What a weekend. TL,DR: It runs.
Here's where we started...just a shell of a car sitting on jackstands. Nothing in the engine bay, no transmission, no differential, no suspension, nothing.
Let's get to work.
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Kyle showed up Friday afternoon at about 2pm, and we started pulling the 5.3+T56 out of the parts wagon in the driveway. It came out super easy, and that part was done within about an hour.
It had rained on and off all day, so we tried to minimize our time outside since we just had a pop up awning for weather protection. I had already pulled the 8.8 out previously, so it was sitting on the ground ready to go into the '79.
Just a few bolts and some low-level cussing at tight fasteners, and she's free:
Out of the weather. Beer:30
"Now what?"
We also removed the Mustang master from the parts car and installed it on the skinny booster in the '79.
Slammed the diff in real quick and bolted it all up.
Jacked the diff up and threw a wheel on. Looks better than I thought it would tbh. Currently these are 245s stretched a bit on a 10" wheel. I'm going to trim my lips and pull the fender since I want to fit 275s all the way around.
About 10pm on Friday, Derrick (940Guy), Matt, and Kevin showed up.
We hooked up a battery to see where the smoke would come out at. Luckily, it all stayed in the wires, and most of the electrical stuff appears to work.
Friday night benchracing:
Saturday morning, Gordon (Volvstang) drove over from Sylva to join the fun. From back to front, my V70R, my wife's T5 V70, Derrick's V70, and Gordon's Flash Green V70R.
Kevin wiring/plumbing the fuel sender:
Front suspension and brakes on:
And we got the motor set in!
Saturday night pizza:
Trans crossmember modification:
Hooking up various things:
A Stick70 and his masterpiece:
We had to modify the mounting for the trans crossmember since the pre-80 cars don't have the rearmost pair of trans crossmember mounting holes.
We knocked off at about 11pm on Saturday. Everyone was absolutely dog tired. Saturday was kind of incredible though...we made okay progress in the morning, but after lunch from about 2pm to 8pm, all five of us were constantly working on some piece or part, and things absolutely flew together.
This morning, we woke up and hit breakfast, filled the trans, changed the oil, robbed the battery out of my trash truck, and gave it a crank.
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And it works. It sputtered once, then started strong on the second crank.
I couldn't be happier.