Car in question is a 1967 Mustang Hardtop (pictures below). It is a 200cid inline 6 with a single barrel carb and auto tranny...numbers match. I'm understand it's not necessarily an amazing find or highly sought after vehicle, but I'm actually quite okay with that, because being it's a first time restoration for me and the fact I'd like to do a what I want with it, paint/engine/etc I think it'd be better to do do a restomod with this rather than perhaps a fastback with a big block.

Anyways I paid $200 total. Me and my dad split the cost 50/50 as this will be a father son(s) project. The guy drove the car to the property, but could not get it started this past spring, and it has 131,000 miles.

Pics:

http://s546.photobucket.com/albums/h...967%20Mustang/

Story:

My fiances parents own a farm house on the property they lived in, but have since built a home elsewhere and instead rent the property out. A guy moved in with his sister. He had driven the car to the property and it sat on the side of the garage. At some point during the winter he moved out, and his sister stayed.

When spring rolled around, he had tried to start the vehicle again by charging it with his sisters car, but was unsuccessful and so the vehicle sat. Now, me and my fiance are planning on using the house after were married, and the lady is moving out. The guy was then forced with the option of selling the vehicle or having it towed and then trying to find a place to store it. It was going to be costly to tow it, he didn't have the money to fix it to run, and he didn't have a place to store it. We offered him $200 and he took it. I figured, worst case scenario, if it's way over our heads to restore or we get frustrated, we can just part it out or sell it (as we're in no rush to get rid of it really). I think for $200 it was a good move, as I've seen them on Ebay with numerous bids in worse shape for far more.

The link should work, but if people want me to post the pictures inside the thread I can do that too. Thanks, just wanted some opinions on what I'm working with and whether I just waster $200. Please note again, I'm under no assumption this is a valuable find, but I think for something to practice restoring it'll be good.

 

I also thought it was interesting that, while my fiance was searching through the car, she found the original owners manual and safety manual. We just thought it was an interesting find, as I figured those were probably hard to come by. Looking through the reciepts of the car and all it's services, we saw oil changes and lubrications as well as other normal maintenance costs for like $3.50 or so.

 

I would definitely say you got that car for a steal! Congrats.

 

Thanks! I understand that this is the type of question to ask prior to buying, but it was one of those things where I hadnt had more than a few minutes to see the car and make the deal. I guess after recieving the title, there was just that bug in my ear saying you just wasted $100 bucks and your dad's too. But then, in the big scheme of things, we could probably scrap it for close to that or part it out, so the actual losses in my mind didnt seem too high.

The thing is, I also see lots worse stuff sell on the internet for even higher, and I know its always a gamble. You can buy a pricey car and still end up with doing loads of work to find it wasnt worth that. I'm just trying to grasp the situation, start ttearing down soon to see the extent of damage and rust, then find a direction to head.

 

Yes you got a very good deal.

 

I've seen way worse go for $2,000.00 You absolutly stole that car.

 

It's a steal for $200. You may invest quite a bit more repairing rust and replacing panels, but you'll easily get it back out of the car if you have to sell. If you had paid over $3000 for this, I'd say you got ripped off.

For Example, this looks exactly like your car:

http://santafe.craigslist.org/cto/1711629629.html

 

These threads always scare me. I see people paying WAY too much for most cars. Patience is a virtue, and in the classic car game can make you a lot of money.

Glad you bought it, you got a great deal.

 

Replacement body panels, patches and all that is cheap.. if you know/learn how to weld. With what I see your gonna have to replace at least 1 rear quarter and at least lower patch panels on the other. Don't bother replacing the fenders, instead buy some 21gauge steel and make your own patches. Simply cut out the bad rusted areas, cut out a patch and weld in. You'll be happier later knowing you kept the originals. Same goes for the doors.

If you don't know how to weld you should learn. With what I see metal related you'd be better off buying a MIG, learning how to use it and doing the work yourself. Shops can charge you an arm and 2 legs for repair work like this.

Look under neither at the floors and then pull the carpets to see what they look like. Pour a gallon of water down the cowl vents and see if the water comes pouring into the cabin floors... rotted out cowl. Big job but lots of how-to's online and it really isn't that hard to do.

Grab a body hammer and go along the bottom and sides of all the frame rails and see if the pointy end punctures through. It'll bounce off good metal but will find any bad areas.

All in all you got the car for a steal really. Lots of work of course but that just makes it mean that much more to you when its done.

 

Thanks for all the replies, pretty much what I was looking to hear. Figured I'd got a decent deal, but just wondered given the overall condition if to not put anything into it.

I know the process and how to weld, but am not exactly good at it. Haha, I mean I can take two pieces and put them together, but it wouldn't be pretty and would probably cause me more problems in the long run with getting smooth edges. I don't own a welder either.

However, I do know a lot of people who can, and routinely do this type of stuff and could probably have one of them do this relatively cheap, almost to the point of, "well buy a pack of beers and bring the car over."

The floor plans do need to be replaced, at least in the rear from what I could feel. Pushing down on the carpet, I just could feel my hand sinking, but I have yet to pull the carpet up and really see the extent of the damage. But, I found floor pans at a fairly decent price. I talked to a guy during the Hot Rod Power Tour here in Newton, Iowa and he had restored his 1967 and he kind of brought up something with the cowl.

I mentioned that the cowl looked from face value to be fine, but hadn't poured water down it. He actually told me not to, and here was his explanation. He had poured a jug of water down the cowl, and found that nothing came through and figured all was fine. Until all of a sudden he noticed rust was beginning to form and over time after a hard rain water was coming into the cabin. Upon checking it out, he found that it had been plugged with debris (leaves, twigs, etc.) and that this caused water to stay trapt and slowly rust the area. With that in mind, I'm at a loss of which direction to go! I agree with what you state and hear it a lot to pour water down to check the cowl, but on the other hand, his horror story worries me.

Anyways, I also talked to him about the rear quarter panels. He said that actually many of the restorations are better than when they came from the factory, because where the quarter panel was welded together, they were many times hastily done to get the product out the door. So sometimes there's a visible seam almost and that if it's not perfect when I do mine, in that sense it's no big deal, but it's also possible that it could be better.