Clay C

My business involves me owning and operating a lot of work trucks. The guy who's shop we are doing this has been my diesel mechanic for going on 20 years. He has done a lot of car work but mostly on newer mustangs and old Ford Pickups. I talked him into helping me out with this car and now he has hired on some other guys to do some resto and body work in an open bay beside his diesel shop......now he's getting a paint booth after my car is done! I am pleased with the paint job. We still plan on buffing as far as I know unless they all are so tired of me at this point and ban me from the shop entirely! He's a good friend and I appreciate all the help so far even though he really doesn't have time for it. The car had a 905 red sticker on it when i bought it so I decided to go back with that color. At least I think I have that color. The place I sourced the paint from in town did have the code 905 Red in their system.....they just had 3 very different mixtures of 905 red?? Two of the three formulas were mostly orange so I picked the only one that actually had any red pigment and got a sample. It looked good to me but what the hell do I know....I've never seen a 905 red Zcar in person and there is very conflicting information on the Ultraweb. This is MY 905 Red and its cool with me.

This is what I didn't know....Those areas are definitly not the same as a 240! The original metal is there it is just covered up with other metal I can only assume was changed for some sort of crash rating law changes in 74-75? Of course the radiator support vertical panel is wildly different to go around all that mess. It is such a bonehead move on my part to spend so much time, money and effort trying to keep this thing as original as possible and restore this car back to normal. I really just picked the wrong car from the start. It looked good but I didn't know what I was looking at and the crap body work from the previous owners covered up a lot of problems. The interior was also in such good shape that I thought it was a good platform to start with. I'm sure people have done more with less and maybe its not so bad but the thought of me having cut a 260 front off and put on this car makes me want to throw up a little now! In hindsight I should have bought a better car but whats done is done and I aint starting over!

Im sure a bunch of other stuff happened I didnt take pictures of but here we go with the body work. I guess Everything went pretty well for a bunch of guys who have never had/seen/worked on a Zcar before. After the paint comes later its clear that the body line that runs down the length of the whole car isn't perfect but honestly until I read Inline6's thread and saw him working so hard on his I would have probably never noticed. My plans were never to flip or sell this car ( I would lose my arse if I did) but to enjoy and drive it around and try to get 20 something women to honk!

Most of the firewall from the 240 was fine except the area right around the battery box, so we cut that firewall section from the 260. Of course the only whole in that section is the wiring harness grommet hole.....not the same! All of you more than likely know all of this but I have had to learn the hard way.

This is the worst build thread ever! I cant get my iphone to connect to my computer and import the pictures so I have to email them to myself and do it that way. A lot has been done but here it goes: There are 2 different cars in a few of my earlier pictures. My whole front clip was in fairly rough shape. It had been hit at some point previously and very poorly put back to shape. Battery area rusted!....Front left frame rail was crunched...inner fender liners were all banged up. I looked for a while for a 240 front to use but never found anything usable for a 240 (at that time....now of course one showed up on Ebay I saw the other day). I did however find a junkyard 260 that was in pretty rough shape everywhere but the front. It was reasonably priced so I trailered it back to the shop. I figured it would be slightly different but at the time I was ready to move forward and build a damn car. I didn't realize quite how different they would be. This is the 240 below as the front is being removed.

Just doesn’t feel like 30 bucks....

Haven't gotten that far yet. The engine is still on the stand.

I have purchased the Z-Story Street headers with full exhaust all the way back. Sean was easy to work with and the equipment is beautiful....however there were some serious issues with the headers that I received. He knows about the problems and hopefully is correcting for future orders. The flange needed to be ground down on each end to allow for the intake to fit and be bolted up. That was fairly straightforward and with some grinding on the flange edge I got the intake to seat nicely. The major issue is the the angle of the pipes coming off of the flange. Several of the thick washers used to hold intake and exhaust in place had to have the edges ground a lot just to get them to slip onto the stud. I had to scrap the stud all together on the fist pipe and use a bolt with normal flat washer because the stud actually hit the header pipe before it would seat against the head. I am a probably a week away from getting the engine back in this car. I hope everything seals up OK but I have a feeling I will have to go a different route. A couple of the manifold nuts were VERY tricky to get a wrench on to tighten, impossible with and socket and swivels because they are just to close to the pipes to get any clearance for a socket to slip over the nuts. I was very excited about this exhaust system but I fear I have a lot of money tied up into a header I will have to replace.

@Patcon I was able to place an order for the other clips today. If you need them go get them!

Just got an email from them and they said they are re-stocking on those. I thought it may have been a last call item because no one else on the planet shows any listing for them that i can find.

They are, I bought the last one.

I was able to source 1 clip from the web but that’s all I can find. Probably a week or so before it arrives. Does anyone have any of these clips that hold the bottom of the finishing panel down? Hopefully I can find or fabricate something that will work if I can’t find any more of them.

I read that yesterday, ...well sort of until the part where he was using the upgrade T3 bar...then my head started hurting trying to make sense of it. I think I have the other prop shaft if it would be the same thing that came off a 280? I have a storage box full of 280 parts but I’ve never built a 280 either. This is all new but I’m figuring it out as I go along. The half shaft angle is important right? I have a good driveline guy in town so if those half shafts lines up and I can get the RT snubber over the housing instead of yoke part then I should be good I think. When I finally get to dropping engine and transmission in I’ll check my prop shaft. I can always have my driveline guy lengthen or shorten if needed. This is all because I can’t find an early model front diff insulator.

A simple hole drilled and cutting maybe a 1/2 inch down the side of the bushing will get it back far enough but now I’ll have to install the brake cable and see what’s going on. I’m more worried about the position of the diff now than anything. I may still have the old mount but without it I’ll just have to wait till I drop the engine and transmission in to see what’s up with the prop shaft. Honestly Now I’m not even sure which direction the mustache bar goes...It’s one way in the book but I’ve seen other ways on the web. My bar is flat unlike the later bars.

That’s very helpful and thanks a ton. I feel like I’m taking crazy pills sometimes with this car. I don’t know the differences in the year models but this isn’t the 1st problem with the early 71 I’ve ran into. I don’t have the parking brake cable in yet so that would have been something else that made me throw a wrench through a window.

Maybe I scrap the RT mount. It’s not on the prop shaft yoke it’s dead center on the diff yoke/u joint...actually rubbing right on top of the metal dust cover that’s welded on to keep stuff out of seal area. The mount is in there correctly far as I can tell because the gap for fuel lines is on the right side of the car. I can modify the mount without a ton of trouble. I think I read somewhere in a previous post the half shafts should be completely perpendicular to the wheels. If I can get that lined up I’ll deal with prop shaft later. thanks.

I have an early 71' and am running into the problem with the diff front mount/insulator where the only one I can source is from '72 onward which pushes my diff backwards. I've heard you can rotate the mount 180 and it will bring it forward. I have also installed the RT Diff bracket with the red Bush on top pressing down on the diff to avoid going back with the strap. Well since my diff has moved backwards (i think) because of the newer front insulator the RT mount is falling right on the yoke which is no good. I haven't tried to rotate the mount yet and reinstall.....The car is at my friend/mechanic/body guys shop but after taking it in and out about 4 times yesterday I gave up to do more research. I have both style's of mustache bars...I have both styles of rear transverse link mounts....I also have a very good functioning r200 sitting in my dining room. Z Store Website says I can use the newer mount with the 72 mustache bar and trans/link mount but I still don't see how that helps unless i flip the front insulator over which may be fine, it doesn't appear that it should matter other than it may make my drive shaft too long or maybe now its too short....Haven't got that far, no transmission in the car. Would you all go with the changing of the mustache bar and rear transverse mount? Or maybe the R200 would fit perfect? If anyone knows anything about this I could sure use some advice to avoid another 4 installs of the rear diff! I was trying to keep this car as close to original as possible but seeing as how I cut the front clip off a 260 and replaced mine that dream is out the window! I didn't realize they were noticeably different. This is my first rodeo. Maybe there is another solution all together?

Anchor block searched....anchor block found. Thank you sir!

Inside rear brake drums each side has one of these. Something for the parking brake cable?? When I dropped my car off at the body shop it was a “rolling” chassis...later I came and picked up all the suspension. I didn’t take loose the cable so I’m not sure if this works with the cable somehow. All I know is I can’t find them anywhere on any brake parts webpages. Of course a stud on each broke when I was disconnecting everything from the rear brakes. I can try and fix them, or if I knew what they were called I may could search them up. Thanks.

Well I didn't know that would be a potential problem but I guess I will burn that bridge when I get there. Still got a bit of a wait time on getting the carbs back in, Last I heard possibly late June early July.

Im trying to talk them in to putting it on the front of that 50's Ford in the background.

Got the steering Rack cleaned up and painted. The plastic grease fitting was broken off and thanks to help on another thread it has been identified and replaced with a Zerk fitting. I decided to leave the steering shaft joints alone. They move fine but I did notice and its hard to see in the picture that the lower shaft has a slight bend towards where it connects to that rubber coupling. That's probably not ideal, I would think that would cause a slight bit of tension in the steering. I probably have another one I may swap out.