Driving project cars, regardless of condition, is perhaps the most rewarding aspect of owning them, but it’s not easy keeping middle-aged iron on the road. While tooling our ’62 Ford Galaxie 500 XL to the office, we counted no less than 15 bushing-beating bumps in the first mile. Considering the 160,000 miles on the car and applying simple math, we figure that rough roads punched the original suspension pieces no fewer than 2.4 million times over the past 38 years!
As such, our Ford is plagued by some serious driveability issues ranging from front end clunks and groans to nose dives under braking, all associated with old age and wear. Our favorite quirk is the occasional random lane change caused by fried ball joints and sloppy steering links. In an effort to rejuvenate the old sled and prepare it for the pounding of future Power Tours, a rehash was in order. The hard part of this job was finding new parts for early-’60s fullsize Fords. Though the Chevy crowd enjoys off-the-shelf availability most of the time, other makes are not as loved. However, we discovered that Auto Krafters in Broadway, Virginia, prints a catalog jammed with stuff made solely for fullsize Fords. In this installment, we went to Windsor-Fox Performance Engineering, pulled the rug out from under this wreck, and fitted it with some new dancing shoes.