1987 Ford Thunderbird Turbo Coupe Nightmare? Or opportunity? mmm, maybe nightmare

Oooh my goodness where do I begin. For good context here folks, I was 23 when I first picked this up, now 26. I've owned this car for a total of 3 years now and I've been putting my heart and soul into keeping the ol' bird alive. I'm sort of fairly inexperienced compared to other when it comes to projects although I've certainly learned much more now, but when I first picked up this bird it was definitely misadvertised to what exactly was going wrong and has thrown me through so so much to getting it to be at a better state, which I'm STILL in the process of doing. Being high on life from watching Vice Grip Garage, Mortske Repair and Puddin's Fab Shop (youtubers with great youtube channels that i sub to and follow up regularly), I wanted to get something. Something to say HEY, this is mine. I worked on it like crazy and you know what I'm proud of it. When I first got this 1987 ford thunderbird turbo coupe, reading about it being the car of the year, seeing the nose of the bird and all I was in love. However, I was absolutely LIED to about the condition of the vehicle, and that's actually something I'm still struggling with even to this day. The owner of this car (we will call him the old man for anonymity), said to us the primary problem of this car is that there is a strut support issue that will have to be fabricated/welded, alongside with the regular things such as brakes etc to deal with, nothing big right? He took us around a full test drive and everything, and so I bought it and towed it home. Well well well, when I open up the coolant and check for coolant, I notice its missing. Missing? Why? So I fill it up and low and behold, the car's head gasket is blown. Well, of course, it could be a head gasket, a cracked block, a cracked head, cylinder warp or all these possibilities. So, dad and I (this is a collaborative project thanks dad) went at it. We watched tons and tons of videos of, what is a head gasket? How the heck do they work? What causes this white smoke? Can we drive it? And it was determined that it needs to be removed. So, on the day of September 26, 2020 I made my first youtube video which you can watch here!: https://youtu.be/PdiQhiHAc7g. I have many subsequent videos but I privated them for later when I could mesh them all in and make a MEGA documentary on the whole car and my many years of fighting with it. I wanted to be helpful to others and I wanted to document my process on what it took to have the car that I so loved. Well well well, in the years since so so much pain has been had just to keep this car working my goodness my gracious. And I'm thankful to WD-40 or else I swear I would have been totally ruined when it comes to unseizing Exhaust Manifold Bolts, Head Bolts, studs, and so so much more. The photos will document so much more, but you'll see one strategy we used to eventually remove the head was that we had to use a 2 by 4 attached by ratchet straps because the thing is SO dang heavy! And it was a crazy job to get the thing removed and to reinstall it AND, when we did. It didnt work! Still blown and now spitting out oil?!?! Which we believe was caused due to us replacing the stock valve stem seals with improper ones. So we did it again, except. We replaced the turbocharger (turbo was super busted as we learned later on), we flattened the head and checked for cracks (it's crack free!), we replaced the valve stem seals, replace the camshaft with something more durable as we learned later that the lobes on the cam can wear (and wear bad it was), replacing it with roller rockers with everything holy moly. All of this on top of so many little things. Replaced water pump, timing belt, starter that died :(, intake which I broke :(, exhaust manifold bolt which I snapped and I had to drill out (I paid like 100$ dollars worth of bits to finally remove it!), cap and rotor, ooo. the pain. THE PAIN! All of this just for a chance for a father and son (I'm the son!) to get this car rolling. I swear to you without the WD-40 folks, we would've quit like. Thank you for your product in being able to just spray the thing down, let it sit for 3 days and them boom, free as can be. I learned my lesson about snapping bolts and intakes! To be honest as of today, the car isn't yet running! Well, sorta is, but it's like it's idling weird which we have to sniff out, but at least the compression is great on all 4 cylinders (150 PSI!) It needs so much more even if it runs, and runs without smoking. A whole suspension redone (struts and shocks are gone, bushings are out everywhere), the interior needs some love (saggy headliner, broken little trim spots. A new gas tank as this one leaks after it's passed the halfway point. Of course the welding still needs to be done! And keep in mind folks, my dad and I, well we're not mechanics! But we try our best. Being former refugees of the country of former yugoslavia now turned canadian citizens (I got mine at 7 years old!), we really believe that no matter how hard life can be, as long as you do your best you'll eventually get there. There has been much hardship in our lives, this car being one of them! But we're grateful for all the support we get. Friends, family, the car communities on youtube and social media helping along the way are so helpful. And here in Canada one can have available to all of the highest quality parts and products. Your rust penetrant especially helped in being part of the solution (pun intended) to keep our dream alive. The grant offered from you folks to help realize my dream would be amazing. And it's hard here being in the east coast of Canada where rust is so hard to cars and you never get to see anything unique. But this car man, its a thunderbird! Literally, Car of the Year, body shape that helped win so many NASCAR titles. This Bird holds a RECORD at nascar, fastest car around! 212.807! MPH I will bring the car back to life. But your help would be very appreciative in having the sick bird fly once more. It would be AMAZING to get this, but I also understand you must have SO many projects to still consider. So with that said, thanks for reading my long post! I hope you enjoyed learning a bit about me and my car! It's been a long journey, and I'm looking forward to hearing a response. Until next time, as Derrick from Vice Grip Garage would say, BRING THE THUNDER! Yours, Kastriot (Kas) Axhami