Car Craft – October 2019

40 CAR CRAFT OCTOBER 2019

I

t seems as though you never have

the time to get to the projects that

are most important. Seven years

ago, we picked up this 1969 Mustang

Coupe for my son, Jason, to build as a

father and son project. He was 12 at

the time and the car needed a fair

amount of work, but we figured we

would slowly work on it. Now that he is

17 and about to enter his senior year in

high school, it runs and can move

under its own power, but it is not

streetable—not even a little. Over the

next few months, we will be attacking

this Mustang pretty hard to get it safe

and legal for Jason to drive, something

we’re sure a lot of readers and their

families will sympathize with.

The Mustang is a full project. There

is no interior, it’s got rough bodywork,

and as you are about to see, it has no

floors. The straight-six under the hood

was rebuilt and runs pretty good now.

We recently went through the front

suspension, so all of that is new. Now it

is time to get into the meat of this

coupe and make it driveable. That

means replacing the driver-side

floorpans. Once the floors are solid, we

can move on to making this shell of a

Mustang an actual driving vehicle, with

a new interior, paint and body work,

rear-suspension upgrades, and

eventually a V8 conversion. The good

news is that even though the coupe

came with a straight-six, it had all the

other features you want, like power

brakes, power steering, and even A/C.

At some point, the previous owner

had patched the floor with a piece of

We Kick Off Our 1969 Mustang Project With a

Step-By-Step Floorpan Replacement

PROJECT

MUSTANG, PART 1

➔PROJECT CAR

By Jefferson Bryant / Photos: Jefferson Bryant and Jason Bryant

tin over a giant rust hole. There was

essentially nothing left of the original

floor beneath it. The subframe was

free-floating—it was that bad. Fortu-

nately, the damage was concentrated

in the center of the footwell, so a single

floorpan patch panel would work,

though there were a few small areas

that we would have to fabricate some

pieces for. This patch would also

require replacing the original seat

stand, which is a separate piece of

formed sheetmetal. These components

were ordered from Summit Racing.

If you are not the world’s best welder

but can make two pieces of metal stick

together, then you have enough skill to

weld in a floorpan. It is actually about

the best practice you can get, as it

doesn’t matter what the welds look