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There are a lot of threads on here about detailing the engine of modern cars and what to be careful of (computer, etc), but not many on classic cars.
I have a 1965 mustang, pretty much all original. The older gentleman I bought the car from treated it as an everyday car, not a classic car.
So it runs great, etc, but it has 46 years of grease and grime built up on the engine. He rebuilt the engine 15 or so years ago, so it was probably cleaned up to some degree at that time.
I want to bring it back to some semblance of its original glory... not a show car detail, and I won't be pulling the engine, but I want to go through it very thoroughly and clean up/paint everything I can. First step is just get all the overall grease and grime removed, then I can go back and focus on smaller areas one at a time to really get them clean and paint parts that I'm able to.
So last night I gave it my first shot. I focused primarily on the underside/bottom of the hood. There's no hood "blanket" under there, just metal that is painted the same color as the car. You can hardly tell that though, due to all the grease/grime build up. I used APC diluted 10:1 and it didn't do much. Next I tried it diluted 4:1 and it was better, but with a lot of scrubbing my results were still mediocre. I'm reluctant to use anything super strong because of the potential for damaging paint, etc with overspray.
So my questions are: What do I need to be careful of when detailing the engine of a car this old? And how can I cut through the years of grease/grime while minimizing the potential for damaging anything underhood or the car paint with overspray/splashing?
I have a 1965 mustang, pretty much all original. The older gentleman I bought the car from treated it as an everyday car, not a classic car.
So it runs great, etc, but it has 46 years of grease and grime built up on the engine. He rebuilt the engine 15 or so years ago, so it was probably cleaned up to some degree at that time. I want to bring it back to some semblance of its original glory... not a show car detail, and I won't be pulling the engine, but I want to go through it very thoroughly and clean up/paint everything I can. First step is just get all the overall grease and grime removed, then I can go back and focus on smaller areas one at a time to really get them clean and paint parts that I'm able to.
So last night I gave it my first shot. I focused primarily on the underside/bottom of the hood. There's no hood "blanket" under there, just metal that is painted the same color as the car. You can hardly tell that though, due to all the grease/grime build up. I used APC diluted 10:1 and it didn't do much. Next I tried it diluted 4:1 and it was better, but with a lot of scrubbing my results were still mediocre. I'm reluctant to use anything super strong because of the potential for damaging paint, etc with overspray.
So my questions are: What do I need to be careful of when detailing the engine of a car this old? And how can I cut through the years of grease/grime while minimizing the potential for damaging anything underhood or the car paint with overspray/splashing?
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