On her way home from work, Mrs. Fungus saw a bright yellow car sitting in a driveway with a "For Sale" sign next to it. That car is now hers. She bought it.
Lowdown: we walked over there to have a gander at it, and talked to the guy selling it. 1968 Mustang, partly restored in 2008-ish--meaning that the bodywork was cleaned up significantly and rust taken care of, and it was painted. The engine compartment looks spic-and-span, and it is supposed to have reasonably fresh rebuilds on engine and transmission and rear end.
Looking it over, I couldn't find anything on it that was a showstopper; it has a 20-foot paint job and perhaps twenty or thirty thousand niggling little details that need attending to--but it starts and runs and drives, it has no obvious squeaks, rattles, or clunks, and when I take my hands off the wheel it goes straight as an arrow.
Carb is a Holley double-pumper; it's in dire need of a tune up but the engine is plenty strong. 0-60 goes by much faster than it does in the Jeep!
The guy's asking price was far below what I'd expected it to be, and Mrs. Fungus made him an extra-cheeky offer that was 25% below his asking price. He accepted...and she came up with the name before we even signed the paperwork.
There are a few worrisome details, like the way it died on me when I stopped to check a couple things out, and it wouldn't even crank...until I took the key out of the ignition and put it back in. It's got a brand new solenoid on it but there may be a loose connection. It makes a bit of an odd noise on acceleration, which could be any of a thousand innocuous things or one serious thing. The real big worry I have right now is getting it into the garage, which means tomorrow is garage cleaning day for Mr. and Mrs. Fungus.
The brakes feel like manual brakes, and it's drums all around. I'm going to check for a brake booster tomorrow--but the cam is an aftermarket one that gives it a bumpy enough idle that if there is a brake booster, it may not get enough vacuum.
But it's a sweet ride, and considering it's a classic Mustang, any money we put into it only improves its value. I intend to complete the restoration and get everything looking and operating as close to factory as I can.
Don't like where the exhaust pipes exit. But damn if the thing doesn't look as if it's going about 90 MPH just sitting there.
Mrs. Fungus is beside herself with excitement; she's always wanted a bright yellow muscle car with a black stripe. She wanted a Nova; once things settled down a bit around here I was going to start looking for one in decent shape. This is better; all the hard stuff has been done already--the bodywork and the mechanicals are all "good enough". It's not going to win any prizes on the councours, but it's a driver and we're gonna drive it. Yeah.
ADDENDUM:
So, started looking at the paperwork that came with Buttercup. What do I see but "Dana locker"; that would explain the noise I hear when cornering. Guy said it was probably the power steering since he'd just replaced something in it, but a locking differential would make noise during turns.
Looks like we do not have a numbers matching car--the list shows '65 engine, '65 rear axle--but that doesn't mean we have a worthless pile. It is still, after all, a classic Mustang. It's just that even if we did a concours-level restoration on it, it wouldn't be worth top dollar. That's fine! It is, after all, a driver.
Oh, yeah.
