Thread: 1966 Fairlane finally about done

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Well, I’m getting close to finishing the assembly on the 66 Fairlane I’ve been working on for the last couple of months.

It’s been one of those jobs from where everything seems to fight. Fitment issues, improper pervious repairs, a rebuilt engine that had a rear main leak (love pulling those Ford pans in car), and rebuilt transmission with the shift and kickdown levers installed upside down (yeah you have to pull the pan and valve body to change them). Then there was the driver’s side header that had to modified to clear the PS and on and on.

Anyway I did the first short road test Friday (to the gas station) it turned out to be real short because of bad rear axel bearings. LOL.

The longer road test yesterday proved interesting. The car would start out in second gear (C4 transmission). That one fortunately turned out to be anti-climatic. 1966 was the last year for the Dual-Range (Green Dot) transmissions. .....it just took me a minute to remember that. Put it in Drive 2 and it worked just like it should.

It will make a nice little car now that hopefully all the little problems have been solved.

With any luck it should be gone this week or next and I can get back on the 37 Dodge.






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Wow Mike. That looks great! I really like that body style.

David

X2, NICE Work!

Good looking car, Mike! My favorite year, too! Had a really nice '67 for awhile till some guy decided he liked it more then I did and parted with a big stack of dead presidents and took it home with him!!!!

Yeah, It’s a neat little car, and with the 351 it’s pretty fun to drive.

In the process of building it I had to come up with several odds and ends that were not available new. Fortunately the local wrecking yard had three 66s two were 4 doors and one of those was pretty well parted.

The third one hidden way deep in the yard is a 66 2dr hardtop. It’s pretty faded but it’s an original red car and although it’s a plain 500 with flat hood and bench seat it’s still has its factory 390. Believe me I looked the car over really really well, but unfortunately it was originally and east coast car and has major rust issues. To properly do it it would really need every panel plus the floors replaced. It’s too bad really otherwise it would already be here at my place. Oh well you can’t same em all.


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Mike,
You say it should be gone soon - does that mean it's sold, or was this one being done for an owner? Just curious - always liked that '66 body style.

Good looking Ford great era

Yup,nice looking car..always had a soft spot for those,,there are a few down here now,too..

It’s a customer’s car Roger. I semi-retired about a year ago to concentrate on my own stuff and wasn’t doing any outside work. This car belongs to the machinist I used to use. He started on the car several years ago but then had a couple of strokes and although he gets around pretty well now he was not physically able to put the car together. He asked me back in November if I would be interested in finishing the assembly and I said yes.

The car was delivered with the doors on, a couple of bolts holding on the front fenders and the interior and glass partially installed. The engine and transmission (both rebuilt) hood, deck lid, bumpers and boxes of parts were delivered separately.


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Well, ya' done good, Mike!! It's a fine looking '66!

Dang nice of you to help the guy out, Mike!!!! Not many want to take on a half-done project!

".....Not many want to take on a half-done project!....."

Normally I wouldn't either (and this one reminded why not to )

But Bob and I go back probably 25 years (he did the machine work on a LOT of engines for me)....it was hard to say no and I'm glad I didn't.


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I know what you mean, Mike... Got to help a friend finish up his car this spring as he's unable to do the work himself anymore.----He was building me engines in the late 60's and was one of our sprint car sponsors for better then 10 years.. Can't say no to a guy like that.

Well, it looks like the Fairlane may be back here for a while. It came back with a couple of leaks, the main one being at the back of the engine. I’ve replaced the rear main seal and the chrome oil pan with an OE one. It’s better now than when it first came in but it’s definitely leaking at the rear main seal and I can’t get it to stop.

It also started losing oil pressure...... it does fine at idle.....45 PSI on a hot idle, but at 1800 RPM it drops to 25 PSI.

Then I had the valve cover off yesterday and found this. Several of the roller tip rockers are riding on the side of the rollers. There is a lot of slop in the push rods/guide plates and I suspect that either the guide plates are junk or they are designed for bigger pushrods.







So it looks like I get to tell the owner that the engine needs to come back out and see what he wants to do as he was the one who built the engine. Yup another fun day kind of reminds me why I retired from doing customers cars.


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Can't see much of the guide plates, slot for sbf pushrods should be 5/16. I've ran into some poorly made guide plates, went to the adjustable ones and no more problems!!! Some heads have so dang much core shift it forces the pushrod to run at an angle, thereby kicking the rocker arm off the center of the valve.....

As with many things, quality control seems to be lacking on parts!!!!!!