My '73 Comet GT Restoration Thread

Lots of room. I'm jealous of the garage. Kudos. Need to make box-stands like those to do my metal work easier.

 

yeah, it is at my parents house in Denton, down 404. If you are ever over this way, let me know and we can hang out in the new shop.

 

Sounds like a plan. My next 4 weekends are tied up but maybe this fall we can hook up.

 

It is a custom color I had mixed up back for the first restoration. I dont know the actual mix though, but it is mainly 1986 Ford F-150 Blue (my dads old truck) and the painter added some purple(?) and pearl. I'm hoping a professional painter can reproduce it.

Here is a pic of the door tag, the car was originally light blue.

 

Real nice, I love that tach also. Tell me about what the car is sitting on please. I think I see some Oak grain patterns. Are they made of plywood?
I am going to move my 72 into my shop pretty soon and like the boxes yours is sitting on
clint

 

They are just wood boxes, with alternating 4x4's stacked inside, 3 high. The plywood on the outside holds everything together. Let the sides run past the top piece of plywood. And make sure they are large enough for your jack stands to fit inside the top of them. They safely add about 12" to your jack stand height.

 

Tooled around today for a little bit. Got the driveshaft, trans and bellhousing out.


Also got the engine ready to pull!


Pulled the bench and test fit the buckets. They look awesome! And even though kinda rough, are more comfortable than the bench. The vinyl patterns don't match... for now.

 

You notice how for mavericks they have cool names like grabber blue and for comets they just say light blue they knew they would be parts car ....I really like the bucket Seats though defiantly subscribed to this thread.

 

actually my old Comet came in Grabber Blue

 

Tinkered around in the shop today. Got the Comet down off the stands, engine pulled and most of the big stuff out of the engine bay. Next is M/S and steering gear, then front and rear window trim comes off, then glass comes out. Cowls, here I come.

The original 302. I think she has a burnt valve on the drivers side. I'll know for sure once I pull it down... later.

 

I'm liking this thread. I had a couple question if you don't mind; what did your Toploader come out of? It seems to have the farther forward shifter mounting location, is that a Falcon mounting? How did the shifter align with the factory shifter hump? Also it looks like a 71 Mustang bell so I'm assuming 164 tooth. If so how did that work with the Z bar stuff?
Thanks

You know it'd be great to get through one thread about a Comet without having to see another inane "parts car" reference. We got it the first 70 times....try to come up with some of your own material

 

Well, when I put the 4-speed in it, I kinda just through it together. In highschool, I did not know much about parts interchanging. I did not know how to decode ford numbers. I bought the toploader at a swap meet, and yes I do believe it came out of a fairlane. The shifter came with the trans. I can check the tag on it the next time Im in the shop. As for shifter placement, it was exactly where I wanted it, which is where I cut the hole out of the floor pan. I don't have a shifter hump. It worked with the bench too.

I bought the bellhousing and flywheel together, at the same swap meet, different person though. I think it is off a 351W truck? The reason I say that is because the clutch I ended up using was for a truck, it was the only one that would bolt up. I can check the numbers on that too.

The z-bar worked great, after I scoured junkyards for manual transmission Comets and Mavericks. Once I had all the parts, it went together and worked great. Although it did have quite high pedal effort, but it could just be the manual clutch. I've only driven 1 manual clutch type car.

Like I said, I will get the numbers on those parts, now I'm kinda curious myself. If you have anymore questions, shoot away.

 

Thanks,
I think a D1TA, which looks like what your bell has on it is a P/N for '71 Mustang but I'm not entirely sure...I usually just copy down the whole P/N off anything I get and run it through Google and immediately get hits on identification. I have a D1TA bell and that's what it checked out as using the full number...but like most things it could've been used on other stuff through the years after '71. Reason I was curious is I have '69 Stang TL (rearward mount shifter) with the D1TA bell and V8 Z-Bar but before I get a proper flywheel for it (164 tooth) I wanted to know if anyone else got one of the bigger bells in there with factory linkage. If you'd had headers in there it would've been even more impressive.
If your TL still has the side tag (RUG or HEH#) on it you can run it through the David Kee toploaders website (http://www.davidkeetoploaders.com) to ID it more exactly. Keep those updates coming!
Thanks

 

The seats are going to look great, Rusty.

As for the incorrect comments about Comets having weak names for colors:

Grabber Blue on Fords = Competition Blue on Mercurys

http://www.mercurystuff.com/1971_mercury_colors.php

 

Thanks!

SEE! Comets are cool too. I found my original color:
http://www.mercurystuff.com/1973_mercury_colors.php
Check out 3B. Light Blue. Dang. It should have been called Light Competition Blue.