My Comet GT Build

Pure art!

Good one Doug!!

 

Very nice job! Looking great.

 

Wow! Incredible!

 

Vry nice Dennis! Is the orange coating on the bottom of the car a primer or topcoat?

 

Thanks for the compliments. The reddish coating is Eastwoods rust encapsulator. I haven't decided what to use for an undercoating yet.

 

Another thing I did is add a exhaust mount for the drivers side. This factory brace has provisions for a passenger side hanger mount but none for the left side. I didn't think about it when I did my Sprint and the exhaust guy just put a big sheet metal screw through the floor. So I just duplicated the right side by welding a couple of nuts on a piece of 1/8" plate and then welded it to the brace. I also put a "factory" dent for clearance just like the right side.

 

Dennis, you cut up a perfectly good rear valance!!!! Looks awesome!!!!! I have to give you a call soon.

 

Looks great, I like the exhaust hanger idea too....

 

Nice work and I like the choice on the exhaust tips. I've been thinking that mine should be revised to something similar. Like you, I have been looking at my taillights and looking for a better match to them.

 

Another awesome idea from Dennis!! (the Godfather of Mavericks)

 

Looking good Dennis....

 

Nice work, Dennis! How are you progressing toward retirement and moving to warmer climes?

 

Just waiting for the alarm clock to go off. Nothing much I can really do until the day comes and thats about 14 months away.

 

Power rack & pinion upgrade. Had my buddy Nick come up to give me a hand with this project. I basically used Dave's (55crownvic) pictures as a guide to installing mine. One difference is I wanted to use the factory drag link so I can use stock tie rod ends and no chance of bump steer. First thing I did was install the factory steering box, idler arm, and linkage set up to determine center and compare travel. The Maverick set up moves 7 1/8" left to right, but also moves back 1 1/2" as it goes to either extreme. Maybe some of you geometry wizards can tell me how much lateral movement you loose by this rearward movement. The Cavalier rack moves 5 1/2" total, but its all straight lateral movement. So your probably loosing less than 3/4" of travel on max turn. Well worth it in my opinion. After I had it all centered, I welded some braces to keep the drag link in the correct spot and removed the steering box and idler arm. I also cut off the ends of the drag link where they attached.





From there it was just a matter of finding the best location and orientation for the rack, making sure there is access to install the hoses. We cut some 1/4" plate steel and tacked the mount together.



Here is both mounts tacked up and the drag link in the proper place.



We have the rack turned so that a straight pice of steel will land right on top of the drag link. The original mount uses those bushings. I'm guessing its to isolate road vibrations from the rack. So I figured it was important to make them work for my set up. The original mount must have been about 3/4". I'm using 1/4" so I needed to cut them all down. I took 2 of the bushings, inserted the steel sleeve, and cut the body off with a razor blade.





The other two I inserted in the steering plate and used a sander to level them out.



Once the bushings were cut, I marked the metal insert and cut it down to size. I actually cut it about 1/32" shorter than the combined bushings so I can get good compression on them.



And here is the finished steering link ready for some primer and paint. I need to get some bolts that are 1/2" shorter than the ones in the Moog kit to attach it to the rack.



Now its just a matter of welding and cleaning up the brackets. Here are pictures of the finished brackets and the rack installed.





I made that top washer out of 1/8" plate steel.




Now we need to do this all again for Nick's Maverick. I like to thank Dave aka 55crownvic for posting the pictures to use as a guide, Dave Boyer for supplying me with the needed part numbers, and especially Nick Dominick for is assistance in doing this project.

 

Looks Awesome!! Glad I could help!