Hello Everyone! New guy here

Jae 'Bird

Jae 'Bird

2nd Gear Poster
Joined
Dec 11, 2023
Messages
107
Age
19
Location
Edmonton, Canada
Vehicle Details
1990 Ford Thunderbird Base with PEP 151A, 3.8L NA V-6
Country flag
Hello everyone, I’m new here, been on TCCOA for a little while just watching and absorbing a bunch of good info. Then I heard that the more active people made this forum, so I had to hop over here. A little bit about myself, my name is Jae and I am currently at the university of Alberta studying for engineering. I live up in Alberta, Canada. I own a 1990 T-Bird that I have had since 2019 when my Dad gave it to me/ let me drive it and work on it. It’s nothing remarkable, just a base model 3.8 with power driver seat and power mirrors but It’s special to me not only because it was my Dads, but because he bought it “new” (it was a loaner from the dealer with 2,000 kms (1243 miles for my southern friends)) in 1991 and its been in the family ever since, so its been around awhile.

I’ll try to keep this short but a little about what’s been done to the ol’ ‘Bird since 2019: Oil and filters of course, changed almost all the light to LED, rebuilt the window motors and had to change one when it completely failed, remounted the side glass in the regulator (this is something I’m proud of cause it worked so well, ill put up a detailed tech article hopefully soon), new tires, new brakes all around, fuel filter. There's some other odds and ends and if its important ill mention it but other than that its all original. The car has 178,947 kms (111,193 miles) at the time of writing this, and she gets parked in the winter, October to April-ish, (it is Alberta after all) and my parents want me to be safe on our crazy winter roads.

I like to spend the winter planning what I want to do to the car, I know its no hot rod so I want it to be a really comfortable cruiser. I have a bunch of questions on various things but I’ll save them for the right time/thread as this is just a getting to know me post. I’m glad to be here with likeminded people who want to keep this platform alive. - Jae
 

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Nice car! I inherited My first MN12 from my dad too. welcome to the club.
 
Welcome! Great car!
 
Yup. The US mandated passive restraints which meant cars had to have either frontal airbags or automatic seatbelts. Canada didn't have that requirement yet when the MN12 was new.
 
So...does that mean that a pre-94 owner in the US who wants to install conventional seat belts already has all the mounting points? Only that they are hidden behind trim pieces.

Doesn't apply to me personally, but I imagine those owners have an interest.
 
Two different pieces of internal unibody doesn't make sense to my manufacturing guy background; I'd bet at least the dimples in the sheetmetal are there, like the clutch pedal mounts.
It amazed me the type of mounts those bolts are in, it's all designed to bend and deform in a bad accident, taking the hard edge off the shock forces.

If you're deforming the unibody with your body and a seat belt, it's time to pray anyway. imho, F=ma is even even worse than g=32'/s/s. Thankfully, most of my encounters with mr. Newton were at low altitudes, usually launched from a bike. There was the street luge thing, but we only did that once.o_O
 
You know, thinking about it, I bet leaving it convertible to a non fucked design would probably be a "Safety Defeat device". And banned. :(
 
Welcome! :)

I thought racecougar did a write up on swapping the seatbelts for his car, time to snoop!

Joe
 
dDUBb said:
Nope
Click to expand...

Have you never taken the rear quarter trim off a 93 and older car? The holes are there, just not threaded. Seen them on mine and dozens of cars in the junkyard...
 
As I understand it those are indeed the Canadian model pivots, the issue is they’re useless unless you find the rare Canadian inner quarter/sail panels, you can’t use the 94-97 ones with those holes as they have the pivot mounted higher up.
 
If I could find a red set of sail panels for my 91, I'd love to convert. The mechanism for the auto belts has removed years from my life😅
 
Zep5.0 said:
If I could find a red set of sail panels for my 91, I'd love to convert. The mechanism for the auto belts has removed years from my life😅
Click to expand...

I heard a rumor, somebody here has a set of Canadian rear quarter panels in storage .. from a 90 35th SC ( Black ) .. possibly the A pillar trim as well, because thats different also .. 🤔
 
I hear that paint they have for interiors will do a color change pretty well.
 
dDUBb said:
I heard a rumor, somebody here has a set of Canadian rear quarter panels in storage .. from a 90 35th SC ( Black ) .. possibly the A pillar trim as well, because thats different also .. 🤔
Click to expand...
I should have noted I have a Cougar
 
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