November 19, '23 UPDATE

Altho I've not posted any Tomato progress reports for a while, I have gotten the undercarriage all cleaned up from the tail panel to the firewall. Need to do the underside of the chassis below the engine and then cleanup the front disc and rear brake components. Several areas I'm not able to get to so I'll have to wait and address them when I pull the engine and transmission again. Still need to cleanup the core support and the engine as best I can then start putting things back together to get ready for the journey to the next body shop.... hopefully right after the holidays!!!

STAY TUNED.....

ZEBRA 3 OUT

October 1, '23 UPDATE

Well, closed out September on a somewhat productive note, but nothing really to brag about....

I made a front fender template so I could locate and mark the body side molding and GRAN TORINO emblems on my driver side front fender....

I placed the passenger side fender up on the padded hood setting on a couple saw horses and then stretched a piece of Saran Wrap along the fender and taped it into place to act as my base material...

Next I applied two layers of marking tape, applied in opposing directions, to try and minimize the stretch of the clear plastic and to capture the contour of the fender....

I took a broad tipped Sharpie and marked the edges of the fender at the door and wheel openings and then took a small flat file and filed along the edge of those openings to better transfer the panel edges onto the tape so I would have a more accurate cut line....

I next used the round tapered end of the Sharpie to press the template into the mounting holes to form a depression of their location....

and I then removed the template from the fender....

Took the template over to the work bench and first trimmed it along the edge lines and then cut of the excess along the top and bottom of the piece. Got out my gasket punch kit and found two punches the size of the openings in the fender and punched out the holes on the template....

I set the driver side fender onto the padded hood and then flipped over and dry fit the template to the  fender. Once I had it positioned correctly, I taped it down to the fender....

I once again again used the Sharpie to mark the hole locations onto the fender. For the GRAN TORINO emblem holes, I marked the first and last hole and then removed and flipped the template back over so I had the smaller pattern closest to the wheel opening so the emblems would be in the correct order...

With the template made and the fender marked, I turned my attention back to the car and applied a coat of POR-15 followed by an initial coat of Eastwood Satin Chassis Black to the pass thru plate I made to allow the rear seat arm rest access panel to open into the trunk like it did on the donor car.....

So next on the agenda is to crawl under the car and get the underbody, chassis and suspension cleaned back up.

Hoping to have the underside of the car and the core support assembly all clean up as well and ready to rehang onto the car by the end of the month.

Stay tuned....

ZEBRA 3 OUT

September 17, '23 Update

Boy, July, August and September have been non-productive months for the Tomato. 

After getting her up in the air, I did roll under her for a look see and evaluate my next course of action and discovered the majority of the underside should clean up nicely as did the interior, trunk and front end.

I got both rear wheelhouses cleaned up after having some mud slung up into them during my short jaunts up and down the ramp while the alley was being worked on and need to do the inside of the front fenders next.

The only real work underneath will be knocking the primer overspray off the rear suspension pieces with a bit of rubbing/polishing compound and respraying the oversprayed areas on the chassis with another coat of Eastwood Chassis Black.

I had a couple local body shops come in to look at the car and hear how I wanted to apply the colors and neither shop thought my method of paint application was unorthodox, so not really sure what happened in the previous shop. As soon as I get the numbers back from the second shop, I'll request a tour of both facilities and ask to see some of their previous work so I can get a feel for which shop I feel most comfortable turning the Tomato over to.

I told both shops I would be ready to turn the vehicle over to them once I get the undercarriage, core support and front wheelhouses recleaned and repainted as necessary before the upcoming holiday season.

Fingers crossed I'm successful in finding a local shop to do the work!!

July 2, '23 Update

June wasn't as productive as I had hoped it would be, but there was some progress made...

I was able to climb my butt into the trunk (NOT an easy task these days!!) and get that area cleaned up fairly nicely....

This past weekend, I got the ole girl back up in the air and the wheels off so I could begin the arduous task of cleaning the bottom of the car and the suspension....

Fingers crossed the underside cleans up as nicely as the top side did!

Until next installment....

ZEBRA 3 OUT

June 3, '23 Update

Other than hanging the new TO DO LIST on the Torino and putting a small piece of trunk weatherstrip on the body to keep the decklid off the sheetmetal, nothing was done to the car.... BUT

I did get the original 460 off the floor and onto my engine stand after several years of setting on a couple of old tires. Tired of it being in the way so now I can roll it wherever it needs to go and police my work area a bit.

THAT is one HEAVY chunk of cast iron!!

Until next time....

ZEBRA 3 OUT

May 2023 update

 Well I've been a bit lacking keeping the project blog up to date but there was progress made this month (May '23)...

The last week of April, they finished the roof installation at the dealership so that following Saturday, I pulled the Tomato out of the paint booth where she had been hiding during all that work and I got her ready to go at it again. While evaluating my course of action, I thought I'd see how easily the foil backed foam insulation I had applied to the floor would come up so I could insure there was not water and crap trapped underneath from pressure washing everything a few weeks before, plus it was looking worse for the wear of being unprotected for several years.

I was right and also surprised how much bodyshop crud had gotten under the insulation and collected in several areas. I also discovered the SUPER CLEAN jug hadn't sealed completely and leaked out onto the passenger side front footwell. Looks like it had lifted the Eastwood Chassis Black but could really tell if it had also attacked the POR-15...

The weekend of the 6th, I started working on my first TO DO LIST...

Finished pulling the foam insulation off the driver's side of the floor...

cleaned the passenger side footwell where the SUPER CLEAN had leaked out (and it actually lifted the Eastwood Chassis Black and the POR-15!)...

so now all the old insulation has been removed...

drilled the pilot hold for the cable entry...

removed all the lines/hoses from the radiator, transmission and power steering coolers and then pulled the core support assembly back off the car.

DAMN, I don't remember that thing being that heavy...... but I did initially remove everything piece by piece back in the day.... when I was a bit younger!!

So the first TO DO LIST was put to bed!

The following weekend of the 20th, I posted the second TO DO LIST on the C pillar and got busy...

I cleaned up the firewall and front frame and suspension (as best I could from top side). Used the foaming cleaner a friend who details our company trucks gave me and MAN did it do a great job! Sprayed it on and then let it soak for a few minutes then hit it with a hogs hair brush to scrub it and get down into the areas simply wiping with a rag wouldn't get into and WOW what a difference...

I also started to second coat the dash but wasn't happy with the way the grain on the repaired areas was turning out, so I decided to stop on that until I could figure out how to replicate the grain the factory has embossed onto the surface.

So the weekend of the 27th, I cleaned all the crap off the interior of the car. My pictures didn't turn out to well, so hopefully these few will illustrate how well she cleaned up...

This week I'll revise my TO DO LIST and then next weekend, I'll climb into the trunk (THAT should be fun!!) and get that area all cleaned up. Once all the interior surfaces have been cleaned I'll then scuff all the areas, reapply the seam sealer and POR-15 as necessary and reshoot all the inside surfaces of the car with Eastwood Satin Chassis Black.

She's really cleaning up a LOT easier than I thought she would. Once I get all the interior of the car wrapped up, I'll put her back in the air and attack the underside.

DON'T TOUCH THAT DIAL.....

ZEBRA 3 OUT