Hey, Here's my '71 Comet story: Bought my Comet about 10 years ago when I was in high school from my grandpa. Did some questionable bodywork to it and repainted it. I'll post pictures of the original color later as I wish to return the car to that color. After an unfortunate tragedy with my daily driver, I'm driving my Comet again after about 8 years of storage. The work that has been done to the car so far is: Carburetor rebuild, radiator flush, transmission fluid flush, oil change, and rear drum brakes redone. Are there any suggestions as to what else I should do? I'm not that mechanically inclined, but I would like to perform as much of the work as possible. I do have the 1971 Car Shop Manual set from Helminc.com and a girlfriend that puts me to shame on auto repairs and general auto knowledge at my disposal. I have yet to check out the other sections of this forum just yet, but I will. Until then, I'll list some of my questions. 1) Fuel sending unit does not function and thus my fuel gauge doesn't work. I did a quick search the other day and found one on Rock Auto for $100. I believe there's a parts section on this forum so I'll check there too. 2) Front passenger door does not open. Button on the outside handle is stuck and pushed in. I believe I will have to take the door panel off to attempt to fix this, but how when it appears that I cannot take the panel off as the door is shut? 3) Sometimes the car hesitates and sometimes stalls when going around a turn when stepping on the accelerator. Asked a friend a work and he mentioned the float-something (I'm blanking on the rest of it) is off. Does anyone know what I'm trying to say? 4) The car seems to idle fast when cold. Is this a carburetor idle adjustment? The girlfriend actually just found the page in the shop manual for this, but I'll leave the question anyway. 5) I'm not a fan of the idiot indicators on the dashboard as it only tells me when the car is hot (no gauge). I was thinking about installing a temperature, oil, and battery gauge. Any recommendations on a brand, etc etc? And is this difficult? 6) I needed new tires since a week ago. My current tires are P195/75R14. Any recommendations on tires? Also, these tires are fairly skinny. Can I go wider? 7) I live in Northern California (Silicon Valley). Are there any good car meets and junk yards to visit that are specific to Mavericks/Comets? Thanks! I'm looking forward to getting it in good running condition again.
from rancho cordova as far as tires and wheels yes you can go bigger some members have 18's without any mods to the car I believe I have 195x60x15 on the front and 205x60x15 on the rear of my car if I remember right and I want to go bigger just not high on the priority list right now as far as the sending unit goes DO NOT GO BUY IT FOR $100 drop your gas tank and check it its most likely just in need of the little float thats attached to the bottom of the rod coming out of the sending unit. the float things rust out and when they dont float on top of the gas and they cant read anything other than empty. that little guy will be retarded cheap. and super easy to change since it just slips in the hook I would put a fuel filter in the gas line so if theres any crud in the gas tank it doesnt reach the motor did you check the front brakes? you said you checked the back brakes. check all of your gas lines and rubber brake lines check your radiator hoses for cracking if the bottom radiator hose doesnt have a spring in it replace it. as far as a parts place youve found the best place for parts theres also autokrafters and of course evilbay heres a pic of my car you can see I have plenty of room for bigger wheels and tires
I'm getting new tires today as my tires are just trashed (showing wires). I checked for some wider tires and I guess I'll be getting 215s. This weekend, when I get some more time, I'll go through and check all those things you recommend. I'm a newb, so my apologies for this retarded question...Doesn't the gas line already have a fuel filter? Or do you mean replace the fuel filter? Either way, I'll add that to my To-Do list for this weekend. And thanks for autokrafters. Bookedmarked the site for future use. Awesome looking car...Is that windshield ridiculously clean or is that your AC? And is your car rattle canned? My paint job that I got when I was in high school (about 9 years ago) is faded and chipping all over. I was thinking about sanding it down, priming it and just rattle canning it for the time being. Any recommendations if you did the sanding/paint job yourself? And I see you are in Rancho Cordova. I went to undergrad at Sac State. Tried going to Sac the other weekend when it was fairly hot and that's when I blew a head gasket on what was my regular car.
Greetings from Tampa, FL. Always good to see another Comet. As far as fixing the door goes, removing the door panel would be a lot easier if you remove the front seat .... four nuts and another pair of hands to carry it out the passenger side, and it is easy. The panel is backed with pressed board and a bit delicate... do a search here and it has been detailed how to do it without tearing it up. As far as making it a daily driver, the first thing I would do is convert it to front disc brakes. New cars that you share the road with can stop so much better than an old drum brake car.
my windshield is invisible so much that even the wind cant tell its there lol no j/k its out. I took both windows out to check for any rust issues and thankfully there are none when I got my car it was a sand brown and all I did wa sand it all over with a belt sander after tearing off all of the chrome and grinding down the little nubs that stuck out. and went to town with a TON of walmart $1 cans of paint. it came out WAY better than I ever expected with ZERO finish sanding sanding on the car at first then we decided to look for any body damage and stripped the car of all paint and found tons of damage that I wasnt aware of and didnt want to deal with so I just repainted it lol anyway the pic with the windows out shows what a little wet sanding and some more $1 cans of cheapo flat black can get you. my kid actually painted the front fenders and doors but when working on the car what seemed like never ending for a while the paint on the doors didnt hold up so well but who cares itll cost me maybe $10 to paint it again lol enough about my car this is your post lol if youre ever in sac and have some free time fell free to call maybe you can stop by Duane 916-868-5977 or 916-289-8450 and as far as the newb thing dont sweat it youre thinking of very important things that often get over looked until the last second then its like surprise this and that and this are all still broken
It seems like from what I've been hearing and from my failed attempts, I will have to take the front bench out and work on it that way To convert from drum to disk brakes in the front, how much would you say something like that would cost? Say if I tried to do the work? I already had to change my driving habits, by giving the cars in front of me more room. And when people cut me off, I can't help but curse them out hahaha. So changing to disk breaks may be the way to go.
