Hello

There is a very large class of people that own 65/66 Mustangs that, as far as I can tell, anyway, have been, for the most part, ignored entirely. They don't really want that 100 pt. show car that is so nice and was soooo expensive that they're afraid to drive it, they also don't want to make their car capable of achieving warp factor three. They just want this car that they dearly love to be able to cruise around smoothly and reliably, without having it dump them out on the side of the road or have it start making weird noises or belching out big clouds of funky-smelling smoke. And I think, truth be told, that this is by far the largest class of Mustang owners. They take their car to some technician when what they actually need is a mechanic, and this, frequently, does not work out very well at all for the owner. They don't want to re-engineer the entire car, they just want someone to fix what broke. These are the people that I am trying help out with this blog. Some problems require a little bit of back and forth, as in, "Try this." "I tried that and it didn't change anything."
" Oh. well, you probably need to try that." " I tried that and it helped, but it still isn't quite right." "Now you need to try this...." If you go to http://www.allfordmustangs.com/ and then go to the classics forums, you will be able to do that with a pretty hefty gathering of some very knowledgeable people that also happen to be very friendly. None of that ridiculous one-upmanship, no flaming or abuse, none of that stuff. Just good, solid advice from people that know what they are talking about.

Saturday, August 17, 2013

Turn signal wiring and back-up lights for 64 1/2 Ford Mustang

The turn signal wiring for the 64 1/2 cars is a bit different from what you find in the 65/66 cars. It isn't very complicated, though. Power starts out at the ignition switch. From there a black wire with a green stripe goes to the fuse box, which has a fuse marked "14A Turn". From there, a black wire with a red stripe takes power out. That wire ends as a female bullet connector about 6 inches above the fuse box. This bullet connector has two wires coming into it, one being the black/red wire and the other is an orange wire with a yellow stripe. The orange/yellow wire is taking power from the black/red wire over to the turn signal flasher. From the flasher a blue wire goes to the turn signal switch, which distributes the flashing power to the appropriate lights when activated. There is a black/red wire plugged into the female bullet connector which goes to the neutral safety switch on a car with an automatic transmission, or, to the back-up light switch on a car with a manual transmission, and, from there, goes to the back-up lights. It should be noted that back-up lights were an option that cost an extra $10.40, so, an awful lot of the 64 1/2 and 65 Mustangs did not  come with back-up lights.

Sunday, August 4, 2013

New Wiring Diagrams

Hi, everybody. I finally got around to shooting the lock off of my purse and buying some software so that I could make wiring diagrams that are a bit easier to follow than the Medusa-head drawings that Ford produced. Trying to distinguish the relevant from the irrelevant in the original drawings can be a challenge, and I got tired of just trying to erase the irrelevant from the original drawings. It is actually easier to just draw these simple systems from scratch, if you have some decent software for that. So, I hope this helps, and, any feedback on how I can do these drawings better is appreciated.

Saturday, August 3, 2013

Instrument Cluster Voltage Regulator for 1965 1966 Mustang

As much as it grieves me to have to say this, the ICVRs available at auto parts stores and dealerships have become so shoddy, they are not worth wasting your time and money on. It is, from my experience, and the experience of others, far more likely that the unit will fail immediately than that it will function like it is supposed to, and, if it does actually work straight out of the box, that state will not continue for long. I'm hearing the same thing about the Motorcraft and the BWD, the Mustang-specific units made by whoever, which are sold by the vendors of vintage Mustang parts, do not fare any better as far as I can tell.

If a person were to take the time to read through my blog, they will notice something. First, there are no ads here, and there never will be. I do not want a nickel from anyone. I do this because I love the cars, and if I can help in some small way to keep these cars chugging down the road, I am happy to do that. You will also notice that I do not recommend manufacturers or retail outlets for parts, and, the reason for this is simple. I will not do anything that will, in any way, damage my credibility. But, the ICVR situation has become so bad, I have to say something. There is a nice man in Florida that makes electronic ICVRs. He contacted me a few years ago, offered to send me a couple for free to check out and possibly recommend, and I declined for the reasons that I have just stated. I now realize that this was a mistake on my part. I still haven't tried one personally, but, I have heard from several people that have used them, and this unit works. It is reliable, durable, and does exactly what it is supposed to. Here is a link to his ebay store.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/281691350846
If I needed an ICVR, this is what I would buy.


A quick update. A friend of mine bought  few of these regulators and tried to blow one up. He couldn't do it without running power straight from the battery with a 10 gauge wire and grounding both the ground and the  output terminal straight to the body of the car. He gave me one and I also tried to blow it up, and was unsuccessful. This is a remarkably durable component.

Horn wiring for 64 1/2 Ford Mustang

Here is how the horns are wired for the Mustangs that came from the factory with a generator instead of an alternator. To see the entire diagram, just left click the part that you can see and the little bit that is hidden will pop out. You have a black wire with a yellow stripe bringing power from the hot side of the starter solenoid over to 'B' terminal on the voltage regulator. From the 'B' terminal, there is a yellow wire that goes into the horn relay, and from there goes to the underdash area, turns blue with a yellow stripe, and goes to the horn button. The 64 1/2 turn signal switch only has one horn contact, instead of the two contacts that a 65/66 switch has. When you press the horn button that grounds the blue/yellow wire, activating the horn relay. From the horn relay there are a couple of yellow wires with green stripes that go to the horns themselves. When the relay is activated, power goes from the relay to the horns, which ground out on the strut rod brackets that they are mounted on, causing the horns to honk. Nothing to it.