12 replies to this topic

[Cougar1969]

I am in the process of restoring CSX #701. I am doing it while keeping the car drivable. Currently I have it tore down to do the paint and body work. Had a friend of mine back into my passenger door which prompted me to remove the front sheet metal for the paint work. I am also updating the front suspension due to the passenger control arm being cracked and I also found a big crack in the front frame cross member under the radiator support.

Anyway, I thought this would be a good place to due a little build log on this car.

Brian.

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Edited by Cougar1969, 17 November 2009 - 03:22 PM.

[Cougar1969]

A little history......at least my history anyway.

I bought this car 10 years ago for my wife to drive to college (we were engaged at the time). It was sitting in a field commonly used by owners for selling their cars. I called the owner who told me that he bought the car from a car lot auction that went out of business for his son. His son decided that he wanted something bigger and did not want the car. I took it for a test drive and gave him an offer of $650.00 which he accepted. The only thing wrong with it at the time was that the charging system was not working. Traced that down to a bad regulator. At the time I had no idea that the Shelby was as rare as it is. I just thought it was another shadow that was "dressed up" a little. Plus my soon to be wife had a shadow that she wrecked, so parts were available. It was not until several months later that I researched the Shelby CSX on the net and found out the jewel that I lucked into.

I have not driven this car very much. My wife only drove it for part of a term of college before she got pregnant with our daughter. After that it pretty much sat out in the weather and was driven by me on rare occasions. The odometer had 99K on it when we got it, it now has just over 101K. So just under 3000 miles in 10 years. I keep the car at my parents place because they have the room and a shop where I can work on it. It is also the place where I work as an A&P mechanic wrenching on airplanes. I only decided recently to do some restoration work on it because out of all the other projects that I have, it needs the least amount of work to complete. I also own two 1969 Mercury Cougars, a couple of Datsun Z's and a 1941 Ford pickup. My dad also is part owner of the truck and owns a completely restored 1964 Mercury Comet Caliente, so I am not a complete rookie when it comes down to doing this type of work.

Anyway, currently I have a new set of lower control arms out of a 90 Caravan that I finished cleaning up and installing new ball joints and Poly Bushings in today. (Thanks to Johnny at Poly Bushings for the bushings and help over the phone) I will hopefully be getting them installed into the car this weekend and have it back off the jack stands. I can then get it over to the main shop to do a weld repair on the frame crack and start to button up the front end. Afterwords, off to paint the clip and body. I will paint the fenders, hood, doors and anything else that I can take off the car off of the car. I paint quite a bit in my business and am pretty picky about how it should be done. I do not like to just tape things off when it can be done nicely with just a little more work. I have a few pictures of the control arms that I will post here, the old passenger arm has a pretty good crack in it that may interest people in seeing. It is the main reason for going with the heavier Caravan ones.

Brian.

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[Cougar1969]

more photos of control arm.

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[Cougar1969]

One more.....

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[greaser]

i wonder if it wasnt hit or in an accident  some time to crack the frame and control arm just wondering.

[Cougar1969]

greaser, on Nov 19 2009, 04:35 PM, said:

i wonder if it wasnt hit or in an accident  some time to crack the frame and control arm just wondering.

I have thought the same thing, except that the only body damage on the car is just behind the driver side door, and it is a real small dent....I think it was run off the road and ran over some fairly big rocks.....there is other evidence under the car to support that theory also.

Brian.

[greaser]

anyway im glad to see you bringing it back to life. i cant wait to see it when youre all done.

[Cougar1969]

Update,

I have not been able to work on the car as much as I like due to Holidays and my work schedule. But I am progressing slowly.

The Caravan control arms are installed, they took a little coaching with a dead blow hammer, but they are in and tight. Overall a great update compared to the originals.

I have been going over the engine compartment and replacing all of the worn out vacuum hoses and such. I also discovered that my turbo's coolant and oil supply lines were both leaking at the hose fittings. The coolant hose was an easy fix, just a 2 inch piece of hose and a couple of clamps. The oil hose however, took some fabricating. I know that there are better aftermarket parts, but I just cant afford to do them right now so i build up a hose out of some spare aircraft hardware that I had laying around the shop. Utilizing the ends of the original hard line, I cut them off and flared the ends installing about a 12 inch long piece of Aeroquip and some old end fittings that were in good serviceable condition. Pics below. As you can tell in the pics, I had to replace one of the straight unions with a 90 degree fitting in order to get the line to hook up right. Tell me what you think of the final result.

I have welded the front crack with the wire feed. So far I have not been able to clean up the weld or make the overlay piece yet. Hopefully I can get that done this week.

Sorry about the crappy pictures All I have to work with is my camera on my cell phone, and the light in the shop I am using is so bad that I have to shine a LED drop light at whatever I am taking pictures of in order to get a half way decent one.

Brian.

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[Cougar1969]

Finally got smart and grabbed the shop camera for some better pictures...Took a few shots of the installed control arm.
Also welded up the crack in the frame. The front section had some pretty thin spots and the weld looks like crap, the rear section turned out much better. I will be welding a triangular patch plate over the crack to give it some more strength in that area.

Brian.

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[Grabber]

Looks like you have your work cut out for you.

What town in Oregon are you in?

[shelbymotorsports]

Cougar1969

On the 1989 CSX, Shelby Automobiles riveted on a gusset plate across the bottom of the radiator support. Looks like they had an idea that was a weak spot. You may want to reinforce yours while you have the welder out.

Steve

[Cougar1969]

Grabber,

I am in White City, basically a suburb of Medford (Southern) Oregon. The car is out at my shop 13 miles from my house.

Steve,

Any chance you have some type of picture of the gusset on the 89. There used to be 2 of them running around here but I have not seen either in at least a couple of years now.

Thanks.

Brian.

[Cougar1969]

Merry Christmas Everyone.....

Nothing new to report, It has been too cold to work on the Shelby in my un-heated shop. The freezing fog also puts a dampening on getting any type of paint work done.

Hope all of you have a wonderful holiday and a joyous new year....

Brian.