Getting ready to order

[azbruin]

I'll be placing my order in the next few days. I have an '88 donor and will be ordering the base kit. I'm pretty sure I know what I need but am interested in opinions on a couple of the options - powder coat frame (now or later?), brake sourcing (definitely not using the drums), wipers, wiring (the mustang wiring is a mess and I know 90% won't be needed - I'm going carbs on a new engine).

[bil1024]

I would do the powder coating, ecspecially if your not doing mods to frame.
Wire harness - aftermarket, your going carb, its simple.
Fortes or north race cars for your brakes, your gonna want to convert to 5 lug and change the rear axles
Wipers - look for a set in classifieds, cheaper that way

Bill

[Jeff Kleiner]

Pretty much what Bill said. Unless you are making significant mods or want a color other than black it's hard to beat the powder coating price from FFR. This might get a few dissenting opinions but I found the Ron Francis harness FFR offers to be well thought out and for the most part user friendly. If you are watching your budget you can get a lot of performance using OEM '94 and up GT rears with good pads and a set of axles from the vendors previously mentioned.

Jeff

[riptide motorsport]

Ron francis wiring option from FFR...get it. Other than that , what they said.

[willy]

I biulding a coupe and am going with carb setup I got the Ron Francis harness well worth the money very nice to work with also got it powder coated from FFR .

[Gale K]

AZ, in a previous post you said, "more time than money." So, for the wiring, if you're really trying to squeeze pennies, the donor harness would work. I actually found self-dieting the donor harness straight forward and rewarding. The FFR build manual says, "take out a circuit, then start the car to make sure you did not cut something you need." I never did this. Each thing I dieted out, I ran the wiring circuit down, reviewed what I was removing, and said, "this should be fine." When I was all done, and I had everything hooked up again, the car fired right up. I am using EFI, so bear that in mind when making your decision. Just a thought, but don't be scared of tackling it.

Factory powder coating is a great deal, plus you don't have to do it later. One more thing already "out of the way." Unless, like Jeff said above, you're planning on doing multiple frame mods. Even then, black touches up pretty easy.

Wipers--I saved the donor guts and controls. The controls will be buried up under the dash. There have been several that have used the donor motor (Mr. Barry for one on the 'other' forum), and it seems to work out fine. DV/DT (here and 'other' forum) used a wiper motor out of a Suzuki or something similar. I figured with the donor parts, I already had them for free, plus I get the added benefit of self parking and intermittent functions right out of the box. If you go Lucas style, agree with Bill above--classifieds will get you a never-used set for less cost.

[azbruin]

I was looking around at some of the supporting vendor sites yesterday and most of the brakes were 5 lug. Other than availability, what's the advantage?