Ok, update guys. Fox body mustang is MINE. `400 cash in hand. Title eis mine. Needs a new fender and some interior love. Aka, rip it out. I will post pictures when it is bright out.

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GuinnessFox
Ok, update guys. Fox body mustang is MINE. `400 cash in hand. Title eis mine. Needs a new fender and some interior love. Aka, rip it out. I will post pictures when it is bright out.

that is some nice haggling.

what engine is in it?

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john vanlandingham
Lima 2.3 with Volvo 16v head with lump-ity-lump cams and 48s
Lima 2,3 with Volvo 16v with big 38mm or 39mm intakes, lumpity cams and 50s---a little chamber welding for more quench, this would be for north of 265 bhp*

Think you can get compression ratios that high with a Lima Volvo combo? Still have to figure out something with a cam for mine. Head, valves, and exhaust parts showed up yesterday.

A neighbor up the road has recently bought 3 -89ish Mustangs with 5.0 injected motors. All 3 run and are driveable...all nice beaters that run well. Between $400 and $1000 each. He is retired and getting into cheap drag racing as a late in life hobby. So far he is having a ball for nearly nothing.

For the average ralliest I think they are a viable option. Since the prize money is somewhat small I think the fun factor is priority #1. The old WSP patrol car gave Mike Halliday pretty good service here in the NW with no real drama. Obviously if someone runs at Hursts or Utechts level they'll need to do a bit of work...but most people never come close to that level in reality. Basically for the same dollars that Quinn Morely spent on the old beater SAAB I could build a decent Mustang and I'm sure be way faster.

Ok. So daddymonk (john) and I ripped the fender off and it has the fiberglass hood with a small intake on it. It has the svo or w/e bumper on it that is fubar on the passenger side. Frame is straight but the passenger side floorpan/unibody is a bit.... flakey. The front fenders gotta go. Not worth redoing them; nothing but cancer. The engine also will not turn over. Turn the key and nothing. Everrything has power. Starter isnt even trying to crank. Replace distributor cap and starter? Plugs and wires are brand new.

Glass is all perfect. Rear is perfect. Hatch needs new hydraulic lifters and the rockers need to be blasted and sanded. I invested $600 in tools tonight (jack, jack stands, deep well sockets, air compressor, etc...) so the grand total with towing, the car, parts and tools I am still under 2k. John M., My friend Chuck and several other locals want to help me with this project already. So I am very excited to bring another Fox Body Mustang to the forum. I look forward to posting updates and keeping you guys up to date on everything with John and I posting! Thanks for all your input guys, it really helped me narrow down my options!

How exciting. pretty interested in this... Keep us posted, and pics!

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GuinnessFox
My only concern is initial cost, part availability and upgradable parts. I know for a damn well fact that FWD is the easiest to learn, followed by RWD then AWD. For the time being, I would like to keep a FWD vehicle my priority. Once I have spent a year on the track getting a better feel for it, I would love to upgrade to a RWD system.

"Rally FWD, RWD THEN AWD. You will recover easier with a FWD... you lose it in an AWD/RWD car; you're on a tree."

I found these statements interesting. I admit I am prejudiced towards RWD, but I have to wonder what these 'friends who rally' would say to the situation for rally not that many years ago when you could maybe get a Saab 96 or 99 to rally FWD and everything else was RWD. We weren't 'losing it' and 'on a tree' anymore then than today. Rubbish ideas IMO.

Just my 2 cents on RWD: You need to get the car to turn with the rear more readily than just using the front wheels; seems obvious but how to make that happen? One thing I found years ago was that working on changing the rear brake bias on a RWD car was an important change in making the RWD car less likely to lose in a 'situation'. So as you work on this Mustang, I would highly recommend you work on the F/R brake bias as one of the things before your first event. The details are not important at this moment, but I wanted to plant that idea. You ARE going to get yourself into situations where you don't know how to react (regardless of the car drive configuratoin) and you WILL panic and stand on the brakes many times 'til you learn when that is the wrong thing to do, so having the brake bias set to at least help you rather than hurt you is common sense, IMO.

Good luck; glad you arae joining the fray!
Mark B.

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GuinnessFox
Ok. So daddymonk (john) and I ripped the fender off and it has the fiberglass hood with a small intake on it. It has the svo or w/e bumper on it that is fubar on the passenger side. Frame is straight but the passenger side floorpan/unibody is a bit.... flakey. The front fenders gotta go. Not worth redoing them; nothing but cancer. The engine also will not turn over. Turn the key and nothing. Everrything has power. Starter isnt even trying to crank. Replace distributor cap and starter? Plugs and wires are brand new.

Glass is all perfect. Rear is perfect. Hatch needs new hydraulic lifters and the rockers need to be blasted and sanded. I invested $600 in tools tonight (jack, jack stands, deep well sockets, air compressor, etc...) so the grand total with towing, the car, parts and tools I am still under 2k. John M., My friend Chuck and several other locals want to help me with this project already. So I am very excited to bring another Fox Body Mustang to the forum. I look forward to posting updates and keeping you guys up to date on everything with John and I posting! Thanks for all your input guys, it really helped me narrow down my options!

Congrats on the purchase...I think Distributor cap has zero to do with engine turning over. Battery or connections, starter or solenoid, ignition switch, neutral safety switch, engine seized up or even an accesssory item such as an frozen ac compressor will stop an engine from turning over. If you hear no noise, click or clunk then most likely something in the starter circuit. I've seen several Fords with a bad ground at the starter/block area have that.

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heymagic

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A neighbor up the road has recently bought 3 -89ish Mustangs with 5.0 injected motors. All 3 run and are driveable...all nice beaters that run well. Between $400 and $1000 each. He is retired and getting into cheap drag racing as a late in life hobby. So far he is having a ball for nearly nothing.

For the average ralliest I think they are a viable option. Since the prize money is somewhat small I think the fun factor is priority #1. The old WSP patrol car gave Mike Halliday pretty good service here in the NW with no real drama. Obviously if someone runs at Hursts or Utechts level they'll need to do a bit of work...but most people never come close to that level in reality.

I do too, Gene, but I think most can have loadsa fun with the 2300, or maybe the V6 and some gearing, instead of the heavy and poor performing stock 5.0

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Basically for the same dollars that Quinn Morely spent on the old beater SAAB I could build a decent Mustang and I'm sure be way faster.

What money did he spend? Where?
And, You could be faster than how he drove that poor ol Saab in a stock 78 so called 510. How could you NOT?

---

John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
CALL +1 206 431-9696
Remember! Pacific Standard Time
is 3 hours behind Eastern Standard Time.

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john vanlandingham

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heymagic

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A neighbor up the road has recently bought 3 -89ish Mustangs with 5.0 injected motors. All 3 run and are driveable...all nice beaters that run well. Between $400 and $1000 each. He is retired and getting into cheap drag racing as a late in life hobby. So far he is having a ball for nearly nothing.

For the average ralliest I think they are a viable option. Since the prize money is somewhat small I think the fun factor is priority #1. The old WSP patrol car gave Mike Halliday pretty good service here in the NW with no real drama. Obviously if someone runs at Hursts or Utechts level they'll need to do a bit of work...but most people never come close to that level in reality.

I do too, Gene, but I think most can have loadsa fun with the 2300, or maybe the V6 and some gearing, instead of the heavy and poor performing stock 5.0

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Basically for the same dollars that Quinn Morely spent on the old beater SAAB I could build a decent Mustang and I'm sure be way faster.

What money did he spend? Where?
And, You could be faster than how he drove that poor ol Saab in a stock 78 so called 510. How could you NOT?

Oh I didn't mean to imply that a V8 was THE choice, just cheap power readily available. Weight wise the 4 banger is a very potent candidate as well as several V-6 options. I owned a Fox body with the 2300. Header,cam, weber, shorter gears..it was a great street car (still rallied datsuns in those days). I'm sure with a JVL spec 4 cyl it would be lotsa fun.

Oh man, hahaha. I hope it's not a seized engine. That'd be a hell of a thing. Oh well, more tool time. Gotta pull the tranny selector for sure, it's sloppy and sticky. Interior is... nice at least. :x I am putting bucks on the electrical system. Bought a new battery and it still did nothing. Any good ways to check these problems easily besides ripping everything apart? I'm putting money on, "Buy a repair manual."


But yeah, they put a shitty sound system in the back. HERE ARE SOME PICTURE GUYS~

http://s166.photobucket.com/albums/u113/Minnesotanwolf/Mustang%20Project/

Excuse me while I link these photos:

















The Moose-Angst is worlds ahead of the Coupe GT for making a (relatively) inexpensive rally car. Get a good cage in it. Talk to rally people in the area to find the right person/shop...resist the urge to get your buddy's buddy who does roundy-round shit to "get you a real good deal" on a cage. It just doesn't work. Or if you're good at that stuff, read the crap out of the rulebook and do it yourself. And that flimsy Fox shell will need a few miles of seam welding.

You're in Rally America land, so the V8 is out unless you have a resume of racing experience to show them. You ought to just put some evil mini-stock 2.3 Ford engine in it anyway (it'll probably be quicker than anything but an obscene V8 anyway). Sell off the interior bits to somebody who cares about that stuff, you aren't going to need 90% of it (you'll probably want the dash and door panels, the rest...nope). Throw a spool and a shorter (higher numerical) ring and pinion at it, get a close ratio gearset for the T-5 and go beat the ever living piss out of it.

Talk to John about the suspension. After he beats the hell out of you over the phone for buying a Moose-Angst, he'll figure out a good solution for you.

for a cage builder in MN I suggest Doug Davenport, good work at a good price.

http://www.davenportracingusa.com/

you should have this page at the top of your favorites list:
http://rally-america.com/rules.php

at a MINIMUM the cage needs to be like this:
http://www.rally-america.com/info/2008_Rollcage.pdf

davenport knows this and can issue logbooks too.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/18/2011 09:57PM by Greg Donovan.

No need to get it running. Just pull the motor out and sell it.

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alkun
No need to get it running. Just pull the motor out and sell it.

yep, put some money back in the budget for a nice 2.3 I4.