Elveden Car Show 2019 (part 1)

This was my fourth car show of year and was in a beautiful little village in Suffolk called Elveden, the best bit was that this show was to be held within their Walled Garden. This was my first trip here and wasn’t to sure what to expect. The sun was promised all day and most importantly no rain! Make a note here – that all four apps I use said “No Rain”. I had a beautiful drive to the show some back roads with very picturesque fields and open spaces. Window open, engine throaty burble and countryside. This was going to be a nice day.

I took rather a lot of photos during the day and decided to split them over a couple of days so it’s not photo overload. The main area was for the general public cars, I spotted that the Bury Retro Car Club was there in the club area. I explained to an official walking around that I wanted to join them as I belonged to the club. He said that I had to stay there within the public exhibition area, apparently “Health & Safety wouldn’t allow me to move.” 🙁  I couldn’t be bothered to argue with him, which was down to the fact I was enjoying the nice weather and chilling with the cars. The second walled enclosed grass area was similar sized to the main area, but they had more room to spread out due to less cars in there.

Anyway, in no particular order I wondered up and down the rows of some gorgeous cars and chatted to some very nice owners, and few of them ladies which was a pleasant change.

A rare Crayford Cortina took my eye and was great condition.

My car getting a little attention from the public. 🙂

There was a woman just standing behind my car saying “I’m in love.” I heard her as I walked back from the other area and stood next to her. I chatted for a minute or so unaware that I was the owner. She said I want to find the owner and ask if she if she could sit in it. I said to her “I don’t think he would mind”, and I opened the door. She said ‘you can’t do that’ and looked a little worried. I just smiled and said “Don’t worry, it’s mine, and do you still want to sit in it?” With that she handed the reigns for her toddler to her eldest son next to her and sat in my car. She sat there for a minute just staring at the dash. Then she wanted to know what all about the car, so I told her the story. She said that I had made her day, while her children took lots of photo’s of her in the car. I had some as well, but she explained for personal reasons, if I wouldn’t post them on any social media. I agreed of course and she explained to me why. So for that lovely lady, consider your requests granted, but I also have to say it was my favourite part of the day.

Tomorrow I will post ‘part 2’ where we will have the club stands, Hot Rods and some super cars too.

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Strike Three – But Not Out!

Last weekend I went to a car show at the Enfield Pageant of Motoring, and guess what? It rained; OK it wasn’t a bad downpour, but it was still wet stuff from the sky which landed on my car. That’s the first three shows this year that I have attended and rain has appeared, although to be fair it wasn’t until later in the afternoon. This won’t put me off car shows, it just makes me check my useless weather apps more to see what lies they are going to tell me. It seems as though my luck this year with car shows is not going very well at all. I drove to the end of a field and parked up on the Mustang Maniac stand where I meet Adam, Yogi and Paul who were busy getting their priorities right, making the cups of tea. My priority was to start cleaning my car. Simple reason being that the previous day Saturday was a hot day for a change at the show and the entrance car park had dried to a dust bowl. The show cars that were driving into the event were going slowly so as not to kick up much dust and gravel. In other words, showing respect for other people. However some selfish a-hole in a van decided to do mini burnouts every time he moved. Needless to say the dust cloud that enveloped the car park was like cloud of nuclear fallout and just as toxic. Not a great a great start to the show, I wasn’t best pleased.

I have continued to review lots of car cleaning and detailing products as I get a few questions now and again about what products I use on my Mustang as well as the daily driver cars too.

Contrary to popular belief I am not a one brand product devotee, far from it in fact. A big pet hate of mine is where somebody will buy a single product and be brand loyal refusing to admit that some of that brands products are in fact a useless waste of money. Those same people will have blinkered and tunnel vision when it comes to trying other products. My outlook on the matter is simple, I’m still looking for the perfect combination of products for each step I perform whether it be; snow foam, drying, decontamination, cleaners for paint, cleaners for wheels, glass cleaners, polishes, waxes, microfiber cloths, brushes, carpet stain remover, rubber restorer, vinyl cleaner etc. Just about everything I use is in a combination of many products such as Meguiar’s, Auto Finesse, Chemical Guys, Poor Boys World, Mirror Bright, Valet Pro, Dat Wax and so on depending on what is need, and what I intend to do to get the results I want. This time I decided to use a Chemical Guys EcoSmart which is a waterless wash & wax product I have been using for a while now, but just couldn’t get it right to use it properly. The results are amazing (now) which have improved a huge amount since I started to use top quality plush, deep pile microfiber cloths at £5 each and not the 25 cloths for £5 scenario, which aren’t much better than toilet rolls if the truth is to be known. Round two was onto the quick detailer, a brand new product recommended to me which is Chemical Guys – P40. (Yes, I buy ALL my own car cleaning products, and I am unbiased in my reviews.)

The car finished and it looked quite clean again.

The Mustang Maniac stand was starting to get full as I was almost done and was easily the Mustang place to be. There were customers who turned up for a chat, people interested in getting a Mustang, and people who were just happy to be around the cars.

With the car finished some one and half hours later I went for a wonder around the show to look at the cars and stalls.

It was an fairly good show in general, but I think that this show is getting more mainstream rather than car focussed stalls. There were lots of house clearance stalls selling cheap rubbish, stalls that sell plenty of plastic toys and stalls selling a selection of tools (I use that term very loosely), which were aimed at people with an extremely tight budget should we say. For once I didn’t buy anything at all from anybody. The wife says I should take her out for the day with the money I saved, she’s right of course, there is a car show this weekend, I could take her there and maybe get her a burger and buy more stuff for the car.

Classic car owners second worse nightmare? Stone Chips.

The worst nightmare has to be rust, the second has to be the dreaded stone chips. I always drive with an extra spaces between the car in front of me and I back off if somebody pulls into that gap. It seems as though I have been caught out with the hated stone chips. Let’s just say I was pretty pi55ed off and the air was filled with the colourful language that may have slipped out of my mouth on a repeated number of occasions.

I spotted the evil craters from the previous car show and fixed them up before the trip down to Enfield. Although I got another one on the way back from Enfield, I spotted this one when I cleaned the car on Monday. I have done a walkthrough or tutorial guide that works for me under the Menu ‘How To…Projects/Fixing Stone Chips’. Here is just a taster of what I did to fix them. This is only the basic explanation, I fully explain it all here.

Identify the location of the chips by marking with a piece of masking tape.

Thoroughly clean the area with Isopropyl Alcohol (or similar) to remove all waxes and sealants, use lint free panel wipe or similar. Then take a little colour and place into a pot. I had some left from the original paint job so I was lucky in that respect for colour matching.

isopropyl alcohol
lint free cloth

There are various ways to apply the paint, with a brush, paper, matchstick, toothpick or similar. I use a wooden burger skewer as they are longer, easier to hold and I can sharpen them well without splintering.

tooth pick

The idea is to place a tiny droplet into the centre of the chip so that it sits just proud of the rest of the paint around it. Place the tip of your choice of applicator into the paint and remove it which should now hold a tiny droplet which is held in place by the wood and not running straight off. If you get a big drop you have the chance of it dropping onto places it shouldn’t be, with a lot of recovery work for yourself later.

With the paint drop as small as possible, covering the chip itself and sitting proud of the paint – leave it to dry and cure. Not an hour or two, I’m talking a couple of days, I left mine for a week. This will also allow any waxes to apply to the fresh paint properly.

Next is to get the sanding paper out, I got a wide selection of wet & dry papers starting with coarsest being 1500grit all the way to impossibly fine 8000grit. They are different colours for identification.

I then take my special stone chip tool, a pencil eraser and mark out the width I need on the grades of paper to cut to the size I need. These erasers come in various sizes and shapes for your needs or what suits you.

The idea is to start with the courser grade and work finer to remove the previous sanding marks. I prefer the rubber eraser as it will give slightly to a contour as it’s not rigid, but firm enough to hold the paper flat to the surface. I marked the back of the papers as the cut strips may not show the grit grade itself.

Patience, then use lots more patience.

Wet the area, I use a small travel spray you can get from eBay. Then gently rub the paint drop down keeping the paper flat as possible. A few gentle rubs then check. This will give an idea of how the paint is reacting to the paper and also you don’t want to sand the topcoat or lacquer of the paint if you can help it. You can adjust your technique accordingly.

water spray bottle
wet area
initial paste rubbing
after drying

When you are getting close to the flat paint, swap the papers over to a higher grit. With the sanding the paper may shed and give you a light paste look depending on the type of paper you bought.

The higher the grit number will reduce the previous marks and stop you from rubbing the paint to hard, keep the area wet. Repeat as necessary all the way to the fine grades. When you rub your finger over the chipped area you shouldn’t feel anything at all, it should be glass smooth. If the paint has sunk and you have a pit, stop sanding and add another tiny drop of paint by repeating all the application steps above and let it dry.

Once you are happy with the sanded area then it’s time to bring the car paint back to life. Use a polish that you normally use to remove swirl marks or light scratches. This will remove all the sanding marks, I used Tripple on this occasion as it’s hardly abrasive. Rub into the area using a DA machine or by hand as in my case using the ‘Handipuck’ to get the shine back.

With the area polished it just leaves the protective wax to be applied, this after the hand polish. Pointed out stone chip area with the wooden paint pick tool.

My next step to wax and protect the area. Dat Wax which is show wax and is heavy on oils not the paste style which is ideal for this type of work. Oh, its also blue and smells of beautiful bubble-gum which I reviewed here.

The finished results:

The trouble is, I have to do it all again soon. 🙁

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Double Wash Out (part 2)

Following on from the last post which was about the Fast & Loud show on the Saturday this is a post about the Sunday; Stonham Barns Spring Break. After cleaning the car from the stop home on Saturday I sat in the arm-chair slightly deflated and checked the weather app, OK I checked all three of my weather apps and one of which I even paid for. All of them said that the Sunday was going to be a better day with overcast conditions, only a thirty percent chance of rain at midday from just one app. I decided to take a chance for a second day, after all the odds were in my favour right?

So I got up next morning and the sky was clear, but a little breezy that’s all. I fired up the freshly cleaned beast and took a what is usually an enjoyable ride out to the show just a short half hour away. I jumped on the dual carriageway and started to relax and enjoy the drive. Then there it was, the first drop of rain. The air turned the colour of my car, the rain fell heavier and soon it was pouring, again. I had the choice to turn around in a few minutes at the next junction and go home or carry on hoping it would pass. I continued with my now somewhat ruined drive. The further I drove the less the rain fell, decision time. I continued on towards the clearer skies with a little hope. Some twenty minutes later I made the turn of to the show and I followed on behind the conga of classic cars waiting to get into the show. We can’t all be wrong can we? It was going to be OK. We were ushered in efficiently and I parked up, got out and the sun was starting to make a show itself.

A few tiny very fine spots of rain filled the air just a little damp, nothing to worry about. I dried the car and spoke to few familiar faces and we discussed the weather for a little while. Within the space of half an hour that thirty percent turned into one hundred percent rain. Within minutes the car was wet again and now so was I.

I was so miserable I even took a video of the rain sitting on my freshly waxed car! 🌧

Yet more of the same ol’ choices for the weekend to date, do I go home or stay and see if the shower passes. I decided to look around at the other cars as they all seemed to be staying too. I recognised a lot of the cars from yesterday at this show, many sitting inside them with a flask of coffee and steaming up windows.

There was a few Mustangs there too, including this distressed Mad Max look-alike, which has fake side up exhausts that were just plastic plumbing pipes just behind the real ones, even spotted a sweet wrapper a the bottom of one of them. But lots of time and effort spend on the car and fair play to them.

There was a strong showing of American classics at this show as there always seems to be.

There were some traders that had covered their tables with ground sheets to protect their stock, but the trouble is that you couldn’t see anything to buy. I didn’t even buy anything to cheer myself up.

After three hours of relentless rain I decided to go home. Which would involve a more thorough clean as the car was no going to stand until the next show. I used cloths to wipe inside the wheel arches to remove dirt and debris from the inner side bend of the wheel arch on each corner of the car. What a terrible start to the show season, it can only get better I guess.

Here’s the thing, I don’t need apps or Google as my wife said to me as I walked out the door; ‘you do know it’s going to rain?’ She was right, AGAIN!

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Double Wash Out (part 1)

Last weekend sees the start of the car show season for me with a double show weekend. Starting on the Saturday was the Fast & Loud show held at the West Suffolk College. Sunday was the Stonham Barns Spring break.

Saturday was looking to be a good day with a chance of rain. As I was itching to get to a show I thought I would risk it, when I left it was overcast, but importantly still not raining. I left early to be there before nine and I arrived some fifteen minutes later. No sooner had I pulled into the car park it started to spit with rain. Baring in mind I had just had a Day in the Bay at Meguiar’s I was not happy. The show was to be for four hours ten till two so my car wouldn’t be exposed to the rain. I meet with my car club Bury Retro Car Club and parked next to their allocated spaces which just happened to be under a tree. Reluctantly I parked up.

Shortly after parking a huge Chrysler 300 pulled in next to me. Now I thought my car was long, but just look at the extra length on this land barge! That is a seriously big car and it sounded amazing too.

This car show was catering for the younger cars and mainly Japanese car scene with wheel cambers that looked like the suspension was collapsing and exhausts the size of my wheelie bin (garbage can for my American readers) that I put out each week. There was a period of around fifteen minutes where they started the cars up and revved them hard to see who could make the most noise, with over run back fires added for the final touch of aggravation on progressively worsening rain cloud.

The funny part was that the Chrysler 300 was louder on tick over than the cars trying to be loud. Not that I was laughing, much. However, I can appreciate the time and effort they had put into their cars, although it’s not my scene at all. The rain started to hammer down now and I was getting rather angry and wet to say the least, my car had been looking the cleanest it had ever been, now it was the dirtiest within same time it took the loud scene to finish their little audio scores to be settled.

Leaves and tree sap were now trying to eat their way through my multiple layers of wax, this was now starting to give me the hump. I started a little walk around to look at the other cars before I decided to leave early from the show. The fast fords was fairly well represented and well-behaved I might add, and they were at the other end of he car park.

You don’t often get to see the Ford Capri now days, but here we had three line up together. These UK Mustangs, did look pretty cool and I think they were my favourites for the day.

On the way back to my car I spotted some visitors which the kids seemed to love;

Just as I was thinking of leaving the big Chrysler was leaving too, but he decided to leave his mark, literally.

Pretty spectacular leaving statement I must say. 👍😉

The rain also did me a bit of a favour as I have just reviewed a couple of products and the water would help me test the resilience of these newly applied products.

The first being the Mirror Bright Wax Paste which can be found here, or cut and paste the link;  https://onemanandhismustang.com/mirror-bright-wax-paste/

The second was my first tentative steps into ceramic coatings, this was from Auto Finesse for the Caramic range for glass, which can be found here, or just click the link;  https://onemanandhismustang.com/auto-finesse-caramics-glass-protection/

Then finally Auto Finesse product Iron Out which can be found here, or again paste the link;  https://onemanandhismustang.com/auto-finesse-iron-out/

After arriving back home I pulled straight into the garage and put my dehumidifier on dry while I started to dry and clean the car again ready for the next days antics. It took me two hours in total, which included the wheels.

First car show was a wash out, surely it had to her better?

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A Day In The Bay; The Video

Continuing on from my last post where I had visited Meguiar’s for their ‘Day In The Bay’ series. I have now been given access to all the pictures that Meguiar’s took on the day, but more importantly the video of the whole process is now also on YouTube, all eighteen minutes of it. Here are some great photo’s of the car from the day, and after avoiding being in any photos for seven years of my blogging, there is even a couple of pics of me in there, (I’m the one with the shaved head and a plain navy t-shirt). I have selected some of my favourites photos from the day, most of which are obviously the ones where I’m not in them. Rather than repeat myself with a write up again, this post is basically pictures, I hope that’s OK.

The link for the video of my car in the bay, is now on Meguiar’s YouTube channel here or watch it below.

The Washing & Drying

Into the Bay

Then it was time watch and learn how to machine polish the paint properly. There was some tiny swirls that needed a little correction first with some compound, before we got to the waxing stage.

Then I got to have a go with the machines.

Waxing

Buffing

The Final Results

With the outside completed we moved to the inside cleaning and protecting the seats.

Outside for the finished photo shoot.

Perhaps my favourite photo of the day!

I hope you like the pictures and more to the point the video, as much as I enjoyed the day. It’s funny though, I still can’t believe that I am going to show them. So, if you are going to leave comments, be gentle with this fifty something, grey haired old bloke! 😉

Remember: This is not a sponsored post by Meguiar’s nor an advert for them. I did by some products while I was there and will be reviewing them soon. Check out my ‘Car Detailing Reviews’ menu for the latest updates.

The car show season is nearly underway for this year, and I’m looking forward to a few shows this year. But, as the calendar dates pan out, there are a few shows on the same day which is rather annoying to say the least. So I will have to be selective with which ones I attend instead of going to them all.

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A Mirror Bright Finish

A big day for me had arrived early on Friday morning, I had taken the day of work and just for once the Friday alarm woke me up and I was in a good mood. The day trip was a visit to go and see the guys at Meguiar’s for a ‘Day In The Bay’. I had been emailing Dale much earlier in the year and we arranged a date for me to attend on the 29th March. Before we start, and you make any assumptions, this is not a sponsored post by Meguiar’s. This is a genuine member of the public’s personal opinion. It’s no secret that I am a fan of Meguiar’s products. I have used other brands to try them out, but I always seem to come back to Meguiar’s.

The journey up to Davenport was little over one hundred miles away, my sat nav told me that it would take a little over two hours to get there. I set of at seven in order to get there for ten as arranged. The extra time contingency was for road works on the A14, it was just as well as I got held up in them, but at least I was moving, all be it slowly. The funny thing that I saw was a sign that said, “a lot of work is out of sight”, it probably is, they were hard at work making tea, sitting on their backsides reading the paper, or posting on Facebook instead of building the roads to minimise the carnage to the motorist. (rant over).

I arrived at a quarter to ten and parked up. The whole place was buzzing as there was deliveries being made and the forecourt had lots of products on pallets awaiting their delivery and stock allocation.

I buzzed into the main offices where I asked to see Dale, he in turn was then called. Within a few seconds Dale greeted me, then if summoned by some divine intervention the local mobile coffee guy arrived and Dale asked if he could get me a tea, coffee or cold drink.

With the refreshments out the way Patrick arrived as he was going to do the video and camera work for the day. This was also going to be an instructional video to go on their YouTube channel shortly. (I will place the links at the end of the post). Like all good trainers I was asked what I wanted from the day what could they do for me. No scripted you must do this, you must do that scenario. My response was that I wanted to know how to use their products correctly and for tips and tricks with my paintwork and wheels. We had a look around the car and I pointed out some ‘pig tail’ marks that were on the hood from a previous mop a long time ago. There was some minor swirls that I wanted to address as well. Dale looked at the paint work intently, listened to what I was saying and recommended their Mirror Bright range for the colour of my car, and particular paint.

Next was the worst nightmare for a classic car owner, water. Again I was asked if that was going to be OK before they started. As it was a beautiful day, sun was out and it was warm I agreed, the mandatory two bucket wash method was given the go ahead. The jet wash came out and the buckets were being filled.

For the next stage I was going to be very much hands on with the training and I didn’t get much chance to pick my phone up for some photo’s. Although I know Patrick was taking plenty as we went along.

We rinsed the car over with the jet wash to wet it over and remove the worst of the road grime.

The wheels were sprayed with the Mirror Bright wheel cleaner. The mix is left on for a minute or so to see if it changes to purple. Once the product has done its job rinse of with a gentle jet wash.

Tip: Use the jet wash at a forty five degree angle to the paintwork. The reasoning being that you are not blasting water directly into and stone chips.

Tip: Fill the wash bucket with warm water and the rinse bucket with cold. This way you can feel which bucket is wash or rinse when they both have foam on the top.

Using a soft wash mitt like the lambs wool mitt to gently wash over the paint with the product allowing the shampoo to do the work.

The car was dried with the new Meguiar’s supreme drying towel. After we had dried the car I was directed into the Detailing Bay, or as Dale described it; ‘the tunnel of doom’. When I asked why, he switched the high intensity lights on, then I realised why. I could see things I hadn’t noticed before in the paintwork. Every minute imperfection was holding a sign up saying look at me.

The main issue was to address the pigtails in the paint I mentioned earlier to Dale. Patrick was filming Dale explaining the process of what he was going to do. He showed me how to use the Dual Action (DA) MT320 correctly. I was shown how to prep the rotary pad, how to prime the pad before using it, and how much product to use. A common mistake by not priming the pad prior to the application of the products. The hood was sectioned into four smaller workable areas. Dale did one side and I did the other with him giving me guidance. Patrick was getting some close up action shots as we were going along.

With the hood corrected and cleaned it was now looking smooth and flat. Again I was asked my preference for wax type, so I said it has to be the hand applied hard wax rather than the liquid form. Dale then started on the application of the Mirror Bright hard wax paste, I wasn’t sure about the results I would get as I was expecting results like the Ultimate wax for my preferred results that I liked. My expectations were surpassed, Dale was right, this wax suited my car.

Tip: Pinch the top of the applicator pad and place flat onto the wax, twist half a turn and that will be enough for a complete panel.

Tip: A small overlapping circle with fingertip pressure is all you need.

It soon became pretty clear that I was using the wax quantities all wrong in the past, using way to much product.

Once the wax had cured it was a simple wipe of a microfibre was all it took to bring the shine out. The wax came straight off. No buffing, no elbow grease required. Just like dusting a car over in fact.

Tip: check the wax has cured by wiping it with your finger. If it leaves a clean mark behind then it’s ready to come off. If it has a greasy smear behind it, leave it little longer and check again.

Tip: With the car freshly waxed, use a light misting of quick detailer. This will stick to any left over wax that hasn’t been removed leaving a pristine slick paint job.

With the car buffed over I stood in amazement as the car looked as good as it did the day it was painted and still wet.

I drove the car outside and the sun made the car transformed yet again in natural sunlight.

As the Meguiar’s warehouse were still taking out and receiving orders, I had to move the car out of the road after the main pictures were taken, the lorry driver even jumped down from his cab and joined in for a chat too. As Patrick was using the professional camera, I let him do his thing and I kept out the way.

With the photo shoot completed I asked Dale and Patrick for a picture of them with the car. Dale in black and Patrick with the stripped top.

I would like to say to Meguiar’s, especially Dale & Patrick who looked after me;

Thank You So Much!

I had the best day ever cleaning a car, and nothing was to much trouble for these guys. They answered my endless barrage of questions, they also showed me the answers too. In fact everybody I spoke to there was amazing.

There was only one thing left to do, purchase some goods. I didn’t have to at all and they never tried to sell me anything. However I needed a bag that could hold the largest of Meguiar’s bottles, so I grabbed their brand new to the market Extra Large Kit bag, which is huge. The other products are what I used on the day, but I hadn’t got in my arsenal of detailing products. The Ceramic Wax I am very intrigued about and wanted to try.

However, once I got the car home I had to give it a gentle clean before I covered it up in the garage.

Patrick is going to be uploading a video of the day to the Meguiar’s YouTube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/user/meguiarsuk

Check out the ‘Detailing 101’ where they show you how to use the products, it’s very useful.

The products I used for the day were all Mirror Bright except for the Meguiar’s Compound stage of the hood treatment. Again, I am gaining nothing from showing you what I used, but if you want some amazing results try these. I will be doing some reviews of the products a little later on of course. But, I can say one thing, they will get scores.

All of the products can be found here:  https://www.meguiars.com/mirror-bright

Patrick has said that they will be sending me the high resolution photos of the day, which I am so looking forward to getting hold of. I will then do a follow up post of some proper photos taken on the day.

Later that evening on social media platforms I spotted these posts:

Yes that is me with the polisher!

Be sure to follow ‘Mequiarsuk’ on Instagram to see their latest posts or follow ‘dale_mast’ himself who really does know what he is talking about.

Thanks again guys. I’m a very happy chap.

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Power vs Noise

Recently I have been kicking an idea around that I wanted to have a H-Pipe fitted to my twin exhaust system. This would be a trade-off, noise vs power the pros and cons.

By adding an H-pipe section it increases power. Even when headers are installed, the close firing cylinders are competing for space in the exhaust pipe after the collector, which creates back pressure and reduces power. Connecting the exhaust pipes allows pressure to escape to the other side of the system, with a resulting gain in low-end and mid-range torque. However, the effectiveness of an H-pipe section decreases somewhat at higher rpm. The increased exhaust gas velocity at high rpm causes most of the exhaust to take the path of least resistance and continue down the exhaust pipe, rather than make the turn into the H-pipe.

On the other hand, when the two close firing cylinders are exhausting on one bank, there is nothing happening in the other bank, so connecting both pipes effectively enlarged the exhaust system, allowing these exhaust pulses to exit through both sides of the system. It was found that, with the addition of an H-pipe, exhaust noise could be reduced by as much as two decibels.

So I took the plunge and made a date at Mustang Maniac for my car to go down and have the H-Pipe fitted. It was good to see Yogi again and he had already cleared a ramp for me to drive straight onto. Within a minute or so he had already pre-cut a length of pipe ready, quite impressive really, and would need proper fitting & fettling.

The pipe was offered up and the best position worked out for it. There isn’t a lot of space under there due to the headers of my exhaust, not to mention the custom-made brake lever as a result of the exhaust headers. Yogi marked up the proposed fitting points on the first of the exhaust pipes and made the initial holes. The holes were made bigger a little at a time in order fir the diameter of the pipes.

The surrounding area was sanded down ready for a little tack weld. The pipe was offered up numerous times to get the fitting and location correct. The welder was set up for the task, making sure the weld would be just how Yogi wanted it.

With the tacks in place a final check for clearance and position then the welding could start. Hand held face mask for more tack welds then the full on mask for the proper welding. I just love the blue arch light from the welding.

To complete the top of the pipes the rest of the exhaust would have to be taken down and finish the seam weld.

The H-Pipe finished and all tightened back up into place. The H-Pipe has a curve in order to make it fit within the space, a straight pipe simply wouldn’t fit. This is where the skill of the guys at Mustang Maniac can work around and make something to fit properly. Something that many other competitors try to do and fail big time.

I couldn’t wait to get in the car so I could start her up almost jumping in the car before it had got down on the ground. The exhaust is now a slightly deeper tone and a more even note. Although the volume is still there I’m glad to say. The drive home I could feel the difference at lower acceleration using the torque and not revs and got up to speed a little faster, it has improved the power band range no question about it.

Thanks Yogi for the good work.

I was then left to my own devises under the car to clean it while it was back up in the air on the ramps again. Yes I did, and I do clean the underside of the car. Then I noticed a split on the steering ram rubber boot. I picked up a repair kit from the new shop of Mustang Maniac’s and took it home ready to swap it over.

I have made a complete walk-through of the full process here, in more detail, or simply copy the link to the browser. This explanation below is just a quick summary of what I done.

Power Steering Rubber Boot Replacement

The repair kit from Mustang Maniac was a very reasonable £24 and straight of the shelf with everything you need in it. Click here for the link to buy it if you need one.

The boot had ripped completely and looks more like it has torn or been caught to damage it so much. I suspect driving over fields and rough tracks to get to the Car Shows has done the damage as this part does sit lower than normal Mustangs.

So the process; there are just two nuts that holds the ram in place, one for the tension and the other for locking in place. My mounting bracket is a modified bracket to sit lower down from the chassis because of the larger exhaust headers and not having enough clearance for the steering ram. However, the principles are exactly the same regardless of the bracket being standard or the lowered upgrade. Undo the bolts and slide off the outer steel plate.

The bushing can either be pulled of or just push the ram through and out the other side. On the ram itself there will be a sleeve that sits inside the bushings inside the bracket.

The bushings will probably be stuck to the bracket and may need a little persuasion to get them off, I used a mini hook that makes it much easier to remove without slipping and mashing your knuckles.

Behind the bracket on the inner side there is a pinch clip or single ear O ring that also needs to come off. This can be a pair of cutters, pliers or what ever, again I just hooked it off. be careful not to damage the ram shaft. With the pinch clip off, remove the damaged boot and clean the shaft.

The next part is to refit the boot and the new pinch clip, If you don’t have a pinch clip tool you can use an alternative fixing. Slide the new boot over the cleaned shaft with the bigger end first, this has to sit over the end of the cylinder ram’s mounting flange.

As my bracket is thicker than the standard bracket, this little modification is not required for the normal bracket. I had to trim a little off (about a third) the bushings otherwise I would not be able to fit the nuts back onto the end of the ram to tighten it back up.

Don’t bother to fit the cylinder end of the boot just yet. Next refit the outer plate and bushing on the inner side of the bracket, they do need to be fitted the correct way, so take care when refitting..

Slide the ram shaft sleeve on and will fit inside the bushing about a quarter of the way. Make sure enough is exposed in order to fit into the other bushing once it is through the bracket.

Push the shaft through the bracket and locate the lip of the bushing into the bracket hole, You should be able to see the end of the shaft and the sleeve ready to be surrounded by the next bushing and then the outer plate.

Looking on from the side. the bracket is sandwiched by bushings and then a plate on each side of the bushings. Slide a nut onto the shaft to tighten in place, then the locking nut.

Now we can secure the bracket end of the boot with the pinch clip tool. Use the proper tool to clamp the bracket in place and not pliers to squash it in place. Be careful not to damage or rip the boot with the tool.

At the other cylinder end you can now stretch it over the lip of the flange. Make sure that the boot is not twisted and is able to move freely.

With the boot in place I found that it can pop of the cylinder and is a pain. So most people use a cable tie just to hold it in place from slipping off. Trim the excess tie and make sure the boot is still free to move.

That’s it job done, total of no more than an hour including me taking the pictures!

My car was due for its MOT later this month, even though it technically it doesn’t need one. However most like-minded and conscientious classic car owners, they want to know that their car is safe and not going to cause problems. This split rubber boot would have been a failure of that test. Once the boot was changed, I took the car to the MOT centre where she then passed with flying colours. Now I’m ready for the car shows again.

I usually look over the car when I clean it to see if anything out of the ordinary is wrong. This was one of those times that saved me not being allowed to drive the car as a result of the failure. It’s a good idea to check the old cars over especially if they have been stored up for a while. Mine had sat in the garage unmoved since the end of October last year.

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Shiny Chrome Is Now Silver

There is an age-old saying in the car scene, whether it’s custom build cars, restorations or just something to bling a car up a bit; ‘Chrome don’t get you home’. When I first bought my car I needed a one wire alternator to go with my American Autowire kit. So I bought a Tuff Stuff Chrome case version, It was a thing of beauty. (Note the box tag line!)

Tuff Stuff box
Tuff Stuff Alternator
Tuff Stuff Rear connections

However after a year or so of being in the car without moving and outside, its beauty started peel off. The chrome started to pit and looked a bit rubbish, but you couldn’t really notice it. Then over the space of last year or so it just started to get worse, lifting the hood on my car at a show was now me hoping people wouldn’t look at the alternator. So I decided that for this year things were going to change.

I took the alternator out and decided it was going to get a freshen up. I couldn’t use ordinary spray paint unless I roughed up the chrome first with a little sand paper. As I didn’t know how this project was going to work, I decided on something a little different.

Rubber coating spray, the stuff you spray on and then can peel back of again. That was my plan so I bought a can of silver, I was looking to get more of an aluminium colour, however my choices were limited to fluorescent pink, yellow, orange, white, purple etc. That just wasn’t going to happen. I could have ordered some from the net in different colours of course, but I wanted to do it there and then as the weather was nice. So silver it was to be, it turned out to be an inspired choice. So I removed the front pulley section and masked up the holes in the alternator. I didn’t want the spray going inside to mess the components up. I masked up the centre part of the case with tape and carefully cut the tape with a fresh scalpel blade to fit inside the break all the way round the middle.

My problem was the rear with lots of holes, so how do I protect them? Then I had a mad moment looking through my tool box for ideas. I found a pack of Blu Tack, that was the cunning plan for the day.

I tore a chunk of and made it workable and picked of smaller parts to fit the holes. Making sure that I didn’t press it through the holes of course. I shaped the tack to the straight edges and curved areas using the back of my scalpel handle. I aimed to be on the limit of what I could get away with, some of the holes had parts just underneath so that was fine, just a small blob inside the holes that wouldn’t go over the chrome at the rear.

I took the masked up alternator out into the sun, no breeze and started to apply the first of six to eight coats that would be needed to make the paint thick enough to peel off, just in case I didn’t like it. Starting on the front and rear sections then the barrel around the sides.

The paint was quick drying and only took a minute or so to dry ready for touch. Standing on the spindle end and balanced I could turn the whole piece round to spray it up in layers at a time.

Yes I did get rubber coated silver nails from over spray, but it just rubbed it off when thick enough. Anyway, with the eight coats applied it dried soon enough to take back into the garage to remove the masking tape.

Laying on a nice clean microfibre I needed to create a clean edge. With another new scalpel blade I cut around the Blu Tack and tape very, very carefully and lifted out the tack and tape parts. If I had of just pulled the tack out it would have lifted the paint away from the chrome. I forgot to take pics of the back, but it all came out spot on, cutting the inside the holes and at a slight inward angle. This allowed the tack to come out leaving the rubberized paint coated right up to the wholes with no chrome showing.

I didn’t paint the pulley or the fan parts as they were in perfect condition, so I simply impact gunned them back onto the spline.

I was well chuffed with how it came out, it looked like the aluminium colour that I was after. The thickness of the coats filled the pits in the chrome and the tin of paint only cost me £12, with just under half still left.

I fitted the unit back into the car and wired it all back up. Overall now it’s in place it just looks right now.

There is polished chrome at the front for a little bling, but not over the top. This pic below shows how close the paint is to natural spacer of aluminium;

Not perfect, but close enough, I could even spray the spacer if I wanted to. I also love the slightly textured look too from the paint.

So it’s all fitted and like I say, very happy with the result. Masking up and cutting the masking tape back out from the paint and the tack was a pain, but worth the time and effort. Now I can lift the hood without worrying again.

I have been busy doing reviews of lots of car detailing and cleaning products. I have reviewed a couple of snow foam products. One from a well-known supplier and the other from a little known supplier. Looking at these can you tell which product is which? One slightly more expensive than the other.

I have been sceptical of snow foam for a while, it turns out snow foams are not all the same! I certainly looks like that have been using the wrong product in the past. On the same day I washed two cars with different snow foam products for a comparison between Auto Finesse Avalanche vs ValetPRO PH Neutral. Exactly the same settings on the snow foam lance were used, here are both those reviews;

https://onemanandhismustang.com/auto-finesse-avalanche-snow-foam/

https://onemanandhismustang.com/valetpro-ph-neutral-snow-foam/

There will be many more reviews added soon and the list under the ‘Car Detailing Reviews’ is getting bigger all the time – Remember these are all bought with my own hard-earned money so the reviews are completely independent.

Roll on the show season, I don’t want to keep taking bits of my car, just because I can!

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Bookings

The car show season is almost upon us now and I must admit that I’m suffering from PMS, that’s ‘Parked Mustang Syndrome’. I would like to take credit for that, but I can’t as I had seen it on a Meme and thought I would reuse it.

Over the last couple of years a source of frustration trying to find car shows and what needs to be done to get into them. It used to be a case of turn up on the day, show your car and talk to lots of lovely like-minded people. Now to get in the shows – you have to fill in forms, pay upfront, provide your insurance details and sign all sorts of stuff to say you won’t leave before a given time etc. Is it just me or have things gotten very busy? I have booked three car shows so far that are local to me and particular favourites of mine. I have a list of a few more that I want to attend so I hope I can get into them.

I have one booking which I am looking forward to very much and has taken a few emails to arrange, however it’s not a car show as such, but obviously will revolve around my car. The booking will be at the end of March this year and I hope to bring the full story on that for you shortly after. It should be a good post with lots of pics maybe a video or two.

I have not been idle in the mean time, I have been reviewing lots of car cleaning and detailing products. All have been listed under the ‘Car Detailing Reviews’ menu at the top. Snow foam, glass cleaners, wheel cleaners, decontaminate, glue removers and more all under each manufacturer’s name. As you can see, the reviews are not done just in the Mustang, but also our daily drivers. Some reviews have been great, and there has even been the odd over rated product too. Remember all my reviews are independent and purchased with my own hard-earned cash.

Hopefully the post should be more regular now the show season is ready to roll.

I can’t wait. 👍🙂

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Stopping With The Times

First post of the year so I wish you a Happy New Year, also hoping that you had a great Christmas and well-earned break too. This year my wife and I decided to ask each other what we wanted for gifts and that we would stick to a reasonable agreed budget between us. The simple reason is that we have spent most of our cash trying to sort our house out and trying to pay some bills off for the materials we used. The wife’s list was around the usual girly pampering lotions and potions as expected. Mine revolves around the Mustang with its own lotions and potions for its pampering. My list only had a couple of bottles from Auto Finesse I wanted to try out, which I will review throughout the year with the other products I have to review, around twenty in fact that I haven’t as yet reviewed. To make up my options for the list I wanted to update the garage and a little gadget for the car, both of which she bought for me. 😀

As my Mustang just fits in the garage with about an inch at the front and just a few inches to the rear. I can park the car pretty well, but I am paranoid about hitting the back of the garage wall for obvious reasons. To try and protect the car from such an event the wall now has foam pipe lagging stuck on the wall with a large Snap On floor pad on top of that. To stop in the right place I normally rely on the good old-fashioned hanging ball to touch the windscreen and works perfectly every time, but it doesn’t look pretty.

I have been looking on-line for parking aids; tyre ramps, laser, twin lasers and ultrasonic variations. Lasers looked like to much of a hassle and didn’t give much of a visual aid. Tyre ramps would get in the way and could be moved when the car wasn’t on them, so that left ultrasonic. There are so many variables on the market, traffic light style or single red LED varieties. I liked the look of was the twin sensors and a box mounted at eye level that gave a count down to the final position.

The set up needed a flat surface or bumper to work correctly. The mustang has very little in the way of a truly flat surfaces. The only relatively flat surface I could think of was the number plate. Some of the other sensor styles need a minimal distance of 12″ or so. This particular model needs a minimum of 6″ inches and takes the closest of the two readings. The sensors will activate when they detect movement and the count numbers display. So you park the car where you want and a number will be displayed. You then drive to that number and stop. Simple.

I made a few test locations and pushed the car out and back in again a few times. Each time the box did exactly what it was supposed to do, counted down. From the back of he car I pushed the car forward and stopped at the mark ’07’ (inches). Perfect. It doesn’t look neat at the moment as I want to make sure the positioning is correct before I tidy it up properly.

How close do I have to park to the wall? This close!

I have written a review of the product and installation here. Or it can be found under the Accessory menu.

Now my sense of direction is legendary, it’s so bad I get lost going home! Honestly it’s true. With that in mind, the other item I wanted was a something quite common in modern cars which is a bluetooth connection, but not that common on a classic Mustang. There are multiple ways around my little issue, a new technology radio made to look old – an expensive option. A new modern replacement radio that needs a hole cut into the dash – a lot of damage to the original dash, but can be cheaper. Or a halfway house that I have; an original Mustang radio adapted. My particular radio was sold to me as working when I bought it from the USA via Ebay. By the time I got the radio and was able to test the unit it certainly didn’t work anymore. 😠 Anyway, a contact of Mustang Maniac helped me out by connecting an input from a 3.5mm jack plug wire. This means that an ipod or phone needed a physical connection. It worked fine, but I wasn’t a lover of having a wire from the dash, blame my OCD for that. Then a friend of mine then told me about this gadget that connects a bluetooth dongle receiver and then inputs that signal into the radio, a similar setup to what I had, although he had a modern radio. This means that I could connect my phone for music, or more importantly, a Sat Nav turn by turn prompt. I already have a great Tom Tom Sat Nav which I could stick on the window, again my OCD didn’t like it and so I had it mounted on the centre console, the trouble with that is that I had to look down at it now and again as I couldn’t hear it over the engine noise, not exactly safe. With this new option I could have my radio on connected via bluetooth to my Samsung S9+ phone using Google Maps with voice turn by turn. The built in dash speaker is much louder than the Tom Tom unit so I would be able to hear what direction I needed to now. I could have speakers in the door, in the kick panels or in the rear parcel shelf. Again all of which my OCD won’t allow of course. Now I have a tiny receiver hidden in the glove box that just needs to be turned on and off I go.

It works and I love it. I have also written a review of it here.

So my old school Mustang still looks stock, but now the media function has been upgraded into the modern world again. This latest upgrade goes with the other modern goodies like my LED lights front and rear, modern wire loom with blade fuses, electronic ignition, LED dash bulbs, voltmeter etc.

Any other good gadgets out there I need to know about? Please let me know. This List idea works great as you get what you want and not a pair socks to go in the draw with the rest. In fact I got a pair of socks as well – but they had the Shelby Logo on them so they are acceptable. 😀

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