Projects 64 Comet Build for Sema.....Its build time....

After what seemed like forever covered in fiberglass filler, skimcoat and endless sheets of multiple grits of sandpaper I was finally done with all of the prep for the seal coat.

 

It felt great to have Erik put the engine compartment back into one color, even though it wasn't the final color. I was really stolked. Getting my feel for doing bodywork again was good but at the same time I am really obsessive about getting the perfect result if i'm the one that is doing the work. If I pick up the car done after dropping off a beater i'm not as critical. I guess im glad I never went into body and paint, id be broke by giving away man hrs. Erik said i'm nuts for going that far on the engine comp but this car I feel it is worth it.

Total Perf-

 

Sealer Pics-

 

pics arent coming through, ill try again later.

 

I'll be puttin in the core support in my '64 this weekend so thanks for the pics...Only wish i was workin withe California sheet metal instead of Pennsylvania sheet metal...Jim

 

Choppednslammed-

Cool 64! Im sure you'll have it lookin killer in no time!

 

Madness is right! I don't want to hijack your thread, but here is a pic. There are more on our website. It's a Road Race car. It comes back from paint tomorrow for second day of shooting for Hot Rod TV.

 

Django-
Looks killer! Best of luck to you!

 

Hoprfully these sealer pics come through!

 

Heres a few more

 

Finally we are to the final stages of wet sanding the primer. It really helped to get out alot of the very fine imperfections. It was a great final touch to the many hours we put into the car. I spent a good many hrs making sure that the surface was really perfect before the final paint went on the car. I feel good about the stage of the game we are at.

 

We must have had an inch thick of sanding gook on the floor of the shop from all the material we anded off the car. It'll be great to get the car in the paint booth and clean the shop a bit. I must have taken every sheet and blanket out of the closet at the house to cover up my stuff from the dust. Thanks honey and sorry..Anyone have a coupon for Bed Bath and Beyond???

Thanks again goes out to Erik for his time and talent. He's had a hand in building quite a few very stunning show cars and collector cars. His input was priceless.

 

Now it was time to lay down the color on the PSYCLONE, Thank god we have a paint booth right in the complex. Special Thanks to Alain (Allen) Wood for his guidance when it came to laying down the color and his use of the paint booth. Allen has been painting for quite a few years (30) at least.

When the guys saw I rolled the car outside to wash the sanding sludge off of it to prep it for paint the next day they had a field day teasing me. See, for anyone who has painted an engine compartment they know you have to get in there and be able to move around to really lay down paint correctly into all of the many contours and curves. I'm 6'4" tall and close to three hundred lbs. Im an ex-athlete now body builder/power lifter that has never really been known for winning at hide and go seek if you get my drift. So as the car got cleaned and ready to roll over to the booth Allen and Matt (mattrod68) had a field day with me. They knew I wanted the best possible result for this car and was to proud to ask for Allen to spray it for me. It was early evening by the time we got the tape on the car, solvent washed and ready to roll. Allen said, "lets shoot it in the morning." I said sure and i'll see you in the A.M.

I showed up and the booth was closed. I waited for a few hrs wondering where Allen was and if he may have had something come up. So I got into the many other things that needed to be done. After awhile Allen showed up and asked me if I was ready. I pulled on my fresh coveralls and went into the booth. Low and behold there she sat, done. Allen came in extra early to do the job like it deserved to be done. It turned out killer. Thank god! I would have left a bunch of elbows and butt prints in there.

Here is the final job!

 

You'll notice we ended up putting some bed liner in the inner fenders as well.

 

I love this shade of black on the compartment. Its really going to show well against the natural aluminum of the injection and the black block. It has a very nice satin sheen to it. I was very pleased. This is the point where I was very happy the car went through all of the work to redo this front piece. It was a time consuming bunch of work with not alot of time but well worth it.

Here are some before and after pics with the old part on the floor and the new part on the car. The battery tray alone tells the story. I feel really good about the switch. Now the engine compartment matches the rest of the cars quality. Awesome

Total Perf-

 

Alright----here's the covers that im planning on running on the car. I have two sets of them that are in decent shape. Both sets however have sat in my lap for hours on end as I beat them back to their original form. Guys would bend them alot pulling out the engine with the chains.

I love these covers, they are 2 year only big block FE covers with slight differences between the two years. We have machined a set of adapters to get them to sit on the mean little small block Ford they will call home. They really harkin back to the Total Performance years for Ford and Mercury. That vibe is what the car is all about so it was a no brainer to do go this way. One went to Gary over at Monterey Penninsula Powder Coating to have a vintage HIPO gold put on them and the other went to Bumper Depot for a nice chrome coating. My decision now is one of those two. Its good to have options.

Here's a shot of one pair soaking up some solvent in the tank....

 

Here's a shot of the headlight assembly. These things proved to be quite a pain in the butt. I realized that the car had a cracked pass side (accident side) bucket, their made of pot metal so they are easy to break and also easy to rot. I had to go through 5 pot metal units and the steel headlight buckets get thrashed too as you can see from the pics. We finally found some quality units and got them looking factory fresh.

Total Perf-

 

Those Mercury valve covers are prettier than boobs to me. I'm becoming a parts perv.

 

I like my parasites to run low on the block. With this great 8 port injection the last thing I want is to muck it up with the alternator right in the way. So with that we had to fabricate the bracket we wanted. Most of the store bought stuff just doesnt have the feel I wanted so this is the design that I felt would work. Now we just had to make it fit on the small block. I love the look of the natural aluminum, it screams im pissed off in the mid 60's!

 

Everythings lookin good TP!

 

Francisco Plumbero-

They turn me on too man, when the factory nails a killer set of covers that is tops to me. These, Hemi covers etc. Sweet......

 

Thanks Clearspot- good to see you back again!

 

Here's a shot of the family affair most of us car guys know so well. We stuck the run in stand in one of our spare bays that we store a car and a few other parts and engines in.

Here's Dad, who used to run Super-Stock, Top/Gas Mopars back in the day. Late in the eve as we were putting the small block on the EZ RUN run in stand. Dad hangs out reading through the literature for the next step in the project. Its great to have him around.

 

Well, we made the special bracket for the alt, now we needed to make special spacers for the crank pulley and the back of the alt to the block. It was a bit of a challenge but now we are totally true and 100% on the belts! By the way, heres a pic of Matt, he's great on the mill. He also know how to kill a Starbucks cake pop like nobody's business!

Total Perf-

 

So TP...what black did you use for the engine compartment? Looks great!

 

Check your master cylinder clearance with those Mercury Pent Roof VCs,mine hit on my 65 Comet. ROY.

 

FOMOCOguy- Thanks! I went through a bunch of different labels and simply didnt like the sheen I got. A buddy recomended this and I love how it turned out. Best of all its very durable. The brand is called Advantage. Even though it says flat black there is a perfect sheen to it. It doesn't look flat black at all in the typical sense. It is very close to alot of factory shades of semi as well. Hope that helps!
#601 FLAT BLACK
Low VOC Polyurethane
Single-Stage Custom Color

PRODUCT DESCRIPTION:
ADVANTAGE #601 2.8 VOC Polyurethane Flat Black is a high solids, low VOC coatings intended for use as a protective maintenance coating for automotive and industrial applications, surfaces exposed to humidity, chemicals and corrosive elements.

 

Comet65-

Thanks Roy, it was super close with the dummy block we put in to check. I decided to get some of the Ron Morris adjustable mounts to give us more clearance. It should clear now taking into consideration engine movement and stuff.....at least thats the plan....

Thanks again Roy! By the way are you going to Eagle Field drags? If so i'll see you there.

Total Perf-

 

This is a bit out of order though we set in the suspension here as a mock up for placing the rack and column. I used the original style components with better bushings. These things actually ride fairly well and with a tuneable front air suspension it was an easy decision to go with the factory geometry. Besides, all of the components we went with are made to eliminate factory short comings, like the Total Control rack, Wilwood brakes and the Ride Tech Shockwaves. Its a combo we've used time and time again without fail.

Total Perf-

 

We also mocked up the Shockwaves. This is always such an easy fit with all of the Ridetech products I was shocked when we had a few issues.

Firstly, the one thing that the Shockwaves need on this installation for my taste is a bit more of a drop to get the car to lay a bit better. So you'll see here one of the R&D mock ups that we do for getting a bit more out of the Mustang kits for the Shockwaves. The one pictured is a rough one that actually got remade for actual placement on the car. Though you get the idea. It works great and is very stable on the road. It gives you about 2 more inches of drop with zero clearance issues when you place the mount below the A-Arm instead of on top like the factory did.

Im a huge fan of the Ridetech products but we got a really messed up set of products. The parts we got actually didn't fit together when we test fit the kit. The upper plates that go in the bottom of the towers would not allow the shock to go in and be seated. As you can see from the pics, both of them measured not only wrong but also different from eachother as well. huh. I figured not a big deal since we have a mill and Matt can handle that no problem. Then we installed the Shockwaves themselves and figured out that we had two different shocks in the kit that bottomed out at different levels. The car would never sit even and the travel wouldn't jive from one side to the next. Double huh.

So we removed them and called our rep at Ride Tech. We later learned that they were retooling the kit and that is why we got the mix of parts. Mistakes happen. The best thing was that they made it all better. I just wish it hadn't taken 2 months to get it better.

That being said I'm running the Shockwaves on the back as well and will continue to run their products on many rods, customs and others as needed. We've been running their products on customer cars and our own for as long as they have been open and have never had an issue. Figures it would be on the one car that NEEDS to be done in a few months....Murphy's law...

Total Perf-