My 1987 Mercury Grand Marquis

[slack]

Trunk Rust Proofing / Leak Fixing

The trunk has been leaking since I got the car. I finally got around to patching it up similar to how how I did it on the Crown Vic when that had the same issue. This leak isn't that bad but it definitely needed to get done. We're in for some heavy rain tomorrow into Thursday so it should be a good test to see if this actually worked.

View of the before with all the tail light stuff removed. Notice that the little filler piece is still on the driver's side. That's because whenever the previous owner had the rear quarter panel repaired, the body shop glued that to the rear quarter panel so it will never ever come off without ruining it.


Not too terrible from afar but up close it's a bit more chunky. On the inside, all the paint was flaking off and under it was all surface rust.



I grinded down all the rust and then cleaned everything. After that, I coated that whole back panel with POR15 inside and out.


I patched the small holes and breaks in the seam sealer with regular water proof caulk sealer from home depot. Then hit the whole thing with a layer of Rrustoleum. It's definitely not a perfect match to the light color of the two-tone paint job but seeing that this area is 99% covered, it doesn't really matter. The spray can enamel actually came out much better than I thought it would have.



Color match looks closer here:



Like I said before, the driver's side was hit bad at some point. When I had the tail lights off, I noticed that there were two different types. The one in the top image is from the passenger's side which may be original. The bottom one is fro the driver's side. On the outside, they look the same but the foam weather stripping is different.



Anyone have any idea why there's a difference? The passenger's side's foam is SHOT. Holy crap. The previous owner put more of that tacky crap they did on the one rear light bulb to try and hold the foam on. Needless to say, it didn't work and I've already lost one bulb because that side gets water in it.

Are there any good replacement foams that I can try to replace it with?

[slack]

Too much time has passed to do any editing of my previous post.

I did some more digging about the tail light differences. From what I can tell from eBay, the two foam version is much much more common. I wasn't able to find a single "single foam" version in the current or sold auctions. Maybe that's a single year one off thing from 83 or something?

So that leads me to believe the one on the side with the quarter panel repair is original and the passenger's side is replaced.. or possibly both have been replaced. This car must have had an interesting life in the past 34 years.

[DerekTheGreat]

Well yeah, shit, 34 years is a looong time when you think about it. The fact it hasn't been scrapped is a big deal. I never thought I'd see my '85 in a bone yard, but there it was. All ghettofied too, guess it was a mercy kill.

[sly]

Could just use bulk trunk weather seal and ultra-black the ends together. Install the next day.

[87gtVIC]

Nice work. Came out great.

[87GrandMarq]

Slack what color did you use to paint that rear panel? It actually came out pretty good. Compare it to the under side of the trunk, the paint is a lot brighter than the old, weathered paint on the outside.

Funny, my 87 was also in an accident on the passenger rear side. The gap between the trunk lid and quarter panel is smaller than the other side, otherwise it’s hard to tell.


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[slack]

Well yeah, shit, 34 years is a looong time when you think about it. The fact it hasn't been scrapped is a big deal. I never thought I'd see my '85 in a bone yard, but there it was. All ghettofied too, guess it was a mercy kill.

Haha. Good point! I guess it's just interesting to me because my CV led such a boring life. It lived and died on LI and never left Suffolk county. This one looks to have migrated up from Florida all the way upstate and has been banged around a bit.

Could just use bulk trunk weather seal and ultra-black the ends together. Install the next day.

Oh! That's a good idea. I'll definitely look into that. I have my leftover seal from the CV but I guess I should keep that intact if possible. Do you think just picking up some generic stuff on eBay would work?

Nice work. Came out great.

Thanks!

Slack what color did you use to paint that rear panel? It actually came out pretty good. Compare it to the under side of the trunk, the paint is a lot brighter than the old, weathered paint on the outside.

Funny, my 87 was also in an accident on the passenger rear side. The gap between the trunk lid and quarter panel is smaller than the other side, otherwise it’s hard to tell.

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I used Rustoleum Almond gloss enamel. It's not a perfect match but works more than well enough for where I painted.

Here's the can:


From afar.. can't really even tell in this pic. Paint ends just past the seam:


Up close on the other side. You can see the color difference a bit better here.


I wouldn't use it somewhere large and visible but for something like this... it works perfect. (At least for me)

[87GrandMarq]

That doesn’t look bad at all. I actually think I’ve tried that one too. I called a few places a couple years ago and the only place I could get some paint locally was Napa in the next town over. I might try that out on a few spots when I motivate myself to go up that way.


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[sly]

Generic stuff should work fine. Anything that's a U shaped type clip on weather seal should do the trick.

[slack]

So, I finally had some time to work on the cars this past weekend. No major updates or anything but I did finally get to replace the stock TV grommet with the brass one from my CV. Looks like it was just in time too.






I also had an issue that started with the car becoming hard to start. I would have to crank/stop/crank/stop a few times before it would get going and then would have to let it run for a few before taking off or it would stall. I was thinking it was the vacuum line I replaced last year that maybe popped off or the TPS or a weak fuel pump... well, it turns out one of the spark plug wires popped "up" on the distributor and was no longer making a connection. It's pretty crazy how "alright" the car ran on 7 cylinders. (though the gas mileage was AWFUL) haha. Cleaned the contacts and pushed it back on snuggly and so far no issues there.


Rust proofing painting is coming soon. I already started sanding and primering sections of the 78 LTD. Most of the roof is now primered and ready for color. I also plan on inside and out rust proofing the GMQs frame this summer too.

[sly]

woo... yeah. that grommet was toasted.

[slack]

woo... yeah. that grommet was toasted.

Yeah, I was incredibly lucky it didn't fail this past (almost) year I've had the car and have been driving it. When I first brought the car home, changing it was on the top of my "TODO" list but then for some reason I forgot about it until this past weekend. My garage is also a mountain of Crown Vic parts I've been meaning to migrate to the basement but that's also been kicked down the road to a later date.

Also, I forgot to mention in my last past that I also finally swapped out the spare tire with one from my Crown Vic's tires. The tire that was in the trunk was the original full size spare from 1987! Completely flat and looking like a hard shiney Hess truck tire. No way in hell am I going to even attempt to put any air in that death trap.

[slack]

PCV, coolant leak fix and shocks attempt

I'm slowly getting through my "to-do" list on this car... This past weekend I changed the PCV screen, fixed a coolant leak, washed the car and attempted to get the rear shocks out.

I ended up buying the PCV filter on Amazon because I couldn't seem to track it down anymore in the parts stores. Dunno if maybe I was just searching the wrong thing. Anyway, I'm glad I changed it. When I pulled the PCV valve out that I put in last summer, it still looked brand new. Well, turns out the filter was completely clogged.

Here's old v. new:


I also sprung a coolant leak earlier in the week in the hose that runs from the engine to the heater core. Thankfully having all the parts from my CV, I was able to just pull the hose from the parts pile and pop it on. I'll need to change it with a new one down the line (33 year old hose vs a 35 year old hose) but it worked as a quick fix.

Anyone have any idea how to tighten this window latch? It's really loose and is making a bunch of wind noise driving. I can't seem to figure out how it comes on/off. I was thinking maybe that pin gets punched out? I did a half-assed attempt but it didn't seem to budge.



Also, I tried to get the rear shocks out. No surprise, the nut spins the whole top half of the shock. I tried putting vise grips on the shock piston but even as tight as I could get it, it would still slip. Any ideas on hose to get it out? I was thinking maybe trying to get a sawsall to cut the nut off at the top but I'm not sure if it would reach in that tiny access spot. I was also hesitant to use heat with the gas lines being right there on the driver's side.

[sly]

No clue about the vent window latch, but maybe a pipe wrench on the shock rod?

[Kodachrome Wolf]

All the rear shocks I've removed that were stock I cut away the upper portion of the shock shield and clamped down the vice grips as tight as possible. They put up a fight, but eventually came apart. If the studs are rusty, I'd suggest spraying them with some Seafoam Deep Creep and letting it sit.

The regarding aftermarket shocks where the upper shield is mated with the stud so it can't spin freely of the body, I've had luck putting a box wrench on top and loosening the shock using the body of it as the grip point.