1989 Mark VII LSC

[blksn8k2]

Replaced the piece of trim on the passenger side front fender today. The trim and the bumper cover both had a pretty obvious bow in them.

 

Here are before and after photos.

 

Before:

 

 

After:

 

 

Next task will be to remove the hood hinge on the passenger side. It won't allow the back of the hood to fit flush with the top of the fender which you can see in the first photo. I already tried adjusting the hinge but it won't go any lower. When you compare it to the driver side hinge you can see a much larger gap between the hinge and the underside of the hood on the passenger side. I can't really see any obvious bend in the hinge so it might be that the inner sheet metal of the hood where the hinge bolts on may have pulled down due to the spring pressure of the hinge or someone pushing the hood too high and causing the sheet metal to flex. It's hard to see from these photos but there is at least a half inch difference from side to side in how far the center hinge pin is from the underside of the hood.

 

Driver side:

 

 

Passenger side:

 

 

 

[blksn8k2]

Okay so the hinge has a definite bow in the surface that attaches to the hood. The sheet metal brace on the underside of the hood that the hinge bolts to is also puffed out at the rearmost hinge bolt hole. Between those two issues I'm betting that's why that back corner of the hood won't go down even with the top of the fender. I can straighten the hinge in a vise. I already took some of the bow out with a smaller bench vise but I'll need to finish it with my bigger shop vise. However, the hood will be more of a challenge. I'm thinking if I lay a towel and a wide board across the top of the hood I can use a big C-clamp to squeeze out that bulge on the underside. The real question is how to prevent it from happening again?

 

 

[blksn8k2]

Hood looks much better now. I guess my tricks must have worked.

 

 

[blksn8k2]

Here's what the back of the hood looked like before I got the car. Big difference.

 

[blksn8k2]

Finally mounted one of the replacement wheels on the front. Not quite finished with that but at least you can see what it will eventually look like. Also reglued the inside rearview mirror mounting button to the windshield and reconnected the wires for the auto dimming features for the mirror and headlights.

 

[Andrew L]

Looks great!

[blksn8k2]

Replaced both hood hinges today. I found a better used pair. The passenger side hinge is the one I had to straighten (it was working fine but I didn't trust it) and the driver side had a weak spring and would not stay in the locked up position. The two I replaced them with solved both issues. However, I did have to paint them because they came from a silver car.

 

[blksn8k2]

Took a few outdoor photos with the different wheels and tires today. Definitely need to adjust the ride height sensors to drop it down a bit. Seriously considering painting the stainless wheel arch trim body color as well. On the later SE models just about all of the body trim including the bumpers was painted body color. Not saying I would go that far but it definitely gives these cars a much more sinister look.

 

[twintornados]

9 hours ago, blksn8k2 said:

Took a few outdoor photos with the different wheels and tires today. Definitely need to adjust the ride height sensors to drop it down a bit. Seriously considering painting the stainless wheel arch trim body color as well. On the later SE models just about all of the body trim including the bumpers was painted body color. Not saying I would go that far but it definitely gives these cars a much more sinister look.

 

Maybe wrap the trim so as to allow for easy return to chrome if you desire....but, I can agree with adjusting the ride height down 1-1 1/2 inches.....she is certainly ridin' high right now. 

[blksn8k2]

1 hour ago, twintornados said:

 

Maybe wrap the trim so as to allow for easy return to chrome if you desire....but, I can agree with adjusting the ride height down 1-1 1/2 inches.....she is certainly ridin' high right now. 

 

Thanks, that's a great idea on the wrap.

 

I probably should have moved it to a more level spot before taking those photos. The auto leveling system does exaggerate the ride height issue from side-to-side a little. But, regardless, it is still way too high, especially in the rear.

 

Here's what came up when I did a Google AI search on adjusting the ride height:

 

Steps for Adjustment:

Preparation: Turn off the air suspension switch in the trunk (passenger side). You can also disconnect the negative terminal on the battery.

Rear Adjustment: Locate the sensor on the passenger side of the rear differential. Loosen the attaching nut and move the bracket up or down; moving the bracket one notch changes the height by approximately 1/4 inch.

Front Adjustment: The front sensors have three preset positions (low, normal, high). To lower further, the mounting bracket can be modified, or the sensor arm angle adjusted.

Finalization: Turn the switch back on, start the engine, and let the car cycle to settle. Important Notes: Do not work on the suspension with the air suspension switch ON, as it may cause the bags to over-inflate or deflate unexpectedly.

Ensure the car is on level ground.

For dramatic lowering, some owners use metal extensions to "trick" the sensors.

 

I also found a few really old posts in some old on-line forums where lowering was discussed. There's also a Facebook Mark VII group but I'm not a big fan. Too hard to find anything there IMO. I posted a photo of the car there several weeks ago and it's still pending approval. Kinda worthless if you ask me. I also found some stuff on youtube but nothing so far specifically about ride height adjustment. However, I did find a really detailed youtube video on air bag and shock replacement which did show the locations of the ride height sensors.

[blksn8k2]

Latest updates to the car include a new power window motor in the driver's door, restored Marchal driving lights and a 90 day temporary plate.

The driving light covers came from an '86 Capri 5.0L that I had years ago. I still need to adjust the aiming of the driving lights but there's no hurry

for that, especially with the nasty weather we're having right now. It was -5°F here this morning and we are supposed to get 6-10" of snow 

starting tonight.

 

 

 

 

[twintornados]

She is big, bad, and beautiful!!!

Edited January 24 by twintornados

[blksn8k2]

Fooled around with the adjustments on the ride height sensors today. I lowered the front about 1" and the rear about 1-1/2".

 

I can go maybe another 1/2" lower on the rear but then it looks like one of those Carolina ass-draggers. 😁

 

Before:

 

After:

[twintornados]

On 1/27/2026 at 5:08 PM, blksn8k2 said:

After:

 

That looks like the sweet-spot for sure.....enjoy!

[fordmantpw]

Looking good!

[blksn8k2]

Thanks guys. I've seen other Mark VIIs lowered even more and some of them look pretty good. However, with the wheel and tire package I have this is about as low as I can go and that is mostly because of the situation at the front. In order to make this wheel and tire combo fit, I had to use a set of 15mm thick adapters on the front. That placed the 255 series tires far enough away from the struts to avoid rubbing them. That also allowed the wheel center caps to clear the dust caps on the stock hubs.

 

Unfortunately, that also puts the tire outer sidewalls about as far out as possible without looking silly, but it's close. I definitely can't go any lower in front without risking the tires rubbing the fenders. The only way to change that would be to either go with a narrower front tire or switch to SN95 Mustang spindles, hubs and brakes. The SN95 parts would eliminate the need for the wheel adapters but would probably put the inside of the tire too close to the strut. At that point I would probably need to go with a different wheel offset and/or width which might be hard to get in this style of wheel which means I would probably have to go with different wheels all around. I really like this style of wheel on this car so for now I'm probably just going to leave well enough alone. It's a good compromise and I agree that from an appearance standpoint, it probably is the sweet spot anyway.

 

BTW, those wheels and tires had only 3k miles on them and I got all four for less than $800 which included shipping. And, they were already mounted and balanced. If I had bought them new I would have easily tripled that price. Hard to pass up a deal like that and it was extra incentive to try and make them work. They were originally purchased for a S197 Mustang GT and, to be honest, I didn't realize just how different the front suspension and hubs were on those cars compared to the Fox body cars which is what this Lincoln is. About the only thing they share with the Mark VII is the 5x4.5 wheel stud pattern and on the Fox Mustangs even that was different.

 

If I ever need to replace the tires I might go with narrower front tires on the same wheels which would probably look a little better and minimize any rubbing issues if I wanted to go even lower, which I don't.

 

As it is, I haven't experienced any rubbing, even at full steering lock.

 

The SN95 hubs would also give me the option to go with bigger Cobra front brakes but I'm not trying to build a race car so I don't really see the need to go to all that effort and expense. The car already has four-wheel discs and ABS, all of which seems to work just fine.

 

My goal here has been to build a decent looking, fun to drive and budget friendly cruiser and so far I'm pretty happy with the results.

 

[blksn8k2]

I replaced the windshield wiper blades on the Mark VII today. That wasn't much of job since all I did was buy some cut-to-length rubber blade refills. 

After sliding the old blades out of the tracks on the wiper arms and removing the metal guide bar from the old blades, you just cut the new ones to length, install the old guide bar on the new refill and slide them back into place in the tracks. 

I did have to bend the little stop bar on one end of the arm up out of the way in order to be able to slide the blades in and out but after the new blades are in you just bend the stop bar back down.

I had never tried to use the wipers until today because the old blades were so bad that I didn't want to risk scratching the windshield with bare metal. 

Turns out the driver side wiper arm was off by a spline or two and wasn't going all the way down to the "park" position when you turned them off. It was also hitting the A pillar and the windshield trim piece when it came to the top of its travel. The position of the passenger side arm was fine and it did return to the "park" position.

After I repositioned the driver side arm and checked that it worked properly I also filled the windshield washer reservoir. 

Next time I turned them on they wouldn't return to the "park" position like they did previously when I turned off the wiper switch. Hmmmm?

I did some research on-line and found out that the wiper motor has a separate circuit that pulls the arms down to the stops below the windshield when you turn off the switch. 

Seemed odd that everything worked fine when I first tried them. 

Anyway, I found an old Lincoln message forum with a post that discussed this same issue.

One of the posters had a wiring diagram that showed how the circuits worked with the switch in each different position.

He figured out how to remove the plastic cover from the wiper motor that covers the mechanism for the "park" feature and had to reposition a lever arm inside the motor which fixed his problem, or so he thought.

However, after he filled the washer reservoir his wiper "park" feature quit working just like mine did. Pretty sure filling the reservoir had nothing to do with the real problem but it just happened to be coincidental to what happened to me. 

What he discovered was that he hadn't fully tightened a couple of the screws that hold the cover on. As soon as he tightened them it worked fine again. He assumed it had something to do with the position of the internal mechanism not being correct when the screws were loose. 

I went back out and looked at mine and noticed that one of those screws he said was loose also held the ground wire for the wiper motor. I took that screw out as well as the small sheet metal screw connecting the other end of the ground wire to the motor. After cleaning the connectors on both ends of the wire and putting it all back together, as soon as I turned the ignition key to the "run" position, the wipers returned to the "park" position. Problem solved!

I'm betting that the guy who posted all that really only had a bad ground connection just like mine. When he took that cover all the way off the internal mechanism somehow got moved to the wrong position (gravity will do that) and naturally wouldn't work when he put the cover back on. Once he got everything back together correctly he still had a problem until he tightened that screw holding the ground wire but he never once mentioned anything about that ground wire. 

Had he simply checked the ground wire first he probably could have saved himself a lot of work.🙄😉😁

 

[blksn8k2]

Did some restoration of the rear window moldings today. The inner edge of those stainless steel moldings are painted with semi-gloss black paint. However, all four corners had areas where the paint was chipping off. After masking the entire window I sanded out those chips and resprayed those areas. 

 

 

Edited March 3 by blksn8k2

[twintornados]

Lookin' good for sure....love the attention to the fine details. 

[blksn8k2]

52 minutes ago, twintornados said:

Lookin' good for sure....love the attention to the fine details. 

 

Thanks. This is the kind of stuff that takes little effort and minimal cost but hopefully makes a big difference. 

 

Here's another one. When I got the car it had a perforated leather cover on the steering wheel. The problem with it was that the cheap plastic "thread" that was used to tie it on was poorly done, especially around the wheel spoke area, and looked horrible. I don't know if there is wear on the wheel rim that someone was trying to hide by installing the cover or if the cover was added as more of a functional thing. Anyway, I took a few minutes to redo the way that thread was used and, at least for now, it looks 100% better to me. I might remove it completely at some point but for now at least I don't totally hate it being on there anymore. While you can't really see it in these photos the seat cushions are also perforated leather so the wheel cover does kinda match.

 

Before:

 

 

After: