Alice and The Festicle

[Sid_RallyX_82]

Doing this a bit late, but I'm gonna just do a quick catch up.
Alice:image.jpg
Bought her the day before my birthday in 2015
Had a lot of fun with her
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And eventually wrecked her. That's kind of my thing with cars. I have undoubtedly the worst driving record
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Anyway, I got to work righting my wrongs
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In the process of looking for a donor, I found this little gem my friends loving named "The Festicle". I also found it quite suiting
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PO said it was leaking oil into the cooling system. What I make of that is he had a bad head gasket, replaced it, forgot to flush out the heater core, and oil flowed back in to the system from there, because in my rebuild, I pressure tested the block and head and they checked out ok.
Anyway, I've just finished painting and about to begin assembly.

[Sid_RallyX_82]

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[Rick the Quick]

LooKing Good!

[Festiver]

Very nice!

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[Sid_RallyX_82]

Just began stripping The Festicle for paint prep. The plan was to strip it down to the bones so I wouldn't really need to mask anything, but then I realized I should ask, What Hard-ToFind, non-reusable things (such as adhesive foam pads and fragile clips) should I mask off, instead of removing the items held on by such?

[Sid_RallyX_82]

Things that infuriate me:
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[Sid_RallyX_82]

Almost done stripping the interior on The Festicle
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I've decided I'll paint it white, since that's how it came from the factory

[Sid_RallyX_82]

Are these brackets structural? Or are they just for mounting the front seats? I'm quite tall, so I would like to mount my seat as low as possible, but they might be in the way. I would like to remove or alter them if they are.
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[ryanprins13]

They are for keeping the intrusion of a side impact less. I would keep them. Or get rid of them and replace with something stronger.

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[FestYboy]

Yes those are structural. They tie directly to the door sill and keep the floor from sagging.

[Sid_RallyX_82]

Would it be a good idea to make two more trusses for each side (left/right), place them on each side of the factory trusses (front/back), and then remove the factory ones? My new ones would probably of slightly thicker steel, but lower profile to allow more room. I think that would be stronger with lateral crush without adding too much twist resistance for chassis flex

[FestYboy]

If you can tie the new ones in first, that should do the trick. You could also U channel from the subframe laterally to the tunnel and then to the pinch weld. But for/aft placement would need serious consideration.

[Sid_RallyX_82]

I don't know that I'm quite to the level of constructing a welding in a U channel without warpage, but I can certainly attach new ones with spotwelds like the old ones.

[Sid_RallyX_82]

So I can find this later:

http://web.archive.org/web/20010203131900/www.fordfestiva.com/AboutFordFestiva/options.html

[Sid_RallyX_82]

Just pressure washed the engine bay
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Some rust on the LL rails from the battery.
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How should I go about cleaning this up? Paint stripper, rinse, scrub with water and baking soda, apply POR15 rust inhibitor, then paint?
Also, starting to find rust in the seams.
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Suggestions? Thanks guys