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When I first started I got a donor car a 1987 thunderbird that was loaded power everything with
a 5.0 EFI and digital dash and I gutted that car and saved every part from it including everything that mounted everything
so when it was towed from my house it just about bent in half!!!! I cut out the complete firewall from the t-bird with all
the mounts for the pedals and dash. First thing I had to do was remove the welded steel dash from my ranchero. The dash of
the t-bird was the same width so that helped. Setup the steering column mounts first with the brake pedal by welding in the
left half of the t-bird firewall in my ranchero it did take a lot of test fitting before I got it just right holding it in
place with sheet metal screws before I welded it. there was 5 main mounts for the dash 1 on each side and 3 across the top
that had to be placed in and welded also had work on how to deal with the curve of the t-bird dash that was a little different
than the ranchero. It will be filled with a filler panel. And welded that right under the windshield. After I had the pedals
and column welded in place I started to work on the right side putting in the other half of the firewall from the t-bird for
the a/c heater unit. I also had to line up so all the vent from the dash would match the a/c unit so it also had to be tested
a few times before I welded the right side of the t-bird firewall on the ranchero then I started to work on the small problems
making a fiberglass box for the fresh air inlet of the a/c unit. Making a new bracket for the wiper motor from the t-bird
(still not happy with that but will work on that later. when it pauses in intermediate mode arms are up not in down position
I will need to get different type of motor to fix that) with putting dash in and out so many times I redid the wiring of the
dash and taped all wires up so it all stayed on the dash. Also had to move the vent motor actuator to the other side of the
vent and rewire it so it would work backwards. When I installed the new floorboard I made myself a new problem the transmission
hump was to high so had to remove the ash try from the bottom of the dash and now the dash edges wrap around the transmission
hump. Then retest fitted a/c unit and had to trim down the floor vent to wrap around the transmission hump as well. I still
need to make a filler panel for the a/c unit to dash vent the dash is 1 ½ inches away from the firewall than it was in the
t-bird. As of now that is just about how I installed a 1987 t-bird dash in a 1964 ranchero I am sure there will be little
things I will still need to do before it will be the finished product.
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