LTDMan's '87 Ford LTD Crown Victoria LX (The Blue Beast) *DUW*

[Tiggie]

So you're getting to that point of... damn... this is a lot of work and I'm not getting any reward for it. Just keep hanging in there mang, once the paint goes down and you start putting it all back together it gets easier. Even if the car fights you.

I just think the car dislikes you for some reason. I didn't have any problems out of it really, even after I took out a great transmission and put in that POS AOD. Then when I decided to sell it to you, the alternator lit up and it sprung that huge leak in the back drivers side. I took a look at how that motor had been installed by the previous owner and realized I wanted nothing to do with the haphazard work that went into that. I'm still interested to see what your find in that shortblock.

Keep pluggin' away at it mang!

[LTDMan83]

Yea, that's about where I'm at now with the car. I definitely get the feeling that it dislikes me for some reason, lol. It even tried to liberate itself from the trailer when we where hauling it back. I can understand if it hates me though, as I am completely killing off the Original identity of the car, and creating something that will be entirely my own.

This car will be getting a stock Explorer powerplant, after I pull the lopo I will post up as to what I find. It does look to have been re-built, or swapped out, (maybe a truck 302?), at some point in the cars past.

I'm going through some of the biggest PITA tasks of the entire project right now, so I know that things will only get easier and more fun from here. I'm currently restoring all the old hardware for the entire Front Clip, without the aid of a parts tumbler, so it has been quite a chore to say the least.

[LTDMan83]

The LTD's "New" Body is now completely installed!

Warning: This post contains 25 pics, with a total size of 3.8MB, so Dial-up users beware.


Continued from last time...



The Rust under each side lip of the Cowl, wasn't as bad as it looked after chipping away all the body caulk.



Completely De-rustified, applied Por15, Sealed the Seams with Body Caulk, and then a 2nd coat of Por15.



The entire Front Clip is now ready to be installed. This is all the Hardware for the entire deal. Fully and painstakingly Restored, completely by hand. I spent around 20 hours Restoring all this Hardware. Thank God this part of the project is over, lol.



Also took the time to Seal Up all the leak points that I found on the Firewall/Cowl. Under the Cowl Vent was among the leakiest, and was running into the interior floorboard.



Front Fenders and Liners re-installed, and everything hooked back up.



All the Header Panel mounting points were Resto'd, and then the Header Panel was installed.



Ford Front Bumper from my old '87 installed. Eventually, there will be a Smooth Front Bumper going on here.



Old Headlight Bezels and '79 LTD Front Grille and Hood Ornament Installed. Needs some NOS Headlight Bezels and Amber Lenses before completion of the project, I have a NOS '79 LTD Grille ready to go on after paint. Old Headlights in there just to fill the space for the time being, until I decide which route to go with them.





Before installing the Hood, I took the time to install a Mod I have had sitting on my shelf for over a year now, but never got around to installing. Hood Shock Hinges, from a Box Towncar. Simple as measuring and drilling a hole in the correct spot, to make these work.



New Hood Shocks.



Installed. Makes it look a little cleaner without having the springs the original hinges had. The Box TC hinges are exactly the same, albeit with a slightly longer top bracket than the stock hinges, but with the longer hinge relief already pressed into the stock hood for these Hinges, it looks like Ford's Engineers may have planned on installing these from the beginning.





Hood Installed and Aligned.





Lower Rocker Trim Re-installed, and some full shots of the body. The car is alot Straighter now than it ever was from the factory, but there is some final tweaking that I need to do to the body panels, to get the fitament absolutely Perfect. I Love the Smoothness of the non-ditch light Front Fenders, and the non-vent 1-Piece Front Door Glass. I will be keeping the Lower Rocker Trim, as I don't think that the car looks right without it. I also replaced the Tag Bucket, because the original one was cracked.


























Now, I can move on to the rest of the car. Next up, I will be starting Resto-Mod work on the Interior/Trunk of the car, and starting to plan out and execute some of the Custom Body Mods that I've had floating around in my head/dreams for the past couple of years. I'm not entirely sure how wild I'm gonna go with it, yet.

Stay Tuned.

[87gtVIC]

Very cool. I am really feeling the coach roof, looks real nice.

[Mercmarquis]

I sure hope you have a decent size blast cabinet and a tumbler to restore all the old hardware and small parts.

[99GS]

awesome, eagerly anticpating more updates

[Jason_GMQ91]

Nice! Make sure replace the headlights.

[Lincolnmania]

dont you gotta take it all apart again to paint the car?

[LTDMan83]

Thanks Guys, more updates are coming soon.

I sure hope you have a decent size blast cabinet and a tumbler to restore all the old hardware and small parts.

Nope, but I have a regular sandblaster that I have been using for all the small/medium sized parts. I realized after restoring all that front clip hardware by hand that I really need a parts tumbler though.

dont you gotta take it all apart again to paint the car?

Yup. This was the Restoration and Alignment phase of the cars body. When it comes time to take it all apart again to paint the jambs, beforehand I will drill small alignment holes through all the hinges, which small steel alignment pins will fit into. Then after it is painted I can easily put it back together, using the pins as guides and retaining the exact alignment that I worked so hard to get, and without screwing up any of the fresh jamb paint.

[87gtVIC]

i really love this photo. it looks so bad ass.

[Cable Guys FGMQ]

Nice it taking shape so far so good....

[packman]

After looking at your pics and then staring at my mom's CV, I realized how NOT straight the car is. If I could justify taking the car down for a few weeks, I would attempt to shim and straighten the body on her car before paint. That CV of yours is gonna look sweet when it's all said and done.



Packman

[p71towny]

After looking at your pics and then staring at my mom's CV, I realized how NOT straight the car is. If I could justify taking the car down for a few weeks, I would attempt to shim and straighten the body on her car before paint.

Yeah, its wierd, I thought my vic was straight but that thing even before paint looks better than my car.

[LTDMan83]

Thanks Guys. I'm glad you can appreciate the Straightness of the body, I put a Metric Shitton of work into it. It was really hard to get good pics that could actually show off the Straightness of the body as well.

The PS doors of the car were done completely with the Stock Adjustment already present in the hinges from the factory, but the DS needed to be modified slightly to get that fit, and it can still get a little better. The front section of the Fenders, which mount on the top of the cowl, needed to be shimmed to get the correct fit, but that was the only thing on the entire car that needed to be shimmed. I actually had to subtract shims from under the core support, from what the factory had done.

From what I have seen, most of these cars were not straight from the factory. Most likely because they knew that the cars were gonna be DD's for the most part, and no one would care about the fine details, so they just didn't wanna take the time with it.

Even though I would like to do a quick job on my Merc before paint, and get it on the road asap, I can't stand the stock alignment it has, so I'm gonna pull her apart before paint, and get her body straightened out. It's worth the extra work though, on any of these cars. As all those small details will add up to one gorgeous machine in the end.

[chitownvic]

pure awesomeness...(can't stop drulling)