Prelude

This is my attempt at documenting the restoration of my 1969 Mercury Cougar Convertible. I have been a fan of the '69 Cougar ever since I manged to get my hands on one at the age of 16 in 1990. It was a plain jane 351 2bbl "H" code coupe. I loved that car, but being from Iowa it was a complete rust bucket. So much so that the more I tried to "fix it up" the more rust I found. I soon realized it was so completely rotten that it was unsafe to drive.
Fast forward to 2009.
 I am on Craigslist searching for parts for a '69 "S" code 390 XR7 hardtop that I am working on when I run across an ad for a Cougar convertible for sale in Albuquerque NM.

The ad shows a white standard Cougar convertible for sale with '71 "dog dish" hubcaps.......nothing spectacular about this car I think, then I see it. Buried in the description it says "original 428 engine"
Hmmmmmm... They did put 428's in '69 Cougars. The 428 Cobra Jet that is. However, in a convertible this is an extremely rare beast. I wasn't sure how rare, but I knew it was rare!

9 times out of 10 an ad like this turns out to not be the real deal so I forced myself to ignore it and keep on searching for the parts I was looking for....... I don't really care for white cars anyway I told myself!

There were no pictures of the engine compartment and no way from the ad to prove it was a real CJ car. They were asking 20K which was way more than a small block car in this condition was worth.......so.....maybe it was real.....

I coudn't get this car out of my head so about a week later I called. Long story short I asked the seller for engine compartment pics and the VIN.

...........More later...........