Month: August 2018

Couple Of Upgrades

It’s been a long time since I have changed anything or added anything to my car. I was at a car show recently and something caught my eye that I decided I wanted to change. That part was under the hood that nobody would really notice to be honest. That part was hood pin and safety catch. There was nothing wrong what so ever with the old ones what so ever. Except that I thought there was just too much blue and it needed to be broken up a little. It’s standard for the safety catch to be car coloured as mine was. The hood pin itself was fine if not a little tarnished after fifty-two years as it was the original parts.

So I had a word with Adam at Mustang Maniac and he said “You need a little stainless steel, with some nice bolts to go with it, not just chrome.”

The safety catch is held in place just by two bolts and like for like swap out. I got a couple of Adam’s new ‘Ford’ branded stainless steel bolts to go with it all. I just love these bolts which looked even better after a good polish up.

before clean
after cleaning
ready for fitting

Undo the two bolts for the safety catch and it will expose the hood pin itself which again is a simple nut to hold it in place.

The swap out is a simple reverse procedure, hood pin and then the safety catch. You have to make sure the hood pin is set correctly, to shallow and the hood will not close, to long and the hood will bounce and vibrate at speed. I created a detailed page on how to change these parts in detail here, or go to the top menu ‘How To.. Projects/Engine Bay/Changing the hood pin and safety catch’

The difference is subtle yet instantly visible if that makes sense, it also matches the hood lip trim.

Before and after side by side. Just another little something to clean now. 😉

On the ’66 Mustangs all models there hazard switch that fitted as standard. The official place for these to be fitted was in the glove box on the upper left hand corner as in this picture I found on the net for the correct location.

Depending if the car hazard switch was fitted later or somebody on the production wanted to fit it somewhere else, it could have been anywhere. The most common alternative was under the dash on the passenger side, sometimes on the drivers side. When I first got my car there was this random switch that I didn’t know what it was for. It was so rusty I couldn’t read anything and it virtually fell to bits when it was touched, not to mention all the wires were cut from it and been melted due to the under dash fire.

I now realise that this random switch was the original position of my factory hazard switch. Now I had a problem as my wiring loom was an American Autowire upgrade kit and wouldn’t work directly with standard hazard switch and pigtail loom. Another conversation at Mustang Maniac and research came up with an accessory kit for the factory hazard switch. Considering the cost of the wire loom in the first place I think it was a bit much to charge for this extra mini loom in my opinion. Anyway, rant over. Adam made a special order for me and the kit came in a couple of weeks later. I popped down to see the guys and also picked up the switch as well.

The wire loom and switch.

The AA kit is a bridge under the steering column that just connects the male to female and the female to male sections for the column (indicators, horn brake switch etc), with the extra wires running from it for the hazard switch. I have created a detailed walkthrough on how to hit it up here, or got to the main menu ‘How To.. Projects/Electrical/American Autowire Hazard switch installation’.

The switch is great quality and just needed to be assembled.

The wire connections for the AA kit was supposed to fit the original hazard pigtail loom, but as I didn’t have (no need for my fitting), I cut the supplied connector off and fitted some heat shrink tubing to each wire, then the spade connectors with a factory look crimp.

correct length
first crimp completed
second crimp
second crimp completed

I then checked the wiring diagram for the correct fitting onto the back of the switch.

I now had a decision to either replace the switch in the ‘correct’ location, or the position that the car had it fitted at the time. I went for the car’s location at the time. Yes there will be the experts that moan it’s not in the correct place, but I have seen a few cars where this was the ‘original’ location. I also understand that some dealers fitted them under the dash to save taking out the glove box liner as it was easier!

Plugged in connectors with heat shrink tube looked pretty cool, even though nobody will ever see it.

Under the dash next to my aircon on the passenger side there are two bolt holes which were used originally, so there was no drilling or measuring for this project either. A case of bolts through the switch bracket, through the dash holes and the backing plate, nuts on the back of the plate and tighten up.

The last part is to connect up the steering column, this is done last as the live power feed is taken from the brake switch, connecting it up first would mean having live or hot wire about as you are connecting up. Not ideal!

under column connected
column sperated
AA Hazard kit in place

The hazard switch now works without the key in the ignition and with the engine on. The old hazard switches worked by putting the switch on and then indicating to trigger the four way flash. To finish the installation, I spend half hour or so wrapping the new loom extension in factory look loom fabric tape, I find it just so therapeutic.

I just hope I never get to use the hazards for a real emergency. I enjoyed my few hours of pottering around on the car, just because I could.

Thanks to Adam at Mustang Maniac (again) who put the special order in for me so I could get this all working.

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Mustang Convoy To Helmingham Hall

The second of a two show weekend was held at Helmingham Hall, another very big and well supported car show, this show is aimed at the car enthusiast more than a simple family day out. There was talk of this show being a let down due to the very well advertised second day for the Festival of Wheels which was being held as well in a similar location. This beautiful building is so well photographed it’s hard to take something a little different. It was a perfect day for a car show too.

I was supposed to meet up at around eight in the morning with the rest of the Mustang going to the show. Unfortunately one of our dogs decided to do a Houdini special on me and disappear down the road. This obviously meant that I was going to play silly chase with the little guy, which in turn made me late. I eventually caught him after couple of minutes and the walk of shame back home. I jumped in the Mustang and set off for the show. At the turning I supposed to meet the guys they were all on there way out and I was flagged down to join them. What a result. There was about thirty Mustangs all in convoy. All be it only four including mine were classic Mustangs. As we pulled into the show ground I managed to grab a picture of the cars in front and some of those that followed me into the show ground.

Simply Mustangs had a great showing and looked pretty impressive.

There was such a diverse range of cars on show I selected just some of the ones I liked best. On a post like this there is not much need for lots of words, the pictures do the talking.

I was very pleased that I went to this show instead of the Festival of Wheels as it was so much bigger, better organised and much busier.

Thanks to the Simply Mustangs UK on Facebook for letting join them and making me feel very welcome.

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Tool Kit At The Ready

Last weekend was a double car show, firstly there was an all weekend event at the Ipswich Festival of Wheels, and the other was at Helmingham Hall on the Sunday. Saturday was no problem as I would be at the Festival of Wheels and the Sunday could be FoW again or Helmingham. So I was going to choose at the end of the day. The Bury Retro Car Club had a stand for both days at the FoW, well it was more like a marked out bit of land to be exact. I was unsure of the exact time it started so I decided to get there earlier rather than later. I rocked up to the main gates at about eight thirty in the morning and it was pretty quiet.

I was directed to the area and parked up.

A little while later I was joined by some more of the club members and I felt relieved that I was not the only one. The guys were camping there over the weekend and nice atmosphere throughout the, I even managed to sit by the side of the camper van with a pretty awesome awning to stay out of the sun.

We were in the allotted area next to a Mustang club as well, which was quite nice, although it wasn’t filled to capacity either.

This was the first show of this type and it was obviously aimed more at the family rather than the out-and-out enthusiasts from what I could see. There was plenty for the younger ones and the event was nowhere full. Perhaps everybody was waiting for the Sunday as seems to be case for these all weekend shows. By about ten in the morning the place was as busy as it was going to get so I set of for some pics.

There was racing influence as well from the Speedway and stock Cars which Ipswich is well known for.

There was a nice selection of trucks and vans from the UK and the USA, the Transit with hundreds of glowing and pulsing LEDs took my eye.

OK there was a huge USA rig that was transporting a great idea of motorised small version trucks for the little ones to ride in as well as the dads to accompany their kids.

There were a few fast UK Fords to be seen, many of which are starting to command some serious money to buy one.

A promise of some ‘Super Cars’ and ‘Film Cars’ were to be on show as well, I only spotted one of each, perhaps there was more on the Sunday.

One car that was getting a lot of attention was this Ford Popular, all chrome and was allegedly driven there from a Kent to Suffolk and “not trailored here”, a distance of around one hundred miles or so. There was not a spec of dirt on it anywhere, not even in the tyre grooves, let alone how he managed to carry all the mirrors and equipment with him as well. Maybe a convoy down to the show but he seemed to be on his own. What do you think?

There was a few stalls there and a few stalls that belonged in a craft fair more so than a car show.

Back to my main story, during the day I had a guy talking to me who had just bought his red ’68 Mustang Coupe and he explained that it needed a little bit of work doing to it. We chatted away for about thirty minutes or so before he had a look around the show. About an hour or two later he came back to me with a couple of guys with him and he looked worried. He asked me to borrow my key to open his trunk as he had locked his keys in there. The car was open luckily and I explained that my ’66 key was a different design. He was now starting to stress a little and I said don’t worry we can get into the trunk. I took out my travel tool kit and we walked to his car, where I explained to take the seats out and the card backing behind the seat back he should be able to reach in and get the keys. His friend helped him take the out seats and used my tools for the nuts and bolts that needed to be undone. A few minutes later the keys were located and all was good in the world again.

keys handed back

The decision was simple and the end of the day, I was going to Helmingham Hall on the Sunday where I took more yet more photos. I will post those pictures later in the week.

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