Vintage Thunderbird Club International

Hello everyone, I figured I'd stop in and joint this forum because I'll inevitably need help when reassembling my project (64 thunderbird), hopefully I can give someone something in return along the way. I bought an 02 4.6L and a 5spd from a mustang GT a couple months ago as the start of my project, from there I found a thunderbird to put it in (cheapest project car I could find). My goal is to make something mechanically unique for cheap (done the right way of course), when I'm done I want to see if I can sell input for a bit of a profit.
Here's how I got the tbird


Here's how it looked after the first 24hrs of owning it


The following week I pulled an IRS out of a Lincoln mark 8




I cut the subframe out to make perches for the stock IRS frame


Floor pans look terrible, but to be expected


Last week my dad and I pulled the engine and trans from the car


Up next is to cut the front suspension out and install a crown Vic front k member to get rack and pinion steering. I plan to run airbag suspension and wide tires front and rear. Thanks for looking, hopefully I'll be updating this frequently, I want to finish this thing within the next 6 months.

Welcome aboard, I see you've found that posting pics isn't the chore it's made out to be. What are you going to use as a controller for the 4.6? Something aftermarket or strip out the donor ECM? good luck, Bob C

Thanks bob! Photobucket on an iPad makes posting pics easy. I don't know how I'm going to control the 4.6 yet, it will be aftermarket though...I'm more familiar with Chevy, my dad put an LSx in a c3 vette w/ psi conversions which is a custom harness and a reflashed oem computer, I'm hoping tome thing along that price and level of difficulty!

Cool project. But why not go with the dohc 4.6 out of the mark 8 as well

This mustang single cam 4.6 are enemic in a mustang let alone a bigger heavier car.

If you can find something out of a mark. You save weight with the aluminum block and get more bang for your buck

Good point on the dohc, my only reason is that I bought the engine/trans for a good price before I bought the Tbird; I didn't know they were this heavy when I bought it, I was assuming it was 1000lbs less!! I'm pondering trying to sell the sohc and picking a dohc up, but the issue I have is that this entire project is a budget project that I'm trying to do for a profit, and quick. I don't know how much more profitable a dohc would be. I also don't think these cars will ever be fast, I plan on it being a low n slow kind of car...do you guys think I'll see a return on swapping over to a dohc??

Tonight I pulled the cowl and attempted to pull the wiper motor but everything is seized up. There is no way I'm going to put a hydraulic motor back in, that's the dumbest 'Rube Goldberg' thing I've seen in a while...I'm sure it works well, but the issues don't out weigh the benefits to me. ill be retrofitting a junkyard electric motor in place of it.

There is no way I'm going to put a hydraulic motor back in, that's the dumbest 'Rube Goldberg' thing I've seen in a while...I'm sure it works well, but the issues don't out weigh the benefits to me

When introduced, it allowed Ford's top of the line car to have variable speed wipers, the electric delay had not been stolen from it's inventor yet. JMO Bob C

Very cool project! I'll be curious to see how you adapt a clutch mechanism to this car.

~Steve

Thanks guys, I assumed the hydraulics were used because it was easier at the time to design/package than an electric motor of the same features...the clutch should be pretty simple, I should be able to pull some manual pedals off of a mustang or similar and put on the Thunderbirds dash support. The neat thing is that this clutch is cable operated too.

Here's a better pic of the overall project, I should be getting steel to finish up the IRS mounts by this time next week.

Ambitious project to be trying to turn a profit with but good on ya.

If you already have the motor than go that route

If I were starting from scratch I'd do dohc all the way.

Miss my markV some days but the old bird is far far cheaper to work on.

Tbird64 wrote:Ambitious project to be trying to turn a profit with but good on ya.

If you already have the motor than go that route

If I were starting from scratch I'd do dohc all the way.

Miss my markV some days but the old bird is far far cheaper to work on.

Thanks for the response, I completely agree, I love even just the look of the dohc, but the project started w/ the engine/trans combo so I was set down that path since the beginning...ill keep walking it.

I'm keeping a spreadsheet of every cost involved in this project (parts, consumables, fuel to pick the car up, etc). If I'm being honest I'm $2100 into it right now, I have ~50hrs my time in the job ('free' since otherwise I'd be sitting on the couch). but the money will start to drain fast when I'm putting the interior back together I'm sure. Together, my dad and I can do everything on the car including paint so we won't have to sub anything out. Even with all hat I'm still nervous of outpricing myself when it's done (target of $14k sell rite now), but we'll see.

As long as you remember that your time is worth something.
So man guys plan builds and never factor in their own labour.

Hitman wrote:I'm keeping a spreadsheet of every cost involved in this project (parts, consumables, fuel to pick the car up, etc). If I'm being honest I'm $2100 into it right now, I have ~50hrs my time in the job ('free' since otherwise I'd be sitting on the couch). but the money will start to drain fast when I'm putting the interior back together I'm sure. Together, my dad and I can do everything on the car including paint so we won't have to sub anything out. Even with all hat I'm still nervous of outpricing myself when it's done (target of $14k sell rite now), but we'll see.

With your budget, I'm curious why you wouldn't re-use the control system from the donor car. It would seem like the stock unit would be cheaper and faster to set up.

~Steve

Hey Sseebart, I didn't have a donor vehicle, I've been buying it in pieces. I didn't want to use factory wiring because I'm afraid that it will look like more of a 'hack job' than it is. I can save money in some other places if need be, I'm right at budget planning ahead, I just don't have as much fudge factor as if like for hardware, forgotten items, etc...

I have all of the tubing welded for the IRS, I should be ready to let it sit on its own weight, i still want to gusset some areas before being completely done though.

I'm extremely impressed with your progress so far. Looking forward to seeing the finished project.

~Steve

very nice welds! I'll sign up for your course any day! When this project is done, it's time for you to start designing/building custom bicycles/frames (there might be more margin there, from the crazy amounts of money folks are spending on bikes these days, and you can brush up on your braising!). Cool project indeed!