My 1984 F150 2wd Flareside Project "Blue Mule"

[Rembrant]

So after my running around and taking pictures this morning, the day's project was to get working on the interior. I've been neglecting this for a while for various reasons, but I really want to get this finished up so I can move on to other things.

I bought two cans of SEM paint. One Shadow Blue, and one BLueMist. It's hard to tell in the pics below, the the Shadow blue was very close in color to the ColorBond blue from LMC...it's just that the LMC version was a matte finish, and the SEM was more glossy. The Bluemist, which got very good comments from those that used it was much lighter than my '84 blue.

Door panel below is LMC ColorBond blue, and the left kick panel is SEM shadow blow, and the right hand kick panel is SEM Bluemist.




Below you will see that neither one comes close to the blue of my dash of footwell vents.






I'm aware that the correct SEM color for 1984 is the 3042 Dark Harbor Blue, but I'd have to order it out of the US, and with the current border situation, they would likely cost me $50 per can, if not more. So, I consulted with Mrs. Rembrant. Her advice was to go with the darker Shadow Blue, so that is what I did.

The sun was shining in, so not a great pic, but you can see how it compares to the color of the dash. At this point, I'm kinda tired of screwin' around with it, so this is how it will stay at least for the remainder of 2020.



I covered all of the door openings with 3/16" high density foam. It's not pretty, but functional. I hope it helps.



I even put some pieces on the back side of the door panel itself. I figured why not, every little bit will help quiet things down.



I just have to finish up the passenger door tomorrow. This evening I installed the passenger door speaker, and ran the wires into the cab. I might even get the stereo installed tomorrow so I can finally move this old truck out of the dark ages!

[Rembrant]

Chris Guthro wrote

Looking good Cory!! It s Beautiful spot for a cruise! Gas is creeping back up now so enjoy it now 😜

Chris,

I hear ya buddy! The front rotors on my VW are gettin' all rusty because I've been driving the old Bull steady while I've been off on vacation...lol. As for the gas prices...the Bullnose isn't as big of a worry as the gas guzzlin 460 in the RV. I was hoping to get some miles on it this summer while the gas was cheap!

Either way, I'm going to drive the old Bull as much as I can this summer since I barely got to drive it at all last season. It just sucks that all the car shows and car nights have been cancelled. Just my luck.

[ArdWrknTrk]

The incredible advantage of digital photography makes itself apparent... again.

Do you remember bracketing shots, burning through rolls and rolls of film and only ordering contact sheets to save developing a bunch of unwanted pictures?

I used to print Cibachromes from slide film, mostly

I don't think I've had my printer plugged in in years, solely because it's so easy to share digitally.
And a single tiny micro SD is now over 400G.
I see the newest standard has an AMAZING R/W transfer rate.

It's an amazing time to be alive.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Unfortunate Cory.
I think Mrs Rembrandt is right though (for now)

Surprised LMC/Victoria doesn't offer matching paint for their panels.

Somewhere, down the road, you can match the dash.

[FuzzFace2]

Rembrant wrote

It just sucks that all the car shows and car nights have been cancelled. Just my luck.

Man do I hear you on that one.
I was able to take my truck to the company 60th birthday party that they had a car / truck / bike show back in November then nothing.

But I do have to say the state has lifted a little more of the stay at home Friday.
I was told of a cruise in not far from the house today put together for a car guy's birthday but he is in the hospital (not looking good) so they video taped it and took pictures and going to send them to him to hope cheer him up so off we went.

The wife and I did wear our N95 masks the whole time, stayed 6 feet apart and being high 80's sweated my butt off.
It was held at a burger joint so grabbed some burgers, fries and shakes and took them home to eat in cool AC.

I was the only Ford pick up of any year, 1 - 50's and 3 mid 60's Chevy pick ups.
Dave ----

[Gary Lewis]

Cory - The darker blue does look good.  And while you may want to hit them with the 3042 later, they look really good for now.  I hope Big Blue's panels look that good.

Jim - I certainly remember bracketing.  And now some cameras will bracket and merge the pics on their own!

[ArdWrknTrk]

Not just 'cameras'
And of course the burst function if you hold the button down could only be accomplished with an expensive motor drive before digital.

SO much easier to get a shot of a catch (or one of my rockets clearing the pad) than it used to be.

[Gary Lewis]

Yep.  Last July 4th I took slow motion shots with my iPhone of my pop can "rockets" launching and got some decent ones.  (The rockets are just a pop can with the crimped end cut out, a hole drilled in the bottom just the right size for a fire cracker, and the open end slipped down over a tennis ball screwed to a board.)

[Rembrant]

FuzzFace2 wrote

Rembrant wrote

It just sucks that all the car shows and car nights have been cancelled. Just my luck.

Man do I hear you on that one.
I was able to take my truck to the company 60th birthday party that they had a car / truck / bike show back in November then nothing.

But I do have to say the state has lifted a little more of the stay at home Friday.
I was told of a cruise in not far from the house today put together for a car guy's birthday but he is in the hospital (not looking good) so they video taped it and took pictures and going to send them to him to hope cheer him up so off we went.

The wife and I did wear our N95 masks the whole time, stayed 6 feet apart and being high 80's sweated my butt off.
It was held at a burger joint so grabbed some burgers, fries and shakes and took them home to eat in cool AC.

I was the only Ford pick up of any year, 1 - 50's and 3 mid 60's Chevy pick ups.
Dave ----

Dave,

The demographic of the car shows are car nights is most definitely an older one, at least around here. At 48 years old, I'm often one of the youngest guys around...lol. I have three good friends my age that all had old cars and all of them sold them because unfortunately their kids had no interest in them. Two of them had these cars since the late 80's...one an early 80's Corvette, and the other a mid-70's Trans Am, and it's pretty hard to get the young fellas interested in that stuff these days.

[Sac79]

I'm hopeful that this trend(of young people not being interested in classics) will continue to grow everywhere! That might eventually drive the demand and price down and enable those of us that are interested to afford the cars and trucks we want... I'm terrified that by the time I can acquire another project, I won't be able to afford the one I want, 1st gen Mustang. 10 Years ago you could get a running one for well under 10k, now you're looking at high teens for one that needs attention!

[Rembrant]

More interior progress today! I am pleased to say that after 36 years without, the old Blue Mule now has a radio/stereo. I installed Kenwood 6.5 speakers in the doors and a Kenwood media player head unit. It sounds and works great. Now that the door panels are fixed up and installed with new sound insulation, and new door seals, the cab is noticeably quieter inside now.



Also installed a new to me factory fat padded steering wheel (Thanks Chris!), and I installed a new (used) instrument cluster lens that is in much better condition than my original.




And to top it all off and make it all pretty together, I re-painted all of the silver edging on the bezels!




And tonight before shutting down the garage, I painted the steel part of the accelerator pedal, and E-bracke release bracket, and the handle for the bench seat slide.

I still have a long list of little tasks that need to be done, but it's starting to feel complete!

[ArdWrknTrk]

Fantastic job Cory!
Is really is the details that 'make it yours'.

Now, how about Mrs Rembrandt's new ride???  :eyebrow. :toetap

[FuzzFace2]

I did not see any "Kid's", I am 60, most I think were around my age or in their 50's.
I think a lot of not having younger people is they can not afford what we are into car / truck age wise.
Look at what we can find 80 - 86 Ford trucks for and them look for anything cheaper and it will be FI and run by computer. I don't have anything bad to say about that but how much can be done that can be seen? The other is you see the car / truck on every corner, here it is Mustangs.

You also have to look at how many of their parents are into cars & trucks.
When we where growing up dad could and HAD TO fix his car or truck. Todays kids father most likely does not know much on fixing a car other than put gas in. I think a lot is because they were also sent to school so they would not be a low life grease monkey.

I know I have not spent a lot of time with my son but coming from a car family he is into them and if he / we had the money he would still have his moms 76 Gremlin and a 73 Fire bird (low miles) my dad gave him. He does have a Jeep YJ he has done work on at my house for when he gets on his feet.
Just my .02
Dave ----

[Ray Cecil]

So that is what my interior could look like....awesome.

My dash is lighter, at least these pics make your look darker than mine.

The truck looks great Cory.

What are you going to build next? Going to sell this one and start all over again?

[FuzzFace2]

That does look nice.

On the door panel paint color match.
Have you tried a car paint supplier to see if they can mix the right color and if they can mix it put it in a spay can? I know at one time you could get the paint shop to mix the inside colors to use in a spray gun so that may be an option?
Dave ----

[Chris Guthro]

I’m easily the youngest around here half interested in anything to Do with a car show or meets. I actually helped organized getting together a car club here in my hometown. All the older folks had a hard time getting it going! And Im 27 lol. Getting called more and more to go work and do odd small jobs on the older folks cars. They don’t want to work on them anymore lol. Cory that interior is looking beautiful!! The new color is perfect in my opinion

[ArdWrknTrk]

Did you ever use Levine's on East Main, or GCC on Fairfield (in front of Vulcan) on the corner of Sunnyside?

[ArdWrknTrk]

Welcome to the old farts home, Chris!

We really appreciate your youth, enthusiasm and fine taste in high performance pickups.  

[Sac79]

Great job on the interior! I love the steering wheel, some serious envy going on here now...

[FuzzFace2]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

Did you ever use Levine's on East Main, or GCC on Fairfield (in front of Vulcan) on the corner of Sunnyside?

I have used them both at one time.
Is GCC still there? I want to say I went there to get supplies and either they were closed for some reason or gone. I remember when they were on Main St on the west side.

So I started going to Levine's in Norwalk just before the RR tracks. Think they have one in New Cannon also but don't know if they do paint supplies?
They were able to put paint in spray cans IIRC.
They also helped me get spray gun cup adaptors for my Start line guns so I did not need to swap the adaptor between guns to use the Dekups.

I always like to go local for supplies than on line, local can help if you run into issues and give you breaks on price.
Dave ----