Ownership Verified: 1967 Ford Fairlane 500

Well, first up, a video i should have put up in July, but have been procrastinating with
My New (then) exhaust:
[YOUTUBE]fplndvRlu1I[/YOUTUBE]
And on to the more recent news:

Turns out, one of my few winter excursions with the car broke the oil drain plug, a small problem, right? It would be if it didn?t already have a (stripped) oversize drain plug, forcing me to use one of those stupid rubber things.

Well, I decided that since I probably need a new pan, i might as well try using a bolt again, so, down to checkers to get a double oversize drain plug.

Which promptly broke the tack welds in the pan, rendering it completely useless.

So, I needed a new oil pan, which meant I had to, at least partially pull the engine.

And if I am at least partially pulling the engine, I might as well go all the way, and double check the shoddy engine rebuild that was done at some point in the cars past.

Ended up finding aluminum shavings in the pan, as well as a severely carbon-ed up combustion chamber, and discolored valves. As well as painted gaskets, many missing bolts, and one loose(ish) rocker, as well as mismatched head bolts (a few of which were loose) and several missing exhaust manifold bolts.

At this point, I?m thinking: Well shit. If they can?t put all the bolts in, and they couldn?t properly tighten the ones they did put in, whose to say they did the main caps right? Or the rods? Or hell, ANYTHING?

A Remanufactured engine is only about $1400, shipped to my door, and installed, with the core shipped back. And it would have more power, and be knowingly built right.
Verses about $400 of machine work on the heads, and about $500-$800 of machine work and assembly work on the block itself, along with the $100 gasket set.

So, the plan now, since its winter, and I can?t drive it anyways, I will save up my $$$ and get the new engine. In the meantime, I will clean up the old one (get the carbon off, old gasket, etc) so that it can be shipped back as a core, AND, if it?s taking too long to save up the money for a new engine, I can put the old one back together as-is, and run it till it dies, or I get the money to get the new engine.


And, PICTURES!!






REMEMBER, always drain ALL the fluids before pulling a engine. the transmission too! D'oh
 
Nice on the transmission fluid mistake. :lol:

Wjen I was in highschool we were disassembling a motor and we thought the tranny had been drained to we uncoupled it from the enngine and sploosh. Fluid everywhere.
 
Huh, I could have sworn I updated this months ago...
I got the engine all cleaned up, and installed around the end of what, I think February...
Drove it for a week before I realized, "Oh shit, I put the old oil pump in. no wonder the pressure is lower then it should be"
Pulled the engine again, and fixed that little oops.. took me all of a day to pull it, fix it, and put it back in lol :mrgreen:

Been running perfectly ever since. Up to about 15 mpg city, and 20 mpg highway.. and our highways are anything but flat :lol:...

Now, on to what I really came here to post. Since the 'Lane is running so good, the K5 decided it was being neglected, and decided to break.
wasn't running right, hesitations, loss of vacuum, really bad mileage (compared to usual lol)
Replaced most of the vacuum lines, and did a carb rebuild.
That seemed to fix everything, till I took it up the mountain, the hesitation under load came back. Turns out, I forgot to hook up a vacuum line when i put the carb back on. oops...

Here are some of the pics I took that day, Most are from a road called "Reservation Ridge".. or rather, the road goes along a place called that hehe








 
Good to hear teh farelane is u pand going.

I love those old K5's. I've thought about getting one for so long. I really want a mid 70's one witht he full black grill. Such good looking trucks.
 
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Thanks for the comments guys.


Time for another update on the vehicles.
The blazer decided it was not going to pass emissions this year, and since I have no $$ for repeated tests while I troubleshoot it, and since it has been running better then ever before, I decided to register it in Cedar City instead. I am going to college there, and its an emissions exempt county :lol:

The Fairlane has been running really good too, so i took it out for a drive today.

Unfortunately, I was too lazy to stop and get out for every picture, so I took them though the windshield. very few managed to turn out, but I will post the best of them. It was a beautiful day, and I managed right around 19 mpg...
Not bad for a 42 year old carbureted v8 hehe...

Took a video or two as well, and since i was in a video kind of mood today, I decided to do a video proof of ownership too, along with the usual picture kind...
On to the Pics!





[YOUTUBE]l8iEKYj2Xhc[/YOUTUBE]

And the proof of ownership for both my vehicles..
Fairlane
[YOUTUBE]vePJ047DUXY[/YOUTUBE]


Blazer
[YOUTUBE]KuCYYZavIC0[/YOUTUBE]


Proof enough? lol
 
good looking shots there man! through the windshield or not! and around 19 mpg ? i struggle hard to get that in my 6 speed camaro. damn heavy right foot :)
 
That mountain road looks like a nice drive. Car sounds killer too!
 
Well, quick update,
I put mudflaps on it,
I fixed the heater,
drove it to Cedar City for school,
drove it back to Spanish,
fixed the truck, (carb rebuild, and replaced almost the entire ignition system)
Parked the Fairlane,
and now i am driving the truck again lol
:cry:

this going back and forth between vehicles is getting old.. I cant decide on just one, I want them both lol
 
Keep the fairlane as a classy daily driver and lift/lock/and otherwise offroad prep the blazer. That's what I would do. (infact that's what I plan on doing with my Jeep and an El camino
 
Well, as of right now, long term plans are to do a little mini-resto on the Fairlane, and do some mods like a modern fuel injected 302, and 5 speed manual swap, as well as a few aero related mods I have in mind.

It will end up flat black, and I hope to be getting ~25-30 mph highway out of it when its all said and done.
Not building it for power per-sey, but efficiency, since i love driving. Paying for 15 mpg or less when i like to do 500 mile drives gets real expensive, real fast lol
It will just be a cruiser/daily/road trip car...

The Blazer on the other hand, I still have to make a decision on.
Do i want to make it into a full on expedition vehicle?
if I go Expedition style, then 35" tires, Dana 60, and 14 bolt axles, as well as a diesel engine are all planned, as well as the usual lockers, 4 speed manual, long range gas tank, etc... I want it to be:
fairly capable, (it already is really)
virtually indestructible,
and to have as long a range as possible.

The other option would be to get a Suburban to do that ^ to, and then set the blazer up as a more short term offroad rig, just light wheeling. a sort of, "any time, any where" sort of thing.
If i did that, then the blazer would just get the rust fixed, a less anemic engine, and selectable lockers front and rear.
I would keep the 31" tires and ten bolts, and just keep it sane.

and go all out on the Expedition 'Burb :mrgreen:

Course, all that is going to happen way, way in the future
Right now, I am a cash-strapped college student, that lives 200 miles away from the house where the vehicles are parked, and I can only have one at a time here in Cedar City lol
when I have the Blazer down here, It makes it nice to go places in the snow or dirt, but every time I hit the asphalt, I wish I had the car.
When I have the 'Lane down here, It's nice to be able to go driving on the weekend, but every time i see a dirt road, I sure do wish I had the 4x4 Blazer...

The argument of which vehicle I take is one that will never be won.
The Fairlane is nicer to drive
The Blazer goes more places
The Fairlane gets better mileage
The Blazer has more range
The Fairlane is more comfortable
The Blazer has a better radio
The Fairlane seats more people
The Blazer carrys more stuff
And they both piss off the local Eco-Nazis...:p

and on, and on, and on...

Anyways, only been here for a day, and the Blazer is already muddy lol... I'll post up pics tomorrow, too dark to go taking pictures now..

Holy crap what a lot of typing... I think I am done for now lol...
 
I wish I had your problem :p

I'd keep the Blazer up at school if I were you, but when you're done with the Fairlane's resto, bring that up. I rather wish I had something I wouldn't be afriad to rag on a bit and take off road here. There are plenty of times where my car is very impractical due to ground clearence/off road ability, etc. My two cents.

Also, go all out on the Blazer :D
 
Possibly already addressed questions ahead on the Fairlane :mrgreen:

Are you still running the 289? Sounds pretty wicked for a 289. Also, what tranny and rear gears are you running? I'd love to get 19 highway out of my Mustang. Sorry I haven't been following the thread :(

EDIT: Crap just saw your sig. Looks like the only difference between us is I've got a 4bbl 302 and our rear gears might be different.
 
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hehe, yeah, still running the stock 289, and the stock manifolds too (for now), but I have 2" true dual exhaust exiting just in front of the rear wheels, with 2 30" Smithy Glasspacks (one on each side)
my camera doesn't do a good job of capturing the sound either,,, its not quite as bassy in real life
rear gears are 2.79:1
Sucks for get up and go, but every time I pull into the gas station I am glad I have them lol
Its still turning 3100 rpm at 70 though... I wonder what kind of mpg I would be pulling if it was more like 22-2400 at 70....
 
This may sound like blasphemy, but have you considering putting an inline 6 in there? They make more than adequate power when built properly, and they can cruise all day at 30 mpg. Parts would be a bit harder to find, but assuming you get it done properly you shouldn't be needed parts much. If you wanted you could even turbo it.

http://fordsix.com/ is about the best recommended site for the inlines if you're interested.
 
Don't know how I missed your thread until now. Looks like a fun project.

I think I'd keep the Blazer for now if you're in Cedar City, especially during this time of the year. (I'm from St. George, living in Vegas, going to school myself :) )

I'm in kind of the same boat too. My Sprint is a bit of a driven project as well. Right now it's sitting in St. George in need of some work while I drive another piece of junk to school.
 
wow, has it really been nearly a year since I updated this?
Well, I guess now is as good a time as any.
Commuted in the car all summer, was a nearly 100 mile commute every day, car dealt with it just fine until it started getting over 90F here, then it started running warmer then I would have liked. At around 100F ambient temperature, it was really running uncomfortably warm (220+ during traffic) So, a fix was required
Bought a 3 core all aluminum radiator from e-bay for $190ish (ordered a 2 core, but they were out, so I talked them into a 3 core upgrade at a discount hehe)
Dont have any pics of it installed on this PC, but it was one of these

I did have to tweak the fan blades a bit to make it fit comfortably
It would have gone in with no modification, but clearance between the fan blades and the radiator was less than 1/8 inch, so I bent the blades in a bit, again, no pics on this PC
With the new radiator in, I could not get the engine temps to go over 195 without doing some really strenuous things (like doing 95 for 3 hours, coming to a complete stop, and idling for 5 minutes, and of course, as soon as I started moving, temps dropped straight back down again)

and thats that, Fairlane was running great, till I sat in it about 3 weeks ago, just after we had got some really heavy rain for 2 weeks..
noticed as I was sitting down that the car was making some new, and very very bad sounding creaks and groans...
went poking around under the car and under the carpet and found this:


RUST! :cry:
pulled the seats and carpet out 2 weeks ago, turns out its not as bad as it looks, only about 5 square inches around both forward seat mounts are bad, so of course, only about 2 - 3 sq ft needs to be replaced lol
the rest of the floor is super solid, other then a few spots where rust is just starting to form
Since I am still attending university, I have neither the time, equipment, or space to fix it now, so until Thanksgiving/Christmas break, the car is parked for the winter at my parents place :(


The one good thing about this, is I was intending on parking the car soon anyways, since the weather is about to turn, and for the last 2 weeks, I have been driving the truck, and using it as it was meant to be abused hehe
Truck does have some odd issues with regards to how it runs in that short time period between the choke turning off, and the engine being fully warmed up, but nothing that I cant ignore lol
Anyways, here's some pics of the Blazer being used as it was meant to...




I think I may have got the truck a bit dirty.... :mrgreen:
(most of the mess on the truck actually came from me playing around on top of Cedar mountain last weekend, but I forgot my camera that day, and have no pics)

First two pics are from yesterday, on top of the Marysvale Mountains, at ~10200ish ft in elevation, with ~12,000ish ft peaks in the background.
Last two are in the Mountain Meadows Massacre historic monument parking lot.



And to answer Nabster's question, Yeah, I have thought about a straight 6 for the Fairlane, and really, I have no reason not to go for a 6, other then I love the feel of the V8, an argument that I cant even make to myself anymore, since my dad bought a Cherokee with the 4.0 6, and 5 speed, and I LOVE the power delivery in that thing, its just as good as the Fairlane, and the mileage is surprisingly quite a lot better......
Damn.
I suppose that in the long run, I may go to a 6, but I would like to see just how good of mileage i can squeeze out of that little 289.. I turn nearly 3000 rpm at 70, and still get 18 mpg..... what would happen if I was turning more like 2100 rpm?
 
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You could always swap in an OD transmission which would greatly increase highway mileage. If you're running the factory 3spd auto 18 mpg isn't that bad at all.
 
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