Last of the V8 Interceptors.. my XB Falcon Coupe

Daved_XB

The passenger side has been fully blocked back now





She’s been spun around now & the top half of the drivers side has also been blocked back…





I do wonder sometimes if I’m just spamming this build thread now with these pics, but I know I’m learning just how much work actually goes into a paint job when it’s done right..

Gremlinertia

Nope, i don't think it's spamming anyway.. It's an interesting insight i wouldn't normally find, all of the build threads!

thereitisgone

Please keep as many pictures coming as possible
Really looking forward to seeing it with its final paint
Great thread

biketard

Spamming? It's the whole reason we're here! Keep posting as many pictures as you like!

quietsailor

biketard wrote: »

Spamming? It's the whole reason we're here! Keep posting as many pictures as you like!

^^^^ What this person said, I'm facinated by the photos, even to the point of opening them on a new tab so I can zoom in and see the work, I consider what you & your painter are doing as art, not "just" a car paint becasue of the detail that is going into the work. It's facinating to me!

Daved_XB

Thanks for all the kind words guys... I'll keep up the constant updates so..

Daved_XB

We’re playing with fitting the front bumper now, this is done without the guards on as the process is to get the bumper square on the car first & then the hanging panels will be adjusted to suit





Also working on getting the front guard “eyebrows” to fit, I don’t understand why Ford did this particular design cue.. there is no model of XB in the range that uses a different eyebrow so there was no need to not just have the guard be a one piece design. I assume this design was to give panel beaters & painters something to do as they never fit right





Next job for me will be to lose my temper, throw tools around & learn new curse words as I try to remove & replace the worn door hinge pins that were designed to never come out as they are well worn & cause the door to sag once opened..

Wibbs

Daved_XB wrote: »

I assume this design was to give panel beaters & painters something to do as they never fit right

And then the design met you guys.

Daved_XB

I was feeling a little left out of the XB process so I’ve jumped back on the tools & did a thing as Clarkson would say.. I’ve stripped the paint off the scuttle panel now, the metal is perfect so that just needs some primer & it’s ready to go



I’ve also cleaned back the underside of the boot lid… again this is perfect so only primer & paint needed..





On the subject of paint… the final colour paint has been ordered now.. so no going back on that decision without significant finical impact (quality paint is expensive here). Next job for me on the weekend will be to strip back the underside of the bonnet.

I’ve also made some progress on operation gearbox decision… I’m keeping the car an Auto as I had said before, but I don’t want only 3 forward gears as that will see the car revving at over 3200RPM on the highway at 110kph given the rear gearing I plan on running. I had been doing a lot of research into a Gear Vendors Overdrive to bolt to the back of the gearbox & I love this tech that gives an OD to every gear in the box… however my big question was always would it fit in my XB… I finally found a guy with an XB who’d fitted one to his. You can see it’s a bulky item that gets bolted to the back of the gearbox



Here it is installed in the car



Now the thickest part of this bolt on piece of kit (where the black solenoid is) lines up perfectly with the depression in the floor where the front bolts for the front seats go… however that is exactly where the beefy rear suspension torque tube brace is for my fancy multilink rear end set up



This had been my big concern all along with the idea… so now I think I’ll have to go to plan B.. I think I’ll still look at getting one for the Dodge mind you as I don’t have any clearance issues there.

Daved_XB

It took forever to get the underside of the bonnet back to shiny metal.. there are some many tight curves & angles & recesses etc that it was a proper pain… but it’s done





Both front edges of the bonnet have rust issues that will need to be sorted, as I had lots of time to think whilst I was removing the paint I’ve drawn a conclusion that since the very front of the bonnet is angled down & is in fact angled off to the side, I guess that any water in between the bonnet skin & the frame ultimately flows down to these corners… perhaps that’s why they are the only spots of rust on what is otherwise a perfect bonnet.

Daved_XB

The rear bumper is now almost finished… it’s centred now & standing upright as it should.





The section where it curves under the drivers side rear light panel is perfect



But the factory panel isn’t the same shape left to right so the gap is about 2.5mm bigger on the passenger side between the bumper & the underside of the light panel, so we’ll have to fill this gap in with lead or filler

Daved_XB

More work was done on the passenger side rear bumper gaps… they are as good as you can get now







The bumper then came off & the whole rear end has been worked smooth & premiered… doesn’t matter that this section will never be seen, he has it so that it will mirror smooth when painted





Now we move onto the engine bay as the last section of the car to be done pre-paint… the lower drivers A pillar section was a mess & now that’s been sorted

Daved_XB

The eyebrow moulds on the front guards have come up great… no option but to use a thin layer of filler here as they aren’t even close to the shape of the actual guard.



The shell is being masked up as he wants to get the final coat of primer on by next week now



We’re starting on the engine bay now.. this is where I’m a little freaked out as my painter has said that this is the section he loves to get perfect as it really stands out, if by that definition he doesn’t feel the rest of the car is perfect now then I’ll be mind blown by what he’ll do here.

Daved_XB

Daved_XB

Hmmm... they've changed how I upload pics, let me go find out how to do that again now... normal service will be resumed shortly

Daved_XB

Testing some imaging loading types

[URL=https://app.photobucket.com/u/Daved_XB/a/231d26bf-c0d2-422f-8acd-b7399ba7cdd7/p/fb6be521-7a6f-4fa4-b77e-78e666d61a21][IMG]https://hosting.photobucket.com/albums/qq330/Daved_XB/Engine%20rebuild/.highres/OilyBit_zps9f0d0bc8.jpg?width=1920&height=1080&fit=bounds[/IMG][/URL]

https://hosting.photobucket.com/albums/qq330/Daved_XB/Engine%20rebuild/.highres/OilyBit_zps9f0d0bc8.jpg

https://hosting.photobucket.com/albums/qq330/Daved_XB/Engine%20rebuild/.highres/OilyBit_zps9f0d0bc8.jpg

Daved_XB

Ok.... so it seems that I can't link to my pics that are stored on PhotoBucket anymore & have them displayed in the thread... seems the only way I can get a pic in here is if it's on my local HDD & I upload it. This is actually a bit of a **** for me as I take so many pics I don't normally keep them on my HDD I just upload them to PhotoBucket also the old site allowed me to write up a long post just coping in links to PB & then I could cut & paste the whole update in on the different forums I run these same threads on.. now Boards will need it's own unique way of updating.. I'll give it a day or two to see of they add back in the functionality the old site had for posting images, if they don't I'll download the pics from my camera again to my HDD & upload them all one by one... what a massive backwards step I think that is for the forum.

Gremlinertia

Agh that's a pity Daved, it was indeed supposed to be easier, as you say hopefully things will improve over the coming days/weeks

Daved_XB

The underside of the bootlid I’d taken back to bare metal is all primed now

I said a few posts back that I was going to go with plan B for a transmission for this car….. well plan B is an AOD transmission, that’s fancy Ford speak for Automatic OverDrive (not very inventive with the name). They do two types of AOD’s a mechanical version called an AOD & an electronically controlled on called…. Wait for it….. an AODE.

AODE’s are common enough here but the earlier AOD’s aren’t & also stock they won’t take any more that 400HP-450HP but I was going to have to find somewhere that sells a tuff built trans that will take over 700HP. I'd been doing my research & I had found the perfect build, but the Aus$ to US$ is crappy right now & shipping times are very drawn out so I was resigning myself to this not being as smooth as I'd like.

Then this week the car gods decided to shine on me... I was on a FB group & a guy posts up a for sale Ad for the exact build of AOD that I'm after, brand new still in the box & unused & as he bought it from the US back when the $ was parity & he was only looking to get back what he paid for it I've saved thousands... so massive win win for me... got the exact trans I wanted for less that I was expecting & it's only in Sydney so I can get my mate Dru to go collect it & I won't delay the build waiting for a trans to arrive from the US in time… mind you Sydney has just gone back into covid lockdown so who knows when I might get it now.

The trans is a built wide ration unit with beefed up input shaft, full race shift kit, performance clutches etc.. built for over 700HP so that's perfect for me.

It comes with everything I'll need too... 2600RPM stall, yoke, linkages, cables, flexplate, spacerplate etc...

Daved_XB

Now with Boards being offline for a week a lot happened.. so the next update is spread over the last week.. We moved on to the final primer coating for the car…

Ok... I don't get why some of the pics are uploading sideways... they look fine on my laptop prior to uploading

Daved_XB

We decided to mix up some of the final colour for the car too & to paint some of sections that will be forever hidden behind other panels etc now, just cause we can & we wanted to finally see some pops of colour on the old girl

We also decided to use the colour for the final sanding guide coat so that gives her a nice pink hue for now...

Daved_XB

Now these pics don't do the colour any justice... but here is the backside of the rear valance panel, this is just 2 coats straight off the gun & hasn't been wet sanded or polished obviously so this is not a reflection of how good the final colour will pop.. but it gives some idea of the shade

Daved_XB

It was time to rebuild the hinges, you can't get new hinges for the XA-XC yet so a hinge rebuild kit with new bushes, pins & springs is as good as it gets.. The old pins are pressed it & then the ends are mushroomed to make it really hard to ever get them out again... luckily for me there was so much slop in the upper hinges that I could get a cutting blade in-between the two halves of the hinge & cut the pin. 

Then it was simple to drive out the pin pieces 

That’s one cleaned up & ready to reassemble

Pressed in the new bushes

Then the new pin

That's one finished then

Then both

Daved_XB

The lower hinges are a bulkier item & they get a new spring also... of course the trick to installing any new spring that needs a lot of tension put on it during the installation is to use the word ****, fucker & **** prick a lot.... I didn't take a pic of it, but what I actually did was cable-tie the end of the springe thru the hole in the spring so I didn't have to go looking for it every time my hand slipped during installation as it couldn't launch itself across the garage  

All 4 are done now & ready to be painted before going back on the car

Daved_XB

The hinges some other brackets & the inside of the doors then got their final primer coat

Daved_XB

We're running out of stuff to do now... so paint is going on, all the hinges/brackets above got done & the insides of the doors too got their first coat of shiny red... The colour I've gone for is the one that Alan Moffat used on his racing Mustang here in the 70's & Eric Bana based his off too.... for your reference that colour is called Rosso Formula 1, Ferrari colour code 234143.

Annoying that the pics load up 90deg out... I can't seem to find how to fix that... sorry ..

We still have some work to do inside the engine bay, so that'll happen soon & we'll paint the inside of the shell next most likely... then we'll have no option but to pull the pin & paint the bloody thing I guess

Daved_XB

The back side of the front guards & the insides of the doors have been painted now in the same Ute bed liner that I'd painted the underside of the car in. Choose this option as it's tuff & has a sound deadening quality built in.  

I've had a change of mind now on the red tinted version of this that I had sprayed the underside of the car in before she went to paint... I've decided that that was a bad idea, so now we're going to black all of that out too.. I think this will look much better in the long run.

Daved_XB

Repairs have been carried out to the underside of the bonnet edges, it's odd I really thought that my bonnet was in great condition but turns out it needed the most filler of any panel on the car in the end.

All coated in primer now...

Daved_XB

With the inside of the doors & the guards done, they have been masked up again & now the next two coats of final colour have gone on..

biketard

That's looking incredible. Massive win on the trans too!

quietsailor

Congratulations on the transmission, that sounds like a huge saving!

Daved_XB

The underside of the boot lid & the bonnet go sealed, from the factory these panels never had any sealing so the where the skin joins the frame always looks crappy on this panels... but we've sealed them as good as we can.

More paint is going on more panels... the front & rear valance panels are done now, as is cowl panel. Sorry for the blurry pics, but I'm still in lockdown so can't go visit yet. The underside of the boot lid & the bonnet are now done too.

Daved_XB

Ok... so I have very little words here for this update, but I've just been to see the hanging panels & OMFG they look amazing... they look liquid, I seriously thought they were still wet when I walked into the booth.. this pics make them look shite compared to how amazing the finish looks.. & this is just off the gun, they will be wet sanded back & then polished before I collect them... this car is going to look epic, epic I tells ya...

listermint

Clean paintwork alright.

K.Flyer

You are going to have to do a Video Reveal when it's totally finished.

Daved_XB

I've had a few people now constantly tell me that I need to move with the times & start a youtube channel to deliver these updates rather than keep updating threads on forums... who knows maybe I'll look into that

K.Flyer

I follow a couple of youtoob car restoration / repair channels.

And while it's great to see the nitty gritty details, I imagine there is a lot of work involved to produce a 30 minute video.

I'd say in your case, an occasional short video walk around of things as you get through the reassembly would be a huge treat for many.

Daved_XB

So I have collected the doors, guards, front & rear valance trays from my painter today... along with a load of brackets etc... these are now being stored in one of the spare rooms in the house along with a lot of the original interior as you can probably see... so we move another step forwards...

Daved_XB

The boot lid is also finished & was collected by me just prior to the last full curfew lockdown... the Bonnet was finished this morning & I was sent this shot but who knows when I'll be free to be allowed to drive the 1km to pick that up.....

Work will start on the engine bay next week with a view to getting the engine bay & the inside of the car painted by some next week... that will then just leave the big job of the outside of the shell... but all things being equal she'll be finished very soon... just hope it won't be against the law to go collect the **** thing then...  

Daved_XB

It was time to do the very last bit of metal work to the XB.. years ago when someone else owned her the passenger side sway bar mount was obviously cracked & the owner decided to "repair" it.... to do this they took some 2.5mm plate by the looks of it & then rather than measuring it & cutting it to shape to fit they described the part to someone down a dodge phone line using units of measurement like about the length of the last dog turd you saw etc... 

Anyway... thank god for plasma cutters is all I can say, there is no way I could have gotten a grinder blade in to these tight bits to cut that "repair" section out.

Then a new piece of 5mm plate was actually measured & cut to shape to weld in

Note to self remember to not weld up the two holes for the actual sway bay mounting bolts to pass thru

A quick linish back with the grinder & she's done... I added the exact same plate to the other side too.. I think it's come up nice, almost better that it was before I started too IMHO

Daved_XB

That repair section is now fully primed & ready to go... 

Daved_XB

I want to start working on the Diff now, so I can hopefully have it ready to go back into the car when I get the car back... needed to get it off the ground & onto the work bench... on my own.. so used the hoist to get it up to the height I needed then just slid it over 

Daved_XB

The Bonnet is home now too... so that's every panel painted & wait for the shell

The top of the front engine bay rails used to have a bad kink in it from bad precious repairs... that is now fixed & perfectly smooth

Sadly due to lockdowns I can't get over to help my painter move the car & work on it... so the shell is still not painted sadly...

biketard

I love how your panels have their own bedroom.

Daved_XB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117872643#Comment_117872643

Wait... doesn't everyones???

It would be remiss of me to not call out Mrs_XB at this point for being super supportive of my car habbit & just all around awesome. Putting the panels in that room to ensure their safety 100% was in fact her idea & not mine. Lucky for us we have 2 spare rooms, not that either are actually needed right now due to the lockdown restrictions here that won't allow friends over to our house anyway.

Daved_XB

Not much of an update but the rear light panel & the boot channels have all been painted up now...

Daved_XB

Sorry for the crappy pic quality (I can't get around to take any myself) here is a bit more..... the rear tail light panel.. boot channels & up under the rear window are done as are the door jams & sills now... 

Daved_XB

It's amazing how time consuming the whole masking up process is around painting... the interior needed to be painted so the whole car exterior needs to be masked off...

The drivers side door jams are getting painted next then the engine bay so the whole car has been bagged 

Daved_XB

We've moved onto the interior now, I had painted it in the Raptor paint for it's sound deadening qualities & as you may remember that I'd tinted it the same red as the car had been painted as my thinking at the time was it'll all be covered anyway so who cares what colour it is. Well turns out my painter cares what colour it is... so he set about fixing it. First it needed a primer base to cover my crimes against cars

With that done he hazed the inside with the exterior colour, he's done this in the same way that Ford did from the factory.. to save paint & dollars Ford only really lightly hazed the inside of the cars with the paint.. I mean no one will ever see it so who cares.... so now mine looks like the Ferrari F1 red was done at the factory & not in a shed.

The floor inside the cabin is now black again as per how it would have been leaving the factory

Daved_XB

Here are some more pics of the car as she stands right now, the inner rear guards have been painted too.. not taken by me personally of course as we're 51 days into our 7 day lockdown & I can't visit the car...