One of the side jobs that I had to work on was swapping out the AC compressor on the Tracker. The old compressor was working after I charged the system and then it stopped one day when we made a short road trip to pick up some engine parts. Later on it turned out that the clutch had finally crapped out on the compressor. So I quickly swapped out the bad compressor with the spare that was pulled from the dead engine that I pulled from the Tracker in the beginning. I got the system charged up and tested and was getting nice cool air coming from the system. Then upon doing a test drive the damn system started getting warm again. At first I thought the system may have needed a little more refrigerant so I went ahead and charged the thing up a little more. The whole time the compressor was running but it wasn't cooling. The system finally took on too much refrigerant that it reached overpressure and shut the compressor off.
I then went ahead and started to bleed off some of the refrigerant to get the compressor to kick back on. This worked and made the compressor clutch engage. And it made the engine stall. I shut the AC off and started the engine again and tried to start the AC again and when the compressor engaged it bogged the engine down and killed the engine again. This could only mean one thing: The compressor is shot. So that's it, no need to continue to work on the Tracker's AC, I need to replace the compressor. So that ends the work on the AC system. The next thing of course was to go back to the Mustang Chicken Coupe. This time I worked on removing the dash frame assembly and HVAC box. This ended up being rather easy, only eight bolts all together that needed to come out. I did have to remove a couple of plastic side panels to expose some of the bolts and a couple of small screws to separate the defroster duct and a small cover panel, but once all the bolts were out, the whole frame came out quick and easy. Now was the time for me to try out my new toy, a lithium battery powered reciprocating saw. I picked up this little specimen from Walmart for $50. The saw came with a 1.5 AH battery and charger but is able to use the larger capacity batteries that power the smaller battery chainsaw. This little wonder made me forget about the corded recip saw as it chopped through everything I needed it to without skipping a beat. I cut the bracket that held the fuse box and remove the remaining wiring that was under the dash as well as running through the driver's side rocker panel trough. With that gone I pulled the nuts from the studs holding the HVAC box to the back of the firewall. Since the box was already rusty one of the studs broke free and once everything was removed, the box separated some as well. All in all, this was not a salvageable component of the car. The next couple of things I removed were the outside air vents that mount on either side of the dash. These only required a couple of screws to be removed before they came out. I also pulled the throttle cable out and pulled the speedometer cable through the firewall to the engine compartment. With the HVAC box removed I then put the saw to the remaining panel that held the wiper arms and extended out from the edge of the windshield frame. With the removal of that section of metal, I secured the steering column back to its mount and vacuumed any remaining glass shards and dirt from all around the remaining areas behind the firewall. With that I can turn my attention to the trunk. I need to cut the rusted out sheet metal from the trunk floor then remove the fuel tank to get that unnecessary metal from the car. I also have to cut the taillight panel, or what's left of it, from the body and straighten out the left quarter. I will have to look at working out some kind of latch or something to allow the trunk lid to be closed to seal the trunk area which will become the nesting box area of the chicken coupe. I also need to look at installing an old spare tire that I have amongst my spare parts and the spare tire from the 69 Mustang. This will allow me to move on to the next phase which is removing the powertrain.
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