A few weeks ago my... consultant stumbled across a red 1988 Thunderbird labeled "Free to a good home." After many years of deep meditation in the darkest forest I could find, I came to a conclusion. What better home than with me? Unfortunately my consultant has advised that I sell my current project, a 1980 Triumph TR7.
It is a Michigan car so rust is present but hopefully nothing too bad. Planning on heading that way in a couple weeks to retrieve the car and evaluate for future plans.
If the rust isn't too bad, that could be a good project.
Lots of Mustang speed parts available for cheap that fit.
Auto or T5?
Daily or Challenge?
Sweet!
Posting to find later
I am starting to really like these cars.
We are calling this one Free Bird. List of mods 'completed' by the previous owner in the link.
"That way" we need to go, is north to visit John Brown. We couldn't meet the sellers deadline on our own and John picked Free Bird up for us. Freakin Enablers!
In reply to 78CobraII :
Auto
In regards to challenge or daily a decision hasn't been made just yet. More thought will be put into it when we have the car in front of us.
I am glad that Gumby found a home for this that wasn't at my house. So glad.
We rose early yesterday to make our way to the land of the wind and potholes.
We arrived at Mr. John Brown's place and immediately set to the task of loading free bird. Everything was going great until it came time to remove the driveshaft... 4 of the tightest bolts you've ever seen enter the stage. Finally after a trip to the store for a torch we gave up and cut the driveshaft. After we finished strapping everything up it was time to hit the road, we'd already wasted hours and we still had a long drive ahead of us.
quick stop for gas and Jimmy Johns.
Exit the interstate about 100 miles from home to fuel up... and discover that the clutch master cylinder on the wagon has decided to exit the show. Limp it to the gas station and give it a once over. Fluid still in the reservoir, all the parts under the car are still present. Nothing for it except to finish what we started limp it back on the interstate and back off, park it in the street and head to bed. Off the bat thoughts the car needs a battery, tires, and a tune...and a wash. For now we've got some planning and funds collecting to do.
Childish_Gumbino how did we not take pics of the old man cursing my gravel driveway?
In reply to QuasiMofo (John Brown) :
Missed opportunities.
In reply to QuasiMofo (John Brown) :
I was just glad you had the foresight to have a tarp for me to lay on!
Also, missing from BHJ's retelling of this event is the unloading process where FreeBird already dipped into my stash of parts to claim the original driveshaft from BlueBird. With that installed, FreeBird drove off the dolly and up into our driveway unassisted.
Been looking at the 9th/10th gen Thunderbirds lately as I'm getting older and they're probably easier to get in and out of than my ZX2. Also they're just cool...
Following....
I see Cobra brakes and a 5-lug swap.
In reply to Will :
And so much more.
It's still worth 5 times what they paid for it.
QuasiMofo (John Brown) said:In reply to Will :
And so much more.
It's still worth 5 times what they paid for it.
10 times even!
Took FreeBird for a short ride to the shop. Short ride turned into a ~10mi test drive for reasons I'd rather not discuss to prevent self-incrimination.
Runs very rich
Many stalls in gear
Brakes feel fine
Trans may have a shift kit
Needs a floor shifter, column shift is wack
Front tires are bald
Trans and PS both leak
E-fan works
First pic in the original post is the good side; left side is rough. Maybe side-swiped at some point. Bondo over rust in places from front to back.... If the left side looked like the right, it wouldn't be a terrible car overall.
I put a turn on the throttle stop screw and refilled the PS reservoir which seemed to help the stalling issue. The tune certainly needs to be addressed.
Tires and tune at the top of the list, superseded by cleaning, and followed by a shifter and deleting the Explorer oil heater.
It is filthy, inside and out from sitting.
UPDATES!
1. Cleaning.
2. Removed tach from top of dash, replaced trans temp gauge in original clock location with round peg in square hole.
(apparently don't have a picture of it in the car)
3. Bought tires but haven't fully settled on wheels yet.
4. Replaced starter.
Some decent progres made and much more to come!
Had the tires put on a set of 99-01 Cobra wheels I located and BHJ purchased.
Removed the Quarterhorse in favor of an SCT chip and a few base tunes to experiment with. We will probably hit the dyno to get dialed in more closely after tying up a couple loose ends.
A trip to the BMV and the insurance branch got BHJ all legal. Then, I cut him loose to start driving and collecting data on what else the car needs.
In reply to gumby :
That looks surprisingly good on those rims 
In reply to Blockhead_J :
Well bought! Plus the adventure of picking it up is a lifetime memory.
Street? Or challenge? $2000 to spend!!! On top of what's already there? I can easily see a pair of EBay turbo's making 800 horsepower.
Fall break means we had some time for a trip to the dyno!
For a few weeks something would pop up about every third time BHJ drove the car; mostly typical things you find after a car has been sitting for a bit. We addressed those as necessary, continued tackling loose ends here and there, and sealed up one fluid leak at a time. We have been running on the leanest of three base tunes and still rich overall with pretty terrible mpgs, but Freebird has proven fairly reliable.
It is 3hrs from home to my friend's dyno shop. We gathered up some travel spares and tools, and decided to just drive the car down. Fantastic weekend visiting and tuning, with zero breakage, and the drive home returned an average of 23mpg!
In reply to gumby :
That's a pretty respectable report card!
Any engine bay shots of this beast?
In reply to QuasiMofo (John Brown) & Shavarsh :
It's not bad considering Ford rated the Explorer this engine came from at 215hp/280tq and this engine put that much to the tire, thru an AOD, with basically just a cam and a bump in compression.
Nothing really crazy going on
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