This will be a slow moving project. Gonna do everything properly and there's a TON of things to do.
First the backstory since it's still fresh in my mind.
My good friend Steve (GLHS231) from Omaha gave me a call a couple weeks back telling me of a GLHS that's now for sale and I should look at it and buy it. He knew of the car back when it was only a couple years old and the seller & he went back at least that far buying, selling & trading old Mopars a few of which I'm sure they wish they would have kept. 'Go ahead & call him right now!' he said. 'It's well after 10 going on 11 at night' I replied. 'Call him anyway, I just got off the phone with him a minute before I called you, he's still up' Steve countered. I kicked it around in my head for a couple minutes, figured why not and called, left a message. We quit playing phone tag the next day over lunch; me sizing up what kind of shape the car is in and he sized me up as what kind of owner I would be. Last thing he wanted was some random hooligan to get it, thrash it and let it go further into disrepair or worse. The asking price seemed more than fair, and I've wanted another GLHS for quite some time.
Turns out this guy is the second owner of the car, bought it out of Iowa in the late 80s. Had fun with it, plenty of the usual stories of shenanigans on side roads & main drag with the standard 'WTF is that?' reaction from several people. He kept the miles down, sold it to a family member out in Colorado who kept it up, put most of the miles on it along with a Maaco quality paint job. The engine was overheated badly, repaired and come September of 2000 things went south in a hurry ending in a bottom end knock after a bunch of repairs. The car has essentially sat since then. It was brought back to Nebraska at some point and sat outside getting weathered. All said & done, it only has 41k miles it on.
The good things right off the bat before getting elbow deep into the car-
Rust is minimal, nearly all of it is from the poor respray. Floors, doors, hatch lip, etc. are super clean.
It has all the Shelby-specific parts aside from the front Konis, even the badge on the valve cover is still there.
The rims are beautiful, just beautiful. Not concourse perfect but better than 95% of the other 30 year old aluminum rims in this part of the country.
The door hinges don't sag one bit. The doors close nice & easy and the door handles work amazingly well.
Basically, where it counts for my skills & abilities to repair things the car is pure.
The bad-
The interior is thrashed. Sun-baked silver seat fabric tears at the slightest touch and the seat foam is only slightly more resilient.
One of the kids decided to replace the fuel pump that seized, and removed carpet...and the rear seat....and the fabric from the seat. The gas tank and hangar assembly are still chillin' in the back of the car.
Headliner is sagging terribly in the center, the fabric is totally gone, the fiberboard is what's sagging.
Steering wheel & shifter leather is rough at best from the elements.
It needs a windshield.
Some reasonably light body work is needed from various dings & dents. Nothing that I'm uncomfortable taking on with guidance from good SDAC friends who do body work.
The car doesn't want to move. It took 4 adults to push it onto the tow dolly and that was no small feat. There was plenty of cursing while I removed it from the dolly on my own. In the end it took 2 half ton trucks to pull it off.
The basic plan right now is to restore it with a little bit of extra get up & go. MP Stage 2 logic module or similar custom calibration, perhaps a better cam. It will keep the stock exhaust. Anything that's done will be bolt-on only, no cutting the car up.
Now for the pics!
The first time I got to see it, 2 days after Steve called me.
Coming home. The crabs on the back are only there since the rubber on the car was sketchy at best.
Home and after a quick bath at the car wash.
The worst of the rust.
Floors are better than any other L-body I've seen with the carpet out.
Bottoms of the doors are all this pure.
Interior
Undercarriage
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Originally Posted by tryingbe
