Here we are after the cam sprocket, crank gear, timing chain, timing cover, and water pump were installed. Having all the right bolts in little tiny baggies is way cool – no more guessing which ones go where.

After chasing the threads with a tap (thanks for the tip, Jim), I got the heads on and torqued down. Man, this thing’s gettin’ heavy on the stand. Also got the harmonic balancer zapped on along with the timing indicator (which Tony ‘blasted and Jim painted for me – ya really do get by with a little help from your friends).

After chasing the threads for the rocker studs, and getting the push-rod guides installed, it was getting close to clean-up time, so I dropped in the push rods, test-fitted a couple of the rocker arms and set the valve covers on (to check for rocker clearance).

One more shot before cleaning up for the day and tossing a sheet over it for the next couple days. Man, this is turning out to be a good-lookin’ engine. Couldn’t really make out the chrome oil pan in the other pictures – but there’s no missing it here.

I had to take the block back to Winger’s Machine Shop to get the holes bored and tapped for the roller lifter keeper “spider.” I’m loving this!

I’m still waiting on the head bolts and engine fastener kit, but I was able to get the crank, cam, lifters, and pistons stuffed in there and torqued down. Gotta love shiny Keith Black 9.5:1 flat-tops.

Here’s the other side – huge difference from the pictures I took after I pulled it out… as in, “this is the same engine that came out of the Rustang shortly after I bought it.”

Sometime in September, I got the engine back from the machine shop. Bored, balanced, blueprinted, 3-angle valve job, hardened valve seats, and the cam bearings installed. Now just gotta put it all back together. Here we are after a thorough degreasing, scraping, rinse, and a nice coat of Ford Blue.

OK – so I have no idea what happened to August. Suffice it to say, I’m guessing it was hot as Hades and stuff from work came up. Oh well.

Here’s me before today’s round of prepping for the new floor pans. I’m still 6′-5″, and the lift is approximately 3 feet off the ground. Look at the goofy grin – you’d think I was actually enjoying this. LOL!

This is the hole the original torque box left when I cut it out. Now I need to clean the sheet metal and fabricate a patch.

Here’s the left kick panel all patched up. I was able to find some good sheet metal still left on the seat platforms for this job.

This is the hole in the firewall I had to make when cutting out the rusty old torque box. You can see the new torque box and frame rail quite well.

When I got the new front clip, I had to remove all the ‘extra’ sheet metal piece they cut around – fortunately, they gave me quite a bit of the left firewall to work with. I don’t think I would’ve ever gotten this panel right if I’d had to fabricate it. As it was, I wasn’t too kind to it when I pulled it off, and had to spend about a hour bashing it back into shape to fit this well.

The hole the passenger side torque box took with it. I think they parked this car in a river for several years.

All patched up – now just gotta clean the rest of the funk and apply some Rust Bullet

Here’s the hole the right torque box made when it came out. I wasn’t able to salvage the right torque box or the piece of firewall attached to it (don’t worry – I will trim up the rough edges and get rid of the really bad spot on the left)…

… so I found an old 486 laying in the scrap trailer and swiped the pristine sheet metal from its lid. The little spiral things are a neat by-product of the pneumatic metal shear.

Thank you, old 486 – your legacy will live on in my car. I just kinda tossed it in there to make sure it would cover the hole more than anything.

Here’s the shot from the driver side to the intermediate panel – essentially the “butt-plate” for the rear seat I also had to replace. Also had to clean and reshape the bottom cushion hook and the little bracket that the inner quarter trim panel fastens to.

Both floors are finally in. Now, I just gotta go back in for some light grinding, clean the metal of the left over paint and other crap, and apply the Rust Bullet and seam sealer. Still waiting on my seat platforms, but hopefully they’ll be here soon.

Got the passenger side pan in on Saturday, and finished up the rest on Sunday. Seems kinda weird having to actually duck under the car now (before… not so much). All things considered – I think I’ll just be happy ducking.

OK – here’s the floor on the driver side. Part of the big hole was self-induced by cutting the bad metal around the torque box and frame rail. But there’s plenty of rusty stuff as well.

Here’s the part behind the seat platform – it’s in bad shape – rusted through in places. Yeah – it’s outta here.

Passenger side front floor. It was in worse shape the driver side… but I cut a lot out around the torque box to make getting the front clip on a lot easier.

And this is the really bad spot behind the passenger seat. I didn’t have to do a thing to this side to achieve this look. Well, except take what was left of the carpet out.

After I got all the bad stuff seen in the above pictures out of there, I dropped in the new floor pans… just to see what it would look like. So far – so good! I still got a long way to go before I can drop them in for real, but it’s looking good so far. Should be done by the end of the weekend if all goes well.

So here’s the new steering gearbox. Most of them are painted black, but I actually like this color. It’s appropriate for the color scheme planned for the car. Too bad we’ll never see it again once the engine, headers, master cylinder, and everything else gets back in there.

Here’s how today started – all the suspension and steering system installed waiting for the spindles so I could get the rest of it all back together.

Here’s the whole suspension/steering system back together again… finally. I’m not going to worry about the brakes just yet, since I don’t even have brake lines yet to connect up. It’s not ready to drive yet anyway… just gonna roll it around for now.

And finally… back on its wheels with the new front clip! The whole front end is quite literally new (with the exception of several nuts and bolts I ‘blasted and reused). Those front springs and new bushings are quite stiff – once the engine and everything goes back in things should settle down and look normal.

This is looking a lot better – the wheels are actually straight up and down (camber-wise), which is a huge improvement over how it was when I pulled it in to begin the front-end swap. I wish we could’ve gotten a picture with Jim and I sitting on the front end with Gonzo pushing down on each side just to get the upper shock studs bolted down – would’ve been hilarious. Next up should be the floor pans.

Not much changed since the last pics, except for some really crappy lookin’ welds where they needed to go. They’re plenty strong, just not pretty. I’ll spare the gory details.

Got the driver side suspension on – except for the spindle, that is. Turns out the originals were toast, so I had to order some new ones. Still waiting for the steering gearbox as well – then the whole front end will be close to done.

Here’s the passenger side. Once I get the new spindle and steering gearbox, and get it back on its wheels, I’ll work on the battery tray apron and get going on the floor pans.

After cleaning the Rust Bullet off the places where metal meets metal, I grabbed my pals Jim and Jason to help me get the front clip loaded onto the power train jack and slide it into place.

I had to get the power train jack out of the way so I could lower the lift. Once it was balanced on the lift’s center jack, I finally (hopefully) got it into place with some minor tweaking and liberal application of the big rubber mallet.

Everything looks pretty close – I’ll know more tomorrow with the laser levels and tape measures.

Almost looking like most of a car again. Just gotta weld it all back together now.

The right side torque box came out relatively easy. When I jammed the scraper into the seam sealer between the ‘box and the firewall, it poked straight through into the cab. OK – time to fire up the body-saw and do some trimming. Still got some bad metal in there, but I’ll worry about that later when it’s time to cut out what’s left of the floor pans.

And finally, got the driver side torque box removed. Turns out the floor on that side was a little more gone than I first thought, so I wound up just cutting this one out as well. Just like on the passenger side, I’ll be removing the leftover torque box ‘flashing’ by more drilling of spot welds.

No more torque boxes – got the real Fred Flintstone look going now. Now I gotta get the rest of the frame rails out and score some metal for the firewall patches.

Didn’t feel like cutting any more, so I decided to get all of the rubberized undercoating off the firewall. Looks like only a couple of minor bad spots that can be repaired with some flat sheet metal (later). Cleaned up pretty nice.

Since I was heading out of town and it would be a week before I got back to it, I put a first coat of Rust Bullet Black Shell on the newly cleaned firewall. This stuff is awesome! Can’t wait til I get the cowl repaired and painted, and slide the new front clip under there – It’s Gonna Pop!! LOL!

Looks kinda weird seeing something that looks almost ‘new’ on this car. Shouldn’t be too much longer til the front clip goes on.

Pulled the Rustang in the shop onto the lift for the last time with the rusty old front clip. Wow, does this thing look like a pile or what?

Got everything off that was worth saving – mostly the spindles and strut bars (Jim might want the ‘bars for his Galaxie 500 XL). This side wasn’t so bad getting the spindle and strut rod off – the lower control arm was actually quite cooperative.

Jim fought with the spring for awhile on this side – because the lower control arm was pretty much rusted in-place. The previous owners ‘redneck engineered’ the ball-joints and messed them up badly. No wonder the wheel was ganked at a weird angle.

And… rusty front clip is no-more. It’s gone… dropped off the lift and tossed out on the scrap heap. Just gotta go back and trim up the scraps I left on there and start drilling out spot-welds to get the torque-boxes and rest of the frame rails off. Then clean up the firewall and slide in the new front clip.

It looks weird with nothing forward of the firewall, but Jim and I were talking about how much better the whole car looks without that rusty ol’ front end on there. It felt weird as well, watching the whole front end of the car fall away with the saw still running in my hands. The back end dropped back onto its wheels as well… so much for all my measurements. LOL!

Got the ‘flashing’ left from the fender aprons drilled out and removed, as well as trimmed the frame rails down a bit so they’d be easier to handle. Also cleaned away some of the excess seam sealer and blobs of undercoating with a wire brush and got started cutting on the passenger side torque box.