My 1989 Crown Victoria.

[gadget73]

Wow. That was a real hack install. Love the tape brackets too. How is the tuning on that radio? The orig like that in my TC would pull in several at once. Terrible channel selection but very sensitive.

posting from mah phone. plz to be forgiving bad speeling.

[87gtVIC]

Nice. I wish I never tossed mine away...

You can freshen up all of the interior dash chrome accents with a silver/chrome paint pen. Steady hand and you can make the interior really pop and look less worn out.

[Mainemantom]

Whoever installed the aftermarket radio was not the sharpest pencil in the box.

[slack]

Wow. That was a real hack install. Love the tape brackets too. How is the tuning on that radio? The orig like that in my TC would pull in several at once. Terrible channel selection but very sensitive.

posting from mah phone. plz to be forgiving bad speeling.

Hell yeah it was. I actually have been waiting so long to swap it out because I didn't want to deal with the rats nest.

Tuning on the radio isn't bad actually. I do notice some of the weaker channels do get a little bit of static in them but overall it's much better than it was.

Nice. I wish I never tossed mine away...

You can freshen up all of the interior dash chrome accents with a silver/chrome paint pen. Steady hand and you can make the interior really pop and look less worn out.

That is an awesome idea! I never would have thought of that. I'll add it to the to-do list. Thanks!

Whoever installed the aftermarket radio was not the sharpest pencil in the box.

Haha. Definitely not. When I first got the car, the whole dash and trim were only held on by a few screws. It's like he botched the radio install so bad that after he just went "screw it" and didn't even bother reassembling everything completely.

[slack]

Police Rear Sway Bar!

Next on the project list! Thanks again dd345!

[sly]

[slack]

Dash Paint Pen Test

So, it was a rainy day and after David's idea about using the paint pen, I decided to give it a try at lunch today. (Sway bar will need to wait until a not so rainy day)

I picked up some silver leaf paint pen locally.

I decided to try in a really worn area on the driver's side as a first test:


Not too bad. Here it is from a distance:


I think once it's all done it should look good. Here's how it looks with the radio trim section. Left side is painted, right side is how it was. The silver trim line is more intact here so the painted section doesn't look so random and bold. (Ignore the wiring mess, that's on my "to-do" list. )

[sly]

[slack]

PI Rear Sway Bar Installed and Thermostat Gasket Re-Do

Today after work, I finally got around to install the rear PI sway bar I got about a week and a half ago from dd345.

My car's rear lower control arms only came with the single hole drilled in them and the lip that needed to be bent down. I'm not sure I did this install "by the book" but it doesn't actually hit the diff cover so I'm thinking it should be good.

Before anything, I gave the new sway bar a fresh coat of paint:


Here's what the control arms looked like before anything:


I remember reading someone saying they just used vise grips to bend the lip down for the install. Yep. That works. The metal bent pretty easy too. I think when I finally replace the back bushings with poly, I might just pick up some rear PI arms instead of re-using these:


Here's the lip bent down:


Test fitting the sway bar now that the lip isn't in the way:


Test fitting using just the already drilled holes: (One per side)


Another shot of the test fit from a distance:


...More in next post....

[slack]

PI Rear Sway Bar Installed and Thermostat Gasket Re-Do (Part 2)

...continuing from previous post.

After the test fit, I drilled out the holes for the remaining two bolts basically where ever they were lined up from the test fit. (There's not really much room for the sway bar to move). For the nuts and bolts, I used a washer on each side, nut side got a lock washer as well. On the inside of the arm, I used two washers and two nuts to fill in the space so that the arm wouldn't get crushed when the bolts were torqued down. dd345 sent the bolts and washers with the sway bar. I ended up going to Home Depot to pick up a few more washers to fill in the space inside the control arm better.

Installed!


Here's the screws mounted in:


This is what it looks like inside the control arm:




So, while doing this, my friend was also working on his '83 CV with CFI. He's having an issue with the car wanting to stall when hitting the gas from a stop and it won't restart after being turned off without a spray of starting fluid. After some checking, it looks like the injectors aren't firing right and the TPS is not reading within voltage specs at all. Bummer. Well, we also both had to replace our thermostat gaskets. My goop ball of RVT from past Dec finally wasn't working anymore and he was also getting a puddle on the timing cover from his. We ended up setting the cars up facing eachother in the driveway. (That gave me a flatter spot to work when I was doing the sway bar.) In any case, once night fell we had the floodlights out and it ended up looking pretty bad ass.

Here's some pics of the setup we had: (He has some high res photos, my phone not so much. It's literally 5 years old lol...)


As for the thermostat gasket, no issues to report here. Right bolt is a bitch because the TFI module is in the way. You can only move the wrench like a 1/8 of a turn at a time. On my friends '83 there is no TFI module and there's a ton more space on the front of the engine making his a cake walk. That said, changing the gasket went very smoothly for both cars. No leaks to report! (yet...)

Final pic of just patching up the last few connectors and bracket on my car:


On the drive home, holy crap. That PI sway bar is awesome! The car's rear end doesn't feel so questionable anymore. Maybe I shouldn't of had the cargo coils in there without the sway bar??? I'm going to go for a longer drive tomorrow to really get a feel for it. The short ride home the car already felt much better. Maybe my suspension strangeness had to do with the rear being wonky. (Hard springs, soft shocks, no sway bar) We'll see!

[Louis]

Nice work!

[slack]

Thanks!! I'm glad everything went smooth this time for once! haha

[87gtVIC]

Yay. And you installed the sway bar right side up.

I am one of those guys that was spoiled with the rear PI bar already installed when I got the car so I cannot say how big of a difference I would have felt without it but everyone seems to say it is a MUST.

[slack]

PI Sway Bar Update & Gauges Finally Mounted

After some more time with the rear sway bar, I can honestly say that it's a huge difference. Definitely don't want to go back to not having one.

I did notice I mounted it a little high but it doesn't seem to be rubbing so it should be fine. I plan on keeping my eyes open for some PI rear lower control arms (I hear they're beefier, plus I can load them with new Poly bushings before install) as well as a wagon or PI front bar. The one downside I did notice with the PI rear bar and the civilian front bar is that there's a little bit of understeer (I think that's the right one) when turning tightly quickly. (Which I don't really do often). I figure getting a matching bar in the front would fix that up.

In other news, I FINALLY mounted the gauges that have been floating around the front of my car for about 5 months now!

I fed the sending wires through the little vacuum grommet on the driver's side of the firewall by the gas pedal. Then under the dash and placed the gauges under the cup holder. I used industrial strength velcro to attach the gauges so I can always move them or replace them without any permanent modifications to the ashtray. I also had to add a hard drive magnet to the inside of the ashtray to help it stay up with all the extra weight from the gauges. That is also velcroed on so it can be removed down the road.

Hardest part was getting the wires neat. Harbor Freight zip ties helped with that!

Here are two pics of the gauges installed:

[87gtVIC]

When I Ran gauges on my ash tray eons ago I used the little christmas trees that hold the door panels on and wedged them in the hinge for the ash tray to make the ash tray stay closed. Your magnet allows you to still easily use the ash tray.