The Adventure Starts

The Galaxie is home. Here she is finally out of the rain. The last safety sticker shows 1994 so I am guessing that was the last time she was run. Sifting through all the parts I found the original owner's details so it might be fun to call him up (if he is still alive) when this project is finished and as his address was just 60 miles away, show him his beautifully restored car.

This is the only rust that we could find and in
the scheme of things it is pretty trivial

So what have we done? Well I drove her into the garage and discovered the no brakes syndrome. It was more like an "oh crap how do I stop this thing syndrome." This is not an issue as the complete brake system will be replaced anyway, but getting the brakes to work will be a priority. In the fullness of time the front brakes will be converted to power assisted disks so I don't want to spend a huge amount of wedge on the drums. Fortunately my mentor, Gene, has a spare master cylinder to loan me so I just need to get 4 slaves at $12 each and a set of rear shoes and that should do me.

All the bright work loaded onto my truck for
the journey home and polishing

And now for a story from the "Irony Department". We needed to change the wheels for some old ones that we don't care if they get covered in primer. Gene gave me the big old jack and suggested that I jacked it on the frame. I pointed out that if I jacked it on the differential I could get both wheels in the air at once. Having got it in the air and the lug nuts off I found that the tires would not clear the wheel arches, because the suspension was driven up into the body. Gene looked down, smiled and said "Now how do feel about jacking it on the frame?"

Money spent; $312 on primer, grit and assorted preparation stuff. It all fitted into a small cardboard box, still at least I got two free rolls of towels.

Next step to repair the brakes and replace the shocks.

Gene and I cleaned up and enjoying a well-earned beer