Season 2019

I keep repeating myself. Once again a wonderful summer, great weather and in addition to that I had lots of spare time, but would only add 1000 miles to odometer of Destiny. Surely, I spent most of my 'automobile-time' with my side-project Snowback. Most of the miles were made during one exceptionally warm weekend in late July as we participated FMOC Fun Run in St.Michel area. More than 600 kms top-down in the three days.

Finnish summer night on July 25th at 11.15 PM

St.Michel harbor

The trip went fine and the car performed nicely. Fuel consumption for the season averaged at 13.1 liters per 100 kms which is about the same as earlier. But towards the end of the season the idle got worse and worse until a point where the engine hardly stayed alive unless given some throttle and the idle mixture screw had no effect at all. I finally think that I solved the irritating symptoms I wrote earlier about as I noticed that there was a vacuum leak between the spacer and the intake manifold. Not only the gasket was hurt but there were big pieces of gasket missing. After replacing it, the idle was easily recovered. The hesitation and wobbling had gone as well. So the trouble was not in carburetor, transmission, brakes or bearings but the leaking vacuum.

The idle recovered after replacement of the gasket

Season 2018

Unexceptionally warm summer with more than 60 days with temperature above 25° Celcius (77°F) has added almost 1500 miles with average fuel consumption of 13.2 liters per 100 km (18 mpg). 

Just another day at the office

I am kind of jealous for the license plate on the 'Vette.

No major problems this season but not trouble free either. While driving with partial throttle there can be felt a slight wobble. That is, it feels like something is dragging and prohibiting the smooth drive. I first figured out that it had to do with worn or oval brake drums which were replaced with new ones. While fixing the brakes I noticed that the passenger side rear wheel bearing was loose and replaced it as well. Obviously something had gone wrong while replacing them three years ago. I also replaced the front wheel bearings. But these changes did not remove the wobble. Whenever I shift from Drive to Neutral while the car is on the move the wobble disappears. So it may have something to do with the C4 automatic. So far I haven't been able to identify what might be wrong there. It might also be the Holley 1940 carburetor causing the problem. Mostly this problem is only irritating but may also weaken the fuel consumption. Further investigations will be needed.

Summer of 2017

To keep this short I could link to the previous post a year ago. There's been no change in the weather.  Anyhow, this summer added 1300 trouble-free miles which is about double compared to the year before.  One longer trip was made to Turku archipelago during the first weekend of summer vacation.

Pre-cruising party at Helsinki-Malmi Airport in May

July cruising night in Vantaa

On a ferry to Nauvo

Recap of season 2016

Lousy weather all summer. Too few miles. Raining almost every day. No more than 700 miles.

FB-68 a.k.a. Frank and Destiny

A shot from a club meeting on one of the rare warm and sunny evenings of July. 
No, we were not arrested for reckless driving. The paddy wagons just happened to be there.

New tires

Black, round, a hole in the middle. Destiny's GoodYear Spectra M+S tires almost met the definition of tires. They were black and had a hole in the middle but instead of being round they were oval. In certain velocities this caused vibration in the steering wheel and front bouncing up and down. Taking a deeper study revealed that these tires were made in 1997. The treads were still deep but the rubber turns to stone in twenty years which makes it easy to loose traction.

The offerings of white striped tires in the market are narrow. Especially if you are not willing pay enormous sums of money. Also, the fact is that the western tire manufacturers, like GoodYear,  do not have white wall tires in their selections any more. If you want inexpensive white walls, you must go with Chinese. 

The width of the white stripes is important for me. Mustangs should have quite a narrow stripe, not wide white walls which would make a Mustang look like Donald Duck's car. The old Spectras had 15mm wide stripes which looked fine to me. I think original bias-ply tires had 3/4" stripes on them.

This caused me some trouble as it seems that many of tires have different widths depending of the size of the tires. In addition to that many of them were branded something that sound Chinese to me.

I chose a set of Milestar MS775 Touring SLE as their brand sounds like English. To be honest, the brand sounds like something which is Chinese but disguised as American. And that's exactly what these tires are. Genuine Made in Taiwan , by Nankang. But their white stripes are 19mm wide. And they only cost 300 EUR a set.

I took me some time to decide whether to stick to 195/75R14 or to go with 205/75R14. The wider tire is also 15mm larger in diameter which would fill the wells better, but would they make the steering heavier in parking. I finally made up my mind to go with 205/75R14 and have not regretted doing so.

Looks aggressive without hub caps, doesn't she

The front might need to be lowered a little

Rear wheel well nicely filled

It's a pain to wash off the blue protection wax

Done with all wheels

Nice tread pattern

Hub caps remounted

To my surprise, the steering did not get heavier. Vice versa, now it's easier to turn and park. The car rolls nicely, holds the direction and the front does not bounce any more. The new tires are quiet and smooth. I did not test how they keep traction in heavy braking. I do not know about their durability either. But so far I'm happy with the Milestars.

1000 miles

This summer was cold until August when we experienced an exceptional warmth. Therefore, despite of Destiny being in good shape and ready to hit the road, there was not so many days when we actually did cruise around. Driving the top up and heater blowing is something that you do not associate with driving a convertible. Anyways, we participated cruising nights whenever we could as well as a few FMOC events.

The wheel bearings started to make whining noise in last fall, so I bought a set of new bearings and oil seals, pulled the shafts, had new bearings pressed on and the whining was gone. As I was on to this the rear end oil was also replaced with a couple of quarts of fresh lubricant.

Left rear axle is being pulled

7.25" rear end has 25-spline axles

To drain the 7.25" you have to remove the cover plate

So, last Sunday I gave Destiny a wash and drove her to my winter garage. This season we gathered exactly 1.000 miles with average fuel consumption 12.8 liters/100kms.

100.000 miles

The 50th Anniversary driving season is about to reach the end and my project Snowback will soon be back from blasting so I need to make room for it in my shop. Destiny will spend the coming winter in my parents' garage in dry and warm. Before driving her in I decided to shoot a couple of photos from her. As Destiny is not a hot rod but a nice driver you can use for easily going to church so that's what I did and went to the Church of St.Lawrence.

550 years old church and 50 years young Mustang

While driving back from church the odometer turned around after 100.000 miles reached !

Mission accomplished !

I wonder if  anyone at Ford imagined in 1965 that someone would ever drive these cars after 50 years. Neither do I believe that they thought that 100.000 miles would ever be exceeded.

This year we hit only about 1.400 miles together, despite the unexceptionally warm July and August that we experienced. You just don't have enough time to drive whenever you want.

We made a couple of longer trips to Ford Nationals at Alastaro Circuit and to FMOC FunRun in Jyväskylä where the Mustang was first shown on Sunday, April 12th (!!!) in 1964.
What has been delightful is the average fuel consumption which is as low as 11.5 liters per 100 km (over 20 miles per gallon).

Destiny and the disassembled parts from Snowback

Technically seen the summer has been a success. No major problems encountered, except that the alternator seems like not charging enough with headlights on and engine running with low RPM. Another thing to address in future is the noise from the rear that can be heard when driving the top up. I suppose the rear wheel bearings may need to be renewed.

Destiny hibernates under the starry sky

So, Good night and see you in April , Destiny !

The Church of St.Lawrence in Vantaa

Preparing for the 50th Anniversary

It's been a while since the last update. Since the front end alignment not much has been done with Destiny (as a matter of fact I've spent more time with Project Snowback).

A couple of pictures of installation of the carpet underlayment, which is needed more for making the carpet sit nicely than for sound and heat insulation.

I first laid strips of jute padding (8mm thickness) lengthwise from pedals to the rear seat and then another set of strips crosswise. By applying shots of spray glue here and there, I ensured that the padding remained in place during the installation of carpet and seats.  I still re-used the old "furry" carpet. 

Later I found out that the crosswise strip on the seat platform should have not been applied. The seat rails tend to sink into the carpet and padding causing friction that prevents forward-backward movement of the seat.

This year the spring is early so the first visit out to fill her up with fresh gasoline was made on 11th March. After changing the oil and filter Destiny is ready for celebrating the 50th Anniversary season of Mustang.

The next project ?

Since last summer I have spent hours and hour checking eBay, Craigslist, German site Mobile.de and Swedish site Blocket.se as well as local markets to find a reasonably priced car for my next project. As mentioned in my earlier posts, Destiny only needs regular maintenance from now on. Though in my mind I preferred Mustangs (in order to have yet another Bullit or GT-350 clone) I kept my eyes open for Camaros, Firebirds and Cougars from '67 to '68. Of course a classic Chevy would do, but knowing what they are worth and knowing the limitations with the size of my shop I kept the focus on pony-size cars also keeping in mind that the clue in the next project was supposed to have a little bit angrier approach than just a nice looking cruiser.

The European market these days seem quiet when it comes to unrestored cars. Should you be interested in finding a well-restored car, it would not be hard to find one in Sweden, if you are willing to pay what it takes.

I found a '67 Cougar, a newly imported survivor in local sale. I spent a couple of nights planning and projecting what it would become in my hands, and made a decision to buy it. But someone else was quicker and bought it before.

I kept on calculating the costs for importing a car from US and for having it shipped, customs paid and taxed and faced the rough fact that any car doubles its price when doing so. US looks like it is running out of reasonably priced collectibles. Requesting 10 k$ for a project fastback without the engine in not unusual.

So, after approving the fact that obtaining the project would cost more than what I originally had expected led me browsing the Internet day after day and finally bidding (via an agent) for a couple of Mustangs. One was sold locally, the other went too high with price, the third one was pulled out before the bidding time ended and so on.

I was really getting frustrated for the hobby until a friend of mine called me on Thursday (Destiny's 49th Anniversary, BTW) and told that he had found the car I had been looking. And the good new on top of that , it was on sale within less than 10 kilometres from my house.

And here she is, VIN 5F09A******

The front is missing some details

In the dark it was hard to tell the color

The missing fender is included

The original paint on cowl side panel seems like Silver Blue

New tires on '67 rims

'65 Mustang Snowback

The left rear fender is in need for replacement again.

So, this cars has a lot of work to be done

• rust to be fixed
• broken windshield
• torn upholstery
• wrong rims
• drum brakes, no power brakes

But it also has a lot of potential

• engine said to be a 302 block, rotating (never fired up this side of Atlantic, though)
• 4 speed manual transmission with Hurst shifter
• all sheet metal needed included 
• passenger side fender included
• all the hard-to-find expensive fastback specific parts are there
• rear window with defrost panel (can't wait to see the D.S.O. of this one)
• NPD export service in Ocala, FL waiting for an order for missing parts

The car has now been towed in and today afternoon I'll be able to see it in warm shop, hoisted up and with good lighting. Should the car be what it is said to be I'll buy it !

Suspension and front alignment

There are a few drawbacks in Destiny's suspension which have bothered me a while and needed to be reviewed. While the rear suspension with original leafs felt too soft , the front of the car vice versa felt too stiff, with the newly installed Kyb Gas-A-Just shocks. When the rear seat was occupied by my daughters the combination felt unbalanced on the road with the rear hanging even lower.

My thoughts about the ride height were contradictory. On the other hand I'd like to lower the stance and on the other I wanted it to stay up. So I would not mind a 1" lowering suspension, if the suspension would be able to bear the weight.

A couple of words about the KYB Gas-A-Justs which despite their confusing name, are not adjustable. What they are is stiff gas shocks which means that you need a lot of force to push them in. And that means they are good for rough driving. That also means that normal cruising on cobble stone street is not the most comfortable experience. If the shocks do not flex, something else in the car will, causing rattle and shake.

A fellow on FMOC happened to have a set of 1" lowering rear springs and a pair of 1" lowering front coils for 100 EUR when I was making a plan for my suspension update. The price seemed reasonable so I bought them. Though, I decided to replace the rear leafs first and then, after seeing the effect, decide what would be the cure for the front. I also placed an order for softer oil/gas KYB Excel-G shocks (formerly known as KYB GR2) for the front. To start with the project I measured the ride height on all corners from ground via wheel center to top of wheel-flare.

Newly sandblasted pair of 1" lowering
sets next to old stock leaf springs.

After painting the leaves and adding some grease and anti-squeak pads, I clamped them the leaves together and bolted them in. Then I took the measures of ride height which showed that the expected 1" lowering had turned out to be only one centimeter  lowering with the new measure being 66 cm.

Next phase was to test the carrying capacity. By asking my wife and daughters to step in, I repeated the earlier measurements of the ride height with load (sorry, no pictures of this), which resulted that the rear sits 1 cm higher with load than earlier. Test approved.

As the lowering of the rear was less than expected, I only replaced the front shocks, instead of replacing or cutting the coils. After this was done and the car stood on blocks of wood I carried out a DIY toe-in and camber measurement.
 

A variety of KYB shocks for early Mustangs

I made a couple of 4-lug modifications to aluminium bars which I borrowed from a friend of mine. Then they were bolted against the brake drums and attached with two measures after the steering was centered.

And the measures were read on the other side. There was 9 mm difference between front and rear which means that the toe-in is 4.5mm (0.43 degrees). The specs for toe-in are  (min,optimum,max) 1/8"-1/4"-3/8" so mine was near to max. I decided to reduce the toe-in to 3 mm total, which called for turning the tie-rod adjustment sleeves about one full turn altogether.




I had unnecessary big 9mm total toe in within 600mm

Many sources say that front alignment should start by measuring and setting the caster. As that is difficult to d-i-y, and my only target was to see whether we're in the range, I skipped the caster and measured camber by the following methods.

The ruler placed vertical against the drum

A bubble gauge 

With the bubble in the middle measure the
gap on the upper end

I repeated the measurement on both sides of the wheel bearing cap, recorded the average and moved on to the other side. Averages were 11.5 driver side and 7.5 passenger side. I placed the numbers in a trigonometric formula and had my camber in degrees. Mine fell withing the acceptable range and with acceptable difference between each other.

I also paid some time cleaning and painting my rims and had the tires balanced in a local tire shop. Then the tires were bolted in and Destiny was dropped on the floor. Ride height front showed 66.8 cm, which is 1 cm less than with Gas-A-Justs and about 1 cm higher that the rear. So Destiny goes slightly nose-up as these ladies used to when they left the assembly line.

 

I also found a date stamp 047 on the tires which means that this set of GoodYear Spectra M+S's left the factory on the fourth week of 1997.  I may have to consider replacing them after a few seasons.  

 

The test drive proved that Excel-Gs were a good choice for my purposes. Small humps and holes were not felt like with Gas-A-Justs and the overall driving experience was smoother and more comfortable.

Thus the new paint on rims , I'll install the hub caps back.

The season summary

The driving season 2013 is almost finished. It's time to sum it up. This spring I set the target to hit more miles than what I did the previous year. Destiny was in good shape, excluding the fact that she was too thirsty for gas. I checked my notes and the start season date appeared to be in mid-April. Since that we've gathered 1300 miles with Destiny so far.

RACING

In July we participated the Ford Nationals at Alastaro Circuit. Ford Nationals is an event organized by the FMOC and Ford-Freak-Club-of-Finland where you can test your FoMoCo product on drag&track. The rules of this "race day" are such that there are separate classes for all engine types, one for six cylinder engines as well. As it only costs 5 EUR to drag,  I had to try. Below is video-evidence of what happened. If it makes you laugh, it really was worth it !

OK. The blue Hardtop beat the shit out of Destiny. BUT the driver was one of the volunteer organizers of the event and therefore had not registered himself in as a competitor. Instead I challenged him in the line-up and he wanted to check my call. Anyhow, driving outside the race, no "official" time for him. For some reason my time is not updated in the result sheet, but like the video confirms, it was 20.393. I found specs for '65 3-speed which talks about 19.3 s drag time, so that's not bad at all.

CRUISING

There are two cruising events to participate every time when it is possible.

Helsinki Cruising Night occurs every first Friday of the month, basically around the year, but actually only when the weather allows. Often criticized to be more of a parking event than a cruising event, due to the small area in market square, which makes people to stay instead cruise. A lot of tourists pass by and they're usually surprised when they see all the cars there. Definitely this is a place to go if you got something to SHOW. Google for 'Stadin Cruising' for pictures from the event.

Vantaa Cruising at the Heureka Science Center's parking lot is my "home-town cruising" and known for it's 'drag strip' where a lot of spectators come to watch the rubber burn on public street. This is an event to GO and occurs every 3rd Friday of the month. Search for 'Vantaa Cruising' on Youtube.

Fast food and gasoline in Helsinki in September

TROUBLE SHOOTING

There has been three problems that were solved during the season. 

• carburetor
• starter motor
• heater core

 For the rest it has been normal things like checking the oil levels and filling her up. 

FUEL ECONOMY

Destiny's fuel economy has been lousy. I have earlier checked spark plugs, ignition and timing and many other things in order to minimize the fuel consumption. Now it seems like the replacement of the carburetor and improved vacuum has solved the problem. I drained the gas tank in spring and since that I had driven 1113 miles and filled 207 liters of gasoline until the other day when I felt the tank was low, but not empty.

Miles	Kms	Fuel liters	Liters/100km	MPG
1113	1791	207	11,6	20,4

Now there are the numbers I've been searching for ! And this is the overall average including driving the highway at 50-55 mph and cruising in the city.

AWARDS AND TROPHIES

Did you check the above mentioned results from the drag race ?  The other day I received a package via mail and here it is. First trophy for winning the class of 4-6 cyl. engines. I am proud of Destiny, despite being the only participant in the class.

PLANNING THE FUTURE

Little by little Destiny has become - perfect may not be the right word - but sort of complete. The tires still need to be renewed and other small things here and there. But in overall, I can not make her significantly better anymore. So I've started to keep my eyes open for a new project, which seems to be hard to find. But that's worth an other post.

Heater Core once again

Imagine a warm and nice summer day, cruising along the seashore for a cup of coffee in a nice cafe (overpriced but you don't care 'cause this is the day you've been working so hard for) with your wife sitting aside. "It was me who rebuild this car and it's my wife sitting here next to me".

Then there are a couple of drops, then more dripping and finally the coolant almost pouring out of the heater core and you know that no good thing can last long. And here, on the left is the reason for my ruined day. It is the the low-cost aluminium heater core that I purchased from NPD when the original gave up three years ago. I do not know whether it is made in Mexico or in China but I do know that it is of inferior quality. Do not buy one !

On the right in the above picture is the original style core which is about to go in.  Hecho en Mexico, said the sticker on it. Note the differences on the structure and location of the water inlets. I this case it wasn't the inlet that failed anyhow. It was the core tubing that leaked. The newer has more openings to let the air flow through.

The case itself has been fixed earlier so this time it only to clean it...

... and to re-package it.

I tried to place the hose clamps in such a position that the hoses can be replaced without removing the case. Remember to connect the wires before pushing the case back into the firewall. It's difficult, if not impossible, to do later.

It went in easily (I've done it so many times before) and gives more warm air now.