Indianapolis, IN

Falcon #2: 66 futura sports coupe, A.K.A...."Creeque Alley"

While the cop-rod was out of action for so long, I began to dearly miss driving Falcons every day. I bought a Malibu and fixed it up a little bit over the three years that I drove it. Then, a friend of mine said his buddy had bought a 66 Falcon. I found that hard to believe, as I had never seen another 66. Certainly it was confused with a 67, right?

Wrong. I went to his house and lo and behold, a 66 futura sports coupe. It didn't look great, but was pretty solid all-in-all and I got excited, yet jealous. I didn't feel so bad a few days later when He told me he had to rebuild the rear end, and had to put exhaust and tires on it already. I offered to buy, he declined.

Skip ahead about 6 months. My friend called me to say that this person was going to jail for a couple years, and wanted to sell his Falcon before he went. I agreed after not seeing the car for more than 6 months.

I put the Malibu up for sale, which angered the wife as it ran good, and looked great. I explained that I could have a Falcon again...that didn't help...she remembers the first one and STILL asks me to sell it weekly.

The Malibu sold, and by nothing more than a phone call, had agreed to buy it the next day. When I showed up that next day, my jaw dropped. The car was in his driveway, running, but smoking and sounding like it had a 455 rocket in it. ALL the chrome was missing, except the rear bumper. There was chemical stripper all over the car, that had been applied months earlier and left. Some places he had scraped leaving bare metal which was rusting bad. Other places it was just 1/4 " thick stripper, baked on for four months. The interior was totally thrashed, and it had virtually no brakes; and not a signal, brake light, or working exterior
light to be found. My wife looked at me, and I said..."give me three days."

In those three days, I finished stripping the car(two days in itself), did some quick body work, painted it deep jewel green (including the door jambs, under hood and decklid), put a new master cylinder on it,fixed all of the lights, went to FIVE, yes FIVE different houses retrieving the bumpers, grille and such, cleaned and taped up the seats and interior, fixed an open heat riser tube hole in the manifold, put a tune-up on it, a new starter, new manifold gasket and donut gasket,and slapped a set of maverick wheel covers on it and had it on the road.

In the 16 months since, I've done, but not limited to, the following.

Had the front end rebuilt(it was sagging inward), fixed the horn assembly and found a horn ring for it, painted the dash and inside doors(top of doors match dash area) and steering wheel and rack, dyed and installed armrests, put front seat covers in, re-plated instrument cluster(not back yet), put original wheel covers on it, rebuilt the entire brake system, installed nice stereo, put in new package tray with nice foam padding and recovered,put in dome light assembly including the door sensors to make it go on, had rear window removed and new headliner installed , had new rear window seal installed with tinted glass and rear window chrome FINALLY, found all but one piece of exterior chrome, recovers the visors,found air cleaner assembly, painted and installed, TONS of nickle and dime stuff, replaced heater core and some switches, and God knows what else.

I truly feel I saved this car from the wrecking yard, as when this man would have gone to jail, anybody would have seen a complete junker
sitting there and had it hauled away. I got great pictures of it the day I bought it, and my wife has even accepted it.

Next in line is I am going to re-dye the trim panels, armrests, and kick panels to match the interior and exterior greens I have used. Then the
bumpers get re-done, and reupholster the front seats if they can match the perfect rear, if not, redo them all. Also, Need a dash pad terribly.
After all of this, I will probably go back through the body and redo it right, and put a real good paint job on it this time.

All in all, its been a great daily driver for 16 months and look forward to continuing to drive it every day.

Take care,

Justin