am building one also. Plan to run coil overs on the front with a power rack. Just finished the Boss 331 short block this weekend. What kind of steering are you running (Ididit)?

 

[mustangmccance]

thanks for the positive comments guys. the doghouse is a great place to be. I hardly go in the house anymore accept to eat and sleep. the wife is not so happy about that surprisingly. as far as the 67 goes I am building this car as primarily a daily driver for my daughter. I am going a bit overboard on some things. I am not so good at daily driver builds I keep thinking I can make that a bit better, and boy that would look a lot cooler if I did it this way. I am really trying to keep it to where she can drive it to school. so I am just using the stock style suspension. all new parts with 620 magna coils but still just stock style so less expensive. the total control rack I consider essential for safety and handling as well as the disc brakes. right now I am re-using the stock steering column but someday I would like to swap to an ididit column. that is what I have in my 65 and I love it. but for now the stock column will do. this thing keeps escalating though. what I do not want is to get it to the point where it is "too nice to drive" I want her to drive it to high school and have the coolest car in school. but I don't want her to be afraid to drive it for fear it will get a paint chip or something. I am finding that it is hard to keep the balance in mind I keep wanting to go overboard.

I have already decided that I am going to rebuild the engine in my son's jeep and let her drive it in the winter, Iowa winters are not much fun for a light rear wheel drive car. I bought him a 2003 liberty to drive to college this year since the old Cherokee's engine bought the farm. oh well always another project.

 

[tinbender 66]

I haven't been a member for more than a few months so I just caught this thread and read it from start to finish. Nice build and very well written. You are right about GJ turning one into garage concious obessives lol. I've had to rethink a lot of things but I'm having a blast and it looks like you are too. I'm a diehard Bowtie guy but I have a soft spot for Mustangs as I got my driver's license in my Dad's new '65 coupe. 289 C4 (?). I guess that makes me a geezer! I've got a '66 Chevy II that's up next after I (ever) finish the garage. At least I'll be one fast geezer. BTW, I would NEVER put a Chevy in a Cobra!!

 

[mustangmccance]

I haven't been a member for more than a few months so I just caught this thread and read it from start to finish. Nice build and very well written. You are right about GJ turning one into garage concious obessives lol. I've had to rethink a lot of things but I'm having a blast and it looks like you are too. I'm a diehard Bowtie guy but I have a soft spot for Mustangs as I got my driver's license in my Dad's new '65 coupe. 289 C4 (?). I guess that makes me a geezer! I've got a '66 Chevy II that's up next after I (ever) finish the garage. At least I'll be one fast geezer. BTW, I would NEVER put a Chevy in a Cobra!!

wow you read the whole thread. glad you like the place. it is a lot of fun. I haven't been working on it much lately. it is pretty close to where I want it. I do have a couple small projects left to do, but overall I am now enjoying working in the shop not on it. The truth is that my shop is for playing with cars, and it is all the garage journals fault that it looks nice. I would never have painted the cupboards or worried about how things looked before I joined. now I end up cleaning the shop every night before I go to bed. the shop is cleaner than my house most of the time. but the simple fact is the shop is a place to work on cars and I am enjoying the heck out of using it as it was intended.

 

[mustangmccance]

well I have finished most of the wiring on the 67 now. I need to install the new spal electronic fan controller, and I found out tonight the old turn signal switch in the steering column is bad. man I new I should have replaced that before I put the column in. oh well. I will order a new one friday. I plan to use a lokar shifter that will have the backup light switch and the neutral safety switch in it. that will have to wait until next year though. but other than that and a drive shaft it is about time to try and start the beast. tonight I started testing the circuits on the wiring. I have the headlights and taillights working, the park lights and heater controls working. still need to test the rest of the circuits. I bought one of those powerprobe iii testers and that is helping a ton with the trouble shooting.

 

[mustangmccance]

Just a small update.


rerouted the heater hoses. and pretty much finished the under hood wiring. I need to wire the fan controller inside. I am waiting for the turnsignal switch and the neutral safety switch but then the wiring will be finished. except for the parts I don't have yet like the horns and stereo etc. I also replaced the door lock tumblers so all the locks, ignition and trunk are all keyed the same so one key is all is needed. I also put the plugwires on and discovered that the harmonic balancer and the front cover I am using are not matched. so I need to get a timing pointer for an 89 mustang apparently the timing pointer on 89 is on the passenger side. a few more baby steps to completion

I have also used my newest tool a lot. it is awesome for testing circuits and finding problems. this is what I bought myself for my birthday. the power probe 3 I just love cool tools. 8)

 

[mustangmccance]

Well my daughters 13th birthday was july 2nd and she decided she wanted to have a slumber party in the garage. so naturally the place was completely transformed. but I got a couple nice new additions.

our old sectional couch had an accident and the sleeper bed section got broken so we bought some new furniture for the media room. since then we have had these 3 pieces just sitting down there kind of taking up space. she wanted them out here for her friends. so I decided to just keep them here. they probably won't last too long but for the time being the lounge has definitely been upgraded.

it was also really hot on july 2nd so I bought this 15000btu window air conditioner. no it is no where near adequate to cool the whole shop down but it helps a ton. with the big fan in place it was really pretty comfortable today. sadly finding a casement style airconditioner is near impossible so I had to order it and it only got in on friday so my daughter had to suffer. but again the shop received a nice upgrade.

 

[mustangmccance]

just a quick update. all the wiring is done, no exhaust yet but

its alive.

click the picture for a short video.

 

[mustangmccance]

ok the final piece of the drivetrain puzzle is now in place. I bought an aluminum driveshaft for less rotating mass and less vibration, balanced and installed with new u-bolts. started the car adjusted the t-v cable slightly shifted into all gears then back into park finished filling with atf and then put the car on the ground and started it again. it moves forward and backward.

we only moved it a few inches but the transmission seems to be working fine. in a couple days we will have to take it out and drive it and make many more adjustments I am sure but so far everything seems to be working peachy.

we really need a fingers crossed emoticon I think. lol.

here is a picture of the underside with the driveshaft installed.

 

[twistedchief]

wow, nice shop there bud. Great to see the family out there with you your a Lucky man to have that. LOL not one pic of my son's face

 

[mustangmccance]

warning shameless I love my shop post to follow lol.


Man I tell you I love my shop.:thumbsup: this weekend I had a friend that was having trouble with his 2006 dodge truck. he brought it over, we put it on the lift discovered that he had a bad strut on the front. well I have never done much with new vehicles but he wanted to try and fix it himself. so we used my shop computer which is right next to the lift. read up a bit on how to get it apart. pulled off the wheel with my air impact. pulled the brake rotor and used my new pickle fork took to pop the upper control arm loose. pulled the strut. ordered a replacement. next day we put the new one on and he is back on the road. saved himself several hundred dollars and we both got the experience of doing the job.
his wife came along and she needed to use the restroom. the rest of my shop may get dirty but I keep the bathroom clean. so I felt no shame in showing her to the library.

then I welded some chain hooks on my skid loader that I am going to use to haul the jeeps engine outside to pressure wash it once I get it pulled. then I built some "training wheels for my engine stand lol. the engine stand had three wheels and was kind of tippy with the 5.0 on it. with that long 4.0 inline six I wanted it to be more secure so I built a t-bar that bolts into the front of the engine stand and has two wheels on it that will make the stand much more stable.

lots of fun and all possible because of my shop and the way it is setup. this shop has been my dream for years and I am very glad to have it.

oh and since my last post I have also taken the 67 out on the highway and tested it. the transmission seems to shift fine. I will need to adjust the t-v cable a bit because it seems to shift a bit hard but that will have to wait until I get the front end aligned and I can drive it a bit more to get it just right.

 

[Omphaloskeptic]

Congratulations! What a great feeling of accomplishment you must be experiencing. Your daughter is probably on Cloud 9 knowing her DAD is doing this for her on the '67 and the Jeep.

Question - When you rebuilt the transmission, did you have to be careful on the fluid fill/purging procedure? Is the hard shifting indicative of break-in, adjustment, air-lock or some other such condition?

 

[mustangmccance]

Congratulations! What a great feeling of accomplishment you must be experiencing. Your daughter is probably on Cloud 9 knowing her DAD is doing this for her on the '67 and the Jeep.

Question - When you rebuilt the transmission, did you have to be careful on the fluid fill/purging procedure? Is the hard shifting indicative of break-in, adjustment, air-lock or some other such condition?

no not really, you are supposed to put a quart of fluid in the torque converter. then 6 quarts in the transmission start it run it for a little while then fill it up to where it reads full on the dipstick while running. obviously that quantity varies depending on the pan you are using. I just have the stock pan that I powder-coated chrome. as far as the shifting goes that is the t-v cable that needs adjusting. that controls how the transmission shifts. I don't want to mess with it too much until I can drive it for a while and get it adjusted right. since I have not aligned the front end yet I have only driven it a short distance just to verify that it would shift properly. I have not driven it far enough to decide if I need to adjust it or not.

 

[mustangmccance]

My son wanted a jeep for his first vehicle. we found this 93 cherokee locally. it had 193,000 miles on it. it had some rust in the rear quarter panel but other than that it looked pretty solid. he drove it to school for the last 2 years. it now has over 200,000 miles on it. in the mean time I have replaced the quarterpanel piece. put a new neutral safety switch on it. a set of nerf bars. new tires and a high torque starter.

this spring he drove to a neighboring town and the jeep would not start when he came back from the convenience store. My Dad and I attempted to get it running, but my son kept saying he wanted to buy a different vehicle that would be more reliable when he went to college. so we helped him buy a 2004 liberty with 55,000 miles on it. and so the jeep sat.

Dad and I spent a quite a bit of time and money working on trying to get it running. here is what I did.

first of all the thing would crank but would not fire. when I went to get him he said one of the guys that tried to help him told him the starter was bad so they tried to jump it. (it was cranking just fine so the starter and battery obviously were fine so who knows what they messed up trying to fix it.)

1. the first thing I did was replace the crank position sensor. this did not fix it.

next we started looking things over and there was a ton of oil leaking all over the engine and inside the distributor so we pulled the distributor to clean it out and found that the cam position sensor inside it was in pieces.

2. so replaced the entire distributor including new cap, rotor wires and plugs

still it would crank but no fire.

3. replaced the coil

then we could get a spark at the plug wire but it still wouldn't fire.
in the mean time we checked fuel pressure at the schrader valve and it was adequate, and checked compression it was a little low but not terrible. most cylinders were over 100 2 were 90's. so we had spark we had fuel, we had compression. we assumed we had a timing problem.

4. replaced timing chain and gears.

the timing chain looked fine and when we pulled the cover it looked like it was lined up fine but we replaced it anyway.

this still did not fix the problem. at this point I thought maybe the cps I bought was defective so...

5. I swapped the old one back in and it still wouldn't start.

6. replaced the ecu with a guaranteed used one

still crank no start.

in retrospect my Dad thinks the plug is only sparking every other turn of the rotor, but I got frustrated and pulled the engine. I know the problem is electrical but the thing is so ugly and greasy and has over 200,000 miles on it so I decided to rebuild it and at least when we go back to trouble shooting it we will be starting with a good clean platform.

so I currently have the engine out of the jeep and I am starting to rebuild it. the engine actually looks surprisingly good. I am going to have to bore it .030 but the rod and main bearings are good. I am going to put a comp cams extreme 4x4 cam in it with new valve springs and a good valve job. I also have my eastwood powdercoating set so I am going to make it look nicer while I can. once I get it rebuilt I will start trouble shooting again.

I also have found more rust than was there 2 years ago. the passenger floor pan is rusted out and both rocker panels are rotted. I know I should just junk the thing and start over but I am just too stubborn. I am going to make it a nice all weather vehicle for my 13 year old daughter to drive to school.

since we pulled the engine I bought a third crank sensor so I could compare them and it looks like the original was bad. so I think we had multiple failures.

1. the cam sensor shredded. I think this was the cause of the other failures

2. crank position sensor

3. coil

4. ecu?

frustrating problem but I am optimistic.


here is the jeep before we put the new tires on it.

here is the panel replacement. (my first time)

here is the engine before.

 

[mustangmccance]

we finished the overhaul on the 4.0 today.

here is a picture of my Dad hard at work putting the lifters in.

and here are some pictures of the finished product.

well we still need to put the intake and exhaust manifolds on, and the motormounts, but I am going to leave the motormounts off until I get the sucker bolted to the transmission. those top two bolts on the bellhousing are a ******.

next weekend we will start trying to get that thing bolted back in. then its back to the troubleshooting to try to get the thing running again.