Finally digging into my Mark after 2 years of owning it! Guidance appreciated!!!

[MN12hybrid]

I am finally getting my 94 base back on the road! Its been sitting for the past 9 months, since I got a pos 1995 Taurus beater that moves slower than ****ing molasses!!!

I went to the wrecking yard last week and found a 93 base Turqoise colored - and complete. The neck on the radiator that feeds the upper hose broke off, and you can tell this was the reason the guy finally sent it to the yard - he prolly overheated the hell out of the motor and trashed it. Lots of new parts, it was made in Jan of 1993.

The guy just recently converted to springs from air - brand new eibach springs were on it, but when I got to the yard today someone got the turn signal lights and perfect chrome trim, and the front wheels with the red springs were gone. dammit!!! It had snowflake wheels all around when I first found it last week and it had great tires on it. Now only the rear wheels remain... too bad because I was going to grab them all. The person did leave behind the center caps for these wheels so if anyone wants em, ill grab em when I go back in a few days, when I go back to grab the AC lines, HVAC hard button unit in the dash, condensor, etc.. I want to get everything working again inside of my 94, including seats that arent trashed, and allow me to move them around.

I managed to strip a lot off this Mark though, and it should be enough to get all the vacuum lines straight on my 94. Every line I grabbed was in perfect shape. The lines on my 94 are all trashed so this will be great to get it normal again, since I have to smog it now. Got a brand new looking crossover coolant pipe too after looking and looking, woohoo!!! I was going to sell my Mark because of all the miles (almost 250k) - I wanted to find a Mark with 80k miles or under in the future to buy, and in the process I figured I would invest a little in my current Mark to make it run decent again, and make it so I can sell it.

When I first got my Mark in 2012, I was out of work and couldnt do anything with the car, and now finally I can!! As a result I am going to post some new threads (after using the search function first to find existing posts!) regarding my current issues on my 94 and try to work them out slowly since its not a daily driver anymore.

Its dirty and needs to be detailed! I also have those same damn American Racing wheels that I see everywhere else. I know there are others on here too with these rims; they seem to be pretty popular even though they arent the most attractive. I also see these same exact wheels a lot on imports in 14" 15" and 16" sizes. Tirerack.com was selling these in 18x8's for a while too.

 

[Bangster]

Good luck and great to see another one being saved.

Personally I no longer go to the junk yard unless I have all my tools and set aside a few hours. It is real close to me, and I am a VIP (hahaha) so it is free to get in, but anytime there is something I want and don't have tools, it is gone the next time. Turn over is less than 2 months, and I have alerts when the cars show up, but they don't go out until the next day. Also you have to beat the guys that go and offer their services for pulling stuff. They will go and pull the stuff that goes quick like aftermarket wheels or steel wheels with good tires, destroy the back seat to check under it for money and treasure, that sort of thing.

I have only found one 93 Mark VIII local to me in a yard. To get parts to fix my front end and busted interior parts I found 3 gen II and 1 gen I 120 miles away, made an early day of it, and pulled everything (it was already 100 degrees at 9:30 am). Tons of Crown Vics (I have a 2000 Grand Marquis), 89-97 MN12 Thunderbirds and Cougars (I have an 89 and a wrecked 97 Cougar), and Continentals (chrome fuel door buttons, chrome and painted improved exterior door handles, 32v COPS).

 

[97 Octane]

Good Luck with your restoration! Can't wait to see it when you're done.

Looks to be like you live around the San Gabriel Valley area.

 

[Spree]

There is nothing at the yards around here, but I found it is easy to get the parts you need right here!

 

[MN12hybrid]

Im in Los Angeles, Marina del Rey area and spend a lot of time in San Fernando valley (Chatsworth which is where the pic was taken.. In the valley
there are several wrecking yards, but I spend a lot of time at Pick ur Part on Penrose (they just combined the domestic and their foreign yards
into one huge area). There are always contis, marks, there was tons of stuff for my taurus. I also got a good look at the Mark VII since one was
sitting next to the Mark VIII I was stripping. I knew the Mark VII was built on a modified Mustang frame, but it never sank in until recently just how
much bigger and brawnier the Tbird based frame was on the Mark VIII.

I was originally just going to get a bunch of things together and get my Mark straight enough to sell it, but Im growing attached to my 94 base
as I work on it, so there is a chance I may just keep it unless I find a spectacular Mark with 80k miles or less. I am a little overwhelmed because my
car needs so much (250k miles), everything leaks, needs to be done, etc... and thats without even getting into the mods yet that I badly want to
experiment with. My interior is in rough shape too... literally nothing worked when I got the car, but now its only the AC, power seats, auto lamps,
and a few other small things that arent working. For a while I was looking at used Lexus SC430's for a while, and may still consider that in the future.

This Mark VIII I found has pretty decent seats, but I am a little spooked to purchase seats and not know if the motors are good or not. I may
look into bringing a small 12V battery with me on my next visit over there to test out some seats..

I am going to finally take some real good pics of everything on my car so you guys can tell me what you think - keep my Mark and restore, or get
a newer Mark and keep my existing Mark for parts, or to sell to anyone interested.