I'm Back....and Cowl Removal

Well, it has certainly been a while since I have posted anything.  I think I can safely blame this one on work.  We have had a few people quit on us and it meant that I was asked to help fill the slack.  The result of this is that I have been working 50 to 60 hours a week for about 3 months.  That means that there has been no time for the mustang. :(  Fortunately that has now ended and I have managed to get back onto the car. :)

I had some birthday money and I decided that I would spend it on a portable car garage and an air compressor.  Happy Birthday to me!  What little free time I had, I used to erect the shelter and get the compressor set up.  I tried to be as thorough as possible and bolted everything down to the concrete to ensure it would survive through the worst weather.  I also picked up a small space heater that so far has made it very toasty inside my "garage."

I started by finishing up the stuff that I wasn't able to get to due to the lack of available time.  That meant getting in there and grinding down all the welds from the transition pan and floor work.  Accomplished that, fixed the pinholes that appeared and proceeded to prep the surfaces for paint.  Wiped down the areas and shot the paint.  Things should be pretty much done in those areas.

Next on the list was to get started on the cowl.  With the help of my new air hammer, I drilled out the spot welds and quickly separated the whole thing from the car.  The upper cowl wasn't as bad as it could be, but the lower cowl is a complete loss.  Certainly explains why I had to do all that sheet metal inside.

I do have a new cowl to install, the problem is that I have to do a whole lot of repairs to the flanges that it attaches to.  Also while I have the cowl off, I plan on removing the dash and fixing some rust problems on that, and replacing the drivers side lower cowl panel, and fixing some rust issues in the A pillars.

Here is my new "garage"

Finally got around to grinding down all those pesky spot welds.

Painted!

More sheet metal riveted to the car in an attempt to repair it.  This actually went down far enough to cover the hood hinge bolt holes.  I wonder how he expected to get the hood to stay on?

Piece is removed.  Oh boy!  More rust!

Extension removed.  Cowl is pretty messed up in this corner.

Basically the same thing on the drivers side.

The new air hammer helped make this removal a whole lot faster than if I was still trying to use a hammer and chisel.  On this side it doesn't look too terribly bad.

This side is definitely worse, If I wanted to do the work, I could salvage this piece.  Feeling a little lazy though.  I picked up the whole assembly while it was on sale a few months back.

Well, there's your problem!

Both sides match!

All the rust that appeared as I was removing the upper cowl.  Yikes!

After vacuuming up all the crap.  I'm surprised it is still attached at all.

Overhead view of the mess.

The other side was barely hanging on.

Overhead view.

It's out! Firewall needs some serious help though.  Looks like I have quite a few patches to form.