My 1989 Crown Victoria.

[slack]

Thanks!

[IPreferDIY]

Seeing all your control arm bushing stuff is bringing back memories of the agony I went through with mine. Fortunately, the big payoff is knowing that I potentially doubled the lifespan of my car.

I just noticed your problem with the outer tie rod threads:

... Problem is, I messed up the threads on the outer tie rod when whacking it out of the spindle. Even though they're less than a year old they already started to become "one" with each other. That said, I can't get the crown nut back on. I'm guessing I have to replace the tie rod now? ...

My first approach would be to try to 're-cut' the thread by using a thin file with a sharp edge. (Using the right size die to re-cut the thread properly would be ideal, but I would presume most people wouldn't have one handy.) If worse comes to worse, filing a flat spot on the threads might be okay if it's not in a critical area. I've assumed you'd already figured something out, but there's my contribution FWIW.

Nice pyro show BTW.

[slack]

Yeah, it's definitely been a labor of love. Once I get around to the final bushing this whole process would have taken a total of 4 long days. I can already feel how much better the front end feels with just 3/4s of the bushings replaced. I can't wait to have some time to finish the last one. The front end would then be 100% all new!

Thanks for the tip. I would have never though of that. I ended up threading the castle nut on as far as I could and then used the impact wrench to screw it down and back off a bunch of times. Basically using the impact wrench to rethread the tie rod with the nut. It probably wasn't the right way to do it, but it worked. Tie rods aren't too expensive to replace so worse case I would have just picked up a replacement if the thing was busted beyond repair.

[slack]

Front Control Arm Bushings Final Round!

It's done. It's finally done. With all the swearing, pain and death heat from the sun I am finally finished will all the control arm bushings in the front. It probably would have been much easier if I didn't have to put the thing back together each night and just spent the three days in a row working on it.

The past Sunday I was able to replace the final two bushings on the passenger's side lower control arm. It went much smoother than the driver's side but was still tough. It was insanely hot in the sun Sunday and there's absolutely no shade in the driveway at my gf's parent's house. I was actually able to also get my oil change done as well as re-grease all the front end steering components before the rain came around 6pm! The oil only had 3k miles on it but it was very black. hmmm...

I didn't take many pictures this time around because it's all what was covered with the last post's lower arm removal.

Here's everything removed: Interesting side note, I had to partially take the rotor off (remove the outer bearing) to get the spindle to clear the lower arm. I needed just a millimeter more in and out play. The driver's side I was able to just get the spindle off without any disassembly.


Here's the old cracked bushing: They were actually way worse than I thought they would be on both sides.


Burn baby burn! (Note: Cardboard was soaked with water before hand as well as the lawn around it)


All back together:


I just got the car back from Smithtown Tire for an alignment. On the short trip back to the office, it seems to ride a helluva lot better. There doesn't seem to be any wondering or uncertainty in the front end. All the rattling sounds going over bumps is now also gone! Woohoo! I put things together so out of alignment that when they went to do the alignment, they had to do a rough one by eye first before the machine could even calculate the adjustments. Haha.

Now on to headlight relay mod (already got the parts) and finally mounting the gauges properly (it's only been 4 months)!

[gadget73]

Its amazing what a front end rebuild will do for the age feel of a car. It takes all that "worn out old car" stuff away.

[87gtVIC]

Sweet!. BTW your bumper filler is not installed correctly. Flap should be behind the piece attached to the bumper itself. Major pain to get them in all correctly without marring everything but it looks goofy as it sits.

[IPreferDIY]

It's done. It's finally done. With all the swearing, pain and death heat from the sun I am finally finished will all the control arm bushings in the front. ...

[slack]

Its amazing what a front end rebuild will do for the age feel of a car. It takes all that "worn out old car" stuff away.

Tell me about it! It actually feels like one solid unit going over bumps now.

Sweet!. BTW your bumper filler is not installed correctly. Flap should be behind the piece attached to the bumper itself. Major pain to get them in all correctly without marring everything but it looks goofy as it sits.

Haha yes. I know it is. It's the joys of having the earlier front end on the later car. It seems '89s bumper mount posts to the frame are longer than the '87 so the front bumper sits out easily a good 2 inches further than it should. I'm guessing it has to do with the lower profile '89 bumper and the same overall car length. If you look in the pic, there's no way to get the filler lip on the other side of the bumper filler, it's too far out. I checked the bolts that the bumper posts mount to the frame and it looks like that's the only position they have. I think I would need to get the bumper posts from an '87 as well to make it sit where it should. (Or cut mine and drill out new mounting holes) As it is now, it's a bit goofy but I always have a seat to sit on!

You can get a better idea what I'm talking about with this picture:

Thanks!

[87gtVIC]

I totally understand now.

[slack]

Finally got around to repacking and torquing down the driver's side wheel bearing correctly last night. I put it on too tight a while ago and went back and did it the right way. (Did the same with the passenger's side when I did the LCA bushing on that side). What I thought might have been an alignment issue after the shop did the alignment was just the pull on that side's bearing being too tight. Rides nice and straight now. Wew.

[slack]

IAC Replaced

My friend had an extra IAC laying around from an old 5.0 he pulled apart. Mine had been giving me error codes but the car never stalled. (It would idle real real low when restarted hot though).

I threw that on and the car idles perfect now. Hot or cold when I start it up it doesn't miss a beat. My strange little stumble at stop lights when hot when away too. I didn't think it was that big of an issue, looks like it was worth throwing the thing on!

No pics for this one as it was literally a 15min swap. haha

[slack]

Radiator Replaced

So, my landlord has been complaining about drips in the driveway. I put down cardboard to soak it up temporarily. My radiator has been leaking on my passenger's side for some time now. Before living at my currently place, I would just top it off every once in a blue moon because it didn't really effect anything. Well, I finally decided to swap it out. I think it took all of 1hr to get the thing out and the new one back in. I was worried about the transmission cooler lines but they surprisingly weren't completely seized. (Thank god!)

Now on to some pics!

Here's the new radiator. I believe it was a "Spectra" or something. Whatever the $95 special was at AutoZone. (Checked out RockAuto, would have been the same if not more to ship the slightly cheaper one)


Here's everything before I started the disassembly:


Before removing the radiator, I spun the little spigot thing on the lower passenger's side to drain all the coolant out into a "catcher".

To remove the radiator, you have to disconnect the upper and lower radiator hose. I went ahead and replaced the lower hose as I had already replaced the upper a few months ago. (Come to think of it, it was probably closer to a year but whatever). You also have to disconnect the transmission cooler lines. These I sprayed down with a generous amount of PB Blaster and used a line wrench on. Luckily they broke free and I was able to remove them without twisting the transmission lines. Other than that, there's two bolts that hold the two radiator brackets to the frame and the thing lifts right out. For the fan shroud, I removed the two bolts that bolt the fan shroud to the radiator and pushed it in towards the motor. I then, after removing the radiator, was able to pull it forward to remove. This isn't necessary but I wanted to paint everything in there while I had the radiator out.

Here's the radiator removed:


The leak was from the passenger's side. I don't think you can see anything in this pic but you can see the spigot I turned to drain the coolant out:


Here's everything removed:


And of course, a fresh coat of paint over everything now that the radiator is removed:


Here's an in progress pic of installing the new radiator. There's these annoying clips you have to attach to the bottom of the radiator to hold the bottom of the fan shroud that were a nightmare to get to clip in place. There are also two trim nuts you have to clip on to the top of the radiator for the top of the fan shroud. Other than that, it's the reverse of the install.


All installed!



And now, hopefully no more drips!

[miamibob]

Did mine, on the '87, last year. A little bit of a "pain" but then again I'm not up to this shit anymore. It was the OEM with a little over 125K on it.

[slack]

Did mine, on the '87, last year. A little bit of a "pain" but then again I'm not up to this shit anymore. It was the OEM with a little over 125K on it.

Yeah, it was a little bit of a pain but all in all it went smoothly and that's all I can really ask for living in the rust belt. My car is around 115k with OEM when I replaced it.

[slack]

1987 Radio Installed

Today I swapped in the radio I've had floating around for almost a year from the car the rest of my '87 car parts came from. The radio that was in my car was this terrible terrible "Dual" aftermarket radio the previous owner installed (hacked in) around 10 years ago. The cd player skipped so bad it was unusable and the output from the radio made the bass sound like someone open hand smacking a cardboard box. Good riddance!

Here's the radio I had to install: The volume button has that burn on it because my friends girlfriend burned it on accident with her cigarette while changing the station a few years ago. Other than that, it's in pretty good shape.


Here's the wiring diagram I used:

It was from an '87 Mustang with premium sound. I just ignored the top four wires for the speaker output and it all lined up. Ignore the positive and negative symbols, it ends up on the plug they go +, -, +, -, +, -, +, - on the back of the radio. The color code of this schematic lined up to the wires in the back of the new radio but not the ones in the car. To match those, I just so happened to keep the previous owners instruction manual in the back of the door pouch for the past two years and was able to trace from the new radio schematic to what was spliced in on my car and match them up with the new radio cross referencing both diagrams. (Wasn't so bad... but was more than a pain than it needed to be)

Here's the rats nest that was behind the dash: One plug was still there but the plugs I needed were all ripped out (the power plug) the other plug was completely gone and the wires were just spliced right into the wires fed to the aftermarket radio. ugh.


Here's the new radio getting installed: I had to transfer the pins I needed for the power connector to where I needed them and then used a spare connector I had floating around for the speaker connector. The leading wires off of those connectors were chopped and spliced with what was coming out of the dash. It's not pretty, but it's the best I could do giving what I had to work with. At least now, I can remove the radio just by unplugging the two plugs and the antennae.


Here's the old aftermarket piece of crap: (Pic is mirrored... oops)


Electrical tape is what held it into the car. This was used to hold the brackets on. (Not very well!)


On the bottom, there was this piece of plywood I guess to keep it from moving. Needless to say, it didn't work.


Here's the 87 radio installed minus the trim:


Here's it all patched up and playing a station: (Amp light is on b/c the key is in the run position but the car isn't actually running)


All in all, it came out great in the end. The original Ford radio sounds 100% better than the radio that was in there and now at the very least I can use a tape or a tape to aux headphone port instead of a skippy cd. I'm happy with the change. The look fits the car much better than the red faced aftermarket radio.


Also! I bought the missing woodgrain dash trim I needed for my glovebox and headlight switch from neums! Thanks dude!