Looking for some advice on paint

Hello everyone. Figured I would use this thread to introduce myself as well as ask for some advice about my 67 S code fastback.

My name is Joe, better known as Utah after living there for several years then moving back to NJ. My 67 has been in my family for many years. My father originally bought it around 1974. It was in running condition, but the body had a number of dings and dents. When my dad bought it, he got it running, then had it repainted blue. It was a cheap paint and it looked ok from a distance, but you can tell it was not quality. For the next 20 years it stayed in basically the same condition, kept in the garage, driven a few hundred miles a year. In 1989, we drove it from NJ to park city utah rather than shipping it. We always had other projects going on, so the mustang just sat. Sadly in 1995 my father died and the car went to me. I had to keep it at some friends houses for a number of years until finally bringing it home several years later. In 2001 I pulled the original engine/trans and rebuilt/went through everything mechanical. So fast forward to today. The paint is now about 40 years old, and its looking pretty sad now. Few pics:

2003
Looks good here, but its a 50 footer for sure



Thats the distant pic, here are some close ups of the bad spots
hood

passenger door


driver door


drivers front fender/upper inner fender. it was replaced with a white fender when it was repainted years ago

passenger fender/inner fender




windshield is original, seal is shot, as is the rear glass


drip molding


when my father replaced the front valance, he never took the sticker off after buying it new from ford


trunk looks terrible, not much rust, original under coating is still on the quarter but the paint looks like it was applied over dirt


decklid lip


tried to get a pic of the spider cracks on the quarter


I would call the car rust free underneath. certainly not going to win any awards, but not falling apart



the one thing I did do is clean up the engine compartment...I know, totally backwards, but it was kind of a test to see if I could do something small, then maybe move on to something more complex


So here is what im looking for some advice on....

This car is a family heirloom, it will hopefully never be sold in my lifetime...would love to pass it along to my son one day. The rust is starting to concern me and I want to deal with it before it becomes too bad. I have brought it to a few body shops/auto restoration specialists in my area. Since the car has lacquer paint on top of the original dark moss green paint, everyone I have spoke to has suggested that I take the car down to bare metal. From what I have been reading, I tend to agree. I have gotten a quote to have the car media blasted, and also stripped by hand. But im very much considering doing it myself.

What I really wanted to get a feel for is how much should I tear this car apart. The windows should come out for no other reason than the seals are done as is the door weatherstripping. I would like to have the rust spots on the top part of the inner fenders fixed. The carpet/headliner are already out as mice once got into the car and damaged them. The dashpad is still in great shape, so while I didnt want to totally gut the interior, alot of it is out already.

Im thinking that I will at least remove all of the trim from the car, then I was thinking I would start stripping the paint myself. I would prefer not to pull the engine out if I dont have to. I did remove/rebuild/install it myself, so its not something i cant do, just not sure its needed. Im wondering whether or not I should pull off the fenders/doors. I was originally not planning on scraping done and refinishing the inner fender area, but its probably the right thing to do. The car has new leaf springs, but other than that, the suspension has never been touched in my lifetime, so I plan on going through that.

Well I figure that is enough info overload for now....any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance,

Joe

If you want the car to last you need to strip everything and restore. There is a lot more rust that you can't see.

As suggested, it needs to be completely disassembled and restored. Those rust bubbles on the door hide some real problems. I would bet good money the inner structure of the door in that area is rusted pretty badly. If your windshield is leaking you can be sure you have rust concerns under the seal too. And there is surely more rust to be found all over the car.
Most effective way to start is media blasting the whole car. Not you, a pro. By the time you buy the necessary tools you could pretty much pay to have it done. And they get to deal with the mess it creates. Doing it by hand is costly and time consuming as well. And I don't care what anyone says, not nearly as effective.

There are no shortcuts or ways to do this cheaply either. At least if you want it to look good and to last. Maybe not what you wanted to hear but that is the way it is.

A full restoration is in your future! You'll be happy in the long run.

As far as stripping, go with a pro and get it media blasted. You'll be surprised what "appears" after all the paint and goo is gone. I stripped and blasted my 66 and spent over a year cause it sucked a$$. I would gladly pay to have it done next time.

Thanks for the comments guys, I appreciate the advice. I do agree. Really the thing that has held be back from tearing this whole car down has not been the money/work (well ok, little bit the money) but moreso that I will really hate not being able to drive it for a while.

I did get a quote to media blast/prime the entire car...I should clarify, I was thinking about stripping the car by hand with say chemical stripper myself, but I wouldnt try blasting it myself.

When I brought the car to the media blaster, he gave me a quote for doing the body and taping off thing like the engine bay, interior, etc. Sounded nice, but I just got the feeling that there would be no way that the drivetrain didnt end up with sand/blast media in it. But I agree its the best way to go as I know this car has bondo hiding who knows what.

Rusty, you might find this interesting....I have seen your car several times while doing some research on my fathers race car and trying to learn more about the SS/GA class at that time. Prior to the 67 that I currently have, my father bought a new 67 GTA fast back. He started racing it in B S/A, then moved to SS/IA and eventually SS/GA in 1969. Mostly at englishtown and Island dragway in NJ. He switched to the 428 and then converted the car from a 67 to a 68 with the marker lights, etc. He ran it in SS/GA from 69-71 Sadly this car was wrecked while being flat towed ~1971. It was the main reason my
dad repainted my current car blue.

1967 racing b stock


1969 racing SS/IA (car repainted to a metal flake blue) (1969 hemi road runner in the background)

~1970

Pull it all apart and send in the shell. No way the media doesn't find it's way everywhere and you don't want to leave anything as is. Even the refurbished engine compartment (unless it was taking all the way to bare metal EVERYWHERE).

I had mine done top to bottom, back to front, inside and out. Best move I made. Clean slate. Nothing left to question. And mine was virgin metal throughout, no rust anywhere to be seen.

And when you get it back...spend a week or more with air hose and vacuum trying to get all the media out of it. And when you're finished. Do it again. The amount of stuff STILL falling out of my frame rails and such when I work on it amazes me.

You would be money ahead to completely strip the car down and put it on a rotisserie, then send it out and have it media blasted.

Hey guys, thanks for the comments and advice.

I have begun the process of tearing the car down. I should probably make a thread and post pictures....for now ill post some here.

I started with the exterior bits.


finally found some of the original dark moss green

managed to get all of the trim off without damaging anything



window seals are original and shot, so the glass will be coming out



Then I moved inside


Maybe some of you could tell...but I think this is the original dashpad..this is behind the passenger side dash panel



when I removed the molding under the windshield, i found a pile of the clips that hold the outer winshield trim on...did they leave these in there when assembling the body?


under the dash the metal looks great


First glance I didnt realize what this was.

I cut it down and realized it was the original build sheet. Pretty sweet find. I had not previously known that they taped these to the main wiring harness in some cases



So its coming along. Next week or so I should be getting around to starting the process of pulling the drivetrain.

You have been given good advice and are moving along good. The original build sheet is a nice find. Preserve it. Be sure to check the cowl for rust and leaks. It is a very typical place for issues and if you do not get it first, it is a pain to do once you are into reassembly.

All of the above and if you get tired of the car , GIVE ME A CALL
You have one great car and it deserves to have a full restoration

Thanks everyone,

Been working on the car at night after I get my son to bed...stripping the car down, removing parts, removing some of the paint. I do not intend to strip all of the paint myself, just trying to do the easy stuff with some stripper and save myself a little bit of labor money. Some pics of my progress.

Inside is pretty much stripped out, the last few panels and tail lights are now gone


pulled the trans last week...waiting to borrow a hoist this week to get the engine out...in 1998 when I had this out I had this genius idea to paint it black..I was 22 and stupid, what can I say. It is the original trans and has the cars vin # stamped on it


Pulled the heater box, looks pretty clean inside the dash


pulled the fenders, havent found much rust yet anyway...hit the undercoating in a couple spots just to see how hard/easy it would come off..not too bad


Cowl looks good, I think....sorry for the bad pic.


Then I started to strip some of the blue paint. I have been using a combination of paint stripper, my electric random orbital sander, and some 3m plastic 120 grit bristle discs on my 4.5" grinder. Im not planning on stripping the whole car myself, just doing some of the easy stuff, car will most likely be media blasted, but i would rather not have them blast the big panels and risk warping anything.



most is coming off pretty easily with a little help from my halogen lights



So most everything I have found has been pretty solid. There are a few spots that will need metal work, which I totally expected.
Under the car, in the back in front of the axle, there is a small spot by one of the brake line junctions...im betting this hose blew out at some point and brake fluid soaked this area bc its very isolated. Will be getting this taken car of.


Always knew this quarter had a ton of filler in it, starting to see the extent of it. Thankfully the other side doesnt seem to be like this one. But I was expecting it so. My 120grit plastic disc worked pretty good for this, although it did wear out the disc pretty fast. Which im ok with, I just dont want to damage anything



So thats where im at for now, should have the engine out in the next few days.

If the door fitment was very good on this car , don't dissemble them from the A-pillar.For aligment purpose later on.
Or
Drill 2 very little holes threw each hinge threw the A-pillar and door.
Same with the hood and boot hinges.
Have seen this and it ain't a bad idea IMHO.

Bruno, thanks for the tip. I figured I would leave the doors on for now anyway. Not going to mess with any of that for the time being.

Little update.

So i got off most of the old bondo to get a look at what was going on with these quarters. So after looking at this, its all coming clear to me know why my dad got this car for ~$100 in 1974. After stripping the decklid and some pieces in the back, I know that they had no green paint, only blue. So the decklid, rear taillight panel, lower valance are all newer/replaced. So the car was definitely hit in the rear end prior to being painted blue. This was not a suprise, but I wasnt sure the extent of the damage until I removed the bondo from the quarters.




its hard to see, but this area on both sides is very dinged up and was thick with bondo





The speckles above the wheel are holes from pulling on the quarter, the whole panel in that area is pushed in a bit



So the areas with bondo are SUPER rippled. I have been told by at least 4 different people that the quarters should be replaced. Which im fine with. What I will have to make a decision on is what is the best way to do it. Skins? full quarter? (area where the vent is to the roof is fine) or I have heard of people using a coupe quarter and cutting it to fit. Any opinions?

Other areas:
stripped the passenger door the other night


the bubble in the door looked like this after I worked out the rust


removed all of the brake/fuel lines, pretty sure they were original. Going to replace everything here

Engine and glass are out now


Getting there..


So I have been getting some quotes to do the metal work (including quarters) /prime/repaint the car blue, engine bay area black...They range of course. Friend of a friend does restoration on the side while doing body work for a living...on the other end I had a quote from a professional restoration shop near me. The latter was ~$30,000 which is WAY out of my budget for this part of the project. Not making any decisions yet, just starting to talk to people.

Thanks for posting these pics Joe. There is a lot of work to be done on your car but it really is all doable. I am restoring an S code hardtop right now. This S code is my second restoration (my first was started 8 1/2 years ago -- a 67 Shelby GT 350 that I have owned for more than 41 years now and it took me 5 years to do and cover resto cost) and I immediately decided to get the car media blasted after every single part was completely dismantled to just a shell on a roller. Having done this before I expect to spend $18,000 to $20,000 to effectively get a completed shell whereby I will have to restore the interior completely, new date coded glass, sealed and painted (basecoat/clearcoat) body and panels all fitted etc. I will send the 390 out for rebuild and short block assembly, outsource for rebuild the 4 speed, have the rear center section rebuilt and an Eaton Tru-trac and new 3.50 gears installed and I will do all wiring and assembly of suspension and drivetrain much like I did with the Shelby. I am in Connecticut and I use the services of Cobra Automotive. They are one of the best shops in the country and of course you get what you pay for and that's quality in every aspect. I am fortunate to have good mechanical experience being a former drag racer and mechanic in my early days... I have other projects underway as well but my message to you is that you have a wonderful heirloom and my hope is that you will enjoy this restoration and that if your patient and can work a proper budget to complete it (it may take years) it will result in tremendous pride and satisfaction that hopefully you will be able to pass it along in your family.

Daver, thanks for your comments and advice, your 67 is awesome, LOVE it. Looking forward to seeing pics of your S code coupe.

I visited a small shop in PA last night. Long time friend of mine manages a body shop and has been doing body work forever, but mostly collision stuff. Although he does have a really cool 68 chevy pick up that he chopped/customized himself. Anyway, he works with a couple of brothers on the side who specialize in restoration work. But they arent doing it full time, one car at a time. Anyway, after stopping by my house the other night and checking out my car, last night I went up to his shop and checked it out, met everyone. They are in the process of restoring a 68 396 chevelle, so I wanted to see how it looked. Im not an car show judge, but I was impressed. Shop was spotless, one of brothers was hand building his own piper cup replica (frame, wing spars, etc), anyway, I liked what i saw. Again not making any decisions yet, but looking around and sort of interviewing people I guess. As I have said before, in 40 years no one except my father or myself have ever touched this car...it kills me that while i can handle any of the mechanical stuff, I cant weld or paint and have to farm that portion out....Anyway, trying to find someone who I can trust with this.

With regards to replacing quarters...I have been doing a good bit of research. Since they needed a pile of bondo to extend the end of my quarter enough so make it line up with the extension piece...


I have read many places that people recommend a full quarter which comes with this entire area...then cutting the full quarter at the top rather than replacing all of it. In the case of my car, there is nothing wrong with the quarter above the trunk line. So that be the case, maybe buy full quarters and cut off the upper portions to fit. What im wondering, is if you are doing this, can you use the coupe versions of the quarter instead? Something i was thinking about, would be nice since coupe quarters are much cheaper than fastback quarters.

It requires less bodywork if you replace the full quarter. If your replace only part of it you have to do the bodywork the whole length of the quarter and also you will be able to see it in the trunk unless you do bodywork there also.

Rusty,

they way they described it to me was something similar to this. Cutting it along/over the hip line of the panel and joining it in the trunk. What are your thoughts about doing it this way as opposed to the full quarter? Full quarter the only correct way of doing it?

I had to replace the DS quarter. I tried to do it similar to the pic above and was not happy with the result. Ended up getting a full quarter and was very happy... Lesson learned!

I don't like to do all that bodywork along the top of the quarter so I would have Brian replace the full quarter.