What have you done to your mustang today?

Apparently I gotta put mine in the garage, get it up off the ground, and dick with the exhaust some more (yeah it's my favorite thing to do). Tried to put those touring mufflers back on last weekend. Driver's side fits pretty good, except I need to fix the adapter I welded on there to be able to attach a tip as it's misaligned. Passenger side is completely jacked up. The front hanger is totally fucked. I don't know whether I bent it weird or it just plain doesn't fit right, it seems like it's way too short when you install the muffler and if you try to put that hanger on, it pulls the muffler over so far the tip hits the bumper cover. And if you run it with just the rear hanger it hangs down about 2 inches too far.

Sigh...I foresee having to probably cut the hangers off these and do some welding to fix this debacle.

Finished up my new McLeod Street Pro clutch, flywheel, and slave cylinder install. It's definitely easier with long tubes and the car shifts way better than it did when i had the Exedy Mach 400. The clutch pedal is smoother than i remember the stock piece being.

Got some older tires mounted/balanced onto my spare set of wheels (AMR 18x10's).
Should be a smoky summer

Sky Render said:

I'm really thinking of switching to that setup when it's time to replace my Konis. They just ride so freaking stiff. And I'm not 24 anymore; I don't think it's "cool" or "hardcore" to drive around in a car with rod ends everywhere.

Click to expand...

I'm with you. I'm selling my H-D soft tail. Not the best ride, but it's not as bad as a hard tail.

I was lucky that I found on ebay the same Bilstein setup that Vorshlag sells when they are avalable.

Gabe said:

Got some older tires mounted/balanced onto my spare set of wheels (AMR 18x10's).
Should be a smoky summer


View attachment 67427 View attachment 67428

Click to expand...

Those are looking more like rain tires. Hahaha be careful with them.

On the car.

travelers said:

Well last friday I installed my new Bilstein shocks and struts along with Vorshlag CC plates. With the rain all week I just waited to today to take the car to a friend garage that had a laser level floor to check camber. I set them to 1.6- camber and they are preset to factory setting but you have 3 more caster adjustment if needed. They have a pointer and scale for the camber so once you have it set, you can mark it and if your auto crossing and want 2.5- you can adjust to that and then reset it to your original setting.

The Bilstein struts are the 1'' shorter center tube for lowered cars. The ride is 100% better. Not a cheep setup but well worth it.

Click to expand...

Good to know the ride is 100% better and agree it's well worth the additional cost.

Sky Render said:

I'm really thinking of switching to that setup when it's time to replace my Konis. They just ride so freaking stiff. And I'm not 24 anymore; I don't think it's "cool" or "hardcore" to drive around in a car with rod ends everywhere.

Click to expand...

I'll also be making the switch to Bilsteins when the time comes to replace my Koni yellows for the very same reason as well

So, yeah, yesterday I installed some new-used 18x10 AMR's with Goodyear 285/40/18 front tires and some 305/40/18 Nitto NT555R's on the rear.
(pic 2 posts up)

A little more info:

Small 4-5mm spacer on the front.
No centercaps because they're the world's ugliest caps (the chrome 'AMERICAN MUSCLE" ones) and I plan on doing something to them to get rid of the chrome and maybe even of the wording.
Had a small issue on one front wheel, it took so much weight that the shop put 2 rows of 5 weights next to each other (side-by-side) and the inner row was touching the caliper. Had to remove those 5 weights, remove the tape off the back, add new 3M double-sided tape and stick them on top of the first row of weights. Hope they stay there. If not, I may have them break down the tire, rotate it on the rim and try a better balance with less weights.


Sure enough, the Nittos run a little narrow, the Goodyears run a little wide
285 GY's and 305 Nittos:

I had those wheels static balanced with no TPMS sensors (to reduce the weights needed) and only had weights put on the inside of the wheels. Only way they'd clear the Brembos.

After doing a real good job cleaning the car yesterday, I'm not going to a car show today when it's raining. Even if the car show says rain or shine.

Sky Render said:

I had those wheels static balanced with no TPMS sensors (to reduce the weights needed) and only had weights put on the inside of the wheels. Only way they'd clear the Brembos.

Click to expand...

Still no sensors, but the outer strip of weights clears, even now doubled up as it is:

Gabe, you want to send me a center cap? I can 3d print you some out of onyx material, or I can machine one out of alu - depending on what is required. I have been wanting to look into this - I'd like to ditch my AM caps as well. I just want to see if yours are the same, and since you aren't running them anyway...

Swapped the Raxiom Gen5 LED tail-lights for Gen7...bought from a local CL seller so thought it would be different from other's who have the Gen5's...

Got the Lethal Performance OTA pipes installed. My timing was perfect: record heat here along with a steamy heat index. Regardless, the fit is perfect and the sound/tone is fantastic (deeper, a little louder). Removing the OEM OTA pipes is a lot of work and not much fun but I got them out (pushed out towards the front). The LP 2-piece design is brilliant and makes getting the new pipes in dead easy.

If anybody is curious about the work method:

Use Race Ramps for the front and then jackstands on the subframes near the back.

Remove both mufflers.

Loosen the sway bar endlink bolts and lower the sway bar. Remove the panhard brace, drop the lower end of the panhard rod, remove the lower shock bolts. Loosen the PH rod locking nuts before dropping the end. Why? Because the rod may need to be lengthened during reassembly to get the bolt back in.

Suggest working on one side at a time. Jacking up the side frees up the spring so I took it out as it gives a lot of room for OEM OTA pipe removal. A little fiddling (rotating the pipe, moving the far end of the pipe to the opposite side, rinse/repeat) to get the inverted u-shaped portion of the pipe over the axle and then pushed it forward.

Do the same for the other side. The passenger side to a little more work than the driver side but this might just me getting tuckered out by that time.

New pipes go in very easily (due to the 2-piece design). I used a 2 x 12 on the floor jack to raise the new pipes and mid-pipe so that the piping was tucked up where it should be. Install the mufflers but leave the pipe-to-muffler joints loose for a bit.

Need to move from back of the car (OTA joint, muffler/OTA joint) to the side (mid-pipe clamps) numerous times to get things lined up just right.

Once the new OTA pipes are installed, reassemble (lower shock bolt, panhard brack, panhard rod). Torque every fastener to spec:
PH rod bolt @ 129 lb-ft; lower shock bolt @ 52 lb-ft; sway bar end-link bracket bolt @ 85 lb-ft; panhard brace (at frame) @ 35 lb-ft (my guess as I couldn't find info on the little bolts); panhard brace bracket bolt @ 85 lb-ft (another guess until better info is available).

Adjust the muffler tips and snug up the clamps (spec is 35 lb-ft). Recheck the midpipe-to-OTA bracket bolts (35 lb-ft - no other info available). Remove the floor jack.

After a week (several cold-to-warm cycles), recheck exhaust clamps and snug up, if required.

That's it!

Chris

p.s.--I should have bought a QuickJack. It would have made this job much easier. Or, a shop could do it with the car on a lift - much faster than the home garage method, lol.

Interesting look on the new tail lights. Did you have to do anything to make them fit?

Iceman62 I think the Gen 5 look so much better than the new Gen 7 style lights.

Iceman62 said:

View attachment 67439 Swapped the Raxiom Gen5 LED tail-lights for Gen7...bought from a local CL seller so thought it would be different from other's who have the Gen5's...

Click to expand...

To each his own, but that style taillight does not flow with the otherwise boxy hindquarters of the S197.

Overall, I also think the gen 5 tail lights look much better on the S197 over the Gen 7 style. IMHO the tri-bars of the gen 7 just don't blend in very well with the lower reverse and brake light sections at all, nor do they match up properly with the upper section of the rear bumper

I'm one of the people that like the Gen7's better than the Gen5's.
Especially since the LED's in the Gen5's are not continuous, they have all the little LED's individually visible.
I guess they saved 3 cents/taillight having the Chinese manufacturer build them that way.


Yesterday I painted the chrome AMR center caps black using some adhesion promoter and some Rustoleum flat black.
No pictures cuz, you know, they're just center caps.

I personally really like the Vector (what you guys are calling Gen 7) taillights. I have a set on my car, I got the smoked clear ones because that's what AM had on sale a couple years ago at Thanksgiving (I had really wanted the smoked red ones but I couldn't pass up the deal on the smoked clear ones).

IMO two things you have to do with those lights:
1. Put tint over the reflectors, I hate the damn reflectors. They look terrible and clash with the rest of the light.
2. Put on a gloss black trunk panel (GTS makes one)

Once you do that I think they blend in better and really make it look more like a '69 Mustang. Plus I think Raxiom did a pretty damn good job on the look of these things. (sorry for the garbage quality of the first picture, apparently it's the only one I have on hand of the back of the car since I did the Vectors and the new trunk panel)