Awesome thread. Killer ride also!!

 

Great job!!! Car is looking great, love that nose! Once the grille, lower valance, bumperettes, and the lights are in watch out FoMoCo neighbors cause the Mustang killa is on the prowl.

 

Thanks guys! She's coming together and starting to look like a car again. I took a closer look at my passenger door tonight and realized it needs to be adjusted inward at the front (top), pulled outward along the entire bottom edge, and slid foward about 1/16 of an inch. All of that is seriously messing with my passenger fender alignment, which is in turn affecting my hood alignment. So, sometime in the near future I'll need to address all of that. Then when thats good, I can install the lower valance, fiberglass RS nose piece, grill, bumperettes.....ect. Have I mentioned how much I really HATE body work of all flavors? Yeah, I guess I have.

I'm really hoping my new camshaft shows up sometime this week. I need a change of pace to put me back in touch with the LS part of this build. I'm real anxious to compare the before and after effects this new cam has on manifold vacuum at idle, converter stall speed on the transbrake (indicator of power/torque), and oh yeah.......sound quality.

 

I am guessing you wont be applying at Maaco anytime soon. I am more of the Earl Schieb kind of body man.

Take the fenders off, line your doors to the rockers and quarters, and then put the fenders back on. You will need to pull a measurement in a criss cross fashion to get the front end square. You may need to shift the radiator support one way or the other. I would use a 1/4" to 5/16" piece of flat steel to set my gap at the door to quarter. If you get the gap right at the door to rocker, everything should line up. See I said "should"!!! Good luck.

 

No....don't even think I'd want to answer the phones for Maaco....

All great advice^^^^^thanks! So, if you could just fly into Tucson this Saturday, we could be in my garage within an hour and a half knocking this job out and then knocking one down by dinner time . I could have you back to the airport by Sunday morning so you'd be back to work by Monday no problem .

 

Send a round trip ticket and I am there! Better have more than one for me to knock down!!! Get a case or two, **** we might even get it painted by the end of the weekend!

 

Awesome job! I've been so busy lately, that the only reason I come to the site is to catch up on your thread. This is probably my fav build on LS1Tech, tons of useful info. Got me looking forward to getting my 3rd gen in the near future. She's looking great, can't wait to see her all together. Honestly the flat black is kinda starting to rub of on me as well. Can't wait to see how she looks with all the trim on. Keep us updated!

I've been reading about the 1020hp 1970 firebird that gets 20mpg on the highway, with a pontiac 400 engine, in the popularhotrodding mag I just picked up. While that car is insane...gotta say I like this build better!

 

Thanks for the extremely kind words! I'm glad you're enjoying my build. I checked out that 70 Firebird article......quite an awesome ride.


I didn't get any time time to spend on the car this past weekend due to celebrating my son's birthday on Saturday and celebrating my anniverssary on Sunday. But earlier in the week I did get some front end parts back from the powder coater. Some stuff like the headlight buckets and marker light brackets will never even be seen, but I chose powder over paint on these parts for it's durability. Other items coated were the upper hood latch (shown disassembled), the 73 RS-only (longer) fender support bars, and the front licence plate bracket. I'm not currently required to run a front licence plate here in AZ, but wanted to have the bracket ready to go in anticipation of eventually moving to a state where it's required .



I'd like to say there will be more progress to follow shortly, but that would probably be a lie. In addition to family commitments, I also need to find time to feed my other habit which is hunting. There is an early archery season starting this Friday, so a good bit of my "free time" will be taken up with that. Also, I'm looking at going in for a much needed back surgery very soon which will take me out of the game for a couple months. But who knows......maybe I'll manage to get just a few more things done before I'm laid up.

 

GAry,
First off, congrats on the anniversary! It can be hard to keep a marriage going when the wife thinks she has to "compete" with our hobby. The children's birthdays go by TOO FAST. I hope you take videos to cherish and relive it over and over. I wish you all the best in your back surgery. I hope you found a neurosurgeon & not just a sports/orthopedic surgeon.

As always. I love when you update your threads and I am digging your powder coated parts. Are all (70-73) RS fender supports longer of just 73? My basket case didn't come with any. I don't remember if I ever asked before, but when you had your radiator core support done, did you remove the headlight extensions (don't know what they are really called) from the main core support?

thanks,
Jim

 

Hey Jim....good to hear from you. Thanks for the congrats, and yeah we're capturing the memories as best we can. My wife took 192 pictures at my son's birthday party! Thank God for digital cameras cause I'd never want to pay to develope all that film! My surgeon is a Prinston-educated ortho spine specialist and the surgery is really a rather minor one as far as back surgeries go. It's just a microdiscetomy which is rather non-invasive and in some cases (not mine) is done as an outpatient procedure. But I'll be spending the night and going home the next day.

The longer fender supports was a 73 RS only type of thing. The 73 RS's have a lot of one year only front end support bracketry that the 70-72 RS's didn't have. It was introduced in 73 to help them meet the new more stringent federal crash standards that year in lieu of a full bumper. Then in 74 GM gave up and went with the "big bumper" battering ram look.

Yeah, when I did my core support it was bare with nothing else bolted to it. The pieces on the left of my picture above are the parts that you are referring to that actually bolt to the core support to house the actual headlight buckets, which are pictured on the far right and do the actual pivoting when adjusting the light beam direction.

Thanks as always for the compliments.

 

X2 on the congrats!!! I have an 18 year anniversary coming up next month, my son just turned 16 today boy how time flies.

The powder coating looks outstanding!

Sorry to hear you will need surgery, hope all goes well. I am sure you are in good hands. Keep us updated on your progress.

 

Thanks man, and congrats to you too! I'm at 13yrs myself. I just got my surgery scheduled the other day and it looks like it's gonna be on Fri the 26th. So, I won't be getting much else on my car but the good news is I'll have a chance to catch up on everyone elses!

 

Hopefully I will have plenty to share to keep you occupied!! Best of luck to you on your surgery.

 

Awesome brother! I hope you do......now get back to work!!!

 

Good luck with the surgery bro. I had a couple in 09, you'll be back on your feet in no time.

 

Awesome job. Keep posting.

 

Thanks man! I'm anxious to get it over with so I can get back to my old self again.

Thanks man! Like I said....it may slow down for a while, but I'm down....not out.

 

I noticed you have a Viper spec tranny in the TA, where did you have the conversion done?

 

GC99TA's signature:

99 Trans Am M6
AFR 205 Heads, Comp 230/232 cam, Mamo Ported FAST 92/NW 92, Speed Inc Rails, 42LB SVO Injectors, Racetronix Pump, Fast Toys Lid, FTRA, NOS Dry Kit, 160* stat, ASP pully, FLP LTs, Borla Cat-Back, B&M Ripper, SPEC Stage 3 Clutch, Moser 12 Bolt W/4.11s, Dennys N2O DS, D&D Viper Spec T56, BMR K-Member, SFCs, LCAs, LCARLBs, DSL, Trq Arm, and APHR, QA1's, Welds, 27in QTPs.
73 Camaro RS - Carb'd LSX Swap in progress....Swap Thread Here

Maybe you missed it or wondered if he did it himself.

 

Jim is correct.....the trans was bought from D&D Performance out of Michigan. I had TRASHED my factory trans beyond the point of reasonable repair (long story), so I sold it as a core to another trans company and bought the Viper spec trans out right from D&D. It wasn't cheap but has been worth it as an extra sense of security when I dump the clutch on sticky tires. Even thought I bought mind from them outright, I'm pretty sure they'll also go through a trans that you send them or they will just sell you the individual parts to do it yourself if you're so inclined. Here's a link to their site: http://ddperformance.com/shop/index.php

Are you just looking at this for a future upgrade or does your T56 need gone through right now? Truth be told, the factory F-body T56 is pretty strong in stock form. My issues started because the torque arm is attached to the trans tail housing on a 4th Gen, which is not a good idea on a high horsepower car that hooks up well.