What did you do to your thunderbird today?

took me some time but finally got my smog done ..

Glad to hear you got thru the Smog Nazi tests!

March 31st, finally had enough snow melted so I could pull the 88 back into the driveway. Opened all the windows, pulled the back seat, vacuumed all the interior. Installed the Stinger fire extinguisher mount on the bottom of the seat. While the seat was out, lubed the seat tracks. While car was idling, noticed some oil burning smell and smoke from back of engine. Looked around and noticed valve cover gasket leaking onto manifold, so now have that to change. Might as well swap in the RR cam while the gasket is being changed too.

Well....actually last week.....New intake, new valve covers, new MGW shifter, modified the shift bezel by opening the shifter hole bigger, trimming down and modifying a new Fox Mustang bezel to adapt to the Bird's bezel and also used a new Fox Stang leather boot, new coil, new distributor, new throttle body, new plug wires from Livewires, adjusted the rocker arms and set the timing, new cold air intake, new plenum spacer, new strut tower brace, new fuel pump.

Over the weekend I completed Step Two of the Audio Upgrade process, replacing the two OEM 6x8 Rear Deck “Premium Sound” speakers with 6x8 Blaupunkt GTX680 Coax 4-way units.

About a month ago I started with two 3 1/2” Kicker 4-Way Coaxial models, replacing the “Premium Sound” dashboard units. I thought that was a major step up...but WOW! The Blaupunkt rear deck speakers are just amazing!

The 3 1/2” units were a drop-in direct fit. I was able re-use the original wiring connectors by removing each from the OEM ones, attaching the included wire leads to the new ones and soldering directly to those. I did the same with the 6x8s, but I also attached the OEM connectors to the new units with tiny screws. The rubber “slings” fit perfectly, making it an easy installation.

Step Three will either involve replacing the door units...or researching and locating a better head unit. While I wanted to keep everything as stock as possible, clearly the OEM AM/FM Cassette Stereo is a serious boat anchor in this system. I’ll take my time and figure out what I want—as Jeff and others have suggested, a simple AM/FM deck with a USB port (for a thumb drive or, in my case, iPod Classic) should be all I would need. I rarely make calls in the car, so Bluetooth seems an unnecessary luxury (and something the iPod doesn’t recognize).

My local Fry’s Electronics made this project so much easier, with great deals on both sets of speakers. Definitely worth a look if you’re planning the same thing.

Installed the 255lph finally. Need to have the bung welded in for my wideband, but I got the gauge installed. Kirban adjustable is also on deck.

I have the fuel injectors out again. Initially one injector was stuck open and less than a 100 miles later 2 more stuck open. Doubt these all have the same life cycle and chasing the cause now.

So I bought a new timing belt set and decided to install it yesterday. As I was getting into it, I might as well install the Ranger roller I had. Might as well install the FMS adjustable cam sprocket too. Cleaned the throttle body, all the front pulleys and the front timing belt cover. All in all everything went well. Set the cam gear at -4 and the timing at 11, turned the idle back to 900 as it was always too high. And went to the junkyard to find a Ranger valve cover gasket, which are very nice. One of those small project turns to a lot more.

Have been attacking the TBird through the winter, mostly posting the update videos on Youtube.. I'll link one of them and if you care to see the rest of the videos you can just see them on my Youtube profile 23027

Started with my drivers side glass that had fallen off the track, did a re-glue of the clips to the glass. You will see the rest of my videos come up on the right side, or you can just look into my account there under uploaded videos
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRqd_gcc_7M

That graduated into my headliner renewal, put a nice new clear lens on the map light, did the Ford Explorer visor swap (not a perfect fit but it's still pretty nice and has the decent upgrade of the dual-visor setup) I took the 18" Cobra R wheels off and sold them after putting brand new 275's on the rears... Decided to go back to factory look. Had to source out one rim because a long time ago I had ONE rim stolen from the set of 4 I had outside the side of my house. Then had to get another single Hubcap as well. Renewed and replaced small bits on the door panels so they are held much more securely now. Put in new front dash speakers. Completely pulled apart my dash gauge cluster to tackle burned out lights and gauges not operating, fixed all the gauges now, greatly improved my light spread using one-sided sticky tinfoil tape, converted to LED lights, and successfully repaired the printed circuit board of a short circuit. I did the resistor mod to the 4 cylinder tach as well because I converted my 2.3T to a 5.0 so now the stock tach reads accurately for the V8 motor Installed an aftermarket steering wheel and made a custom TBird sticker for the center of the horn button so it isn't TOO aftermarket like.. Installed new rear springs to give proper ride-height again. Pulled a bunch of good parts from a car in a junkyard, including a set of front wheel-well liners that my car did not have. Installed those. I had to take my motor mounts out and re-tighten them just recently. And today I ripped out the aftermarket stereo I have had for the longest time and replaced it back to the factory radio, all working well! I have two versions... One is the NON Premium radio (no slider) which requires to use the plug that does NOT go to the equalizer. I also have a Premium stereo head unit as well that works, however I have a lot of things in the trunk right now and to go back there to re-connect the Equalizer wasn't very favorable so I decided not to lol. I really don't listen to the radio when I drive anyways, just the sweet sound of that V8...

Looks like you have been busy!