One Loyal Owner, Two Classic Mustangs

Classic Ford Rentals

0:00You have a classic Ford that turns heads everywhere it goes? Don't let it just sit there. Let it steal the spotlight. We're looking for Mustangs, F-Series, and vintage Fords ready for their close-up in photo shoots, commercials, and even weddings. Put your classic to work at ClassicFordRentals.com. Just provide the info at the bottom of the page and let your Ford be the star. That's ClassicFordRentals.com. Looking to restore your classic ride? Trust National Parts Depot, the largest restoration parts supplier in the industry.

0:33From Mustangs and Camaros to Broncos and classic Ford trucks, NPD delivers the highest quality parts to fit your goals and your budget. With premium catalogs, best-sourced products, and family-owned dedication, NPD helps bring American history back to life. I keep all four of my classics on the road with NPD. You should, too. Visit NPDLink.com today, where a restoration begins.

Episode Introduction

1:00Coming up today on this episode of Ford Mustang, the Early Years Podcast. I would know I would walk through the cars and, you know, everybody has their favorites and I'd always be like, where are the Mustangs? And I would, like, zone in on, like, whatever Mustang was around. And, you know, other friends would be like, I want to go look at the Corvettes or I want to go look. You know, they had a lot more, like, Bel Airs at the time. Like, 50s cars were huge in the Hot Rods. And I'm like, nah, man, look at this. Have you seen this pony that's convertible over here that's, like, 65 or 66?

1:34I'm like, look at that Mach quote over there. It kind of started in elementary school, I guess. And then hearing family tales of lore of the Mach 1 that my father had. Or he got allegedly, like, four speeding tickets in one month. And he had to go to court and defend his license. And it had, like, a 351 Cleveland engine in it. He upgraded to, like, a four-barrel, like, polycarburetor. Had to have some guy tune it. Just the lore of it made it sound typical. And I loved it.

Welcome to the Podcast

2:05Welcome to the Ford Mustang First Generation The Early Years Podcast. Every week we will have conversations with collectors, experts, weekend warriors, and those in the know when it comes to first-generation ponies. Start your engines and let's go. All right, Ford Mustang communities. If you have a classic Ford Mustang and you live in Southern California, a Mustang, an F-Series, a Survivor, Patina, Show Truck, or a Show Mustang,

2:38I'm looking to put your classics, your real classics, onto real sets. Photo shoots, commercials, film, and premium productions. You keep your ride. I handle the clients, the bookings, and all the logistics. Turn your classic Ford into a paid on-camera icon. Visit ClassicFordRentals.com. Scroll to the bottom of the page and share your info with me. Let's get your truck or Mustang working for real bucks.

Jen's Mustang Story

3:00All right, now on to today's story. What could be more fun than one classic Mustang? Well, it's pretty simple. Two classic Mustangs. Here to share her story, her Mustang story, and how she got into her 1965 and 1972 ponies. Welcome, Jen, to Ford Mustang The Early Years Podcast. Hey, thanks for having me. I'm excited to have you. And you teased the conversation on Facebook Messenger. You just said, I have a lot of fun stories I want to share about my Mustang. And then I heard and I saw you have two Mustangs.

3:30And again, I'm always very captivated by those that have more than one classic ride. I have, geez, four of them now. One Mustang and three old Ford trucks. So I'm always interested in sharing your story. Where do we begin?

Jen's Childhood Interest

3:43Tell me your Mustang story, Jen. Well, I mean, I always wanted a 65 or any Mustang at this point, except for like the 80s Mustangs, because I had friends in high school that had those and different memories of that. But it was a year ago. My husband, I think, is winning husband of the century because he had delivered for Christmas. It was like a month late and he was sad about that. He's like, I'm sorry it wasn't like on Christmas. I'm like, it's OK. It's still a Mustang. It was, you know, we're sitting at dinner.

4:14His phone's going off like crazy. I had like the worst day ever. I had an ear infection. It was January. It's like I'm in the northeast in Jersey. So like we get snow, we get ice. It's horrible. You pretty much disassociate for the winter months until you go back outside. But I hear a tow truck coming in the driveway. And like I first thought like, oh, man, that must be like my mom's car because she lives with us. And maybe it broke down and that's going to be even more hassle. But nope, it was it was a pony on the back of this tow truck getting dropped off in the

4:46driveway. Anyway, and I was like, I think I was speechless for the first time in my life. And I talk a lot. So that's like that was a huge deal. I immediately got the keys, was looking all around it, started it up. And it's funny to me is like I come from a family that knows cars, even though I never had the chance to like work on anything of my own. Yeah, because I went to college to be a music teacher, did the academic thing. But, you know, my brother had like old Ford pickups. And my dad historically had a Mach 1 back in the 70s when he was cool.

5:21I'm pretty sure that's how he got my mom interested in him. He drove up to Mach 1.

5:27You know, but anyway, back to how I got it, you know, I never thought I would afford or be able to get into this hobby. I mean, I'm like 40 in my 40s, early 40s. I figured like, oh, it's going to be a little bit of time. I'm going to pay off some debt. And then, bam, this Mustang appears. That's awesome. That's awesome. Now, so your husband picking out a Mustang for you, you must have talked Mustang a lot because, you know, it's hard to buy a car for somebody. Not, you know, left alone the whole idea of buying a classic Mustang.

6:00How did he know what you wanted? Did you leave pictures and hints around the house? I mean, tell me how that worked. I mean, Facebook Marketplace, like you just like see something, oh, that's mildly entertaining. And it was like a Mustang. You send it off to him and then he'd think about it or, you know, wouldn't it be too far away or too much money because some of the prices for these ponies are like outrageous for what's out there. But, you know, or I had like a little model toy car of one I would just kind of leave out. But and I never like said, like, you know, if you don't buy me this Mustang, it's curtains

6:32for you, man. But it's more like, you know, a reach goal for me. Like I started a new job and I'm like, I'm going to put some money aside and buy my own. And then he beat me to it. And it started it started quite the journey with having to go through it and learn how to work on it myself, which was really cool. All right. So let's talk about the origin of that of that Mustang or let's even back up a little

Becoming a Mustang Fan

6:58bit further.

Becoming a Mustang Fan

6:58When did you start to become a fan of the Mustang brand? Because, you know, there's tons of of classic cars that are out there. I personally think the Ford community is a great community over some of the other communities that are out there. But tell me about your your rise to to to become a Mustang fan. So growing up, we had the local town had like every Friday night, this cruise night. And when I I think I was like in first or second grade, I would go with my friends, parents and their dad, like made these really chopped up hot rods that shot flames.

7:33I mean, it probably the most unique on the East Coast I've ever seen. But I would know I would walk through the cars and, you know, everybody has their favorites. And I'd always be like, where are the Mustangs? And I would like zone in on like whatever Mustang was around. And, you know, other friends would be like, I want to go look at the Corvettes or I want to go look. You know, they had a lot more like Bel Airs at the time, like 50s cars were huge in the hot rods. And I'm like, nah, man, look at this. Have you seen this pony?

8:03It's convertible over here. That's like 65 or 66. I'm like, look at that Mach quote over there. Right. It kind of started in elementary school, I guess. And then hearing family tales of lore of the Mach 1 that my father had, or he got allegedly like four speeding tickets in one month. And he had to go to court and defend his license. And it had like a 351 Cleveland engine in it. He upgraded to like a four barrel, like Holly carburetor, had to have some guy tune it.

8:34Just the lore of it made it sound typical. And I loved it. All right. So you, you, since childhood have been a fan of Mustang and then your husband drops this, this Mustang coupe on you in 1965. Tell me some of the features of it. Let's get our audience to picture what you have sitting in your driveway or in your garage right now. Oh yeah. It's in the garage right now. You got a lot of snow in New Jersey this past week, didn't you? Yeah. We got like about a foot here with like a coating of ice and, uh, yeah, I don't know.

9:04It was something else. Yeah. Right. But, uh, um, yeah. When he dropped it off, I mean, granted, I was more familiar with the two 89s, uh, you know, the eight cylinder, but he got me a six cylinder, which I think, I mean, I think he knew what he was doing, but he, he goes, you're going to be working on this yourself. Cause he knows I like to do that sort of thing and learning in the six cylinders, like the easiest engine, it's basically pocket size. You could look at it, see everything that's wrong. It's like a vote tech kid's dream, like to tear that engine apart.

9:36And he's like, I know it's not perfect. We'll have to go through the car, ran and drive and stop, but it had a lot of gremlins in it. But, uh, yeah, basically it's Caspian blue, uh, coupe. Um, and it's pretty well stock. I haven't done anything, um, magical. It came with these giant center line rims that were way too wide. Right. So when you're, you know, they look kind of cool, but they were, I don't know, it just didn't look right. And when you went around turns, you couldn't really turn all the way without scraping,

10:07scraping the rubbing. Right. I understand. Yeah. And I'm like, oh man. And then in the back, like the, the springs, definitely, I have to, I have to do those, but I put in, um, different shocks to boost it up in the back, but you'd be riding down the road and you're hearing like all these noises. And I'm like, yeah, these rims are just not doing it for me. Totally get it. And I understand what you're saying about the, uh, the, um, the straight six, because, uh, while I do have a two 89 in my Mustang convertible, I have one of my F two fifties is the, uh, the three, I six 300.

10:39And it is, it's just a little, probably a little bit. What do you have? The one 70 or two, 200, 200. Okay. So, so I wasn't a hundred percent sure what you had under the, uh, under the hood, but they do make really nice, um, hobby style. You know, it's like, it's not confused. I mean, it's certainly is confusing if you're not mechanical at all, but it's a little, at least a little less confusing than the, uh, than the V eights. Those I sixes are really nice and they're hardy too. And you know what, you get in a lot less trouble on the street with the, with the sixes than you went with the two, with the two 89s.

11:09I definitely think that was the other part. Cause he knew he's like, yeah, if we give you a VA, you're going to be like, you know, yeah, speeding ticket, you know, like the family prophecy of getting speeding tickets with these mustangs. But so is it a, uh, is it manual? Is it automatic? It's automatic. Nice. Nice. And, uh, power steering, not power steering. It's all manual, manual steering. Oh my gosh. So, so you're, you're getting a workout on your, uh, on your brake foot and you're getting a workout with your, uh, with your forearms also.

11:41It's like driving a tractor. Yeah. Definitely feels like driving. Low speeds is a tractor high speeds. It's, it's fine. Like there's, you know, you really feel the road and you just have to, you know, with the braking, it's not like a modern car where you could come up and really hit the brakes on somebody. If someone pulls out in front of you, I mean, you just leave a little bit more space, but it's a cruiser. Like it's fun. I got it. I got it. All right. So when you, when you got the car, uh, what type it was in, it was in safe condition, but not, it still had its gremlins.

12:12You still had to start taking things apart and putting things back together again. It sounds like. Yeah, it definitely did. It had, um, the, the infamous turn signal switch issue where the turn signal switch stops working, so you have to replace that. So you have to weasel that out of the steering column. And then the connectors on the bottom, by this time it was March, right? Cause the car sat in the driveway under a cover. We couldn't do anything. Cause it's like freezing out. Um, my husband's brother is lifelong hot rod builder mechanic. He has a shop at his house.

12:43Wow. He's retired. Like he, this is all he does every day. Like he has a three bay garage pole barn. Yeah. It's hot rods. This is like his, his man cave thing. Um, I asked him really nicely if I could have it towed down there. Cause, uh, I noticed there was something up with the brakes. Like, even though I guess I had all new brake lines and all new brakes and like, uh, drum brakes. Um, I noticed like the brake post was like wobbly and I'm like, yeah, that's not good. We need to get. Right. Definitely not good. Right.

13:13So, so we started in, in March, just going through the car and I did the turn signal switch. Um, and then the break, the break, um, we, we upgraded to the masters, the dual master cylinder. Cause it came. Nice. Yes. Good job. That was like first thing I bought and I'm looking at like, okay, what do we do online? And it's not like a new about where to buy these things. And I'm like, Oh, CJ pony. I don't know. They're, they have like a four week wait time. Who else is out there? And then, you know, just finding the parts and putting them in. And, and, um, I learned a valuable lesson about making sure you, you, you know, check

13:47your connection plugs before you plug in the whole harness upside down. Um, that was valuable. Um, that was laughable cause it took way too long because I was learning as I was going, but you know. Yeah. How many projects have you done on your car that you've had to do two and three times? Cause the first, first couple of times you screwed it up. I mean, that is pretty much my, uh, my MO with every repair that I've made on any of the trucks or car. That is, that is how you learn. I mean, I think the, that harness was probably the only big like snafu I had. Everything else was pretty much, I would ask for help or I would get it.

14:21Or, um, I mean the thing after that, I, I did the radio. So I put like a retro sound aftermarket and the speakers and I know how to solder cause I, I don't know if you see, um, I'm sitting right now in my recording studio. So I have that going for me, which is nice. The whole little to solder. So putting in a radio is not that hard. And actually they're easier on the old cars because you don't have so many plastic pieces to take out like on a modern car. Right. Right. You just have to be a contortionist and get up underneath that.

14:52You know, what's interesting also about, about the car is with that, uh, with that 200 under the hood, you probably could stand in the engine bay and actually, and actually do some of the repairs too, as I could in one of my trucks. I can't, you can't quite get around it as easily with the two 89 in there, but you certainly can with an I six. Well, like you can see, um, like immediately when I first thought, I'm like, Oh, that's the original suspension components. Like when you're looking down into the engine bay, cause you can see around it. Um, yeah, we replaced those. That was, uh, I mean, that, that was kind of tricky learning how to do that.

15:25But I mean, I, I geeked out the car enough to where it's, it's safe. And then I noticed like over the summer I had, I guess it came with the car. It was an aftermarket auto light 1100 carburetor. And I'm, I don't know. I, I, I, I still keep things, uh, points and condenser and carburetor. It's just easier for me, from my background, we try to pertronics on it and it just, we weren't able to get the pertronics to seat correctly in the distributor. It might've just been us being nerds about it. But I mean, I ended up putting a new carburetor after like a bazillion hours of research and

16:01just threw a Holly 1940, which is what they ran on the Falcons. And I'm happy with it. And the only reason why I got so like mad about that carburetor, uh, like everybody's fine with an auto light, but I was coming out of my job. I brought my car to my job and now all the other, you know, I'm a teacher. So all the other teachers are looking at it. Oh, this is so cool. Very cool. I'm trying to pull out and it stalled like two times. Cause the accelerator pump was no, no good anymore after sitting and it wasn't of a good quality. So I'm like, all right, that's it. We're done.

16:32We're out and then rage bought the Holly 1940 and read up and like, all right, we're putting this on and then slapped it on in about a day. Yeah. And then tuned it up and got it going. And now we're good. That's awesome. So, so the engine, maybe you mentioned this and I just missed it. The engine, the 200 itself, has it ever been rebuilt? Do you know, or did you guys take a shot at doing any of the, any of the major work on it? I feel like the car, based on what I was finding as I was digging it apart with the radio, I think the car had a rebirth in like the nineties, um, like 93 or 90, 94.

17:04And I believe the engine was redone then because the, the paint suggests that like the paint flaking off, I want to replace my valve seals. Cause I get a little smoke here and there, but that's like, you know, the typical thing to replace, but that engine's probably going to get rebuilt on that trans rebuilt. Probably once I'm a little further along with the mock project. Yeah. So we'll get into the mock in just a second. I'll, we'll finish up on this one. So what lessons have you learned on your, on your, uh, on your 65 Mustang that you'd like

17:36to impart whatever wisdom that you have in the, now you weren't involved in the acquisition, but you did get the first sight of it. So if you had to go back and do it all over again, what advice would you give your, your, your younger self about the car itself? Um, you can do it. There's, you don't have to pay someone to do it. You can, you're smart enough to figure out how to do it. And when you're not sure, ask people who know, and there's always people that, um, that want to help with this. I noticed like this community, the Ford community, I mean, everyone's just, they're like excited

18:10for you. I think that's the best way to say it. Like I've been in a lot of different professional communities. I've seen some friends that are in Corvette communities and they're just really mean to each other. Like one, one upmanship on the Corvette world, huh? It's very strange. The archetypes, you know, and I think the nice people, we, we tend to have the Mustangs or the Ford products and we're like, oh my goodness, I'm so happy you got that. I had that problem too. This is how you fix it. Right. Right. Yeah, no, no doubt. And I will attest to the fact that there are people in this community that are amazing.

18:43Uh, I was just looking at another Ford vehicle and we were just, we spent 30 minutes just reminiscing about the, the cars and trucks that we have had and, uh, and, and sharing in the joys and the trials and tribulations that we've had on any of the repairs that we have, uh, that we have made on it. Also, um, before we get onto the, uh, onto the 72, uh, let's finish up on this. So body work, are you, you going to do any body work? Does it need any body work? How's the, you live on the East coast. So I'm assuming at some point the car had to share some of the road with some salt.

19:14Is that true? Well, this it's a California car, which is crazy. Okay. But it spent the latter part of its life in Pennsylvania in a garage. So when I say there's no rust, the only rest I found was on the driver's side door, the lower part, and it's very manageable. I don't need to replace the whole door. I just need to grind it out. I was a little hesitant to do any other body work. Cause I'm, I'm not a big fan of my rear quarters. Like they do look like they have a lot of bondo in them, but I wanted to get a little bit more confident, uh, on my body work skills before I dove into that.

19:48Cause the car will need to be repainted and everything, but that's where the, that's a good segue into the mock one project. Cause that was body work. Um, all right. So tell me about the acquisition story of that one.

Acquiring the 72 Mach One

20:00So as though you didn't have enough work with the one Mustang and you thought, Hey, let's get a second one. Cause I'm totally messed up in my brain. Well, it's, it seems to be what I do for fun now. Like I spent every weekend working on the 65, like Saturdays and Sundays from March when the weather was good all the way through July, when we were able to bring it, to get it to the alignment shop and bring it home, um, just to get it going. And like, it's going to be the same workflow with the mock one. I mean, we, my husband and I were kind of looking at getting another car.

20:31He's like, he has cars too. He's a Mopar guy. So he's got a Barracuda 64 Barracuda. Yeah, it's beautiful. Uh, he's got a 65 Valiant. Um, he's got a 72 Valiant that we were going to rebuild, but it's just not, it's like a little too far gone, so we're just going to let go, but so he's kind of a car guy too, in the sense that he appreciates them. So he said, Hey, you know, uh, if you're looking for another one, it was either going to be a fastback, like a 65 or 66 fastback, but they're on the East coast.

21:02You can't find any without any rust. And they're, they're all like shell projects, like within our budget. Cause our budget was like around 10 grand. We weren't going to be like, all right, let's go to the Barrett Jackson auction and like throw some money down. Yeah. Good luck finding 10 grand. You might find the front end only of a, of a fastback at 65 or 66. You certainly aren't going to find a 67 or 68 at that price, but you could find something maybe if you stretch the budget, Oh, to 25 or 30, you know, and you'll still see. Exactly. Oh yeah, exactly. And even around here, some of the prices for fastbacks were like insane.

21:35Um, and then about a week before I saw a Facebook marketplace, it's a beautiful place. Uh, the list for the car that we got, I had the weirdest dream of a grabber blue, uh, Mach one with, uh, and it said like, pay attention. And the dream, it was like focusing on the hood. And I know like with a Mach one hood, it has a, you know, the air intakes. Uh, and it said the hood's going to be different on this one. It's going to be weird. And I'm like, okay, fine. So I'm like, okay, weird dream. I must say eating something a little too late at night or, you know, maybe I watched like

22:08the wrong show or I don't know what happened. Right. So I wake up the next morning and I'm, you know, I'm, I don't think about it too much except the grabber blue color. I really liked that. And I didn't think much of like, you know, we were looking at cars, but I was looking more of like a yellow or, you know, not a red one. Cause I figured that's, I have my thing about red cars, but I guess that's for another podcast episode, but, um, you know, about a week later I see, you know, as soon as I wake up, I check marketplace for no, no good reason. That's probably not good for you, but I see a grabber blue Mach one and I'm like, okay.

22:42And I'm looking at the pictures and I go, that hood is like a regular coop hood. That must be like a Mach that somebody, you know, it's, it's really a sports roof. And they decided to make it kind of look like a Mach or there's, they don't know what they have and it has like the Mach, you know, stickers on it and the back plate. It's like identifiable. I look at the listing and the guy that's selling it is saying, Hey, this is a Mach. Here's the VIN number. It's Mach all the way. It's just that when the person ordered it from the dealership on Long Island, um, they

23:16didn't want to pay the extra money for the special hood or the spoiler with like the, with the vents in them. Yeah. They didn't want that or the spoiler. They just wanted the mock stickers and the, the honeycomb back plate. Right. Um, and the, um, AM FM radio, that was important. Of course. And so, you know, we, we go out to see the car and it's like, it had just snowed again because this winter has been brutal out here. Um, and the car was not too far away. It was like an hour away in Pennsylvania.

23:47So that's, you know, and this is like maybe two weeks after we saw another one, another Mach one up in upstate New York. That was like two hours away. And that one was horrible. The floor was gone. I mean, it's upstate, upstate New York. Right. Absolutely gone. Right. And they had a clapped out three 51 Cleveland in it. That sounded like a rod had gotten bent, but that's a story for another episode, I guess. But we see this one and it's almost like you, you look at the car and you're like, Oh my God, that I have a weird dream. Yes. That is the car from the dream. That's really weird.

24:18Um, the prophecy has been fulfilled. So we made a deal, um, got the car for within our budget. And then the guy even delivered it to my brother-in-laws, which was like a huge help because the guy that I use for transport, he hit a deer with his truck and that's not going to happen. So, so what, uh, what has to be done on the, uh, on the Mach one, because I figure if it was within your budget, while I'm sure that you can get your hands on a nice vehicle, if you search real high and low, um, it sounds like there might still be some work that has to be done on that car.

24:49Yeah, but it's, it's all stuff I want to do, which is, it sounds weird, but it needs brakes, um, brake rebuild master cylinder. Um, the engines probably will, will need to be rebuilt. It runs, it's fine, but you know, I'll read, I'll rebuild the six, then I'll rebuild this one and then I'll have all the confidence and it needs some body work. And that's why I wanted to pick it because it does need, um, at least a passenger rear quarter. And then I would like to get a new passenger door for it. Cause the bottom of that's all rusted out.

25:20Right. And then there's a random little tiny hole in the bottom on the passenger side from, of course, everybody knows their heater cores spring a leak. And then you get that little dribble. Yep. The only pluses it has going for it other than it runs and the engine's fine. Um, it's a three Oh two, which means a Cleveland is like, that's like a lot, like, even for me, you know, like a three Oh two is good. Three Oh two is a very sturdy engine. It's like, we're good on that. Um, it came with a four barrel Holly carburetor.

25:51I don't know much about those yet, but I'm going to become the local expert, I guess. Um, and all the electronics are original, like the, the radio still works. So that means no one has played under that dash, which is something, you know, when my brother-in-law and I were talking about picking up cars and he's like, you really want to get something no one else has touched before. If you plan to restore it, because unless you get a rotisserie restoration, that someone like a shopper, a really detailed person does, you're finding other people's chop jobs and messes.

26:23And my 65 is a little bit of that. I found some interesting wiring underneath the dash always, always between tow packages that people put in the trucks and, uh, and, um, horns that don't work to AM radios that are inoperable to cigarette lighters that, that probably blew up or imploded. At some point, the wiring on every one of my cars has, has seen it's better days. I mean, I've, I, I try to clip away all the stuff that I think is related to stuff that was like aftermarket that isn't, you know, fog lights or stuff. Somebody put on the, on the car.

26:54It's like, no, no, no, I don't want any of that. I want, not that I'm a purist, but I want to deal with as little complications as I possibly can when it comes to the, uh, the wiring that's under there. Oh, it's an absolute truth on that. And I mean, that's where I'm hoping with the mock. It's like the only aftermarket things I saw were, um, a hookup for an eight track player. Nice. And the wires are there. So that means, you know, things are working. The speakers, um, only one speaker works right now. On the back deck or are speakers in the front?

27:27I don't remember. I don't know where they are in the, uh, both spots. Uh, I have them in the back and then somebody cut them in the doors. Oh, but they're the seventies silver, like radio shack ones. So I'm just going to leave those, but I'm going to, I'm going to put new speakers in and hide the wiring through the door through like a wiring harness. Nice. Um, and keep that. And I'm going to, I bought an eight track player that works. Now you've got to find eight tracks.

27:57I actually, I have some. Yeah. You're in a, that's your world. You're in the music world. Yeah. The music thing. Yeah. I know enough record shops that are like, they throw them away practically. Pretty much. Out of here. So, so tell our community the confidence or maybe the lack of confidence up to you, what you can decide which way you're going to go that you've, that you have found in doing all of this work. Cause it sounds like from your 65 and from this new one that you, that you just got, it sounds like you're, you and your husband are doing this work on your own.

28:27And it sounds like you're probably doing a lot of the wrench turning yourself. Oh, it is. Yeah. That's, that's exactly what's happening. I mean, I'm fairly confident enough where my day job, I get people saying, Hey, my car's making this weird noise or my car didn't die at the lake. Can you come take a look at it? Yeah. And I have a toolkit in the, in my trunk of my daily driver. So it's gotten at that point, as long as it's got a carburetor, you know how to work on it. Right. I mean, theoretically. Yeah. I mean, even though we just, my, my brother-in-law and I just worked on a car with ABS brakes and then use the computer to like blast the ABS brakes out.

29:04And I mean, that was cool, but yeah, if it wasn't for my brother-in-law helping out, um, that I would definitely be really lost. I'd be, this would be taking way too long because I'd be having to read everything or watch videos. And if I work at his garage, I just, you know, he's working on his, his hot rods and stuff. And I just go, Hey, Paul, I got a question for you. Isn't it so great to have someone that is either figuratively or literally standing over your, your shoulder, watching you make a repair, because that way you can get the, um, maybe a few less swipes at something until you get it right.

29:41And it sounds like, uh, your brother-in-law, is that for you? A true testament of someone that is being supportive at the same time as they are being helpful at two. Yeah. He, he definitely treats it. Like, uh, I feel like I'm in school, like I'm at Votec and he, he's just the teacher going, yep, that looks good. Okay, fine. Or, Hey, I'm having trouble with this. Yeah. You got to do that before you do that. The amount of, the amount of times that I've spent with, uh, with my buddy, John on FaceTime, holding the camera over my shoulder as I'm saying, okay, now here's where I am.

30:12Am I making the, am I doing this right? Oh no, don't do that. Like I had to bleed the, the, uh, the, uh, the brake lines and I was doing, or do I bench bleed on a master cylinder that I put in? And I'm like, I thought I did it right. And he goes, no, you didn't, uh, no problem, but you got to take it back out. You got to get it back on the bench and you've got to do this. Cause you got to get every single air bubble out of that master cylinder. Yeah. Dang it. If he was, if he was right. And he was, I mean, of course, these guys have done this, you know, hundreds of times and, you know, you and I are doing it for the first time and, you know, pay it forward.

30:45Now that you've done this repair, now that you can, now you could probably help somebody make all these repairs that you've made. Like, uh, did you, did you, when you replaced your master cylinder, how much wisdom did you get from that, that you now can impart upon somebody else? It's about to replace their brake booster and master cylinder as well. Um, all of it pretty much. And I'm going to be going through it again. So that's how confident I am. I'm like, Oh, that's nothing. I already did it. That's an easy one. That's an easy one to do. Power steering pumps and all that. Yeah. I mean, the worst, the worst part of it for me on the Fords was like the, the brake light switch.

31:17And on the 65, when I had to like crawl underneath there, The pedal, the pedal with the, and you get, and get that, you have like a, I don't even know what's, it's the nut on one side and the other side. It's really hard. And it has to go through the, through the pedal itself and into the, into the arm that links up with the booster. Yeah. I know exactly what you're saying. And that light though, depending on the switch type, it's not the easiest thing to try to figure out, but it sounds like you did it. But yeah, we, I mean, we had a lot of connection issues.

31:49It's the original switch connector. I bought an, that was the other thing I was going through. Like we would see something that wasn't right. And I would just have my phone out going order, order, like shopping cart by the end of Sunday. And then it would get there by Wednesday. And I'd be like, okay, well that's next weekend's thing. And I have so many extra parts that we were able to get other stuff to work to where I just have, I basically have CJ pony, like New Jersey version in my garage at this point, like a warehouse full of extra parts, which I'm going to see how many of them transfer over to the 72, probably not a lot.

32:23But I don't think that brake light switch has changed because I was able to get a replacement at like the local auto zone because a lot of Fords use it. So I was excited about that. The brake light activator, actuator in the, in the early sixties, I think was the kind that is like a big rectangular thing that fits in there. It's got two holes and it straddles through the, the bolt, which straddle, which, which pushes through the, the brake, the, the, the rod for the brake pedal. And then the, the later ones is just like a, a little switch.

32:55I can't explain it. It's just like a little plunger, almost a little plunger switch. It, it disconnects or activates the light because it, it bumps up against something. So a couple different types. And again, same thing as you, you're just like, I have all these extra parts now in my garage. I'm like, oh, do you need this hose or do you need that? Yeah. I've got like six of them because I've screwed it up so many times. I've got them all, got them all. No problem. You can have that one too. Well, it's like when we did the exhaust on the car, it came with, that was the funny part.

33:26It came with the flow master and it was attached with like a coat hook underneath the car. Yes. Like a rusted out intermediate pipe and everything was all messed up. So we, you know, my brother-in-law has a lift. So we got it up on the lift the first time. And then we realized the other muffler I was going to put on, wasn't going to fit. So we had to repurpose this one. We put it in another location and we, you know, everything's strapped in really nice. And then we ran out of end pipe and it was, um, I think it was Memorial day weekend. So no stores were like open.

33:57Right. He, he, he rigged up some pipe just so I could get home, like to come out of the wheel well, um, like a hot rod. Like, like, it was just so cool. Right. It was like shooting the exhaust, like back up at me and those cars, like, if you don't seal the back, you just gas yourself. Um, it's like, I came down a couple of weeks later, I went and I bought the, you know, the pieces we needed. And then, you know, we, we clamped those in and then he's like, why are we doing this again? And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like doing it again.

34:28So I don't asphyxiate myself. Yeah, we did it again. And then I realized the, um, the saddle clamps we use were hitting the, cause we're really trying not to hit the springs. Cause anybody who's done exhaust on these cars, there's like no room between the springs and the tank. It's just, how are you supposed to get a pipe out there? I don't know what, except they use like a, you know, a one and three quarter pipe. We're using a two and a half cause we're, you know, on a six cylinder. Why not? That sounds cool. Sounds good. Yeah, it's a nice sound. And, um, so I, I realized the clamps weren't doing it.

34:58So when I got the car back home, I'm like, all right, well, I'm not going to bother him with this. I'm just going to lay on the ground. It's, it was nice weather out, put the radio on, just do the clamps over. I found, um, you know, smooth clamps. Clamps are good. Everybody's happy. Nice. Nice. Well, it sounds like you have done a huge amount of work. You got more work to go. I'm sure you're going to do it and, uh, I'm sure you're going to do it well. And I'm excited to have you back again. Once some of these, uh, uh, um, additional restoration things are done, come on back on the show and give us an update.

35:28In the meantime, send me some photos of your 65, if you would, because I'd love to put that on the cover of our, um, of our podcast episode that we're doing today. Uh, it'll air in a couple of weeks. So if you're in our community and you're listening in, we've, we're doing this during the tail end of a huge snowstorm that they got on the East coast.

Conclusion and Future Plans

35:48I don't know what you guys are talking about. 65, 70 degrees and sunny here in Southern California, but you know what it's, you know, that's, that's what you get for staying on the East coast. Where in, uh, where in Jersey are you living? Oh, a town called Manville. It's, um, if you know anywhere around here, um, it's, I guess the closest city would be New Brunswick. Got it. So you're university, uh, exit nine, exit nine off of the, uh, off of the turnpike. I lived in, uh, Robbinsville for, uh, for a few years in the, uh, in the early nineties and, and loved it there.

36:18I love New Jersey, um, except for the winters. I love New Jersey, Ocean City, New Jersey. You can't beat that town as it relates to, uh, to good family fun and enjoying yourself during the summertime, summer months. Oh yeah, definitely. Yeah. This winter has been exceptionally brutal and I'm taking it personally. Understood. And, and, and it keeps that, that, uh, those Mustangs. Now, how do you, do you have room for all of these cars in your, in your garage or what are you doing? I mean, it depends on your definition of room. Um, I mean, right now we were waiting for this clapped out 72, uh, Plymouth to get sold.

36:54Um, and then we'll have some room, but I mean, I have a garage and that's where the 65 lives. And that was the summer. I like got at that garage and the 72 used to live in there. Uh, the, the, the Mopar 72. And I'm like, Nope, it's getting evicted. We're not getting out of here. It's Mustang is not going out in the, uh, in the weather. Understood. Yeah, it does not. I mean, uh, the Mach one, unfortunately right now it's under a cover, but most of that body work's getting done. So I'm not like too pressed. I mean, we bought it and had snow on it. I mean, the guy was like, I'm not, I'm not here to put lipstick on a pig.

37:27And I was like, well, how are you, why are you calling my car a pig? You already took ownership before you even penned the check to it. Jen, I so appreciate you sharing your Mustang story. And thanks for being here on the show today. And, uh, and thank you for being an inspiration for all Mustang owners, uh, for those, those that you that want to get under the hood and do the work yourself. Jen's able to do it. I'm able to do it. Use us as examples. Well, use me as the example of the idiot that could not do anything before I owned this Mustang. I will not say that about Jen. It sounds like she's always had an interest in, in cars.

37:59She's now got a chance to work on it in the last couple of years on her, uh, on her very own Mustang. So thanks Jen, for being on the show today. Well, thank you so much, Doug. Hey, Ford Mustang community, keep it safe, keep it rolling and keep it on the road until next time. Thanks for listening to the Ford Mustang first generation, the early years podcast. Please subscribe, rate and review wherever you listen to your podcasts ideas for the show. Click the link in the show notes. Thanks again for tuning in.