1987cp's new '81 LTD 2-door

[1987cp]

Pulled the speedo gear and found it to be white, with 19 teeth. It appears this will be too few for the C4 transmission with 9 drive teeth, as it used a 16 tooth driven gear for 2.26 rear gears, and 16 x (3.08/2.26) = 21.8, or about a 22 tooth driven gear. Duce says he's running an AOD driven gear with his C4 and it works fine except for the inaccurate speedo readings (no doubt resulting from the 7 or 8 tooth drive gear on his old tranny).

Also, the exhaust is all the way off, and without having to cut anything so far, so if nothing else the cat pipes may be a good resource for someone who needs a pair (or - *shudder* - if I need them again in the future!). There is a shred of tailpipe still hanging over the axle that may have to be cut loose. I still haven't disconnected the tranny cooler lines or the shift linkage, after which I should be ready to go ahead and yank the old motor and tranny.

Nice find, I didn't know they came with 255's.

[1987cp]

Oh, by the way, I located the door sticker on the door jamb (not on the back of the door like I expected) ... if I'm reading it correctly, the car has a Y code axle, or 3.08 open. I still haven't yanked the axle tag to verify that ....

Verified. 8.5", 3.08 open.

[Lincolnmania]

no those are the base model levers.......fatnastys wagon had black too he sent them to tom for gmgt at some point when he scrapped his wagon

[gadget73]

doubt its a turd column, probably just tbird levers or switches. the switches i'm fairly sure are electrically identical, just they got different levers.

[1987cp]

Dunno; either it's been swapped at some point, or this is just what the super-el-strippo models got! Like I said, I hadn't even known they could be had without tilt steering, but scottyschafer's '81 four-door has a nontilt column as well (thus the reason he seemed interested in the tilt column from my Country Squire).

Oh, by the way, I located the door sticker on the door jamb (not on the back of the door like I expected) ... if I'm reading it correctly, the car has a Y code axle, or 3.08 open. I still haven't yanked the axle tag to verify that ....

[marquisman]

could have t-bird steeing coloum?

[gadget73]

why do those wiper and turn signal levers look like Tbird parts? Never seen black ones in a panther before.

[marquisman]

i can maybe get some lol

[1987cp]

i got some cool LTD emblem stuff. like on the first gen panther mercs how they have the emblem on the door pannel by the pull strap, i have the LTD ones, and some other ones.

Sounds kind of interesting. Got any pics?

[marquisman]

i got some cool LTD emblem stuff. like on the first gen panther mercs how they have the emblem on the door pannel by the pull strap, i have the LTD ones, and some other ones.

[1987cp]

did you get it home from the video store yet?

Yuppers; that was the first time temporarily rigging the HEI module. Then the starter crapped out after it fired exactly once, so I got to swap the starter in the Family Video parking lot first thing Sunday morning.

[1987cp]

What's with the wire?

That's a piece of old speaker wire, presumably leading to the blue-cone Alpine speakers in the dash.

[Lincolnmania]

did you get it home from the video store yet?

[1987cp]

Thanks for the thoughts, guys. The most obvious thing would of course to be the curlicue LTD script like is on the p/s C pillar, but I really don't like it that well. I've found a couple more badges I ought to consider:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/FORD-LTD-EMBLEM_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQcategoryZ33643QQihZ006QQitemZ160212141436QQrdZ1QQsspagenameZWDVW

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1972-FORD-GALAXIE-LTD-CONV-TRUNK-COVER-EMBLEM-NOS_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQcategoryZ42606QQihZ016QQitemZ260215142777QQrdZ1QQsspagenameZWDVW

I also thought about the Fox LTD badge, but I don't think it would look right. Best bet in my mind is to try to match the style of the "F O R D" lettering on the port side of the decklid.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/FORD-LTD-II-SCRIPT-EMBLEM-BADGE-METAL-77-79_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQcategoryZ80736QQihZ018QQitemZ280203673182QQrdZ1QQsspagenameZWDVW

Those wheels look awesome on there. I still can't believe you got that car for 500...

Heh.... if you'd been the one trying to convince the dumb thing to stay running whilst pulling into the garage a couple days ago, you'd believe the price a bit better! The old Duraspark module flaked out again after only about 5 minutes' running time, and even after swapping the HEI module back on temporariliy, it still really didn't want to stay running. Methinks this engine has reached about the end of its usefulness!!