Lucky#13

First I want to thank all you who have helped me through this project. Great support found on this site. I want to share the swap with all of you.

Excuse my typos (there will be few)

So here is my story. I bought this blue -68 granma Camaro last june from Burbank. It was kind of a survivor. I would be the 3 rd owner. Overpainted once due some front collision. It was September when the car arrived to Finland. When I first saw the car I was like "Itīs gona be just a little work and cleaning here and there. Some minor rust fix on the body and quick fresh on the little 327 and maybe on tranny (PG).



After few weeks of driving I decided that that chassis and drums would need some attetion during the long winter. But still would like to keep things pretty simple and just enjoy the grocerygetter.


Yeah right! Winter came and everything got out of hand (As always).

First I started to take few parts off to be able to check the steering box and next morning it looked like this:

After few more evenings of wrenching things went to this direction:


and then finally father x-mas brought one late present:



Just little cleaning and fixing

Story to be continued soon

fieroguru

iTrader: (1)

Looks like this will be a fun build. The camaro you are starting with looks pretty good.

BlueMagicSS

iTrader: (4)

And that's how easily something simple can spiral out of hand.... SUBSCRIBED... this should be interesting lol... God Luck with the build!!

Lucky#13

And the saga continues.

After santa brought the new engine things started to move on. I was wondering which way to go with the mounts. I decided to go with the Hedman Hustler kit. It has midlength headers from Hedman and the mounts for engine and tranny were made by BRP muscle rods. There was a oil pan mod needed:

I ordered the headers as plain. Some sandblasting cleaning was done to remove the oil and to prepare them for some VHT blue coating:

Also the subframe, inner fenders and basically every stripped part was sand blasted and painted. After that it was really nice to start to put things together. Old mushy rubber bushings were replaced by solid aluminum units (Global West)

Fresh ones

Cleaned firewall and subframe looks goooood

On eastertime the wheather was warm enough to move the shell outside. That poin my small one car garage turned to a painshop, speedshop, fabrication shop etc.

Engine and tranny first time on. True bolt on. Everything lined up nicely.

Even the old driveshaft could have been (and was) used in emergency.
New drive shaft was ordered (1,6 inch shorter). I found a shop (Shaftmasters) at e-bay. Highly recommended. Less than one week from order I had the shaft at my garage. That is custom work and delivery from
Michigan to Finland, Europe in six days. Impressive workman ship and superb delivery on reasoble price. Sweet

Drumbrakes at front was first upgraded to OEM disc. (The fellow on pic would be me)

Later the brakes were futher upgraded with CPP bigbrake kit. (rear disc brakes I will install later)

Some other parts at garage waiting for installation.

Lucky#13

Next to the other things that would need to be modified or upgraded.

- fuel system. I ordered new tank with pump in from a vendor from e-bay. This was done at the beginning of march. On late mid june my project was near the first start. Tank has not arrived, so I contacted the vendor. Their reply was like: "Uh, sorry about the delay. We get these at the end of july."

I was like WTF. I ordered the Walbro 255 and used the OEM tank for now. Vette regulator is also used.

- cooling system. I got the shroud/fans with the engine, so I just ordered new 2001 radiator and modified that to the car. Works great.

- wiring harness. First I thought I would use the OEM harness. It was missing the fusebox and the relays. Also it is about 10 years old and one could see "repairs" here and there. I decided to order a new harness from TechRods. They also made the subharness for the fans. Nothing but good to say about the harness.

- exhaust. Those Hedman hedders go with 4 cherry bombs. 2 on each side and h-pipe in between.

After most part arrived it was just straight forward wrenching.

Other things that were upgraded during the wrenching would be the following:

Steering: fast steering box, new idler and pitman, new tierod ends. Control arms had rubber bushings and ball joints changes few years ago. So I saved some time by just using them. I have urethane ones on shelf if needed.

Suspension: bilstein shocks, cpp 2" drop spindles and new front coils. Rear monoleafs were sandblasted and checked then back on with new uret. bushings

Rear end: fresh 10 bolt rear from a friend. 3,55 ratio with tight lock. Moser shafts inside.

Wheels: 17x9,5 rims with 275/45 tyres rear and 17x8 rims with 225/50 tyres at front.

Seats: Cobra classic seats at front

Mostly thats it.

Body also needed "some quick fix", remember

All the lists were removed, also the sidemarker lights had to go, rear lenses were upgraded to RS/SS models. So no reverse light here. Only decal that was left is the one at the trunk lid. Rust issues were handeled. New driver door hinges were installed. Fresh weather strip kit by SoffSeal was used.

Then some pics for a change.

Ka-chow:

Engine bay

New brake master cylinder and radiator. Ported TB there and intake changing sides

Upgraded suspension with OEM dics brakes. Notice the new -01 radiator

Front end almost done. Co-driver is anxious

or what do you think?

New rear body panel

Rust and lists removed

sideline


Then it was time for painting. For an unfortunate reasons I had to find new painter in short time. The new guy said that he will not fixpaint it. Result would be awful. He said that he will overpaint the whole car.

This point I decided to do what I have always wanted. Use the gulf color theme. Car was painted last monday and on friday the vintage racecar look was completed by decals. (or stickers or call them what you want)

Almost there


Virgin voyage was taken to the summercottage. Here she is last saturday


So there was my swap. There are still a lot to do. Interior is far from complete. Small and bigger things everywhere. But it runs and drives so I think that the tempo will slow down a bit.

It has been fun but also hard spring. You all know how much time this kind of stuff takes. And all that time is mostly away from the family. So we all are pretty exhausted.

Also on sunday I got a speeding ticket 680 e. Thats like 800-900 USD. Money not well spent

Then the engine started to run rough. Checked with HP Tuners. Its running about 40% too rich. Will look into that on next weekend.

Anyhow, it has been fun and will continue like that when I get it back together.

I also want to thank all the friends outside the site who has helped me along the way. Without all of you this would have taken 3 years or so.

Thanks to everybody
-jarno-

adrian-1

iTrader: (1)

That is one fast "grocery getter". Great build. Those blue headers look sweet.

Lucky#13

Thanks. I had a vision in my head all the way. You can imagine what guys who have visited my garage must have been thinking when looking at those blue headers and red rims.

"He must be colorblind"

Thanks for your comments.

Lucky#13

You are right on nail, fieroguru. It was clean, straight and unmolested. Could not have been more happier for what I got.

Thanks again Chris, it was a pleasure to deal with you. And still is. It is funny how you stumble to people with this hobby. And soon you can start to call them as your friends.

One of the coolest things about this hobby.

bonecrrusher

iTrader: (1)

LOL @ headers.

Car looks great!

Klimaxx

iTrader: (1)

bummer about the ticket, I musta been easy to get. Glad that you were as happy with the techrods harness as i was. Where did you get the big brake kit through? were you able to keep the spindles you already had? perportioning valve? master? how do you like them?

rc51rr

Nice work "Lucky". I have guite a similar projekt next winter. Going to put a LS376/480 + T56magnum in my car

Timo

Lucky#13

Thanks. Good luck Timo, it is going to be fun! Keep me posted

1972nova

iTrader: (13)

very nice

Lucky#13

All systems ok and running

http://s647.photobucket.com/albums/u...ent=Jiihaa.mp4

130fe

iTrader: (14)

Great video and car Lucky! Sounds awesome.

Jimbo1367

Cool video. I bet the people in the gat station where like " WTF" lol

good work Lucky

LS2 67GTO

iTrader: (8)

nice build, car looks great. love the video.

Klimaxx

iTrader: (1)

Cars lookin good!

Lucky#13

Had some fun at Alastaro Race Track last weekend. First time ever on raceway as you can see

1/4 mile went 13,23 which is okay on my books. Engine is stock inside. Rearend is 3,55 ratio, which is way too long and still have some problems with tranny. Difficult to get 3rd on. I will look in to those during the winter.

Also a head/cam swap in my mind. Thinking of making a LS6 clone. Budget is a big factor. BTW, open for all suggestions (on head/cam).

Anyway thatīs all for now, enjoy the video:
http://s647.photobucket.com/albums/u...t=goodguys.mp4

It might take a while to open, cause it is a huge file

tonytone4143

dude!!! this is a awesome looking project..wish you all the best on it