One of the completed power door latches. The aluminum tank at the top of the photo may eventually become a coolant surge tank if I can find an aluminum rad fill neck to weld to it.
Shaved Door Handles:
After spotting some heavy duty 12-volt solenoids at a surplus store ($6 U.S. each) I just couldn't resist. I pulled the exterior handles off, discarded the locks and pulled out the latch assemblies. Then using some scrap aluminum plate I built brackets to mount the solenoids and built new actuator rods. They work great! The solenoids will be controlled by an "Omega" keyless entry. To prevent damage to the electronics, the remotes will send signals through a pair of factory Ford relays (I am currently re-wiring the entire harness including adding a '93 fuse panel).
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One of the completed power door latches. The aluminum tank at the top of the photo may eventually become a coolant surge tank if I can find an aluminum rad fill neck to weld to it. |
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Well as you can see, final finishing and the interior are a long way off. But I have started!
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One item I have done is built a new shift knob and base for the T-5 transmission I swapped in. The shift knob was made by throwing a piece of 2" diameter rod stock in my drill press and shaping it with a file. 2 hours later it was almost round! The base was retrieved from the garbage at work. |
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Another afternoon project was installing some homemade "race" pedals. I made these out of some scrap sheet aluminum and about 50 aluminum pop rivets. The "dead" pedal to the left also serves as the headlight dimmer switch. |
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I modified my speedo and tach by installing a RPM Overlays whiteface kit and painting the pointers with Testors model paint. They're now a nice match for the Autometer Phantom gauges I'll be using to monitor fuel, volts, temp, oil pressure, boost and AFR. |
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The factory T5 shifter handle was just a bit too much of a reach for me so I decided to make a new one that was longer, lower and angled closer to the driver
Here's a recent photo that shows the shift lever I built from 5/8" aluminum. As well you can see my TV antenna park brake lever and my "Shelbyized" steering wheel. |
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BEFORE |
AFTER |
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Here's a view of my "Shelbyized" wheel. Though the original is nice, I took it a step further by joining the holes on each spoke and creating a new horn button using a chrome Shelby wheel center I bought on Ebay. Unfortunately the poor photo quality doesn't show the polished aluminum hub well, which features eight stainless allen head bolts around the circumference. No more cheap plastic and the horn works! |
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This is the end of the "Body Mods" Section....so far!
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