Steve & Lavonne's XW GT

My XW GT was purchased new by my uncle from Cam Dawson Ford on 3rd July 1970, just after he returned from Vietnam. It was first registered in my grandmother's name. After purchasing the car from my uncle in 1989, I joined the GT Club and used it as a daily driver for about six months. It was then I decided to do a complete resto on the car. Not knowing anything about restoring cars I set out trying to find someone who could do a job I would be happy with. Finding the right person is probably the hardest part of restoring a car.
After having the motor taken out by Jim Keogh's, which was just down the road from work, he gave me some helpful advice on who to speak to, for all sorts of things from resto work to mechanical stuff. Being a member of the Club also had its benefits, but at the end of the day, you still learn the hard way. For example, three exhaust systems were fitted before I found a good one, in the end being a standard stainless steel system from Beedhams in Queensland. Perhaps I'm just too fussy! Having known this car since I was a little tacker, I can still remember the days of having to take my shoes off to get in it, despite everything being covered by sheets inside the car. Perhaps that's why the interior is as good as they day it rolled off the production line. Smoking was taboo!

The interior may have been perfect, but the exterior was weathered. The original Reef Green paint was full of crow's feet and had patches of primer here and there from attempts at fixing the problem. It also had a couple of 70's style options: magnum mags, Mickey Thompson tyres and an underdash Realistic cassette player. A cheap eight track? All this plus some sort of sports steering wheel. These options were due to an incident where the car ended up on blocks in Spencer Street in 1971, near the PMG where my uncle was working. The wheels and steering wheel were missing. There were two more incidents that lead to the car being garaged for at least 15 years without moving. First the car ran out of petrol on the Frankston Freeway, and the second was bent push rods from trying to start it several years after the petrol saga! So there it sat, that problem fixed before I took delivery. It ran like a dream, although it still got a full rebuild in the resto!

After being stripped back to a shell by the first panel beater, he decided to pull the pin and do other things, leaving me stuck with a car in a million pieces not going anywhere. A friend then put me onto Ian Willmot in Frankston and he took the task on. While all this was going on the motor was being rebuilt by the late Ken Leigh who was working in Jim Keogh's workshop at the time. The motor isn't a huge horsepower beast, but it's reliable and bullet proof. It has blueprinted heads, gapless rings, 30 thou oversize, cc'd heads, balanced and resized rods, new pistons, single groove valves, balanced crank, block decked, cam to original specs and distributor recurved. Although it had a 750 Holley for several years it's now back to running an Autolite. It still has the Autolite distributor. It also runs standard manifolds – one reason it's too quiet, I guess!

After looking for people to do the resto, and after quite a few more phone calls, I came across Neil Thompson at Grand Tourer Restorations. At that stage he was still in his first factory in Reservoir. After talking to him about the car he was more than happy to do the job required. With the car being painted in Frankston and Neil being in Reservoir it was just another problem to add to the list. The car was stripped and painted piece by piece and went back and forth between Frankston and Neil's at least a dozen times! The paint job was fantastic. Nothing was done without being OK'd by me first. The bonnet had a stencil made of the blackouts, measurements, distances, even how much orange peel I wanted in the paint was considered. The underneath was the same. How much body deadener and where it should go was noted.

After all those trips back and forth over at least a year, the car was finally ready to put back together. An original Ford twin plate clutch and all new Ford front end components were used, as you could still buy them new from Ford at that stage. The rear springs were reset, original shockers sent to Adelaide for reconditioning, and new springs were made for the front with the correct height and spring rate. A complete new braking system was fitted, although the original disc rotors were reused. The tail shaft was balanced, and the shifter linkages and diff reconditioned. I picked up a NOS grille still in the box for $100, plus four brand new wheel trims for $20, still in their boxes. Bargain! That was about the best money spent in the whole project (bargain wise that is!). Ajax Wheels had four riveted 12-slot wheels they didn't want. They rolled them for me as well for the total cost of $25 the lot. Pedders in Frankston gave me one, solving the wheel problem!

After all the bits and pieces were finally put together it was time for the first drive. Neil was then in Newlands Road. With no stripes, no bonnet, one seat and no rego I took it for a spin down Newlands Road to the drive-in and back. The car was re-born! After a few more trips to Willmot's to finish the panel work, apply stripes and polish, Neil eventually put it all together. The car has since done 24,000 miles, just clocking over 77,000 original miles recently. Most of this was when it was a daily driver. I know the guys in the Club give me heaps about not driving it, but to me it's a part of the family so it's pretty hard not to fuss over it. That's the way I built it so I guess it's my loss. Which is why I need another GT! Would I sell it? Everything has a price??

There's so much more to tell about the resto of the car, but that would take years, as anybody who has anything to do with one knows. It's always great fun to drive (when I do) and being a member of the Club just enhances that.