It’s said that time flies. No kidding. I can’t even remember the last time I posted something on this site, and I don’t even want to look. I also can’t believe I’ve owned my 1971 Ford Torino 500 for 10 years!
For those who don’t know, in the state of Florida, after owning a vehicle (having it registered) for 10 years, the DMV will send you a new license plate automatically. This year, I was shocked when I thought I was getting my little registration sticker in the mail, and instead got a piece of stamped metal.
Here’s my story of everything that I’ve done to my Torino, and the long term ownership of a classic car. Heck… There was ever one point when I had to daily drive my classic car, and that was, well, better than expected. Buckle up, and let’s go.
When I First Got It
He was honest and told me it was going to be a father son project, but his son wasn’t doing well in school, and that idea was over.
He did tell me there was a good amount of rust, and as the years went on, there was FAR more hidden than he knew about.
The Plan That Failed
The original idea was to get the car, put a little bit of money into it, enjoy it for a few years or so, and either flip it for a small profit, or trade it for something a little better. I wanted to repeat that again and again until I got something really nice. 10 years later, here I am.
The Mechanical Repairs, Upgrades, and Changes
Instead of just going in order for everything, I’ll break it up into sections. This part might surprise you the most. This car is almost all original, with very little done to it in terms of repairs.
The first thing I decided to do was put out some fires. No, really… A few days after owning the car, it caught on fire while I was leaving a late night (2am) shift at work. That was fun! She burned for about 7 minutes before I got a fire extinguisher to put the fire out. Needless to say, I have one in all of my cars now.
Since the chemicals in the fire extinguisher got sucked into the carb the next day when my mechanic fired it up and then I let it sit for a while, it got corroded, and I needed a new one. That was the first carb… I also put new spark plugs and wires in it, an HEI style distributor, and then I had to fix the driver door since it stopped opening from the outside.
That was accomplished by replacing a cable tie inside the door that someone else used to fix it last that broke. Could I have gotten the right part? Sure, but I had a cable tie. 10 years later, it still works. So yes, I fixed my car with a cable tie.
Around this time, my daily driver (my 2005 Mustang) was in the shop getting its transmission replaced, so for probably seven days, I had to drive my Torino about 75 miles roundtrip every single day. She handled it like a champ, but I did need to keep transmission fluid with me.
The next biggest thing was addressing the very bad transmission fluid leak. For that, I replaced the transmission pan gasket, and everything was fine.
After that, I took a turn into my neighborhood one day, and the car popped itself into neutral. The linkage bushing said (at that point) 46ish years was enough, and fell apart. I replaced that. I do probably need to make a new adjustment, but hey… Still going strong.
After that, nothing really interesting happened until I went for a drive one day and my brake pedal went to the floor. Thankfully I was able to roll to a stop. One brake master cylinder later, I was good.
It was also around this time that I did my first oil change in 6 years and another set of spark plugs and a new carb. Whoops. Can you tell I don’t really care about this car? That was also when my Harbor Freight jack stand collapsed. Why THAT video has under 500 views is beyond me, and one of the reasons I gave up on YouTube.
I have gone through two or three more carbs since then too. I keep using cheap Chinese ones, and the car sits for weeks or months at a time. The ethanol in modern gas kills carbs. I also ended up putting in a new fuel pump thinking it was bad, but it ended up being yet another carb.
At some point I also fixed my fan shroud with a soda can because I’m a cheap SOB.
To fix the rest of the fuel issues and some power steering leaks, I took the car to my mechanic, and he replaced a few power steering hoses and fuel lines.
Very recently I started attacking more of the suspension. I replaced the front swaybar bushings that were literally not there anymore, as well as the swaybar endlinks. I noticed I needed them when doing my second oil change in 10 years, I bumped into the sway bar, and it moved. That’s not supposed to happen.
There is plenty more than I can do, but she runs, drives, and stops. That’s good enough for me for now!
Cosmetic Changes, Restoration, and Preservation
This car is FULL of rust. If you close the hood, trunk, or doors, you can hear rust rain down. What’s left of the firewall is a waterfall when it rains, for the longest time you could see from the rear pillars to the ground (yes… even through the trunk floor), there are trees growing out of it, about 9 holes in the gas tank, very little trunk floor or any floor left, and so much more.
The last owner did disclose what he knew, but I don’t think the guy he got it from did to him. There were TONS of really bad fiberglass patch repairs. Nothing against that, but when doing my own repairs, I was pulling out dry sheets of fiberglass. They didn’t use resin…
Anyway, from the start, I used some gas tank putty and plugged up the tank. Dumb idea, but whatever. I don’t fill the tank up beyond halfway for that reason.
Next I attacked the areas around the deck lid and filled in a bunch of holes with really strong fiberglass patches. I put body filler over the patches after and painted them, and I’m very pleased with how they turned out! Would welding in metal be better? Yes. Can I weld or have the tools for it? No. Was I about to let sparks fly near a gas tank with holes in it? No.
My biggest satisfaction come from the (I guess C, even though there are no B) pillars at the rear. What I thought were a couple rust holes turned out to be awful fiberglass repairs when I attacked the areas with my angle grinder.
I got those two areas down to bare metal (what was left of the metal), and then made my own patches. They turned out great, are super strong, and no more seeing the ground! I then did the same with the panel between the decklid and rear winder. That needs more work, but hey… baby steps.
Beyond that, I did another patch on the roof to stop rain from getting in, and a couple more in various locations.
I don’t want to get too carried away with the floors or anything like that until I stop water getting in, and that means working from the top down, but… I really don’t care…
What’s Next?
I probably missed a few little things, but it’s still crazy it’s been 10 years. Only two oil changes, and probably only 1000 miles put on her. I never kept track, and the title said EXEMPT on the mileage when I made the purchase.
As for what’s next, I really would like to plug up all of the holes letting in rain, and replace the gas tank. Finding a 1971 tank is impossible. It seems like they were only made for one year. The 1970 tank will fit dimensionally, but there’s a bump on the 1971 tank that’s missing on the 1970 tank. I don’t know how important that is.
Once all that’s done, I would just like to keep patching holes, working my way down. She’ll never have a full restoration, but once again… but she runs, drives, and stops, and that’s good enough for me for now!
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