Vintage Thunderbird Club International

Seebart, I have another method of application to make the hinges look closely like Grey/Black Phos. It is something I experimented with a couple of years ago. In an effort to copy the finish I treated all my parts with Tool Makers Ink. It is a form of dye, leaves a dark colour, and a thin coating w...

And regarding my suggestion of installing the short block first: On the ’64 through ’66 MYs, the exhaust manifolds need to be installed onto the heads before putting them on the block, while for the ’67 through ’69 (and maybe later) the exhaust manifolds go on easier after the heads are in place. Y...

I’ve taken the engines out of and into my ’66 and ’68 Birds several times by myself without any problem. My preference is deal only with the short block (block, crank, pistons, pan etc) and put the heads/exhaust manifolds and intake manifold on after the block is in the car. That makes it MUCH easi...

My wife has helped me in the past and by coincidence she is in N. Cal. helping with a new granddaughter born 4/29. However, she is coming home first thing tomorrow morning. I have a general caution. While this is pretty straight forward, the 'what could go wrong meter' is pretty heavy in the negati...

I have nearly reached the point where my motor is ready for reinstallation, but shelter-in-place orders mean that my normal help isn't available (for another month or so, probably). I've probably pulled/installed a dozen or so motors in the past, including this car a few years back, so I'm consideri...

For those who have switched over to EFI, where did you install the O2 sensor? I'm getting ready to reinstall my engine and while I'm not pulling the trigger on EFI yet, I want to install a bung for the O2 sensor while the motor is out and the exhaust is accessible. But, I want to make sure I can rea...

It's a little hard to tell from your photos just how bad the mismatch is. Seems that just about every Flairbird I've seen has some gap or mismatch at this joint.

~Steve

Ah, sorry, that's not the spare I've got.

Do you have a photo? I might have one, but unsure if we're thinking of the same thing.

~Steve

I would like to know too but know it is not possible. My 1965 Tbird is Charcoal Grey Metallic which was a one year color,I guess it was not very popular. Anybody out there have the same color? When I put my car on the Tbird registry they got back to me and said they very rarely see that color.. Lin...

Thanks for the tips, everyone. I'm going to take a power washer to mine to see how much dirt I can blast off, then inspect the pivots. I haven't had any hood alignment issues, so hopefully the hinges will pass muster. If I can find a $15 plating option, I would be happy to go that way. I suspect tha...

I'm not hung up on originality, and there won't be any yellow cad anywhere else under the hood, so recreating it probably isn't the best choice for me. However, good point about a plated vs painted surface--it hadn't occurred to me just how fragile paint would be in that application. Follow up quest...

Theoretically, I'm getting close to reinstalling the motor in my '64. In cleaning up the garage this weekend, I pulled the hood hinges out of a dusty corner and realized I couldn't bear to reinstall them in this condition. 20200426_160313.jpg Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but were these originall...

In the process of idling the car to check vacuum leaks, I’m noticing that the gauge indicates the car is running hot. It will peg the gauge rapidly (like an air pocket in the cooling system), but I’ve bled it over and over again. I replaced the temp sending unit once, with no change. Using an IR th...

Your t-bird vendor has it right. My motor is out of the car, so I have a motor mount bolt handy.

Takes a 5/8" socket.

Hard to imagine how it could happen, but if it were stripped, that would explain why it's missing.

~Steve