Mustang V6 Autocrosser named Mistress

I still think this should be a GRM project car.  You could easily get at least 5 articles covering this build.  Hold out for big bucks.

Have agreat holiday season!!

Over the course of the past couple of days I've read your entire thread from start to finish. What a read! Incredible work developing the car, and I love the analytical process and write-ups throughout. I hope you enjoy your retirement and get to enjoy the car for years before it becomes time to stop autocrossing. I feel like it's well deserved!

Thanks guys. I have a lot of fun writing these things. I am glad someone finds them useful and/or entertaining.

No One is Laughing

Over the last 40 years I have had trouble with my left knee (my old diaper changing injury – another story). The knee was finally replaced two years ago leaving me with some lack of flexibility during the recovery. Climbing up on the trailer to get Mistress on and off was getting to be a little tricky. I reasoned that a winch on the trailer would save me climbing up and down. It could also be useful if the car broke down at an event. I have a “come-along” but that is tedious for routine use.

I put a small winch on the trailer to pull the car up. Nothing special. It has long jumper cables that can be run directly to the truck battery as needed.

I needed a tow point on the car to attach to. As is my way with things - I made one.  I wanted something unobtrusive, almost hidden. What I came up with was a simple ¼” rod bent in a “U” shape and welded to a bracket bolted to the front frame. I reasoned it did not need to be exceedingly strong since I was just pulling the car up a ramp. I calculated the maximum load it would see was about 2000 pounds based on the weight of the car and some geometry. It is not like we were pulling a wrecked car out of a ditch or something.

I was very wrong. The max load happens when lowering the car off the trailer. The car stops rolling for a moment, cable goes slack, car starts rolling, cable goes tight… Tow bracket snaps in half (ping!).

First event of the season and Mistress is rolling itself untethered off of the trailer towards someone’s pickup truck.

I leapt into action! On the second step I was realizing there was nothing I could do and that this was not going to end well. The third step was trying to regain my balance. The fourth step never happened.

They say you can tell how old you are by how much people laugh when you fall. Toddlers are a riot. In this case, no one was laughing.  I landed on both extended arms which promptly collapsed and planted my face hard into the asphalt.

People came running. I could not move at first. Calls to 911 were in the works when I was able to struggle to my side and was helped to lean against the trailer.  Somehow my arms and shoulders were not broken although they took quite a shock. Fingers not working at first. Face bleeding. Sunglasses mangled. Stunned but, somehow, I think I am alright…  No 911 call.

As Mistress rolled off the trailer it turned itself and rolled harmlessly onto the grass.

After sitting there for a while answering questions about how many fingers were being displayed, I was helped to my feet, patched up, and proceeded on a slow and slightly wobbly course walk accompanied by a couple of friends would not let me out of their sight. I was never alone the rest of the day.

The reasoning was that, if I stayed at the event, we had several medical people in the club who could watch me. Better than loading up and having issues alone on a country road two hours from home. Made sense  at the time but when I got home that evening my wife took one look at me (you idiot!) and drove me to emergency. No further issues found but I missed the next event and it took most of the summer to fully recover.

So… I needed a right and proper tow loop on the car. I bought a Competition Engineering C3435 from Summit. This is a robust 5/16” steel plate with a hinged burnout loop of the same material. You could probably pick up the car with this thing and shake it. Except, the car is made of sheet metal.

There is nothing robust on the front of the car except the bumper and I did not want to mount that high to work with the winch on the trailer. The winch is mounted fairly low and the angles would be all wrong for the last few feet. It is a short trailer.

The plan was to insert a heavy backing plate inside the radiator support frame for the tow loop to bolt into.

I started with a piece of 3/8” plate cut to match up with the tow loop.

This would be placed inside the radiator frame on the right side. There is a narrow opening on the frame at the bottom right corner where it could be inserted. But it has to be precisely placed and held in position to get the bolts into it. To allow this I used a 3/16” rod with a sharp bend in the end and tack welded it into a hole drilled into the corner of the plate.

Now I have a “handle” to insert the plate and hold it in position.

Using the tow loop as a template I drilled and tapped the backing plate.

This did not seem to have enough thread engagement to be utterly fail proof so I welded Grade 8 nuts to the plate after aligning them to the threads using dummy bolts. I know the temper on the nuts is gone but I now have over ½” thread engagement.

The angle of the radiator frame put front of the tow loop too high on the car behind the facia. It also hit the intercooler. I knew this would happen and had a plan for it.

A manual hydraulic press is one of those shop tools you wonder how you did without for all those years.

You have to be careful with these things. The forces can get extremely high. This tool can snap those Harbor Fright C clamps in an instant and imbed shrapnel where you don’t want it.

With my tow loop bent as needed I completed the assembly with 3/8” Grade 8 bolts. I cut the excess off of my “handle” on the backing plate leaving just a bit sticking out of the opening in the frame.

I may have to rework it if I put a splitter on the car but we will figure that out when the time comes. In the meantime, this thing would rip the car apart if enough force were applied. It is placed right where the winch needs it and is almost hidden. Should have done it up right in the first place.