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Life in 6 Land

Tag Archives: Cougar

Keep It? Sell It?

Wow! A news post about my ’68 Mercury Cougar. It has been some time since I have really commented on this “project” that takes up the entire two car garage. Needless to say, my wife is less than thrilled to see this continue to occupy space her 2009 Dodge Charger could be parked in. Over the past few months I have considered selling this project. Unfortunately, the down economy has seen a downward trend in the price of restored vehicles. Mine is nowhere near restored, nor is it drivable. With that said, a good portion of the mechanical work has already been completed. I guess I have something going for me, rather than a true pile of shit sitting in the garage.

The car was really just given to me back in 2004 when a friend of my girlfriend (now wife) at the time made mention he needed to get rid of his 1986 Cougar before it was towed. Splitting time between SoCal and NoCal I decided to take ownership of the car and made the trip to Santa Rosa to pick it up. It was not bad looking, some rust from the missing vinyl top a few minor dents, but structurally, the Cougar was a true find. It cost me nothing more than title and transfer at the DMV.

Since taking ownership I have spent A LOT of money on this car, to the point I could have easily bought a very nice 1970 Cougar Eliminator. Okay, maybe that would be a bit of a stretch, but I know I could have bought a fully restored Cougar. I decided to tackle this project, knowing close to nothing about restoring a car such as this. It has been a learning experience as I go along. I also knew as I got older my son could take an interest into restoring the Cougar with me

Let me get this back on topic as I could easily get sidetracked. Over the last few months I have thought about selling this project. I know i won’t get what I have put in to it, you never do. As I said major components of the Cougar are already done, including the engine, front and rear end rebuild, new brakes all around, a new drive shaft, rebuilt transmission and an all new exhaust. Do the math, you will have some idea what the bill comes to.

Getting back into amateur radio, coupled with the growth of my son and the rigors of work, time is something I don’t have much of these days. This is one factor leading to my potential decision to sell the project. I have received many comments from other cat enthusiasts to “put an hour in a day and work on it.” While great information, I don’t have 60 minutes to dedicate to the Cougar at this time. Couple with the fact that whatever price I got for the Cougar (and or parts) could be applied to outstanding debt that seems to plague many in America today.

While selling the Cougar is not a long term solution to my short term problems it would help. Most importantly it would please the wife that the Cougar was out of the garage. It would give us some more room in the garage, it would payoff some debt, allowing more of the paycheck to be stashed in a savings account. Conversely, I could look back on this decision and wonder how I could do something so stupid selling this car in it’s current state. I still reflect on my decision to sell my initial baseball card collection I took with me to BYU. Some $3000 worth of cards netted me about $1000 for a new GT Avalanche mountain bike.

So I now stand at the crossroads, which road I take is not yet known. I will continue to weight my options and hopefully come to a decision soon. Now that summer is rolling around and my son, now 4 years old is a bit more responsible I might be able to dedicate some time on my weekly days off to doing something on the Cougar. Time is only part of the problem, money is the other. Everything I need to do costs money. I guess I could always start reading about bodywork and make an attempt to straighten the dents and imperfections in the Cougar, since that is the next step in the restoration process.

Still Alive

While I have not been very active on The 6th Floor, with my Mercury Cougar club, Urban Terror or any other other hobbies and interests I have, I am still around and alive, if anyone was wondering. Life continues to be tied up with training at BART and the light at the end of the tunnel continues to get brighter. This is a good thing.

Most all of my free time is spent with my son and wife (when she is not playing Guild Wars) and some games on the 360 (which still is a POS). I fully expect things to be “back to normal” come December, as our target date of completion is December 7.

I have quite a bit I could write about as many things continue to happen in my world and that around us, but time has prevented me from bringing you any of my thoughts about whatever topic I will ramble on about. A few notes that maybe I can expand on soon. Air travel is still not safe, want proof, read this. The Orange Box for the 360 is quite impressive. Never been a big HL or HL2 fan, but their Orange Box has me intrigued.

The firestorm in San Diego did not burn down my childhood home, where my parents still reside in Poway. The flames came within 5 feet of burning the guest house, but no damage to speak of. Thankfully! I was a bit stressed for a few days as I was not able to contact them.

Okay, more later as I need to get out of here and get to work, it is my Friday and I have some cold Sierra Nevada Pale Ale (Celebration Ale) that has been staring me in the face all week long.

Date with a Tranny

Would you believe I actually got time  today with my Cougar? Hard to believe, but I did not really feel like  working on the yard, so I put a few hours in and ended up pulling the C4  transmission. This is the first real work I have put into the Cougar in  probably 6-8 months. Not because I lost the desire, but because of  training and family commitments the time was just not there. Don’t even  ask how poorly I have maintained our Cougar club web site.?This  was the last major mechanical piece I needed to remove if I have any  intentions of getting it painted later this year, which I do. The  transmission is rebuilt, with a new drive shift. After dropping the two  u-bolts on the read axle I muscled up and slide the drive shaft out of  the transmission. I thought I had poured out all the transmission fluid,  well I was wrong.I started to unbolt the last few remaining  bolts and hooked the bell housing up to a cherry picker, just to help me  out here. As I raise the front of the transmission, a river of  transparent red began to flow…onto the garage floor. So, while it was  the not most professional of removals, I did get it out of the car and  now have more room under the car in order to clean the undercarriage and  recoat it. I plan on cleaning up the transmission, repainting the bell  housing and replacing any parts that might need it before bolting to the  engine and dropping both into the car after it is painted.

What’s Going On?

I wish I could say I had a life outside of work right now, but I really don’t seem to have on. My “STD List” or “Shit To Do List” continues to grow to epic proportions, with no end in sight and no real free time to do any of it in. Training seems to expend all my energy when I get home from work. I think I went out in the backyard, just so I could play in the dirt, get hot and sweaty and feel like I accomplished something. Well, I did make a mound in anticipation of landscaping.

There are still 6 months of training to do, so I am guessing my list will extremely long and very little will get accomplished. As for Urban Radio…pfft. Who knows. Currently anything “Urban related” is not even on my scope. Sure, I idle in numerous channels and drop a comment on the forums from time to time, but honestly this is the last thing on my list. I know we want to get 4.1 out and forget about it, hopefully moving on to bigger and better. At this time, I don’t have any details on what bigger and better are though.

The HOA finally caught up with me regarding my ‘tower‘ I raised on April 28. They say (and I knew this) the CC&Rs do not permit “towers” on your home.” I was going to remove it immediately, well within the 30 day window they gave me. But now I think I am going to argue that what I have erected is NOT a tower, but an antenna and see how they respond. If push comes to shove, then the “tower” (antenna) will be transformed into a 20′ flagpole flying the stars and stripes. It irks me when I see so many other blatant disregard for the CC&Rs, such as non-registered cars and broken fences, yards that are not taken care of and I get popped for this.

Finally, the Cougar, still debating, but it could see a body and paint shop by the end of the year. I think in August it will be trailered and taken to a local shop for an estimate. Hopefully the estimate falls within my range, or else we will have to rethink this step of the restoration process.

Cougar Sighting

Yes, believe it or not there is a ’68 Cougar sighting. While I wish I could say the Cougar was coming back from the paint shop with a brand new look, I must keep dreaming. I do have a few leads on where to get the bodywork done and the car painted. I figure in a few weeks I will put it on a trailer and take it to a few places for estimates. Of course none of the three shops are anywhere close to each other and one comes highly recommended by a family friend who had his ’34 and ’35 Fords painted there, plus it’s the closest.

As for the Cougar itself, I think I might have a rat living in the car somewhere. Damn if I have not been able to catch this sucker, but I see little tracks over the rear leaf springs and axle, which leads me to believe this rat might be making a nest, which is definitely not good news.

There is good news though…I was able to pick up a new right fender and passenger door this past weekend. The two parts I currently have, which are both original equipment have the most damage on them. The fender has a deep dent near the front and the door looks as if it side swiped something. That would not be bad, but the person who tried to fix it pushed all the dents out to the opposite extreme. So the door (glass and hardware complete too!) and fender I picked up were off a ’68 XR-7 and in great shape. I made a trip to Lodi via Stockton and picked up a guy from the Stray Cats Cougar Club who was in contact with a lady who was selling the pieces.

Absolutely no work has gone into the Cougar this year due to other priorities, but with any luck I could have this out of the garage within a few months. I also got a great lead on a white/black vinyl ’69 Cougar in Stockton. The guy is moving and wants to get rid of it for $6500. Thankfully my tax return is just around the corner. Wonder if the wife would notice.