smh00n

I bought a 2 pole connector and ran a power wire from battery positive to it, then pulled all power from that. I used like a 8GA wire into it so plenty of capacity. The starter relay, MSD, fuel pump relay, Sniper, radio amp all come off it with no issues. I also put the alternator wire into it. This one has 8mm studs. Worked so well I did the same thing on the other side of the car and hooked light and fan relays into it. This one has 6mm studs. Neat and tidy, well kind of. Not show car but all I have on the battery terminal is the main power to the starter (large cable in picture) and the power to the block (smaller cable coming down the strut tower)

Stereo Install So now the car is running well, next step is to out in some decent music. As much as I like the sound of a V8 there are times I need to rock out. Looked around at various options like Sony, Kicker, Rockford Fosgate, etc. My wife has a kicker system in her toy but it's not that impressive. I went to a local specialist to buy Rockford speakers and amp and ended up buying a Hertz system. Never heard of it, was a bit suss but pricing was good and the salesman reckoned for what I wanted - just good decent clear music with some bass - it would do the job. So, I bought a 10" subwoofer, 4 channel amp, 6x9 3 ways and 4" for the front as I wanted to keep the original factory speaker locations in the doors. The head unit I bought a Kenwood media player as CD's are so last century. Bluetooth, Pandora, USB input and pre-outs. Along the way, I found a new Hertz 5 channel amp cheap so grabbed that. So, the start was to pull out the parcel shelf and mount the sub (which was in an enclosed box) and the rear speakers. I centered this on the parcel shelf using an existing hole that was there. Using rivnuts into the box it's a nice clean mount. Next was the 6x9's. There was 2 holes already there so I put these where I took the least amount of metal out. They ended up right on the ends of the shelf which I was happy with. The finished shelf. I trimmed the cut in the parcel shelf with some U channel rubber so it looks clean. Then, the amp. Not much room to place one in the boot of a Sports roof and I decided to place it horizontal right behind the rear seat. I wanted to be able to access it easily if needed and taking the rear seat back off it not too much hassle (this is not a fold down seat car). A piece of 20mm MDF did the job. Some black spray paint and 4 rubber insulators had it mounted. I screwed it to some brackets on the wheel arch side and in a moment of brilliance (?) I used hook and tongue 3m tape to hold the inside edge down. The Amp pretty well done, with speakers and Sub Woofer box shown. Then, running the wiring back to the amp from the head unit was fun. More like spaghetti at the start, until I had them all in order and ready to run. One D'Oh moment was not matching the pairs at the amp end, but a multi meter when wiring them up sorted that out. I used coloured wire matching the head unit positive and plain black for the negative. I put the bundle through the driver side sill, as the power went through the passenger side. The bundle had the pre-out RCA cable for the sub, all 4 speaker out wires and the front speaker wires as well, so was quite a fat item. I used Summit cable sheath to protect it at critical points. As an aside, I love that stuff. It is easy to work with, tough and doesn't fray and looks good. My trusty pal wasn't much help during this work. The front door speakers caused me a lot of thought. I started with 4" ones but decided they would not be much good. Some of the forums I looked at about car stereos said that 'front of stage' is where you wanted your sound, not at the rear. Made sense to me, so I went about bought a pair of 6.5" speakers with separate tweeters. I have this set up as factory in my Falcon and once I started playing with the settings I could tell the difference. But, that meant cutting into the door panels and trying to mount the tweeters on the A pillars. So, more research showed that Hertz actually do make a 4" x 6" speaker. I had been searching for a 6" x 4" speaker so Mr Google failed me. Now a much happier speaker owner, I went to work. I had to make up some mild steel backing plates to mount them, but once done they fitted into the holes like a dream. I couldn't use the original plastic mounts as they would have spaced the speakers out too far. The car had Ken Harrison speakers fitted: The Hertz ones are pretty identical with lots of choices to put screws through. I wanted to use the original speaker covers as they were new repro. Lots of clearance, factory look. Now, the hardest part - fitting the head unit into the factory bezel. I have a bent to make cars look original but they hide a sledge hammer. This is a base model and there are single DIN bezels available but they look crap in my opinion. I think it was on here someone cut up and original black and chrome bezel to fit a single DIN, so I bought a repro one for that use. First task was to make up a housing for it. Some scrap black plastic did the job. I don't have pictures of it being done, but I cut it in half just above the bottom opening, chopped out the amount from the sides to match the height of the radio box, then glued it all back together with plenty of support. The radio is pretty light so I can't see it busting. For the wiring into the head unit I used Narva plugs so there are 2 connectors for all wires. I also have the pro quality ratchet crimper so every connection is good. The finished product: The cable above is for the Holley Sniper which I ran through a gap I made at the top of the bezel. So, how does it sound and was it worth it? Hell Yeah!! The sound - and especially from the fronts, for the size of them - is damn impressive, clear, beefy and loud. I can get the side mirrors shaking without any distortion. I think it all cost me about $1,000 Australian for the bits and around 4 weekends or more to put it all together. I took my time, making sure things were right. The Hertz stuff is quite under rated - Although the front speakers are only rated at 40 watt continuous (80W max,) they pump some good sound and I have the front of stage effect I wanted. The other smaller speakers I found were only 30-35 watts. I ran the power wiring direct off the distribution block shown in the MSD posts so it is 'clean' and the earth for the amp I tapped an existing bolt hole and put a bolt in there. All the power wiring I crimped but also soldered. Been out and about in it for a while, radio is clear, bluetooth phone works well and the doof doof (aussie slang for a kid in a shitbox car with a mega stereo) makes heads turn.

Mine is a grabber so the tail panel is black but trunk body colour

Not for me. I have a Calypso car and I'll be doing mine flat black. But, I always tell people I build my cars to suit me not them so if you like it do it. I think it will stand out from the chrome and black ones for sure.

It's priced high but looks like it's been loved. The small details like the trans cooling hose routing and the trunk metal work looks to me as if someone has spent time on it and not rushed whacking it back together. I always ask myself can I build a better car for the same money?

Well down here we are so restricted in what we can do to cars now it's annoying. Cops will pull you over for 5km/h (about 2mph) over the limit. We have speeding camera's everywhere. You spend more time watching the speedo than the road. A Hoon used to do all the Wikipedia stuff, now it's just someone in a ricer with a body kit and a 4" polished muffler. Although some of us keep the tradition alive: https://www.summernats.com.au/

Damn straight. I have a brand new AED 650 double pumper here I was going to put on, but couldn't be bothered with either trying to learn how to set jets or taking it to get tuned. And now I can adjust most parameters from the driver seat.

Another 70 Grabber :). Welcome to the club. I have Sniper on mine too, great system drives like a modern. Only hassle is waiting the 2-3 seconds for the system to prime and boot up before you start it. I followed the instructions to the letter and from first start have never had any issue with it.

Explains the 4 sales/discount emails I got this month alone.

Wow, why are they shutting down? I thought the Trumpster had got the economy rocking?

I run all my cars at 36-38 psi. My wife pulled 70,000km (40,000 miles?) out of a set of Bridgestone Potenza 18" on her daily drive. Most others struggle to get 40,000 km out of them. I got 120,000km out of a set of Goodyear cargo, which are a commercial 1 tonne tyre. Running them at 30psi or around that just wears them out. On my Hoon cars it doesn't matter what pressure I use, the rears don't last as long as the fronts.

I hassled them by email and they finally extended my current Hot Rod subscription. Too some effort, but my renewal date has been extended. A reminder to always save emails and receipts.

Bad news on the fires here. A Canadian C130 Hercules with a USA crew crashed on Thursday 23 with no survivors in the 3 man crew. Pretty shocking, we've had helicopters and fixed wings crash but nothing this size. At this stage nothing is known why it went down. I am part of fire aviation and the flight trace looked normal until it went down. It dropped retardant for 2 seconds just before we lost sight of it. We have had a lot of US and Canadian aviation people over this year and they have been some of the best people we work with. Their level of expertise is very high and they all hit the ground running. They found that the word 'mate' has many variations from positive to negative but can be used in every social situation. It's bad enough to loose people in fires, worse still when they are miles from home and away from family helping out strangers. RIP B134 and thanks.

Grabber I realised I've already written up about the MSD instal on my progress page.

Grabber, yes I have it controlling timing. I did this after I installed it with the Ford distributor as even Holley recommended to get it running first then do timing control, just so you don't have 2 issues to chase if you have a problem (which I didn't and was a bit surprised after reading all the drama on the Sniper EFI forum). The MSD distributor can be locked out pretty easily and in my box the parts were included. I have pictures at home with the mods. Basically the obvious - remove the vacuum advance and lock the base plate. The info on using timing control I found confusing. One manual for either Sniper or the Distributor (I can't recall which) stated you needed to use an adjustable rotor, the other one said you didn't. When I started installing it, I'm pretty sure the Sniper manual said you didn't need to install the adjustable rotor. 60 bucks down the drain. The problem was I think both Sniper user guides had different stories about how to set it it and only 1 is correct. The Sniper kit has the cable to run from the distributor output to the 6AL. I recall you have to set the distributor at a point (15 degree's??) but that is all in the Sniper manual. You then change the handheld to set it as timing control and away you go. On the handheld you can see the timing in one of the gauges as well. Was a pretty simple process in the end. I have pics somewhere, now it is all finished I'll add to my build post with it all.

Well down here our coldest day would be about zero (40F?) celcius so cold weather won't be an issue. Hot is.

Nice work.

I put one on a tired old 302. I've not run it enough yet to fully complete learning but I have not done anything to any tables. Idles nicely, hot or cold. Starts pretty well first time, with both the original points distributor and the MSD billet/6AL combo I put on. So far, I am impressed with it and have no issues. I guess the challenge will be once I drive it in traffic and see how it goes. Which is what I wanted as I can't be bothered tuning either a carb or playing with EFI.

I got an email this week saying that Car Craft was dropped and I would get digital access to another mag (Hot Rod, Motor Trend or 4WD) and 6 months access to Motr Trend streaming. No mention of Mustang Monthly. Nor money back. Lucky I only took a 1 year Car Craft subscription when renewing MM as it was like a few bucks more. Maybe MM has survived the cut?

I just signed up for 3 years subscription. I hate reading magazines on a computer

Thanks Vic. I only needed one to use as a kill switch - Trunk Monkeys are too dear - and the cost of shipping one down here is too much. We were on holiday over there but were moving hotel every day so I couldn't order a new one. We were in Charlotte for 2 days as well :(

Apparently $125 according to a wrecking yard in North West GA. Is that right? Are cigar lighters for 70's so valuable? What annoys me is they wouldn't give me a price on the phone, despite me saying if it's 5 bucks I'm there but if it's $50 I'm out. I drove from Athens out of my way.....

You need a speaker with just under 2" from the mount face to the back of the speaker (well in my car thats the case). I'm putting mine in the original position just under the door trim in the steel part of the door (I don't have a Mach 1 so not a full door trim) and keeping the original speaker grilles.

Spend more money than you first thought. Speakers make the sound and if you enjoy your tunes it's worth it. My wife has a Kicker system in her daily and for me they need to be pumping to perform and lack bass and mid range. I went to buy a Rockfod Fosgate setup for my 70 but the shop steered me into Hertz Audio based on I wasn't after popping windows out of the car. Yet to instal tham but they reckon they do lots of systems with them.

Another one for brakes and steering. New standard stuff is all I would use (and am using) The hourly rate is what I'd look at. To redo the front and rear with stock stuff I reckon a bloke by himself would do that in 2 days so a 'pro' should take less than that. In our part of the world mechanics would be getting around $80-100 an hour so that's 15 hours. If you're halfway handy you could have a go yourself. They are a pretty simple suspension set up and you do 1 side at a time so you can refer to the other if you get lost.