Hello CCC!
We are brand new to the Cougar family. We have enjoyed many classic cars and trucks over the years. The love of their charm and character is something I want to pass down to my children. Also, I have a rule in my home - my children must learn to drive with a manual transmission.
My youngest has liked Camaros since he was very young. When he was around 3 or 4, I had picked up a rough 78 Camaro with no title. I tried for several months to make headway on getting a title for the vehicle, but never had any luck. I eventually decided to part it out. Whenever I was in the garage working on other cars or taking parts of the Camaro, he would play in that car without ever getting bored. When the time came to sell the rolling shell, he stood in the garage with his arms crossed and a serious scowl on his face as the new owner winched it up on the trailer and hauled it off. He has been a Camaro guy ever since. But… as he has matured, his tastes have matured with him. We had been looking for a good project car candidate for a while. When he discovered a running driving 1970 Cougar nearby, we went to look at it. He was sold. The problem was the price tag. I have a little GMC pickup with a manual that we’ve been using for teaching driving skills (because so many affordable classic cars are automatics). The argument was made we could sell the little truck to help for the Merc since it too was manual. I couldn’t really mount a defense against said argument. We moved a little money around and got a small loan to pay for the Cougar and the truck is listed for sale. The money from it’s sale will pay back the loan. I had to leave town on a work trip, so I wanted to close the deal before we lost the opportunity to pick it up.
Enough back story…
We went back this past weekend. The seller stated he had turned down offers that were $2k under his asking price. With the little loan and my collected savings, we were exactly $1k under the asking price. (I had already asked if he was interested doing a partial trade for the GMC …he wasn’t). So we scheduled an appointment to go check it out in earnest, took our little stack of cash, and jumped in the big truck for the 40 mile drive over to the east side of the Puget Sound. The car had been in storage for a quite a while, but was started and ran semi-regularly. Even so, the battery was dead as a doornail. With a battery charger on boost, it fired right and purred along smoothly. The owner backed it out of the garage and I noticed the front drivers tire was very low. He stated he hadn’t checked tire pressure in 4 years. He turned on the air compressor and I began to check the other tires. They were all low - right around 20 psi. We topped them all off then backed it out farther to the road. Even though the car had a pretty decent layer of dust, the paint still looked pretty good in the sun. We jumped in and took it for a ride. The engine ran very smooth, but the 4-speed was super clumsy. When it had been upgraded from a 3-speed to 4-speed, it must not have had all the kinks worked out. Other than that, it was great. Engine never coughed or sputtered. The manual brakes were strong and the power steering made zero noise.
We went back to the house and as the seller showed me all the spare parts coming with the project, I was sure to check the garage floor where it had been parked. Not a speck of a fluid anywhere. And being an old dusty shop with several old cars, there wasn’t any evidence any of them had moved recently. I chocked that up as a win. I made the offer and he accepted.
It is sort of an Eliminator Clone. I’d say a good-ish restoration was done in the late 80s or early 90s based on the crushed blue velour interior. The fabric is dusty and and little soiled, so I didn’t snag any decent photos of it. We haven’t really had a chance to find out how nice the repaint is yet. The color shows up very blue in the photos, but in person it has a tinge of teal in it. As near as I can tell in the few hours I have had to play with it, the body is completely solid except for a bit rust showing up on the lower corners of each door. I believe the Eliminator scoop, spoiler, and mirrors were added much later after the restoration. Two owners prior swapped out the 351c 2v and 3 speed manual for a 351c 4v and 4 speed. I’ve checked for the “cannonball” cast on the head (it’s there), so I believe they are open chamber heads. Bummer. All gauges appear to work correctly. All lights (including the sequential rear turn signals) are working, but the windshield wipers don’t do anything. I think there may be an electronic upgrade hidden somewhere for the sequential turn signals because there is a naked vacuum manifold thing in the trunk with nothing attached. (I’ll learn as I go along with this car.)
The price included the original engine and transmission, most of the pieces to turn the interior to black vinyl, and a bunch of miscellaneous spare parts in varying condition. After completing the necessary paperwork, we loaded up all the goodies, jumped the car on the battery charger again, and took off.
The seller never kept much fuel in it, so I need to get to a gas station quickly. I opted to turn the car off at the pump due to the filler neck being between the tailpipes. I figured the Duramax with dual batteries would be enough to jump it again. I was wrong. So then I had to run up the road and get a battery at the parts store before it closed. After installing the new battery, it jumped to life immediately, and we hit the road for the 40 mile trip back home. The car ran great, but it needs a tune-up. It must be running rich because it belches out some black smoke at WOT. It pulls to the left slightly, but everything else was fine. We were almost blind at one point driving into the sunset with all the dust on windshield. The rear end gearing for the original 3-speed makes it a good highway cruiser with the 4 speed. At 66 mph (according to GPS) the speedo only indicated 50 mph and the engine loped along at a comfortable pace. Temps and oil pressure stayed good the entire time. I was comfortable enough with the car to take a quick detour for some sunset pics. By all accounts, this will be a good father & son project. It’s plenty nice enough to enjoy as-is, but still has opportunity for wrenching and teaching and learning.
My son is very excited. And I’m very anxious to get the little gray truck sold. I’m sure it’s killing him to wait for me to get home from my work trip.
you can kinda see some of the dust on the car in this first photo
the car is still just as dirty in the other photos, but I’m trying to hide it with the light/angle of the photos
I welcome any and all critiques, feedback, suggestions. This is my first blue oval classic vehicle that isn’t a truck, so I’m sure I’ll have lots of questions.
Most immediate things we need to address is the shifter linkage, a tune-up, and the windshield wipers don’t do anything when actuated.
