I love reading these threads. It's really cool watching a restoration come together piece by piece. Keep the updates coming!

 

Very nice. I hope to restore an old FHP SSP one day.

 

I love the creme & black paint scheme on the FHP cars. The above 4-eyed SSP was restored by jarhed123 in Florida, but he sold it to restore another SSP - an 85 CHP Mustang #8302 very similar to mine.


6/11/2009 UPDATE:

The hood was mounted, and the window moldings were installed today -






The bumpers and fenders are painted and buffed out.




I'll get more pictures on Monday 6/15.

 

I took a few pictures today, but they didn't really come out that great. So I only hosted one picture to save on space.

The gas filler neck and door are mounted now. The side sail panels are attached, and the rear bumper is back where it should be. The tail lights were test-fitted for the picture (hence the tape still attached), but the rear is shaping up nicely.




The trim color on the bumper and side moldings isn't 100% correct for my 85. It's actually the correct 83 color, which is more matte black than the slightly grayish color on the 85/86's. I like it better this way.

 

Bacon is making daily progress in terms of looking again like a real car. The trunklid was remounted after being taken off to wire up the trunk light. Here you can see the side sail panel, side window trim, the rubber side molding behind the tire, and the spring-ball mount for the 66" CHP whip antenna.




I was surprised to see that they mounted the antenna base, as my intention had only been to provide it to the shop so they could make sure the opening was properly sized. Had I known that, I would have left them the a-pillar spot lights too

In this shot, you can kinda see that the driver's side front fender has been put in-place (but not secured yet). Neal had just lifted it into position when I walked in.




I told them that I need to have the car completed by June 26th, which is next Friday. Neal said that's do-able, but he'll know for sure by early next week. There's only about 2 days left of work to finish, but he is working on other cars too.

 

Looks great!

 

Both front fenders have been mounted, and the side moldings have been attached. In this shot, I test fitted the 66" CHP whip antenna, which is visible to the left of the green line.




I didn't leave the antenna on because it would hit the overhead lights. The CHP used a retaining clip mounted in the doorjam by the top drip rail. I am in the process of recreating the clips using the same non-conductive phenolic material, but I need the car back to properly shape the aluminum bracket to the countour of the drip rail.

Here is a shot of the side moldings mounted to the car. They came out great IMO.




When I asked Neal if he was still on target for getting the car completed by Friday, June 26th, he smirked and said "should be". Ahh, nothing like getting a definite maybe to a question! But the car is coming along, and it is looking like it will be out of the body shop by the end of next week (knocks on wood).

 

pretty badass, any plans for the interior? I notice it has the wrong seats in it

going to work over the motor while retaining the stock appearance?

 

I have a new headliner, dashpad, carpet, radio/speakers, rear package shelf, and console delete (enroute). I also picked up another set of gray cloth seats that are closer to stock (different pattern). They are slightly worn (better than the current seats tho) and need a good cleaning, but they'll look alot better in a 4-eye than the ones in there now.

The motor will eventually get worked over properly. I will be stayng with a 5.0L block, and will most likely keep it naturally aspirated. I'm undecided on gears. The taller 255's effectively raise my gearing. I could install 3.90:1 gears and with the taller tires be close to 3.73's as far as the speedo goes.

 

I just had these seats cleaned up, which are closer to stock -




And this afternoon I was able to bring her home -



She needs to be cleaned up, but now the fun begins!