My eyes are on fire after reading all 25 pages lol. You sir, have inspired me to go over my 73 and redo it all. I do believe I will be building mine geared more towards an every day driver though. Great work on everything btw!

 

Jimbo I missed that one altogether. I seen Viper spec and didnt bother to look any further. Thanks for the bold print, smartass!!! Lol!!!

Gary- There is a shop an hour away that does the same mods and from what I gather they are great at what they do. I think they are a sponsor on this forum. Tick Performance is the main business and they have a subsidary Pcms4less that did my flash and will do my dyno tune when the time comes. The tranny I have is in good shape but as a future upgrade I will go with the viper specs. Man that tailhousing was trashed!!! Did you salvage the transmission?

 

Man.....you musta been really bored! I'm really glad you enjoyed my thread enough to keep going. Thanks a bunch for the compliment! I love to see other guys bringing these cars back to life. The car in your sig looks great!

 

LOL


Yeah, from what I know Tick Performance has a great reputation around here and would probably be a great choice to have go through your transmission when the time comes. If nothing else, it's save you the cost of shipping it somewhere! I didn't realize Tick and PCM4less were affiliated companies.....thats pretty cool.

No, I didn't salvage the transmission. I ended up selling it to a former board sponsor for parts. Believe it or not, that was actually the second time I trashed that transmission. The first time I broke it at the drag strip. I busted the output shaft on a 4200 RPM clutch drop on ET Streets, but I really think the tailhousing failed first due to the torque arm being bolted to it. When it came apart the output shaft was no longer supported and it snapped as well. So, I bought a new stock size (27 or 28 spline; cant remember off hand) output shaft, a new tail housing, and a few other interal parts (syncros, etc) and had it rebuilt locally by a local 4-speed racer and mechanic.

During all this the slip yolk was also damaged so I replaced it and apparently didn't get one of the u-joint clips in well enough. On my maiden voyage with my freshly rebuilt transmission, I thought it would be a good idea to make a full high speed pass on a long stretch of road. Well, at 120mph the front u-joint I had replaced decided to part ways with my driveshaft, resulting in the carnage you see above. All I can say is thank God for driveshaft loops!!! The only good thing about this was that I didn't have to remove many bolts to get the trans out of the car. When the tailhousing exploded, the rear trans mount went with it leaving the trans unsupported. So the aluminum bellhousing cracked the entire way around. If the trans hadn't been wedged on the crossmember......it could've fallen all the way out!!!

And since we're sharing carnage.........here's a pic of what I also did to the stock aluminum driveshaft at the track. This is what prompted the upgrade to the Denny's N2O-Ready shaft. Yeah.......I've had my share of driveline failures. The driveshaft loop saved me on this one too, but at least it was on the starting line.

 

Today I had the most productive day I’ve had in the garage in a long time. I guess it was my last ditch effort to get something done to the car before my surgery this Friday. I started out by pulling the hood and passenger fender back off so I could adjust the passenger side door. It needed a lot more adjusting than I had originally thought, but in no time I had it where it needed to be. Then I put the fender back on and took a cross measurement on the fenders to see if they were square on the car (thanks for the tip tsnow!). And man, were they out of whack!!! My cross measurements were ¾ of an inch off from one side to the other, which explains why my hood wouldn’t fit right. So, I unbolted the drivers side inner fender (passenger side was still unbolted) and removed everything that was bolted to the core support so I could loosen it from the frame and shift it and the front of the fenders over towards the passenger side of the car. Once this was done and my cross measurements were in line, I set the hood in place without the hinges for a test fit. And to my delight, the hood fit very well (all things considered; more on this later). So I took the hood back off, replaced the hinges, and bolted it back on. Next I was able to install my upper hood latch which is fresh back from powder coat.

Now with everything up top in line, I got out the lower valance and bumper brackets. With just a little work, I had it lined up and bolted in place as well. Then I started to fit my Customworks fiberglass RS nose piece. I had already done some pre-fitting to the upper before I primered it, so it didn’t take much fitting work at all. It still needs a little work on the gaps and could use some build up on the sides, but all in all I’m happy with how it fits. Then I pulled the front bumperettes out of their crate and bolted them up. They’ll need to come back off for a good cleaning and polishing but I couldn’t resist bolting them up for the pics. Lastly I set the grill halves in place, even though they still need to be cleaned and painted too. I just had to complete the look.

You’ll notice in the pics that the hood still needs to work to fit perfect. The driver’s side front is slightly warped and wants to sit high but it pushes down very easily. This will be easily cured when I install hood pins. I’m sure over time it will take the proper shape from sitting in the sun with the hood pin holding it down. It also needs to go down a little in the center. This is because the center “stem” on the upper latch it adjusted a little too long. Before I can shorten up this adjustment, I’ll have to take the assembly back off and drill a hole in the hood for the additional length of the stem to go through. Anyways, all of the panel alignment isn’t perfect, but it’s a ton better than it was before I started. Here’s some pics.

 

Thats a fine *** looking car there!!! Love that front end. Great work Gary!!! Good luck Friday, you'll be up and running before to long. At least it will start to cool off outside as you heal. New back and cool weather, you'll be blasting down the quarter in no time.

 

Thanks dude!!! Getting the front end back together has really lit a new fire in me.......just in time to have to quit . I only wish I had enough time to get the springs cut before I leave it sit......but oh well, like you said....at least the weather should be beautiful by October, which will really have my fire lit to get this thing on the road/track!

 

While I’ve been off work recovering from my back surgery, I’ve been going stir crazy just lying around in bed unable to do anything. So as I’ve been feeling better and better each day, I’ve been venturing out into the garage for 30 minutes here and 45 minutes there…..just to see if there’s something “low impact” I can get done on the car to occupy my mind and a little bit of my "spare" time. Its like I'm an addict and I'm sneaking out into the garage for my "fix".….LOL. Anyway, the first thing I decided to tackle was repainting my grill. It was very faded out and really needed some attention. So, I cleaned the grill halves up really well, sprayed the front edges silver, then masked them off with thin pinstripe tape and sprayed the rest in satin black. I wish I could take credit for that technique, but it was one I had copied from a few other guys I have seen redo their grills this way with pretty nice results. Mine didn’t come out perfect, but here are the before and after shots.





I recently also had an old set or RS turn signal housings generously sent to me that still had the factory wiring and plug ends on them that I needed to repair my otherwise good condition passenger side RS parking light assembly. I didn’t have the camera in the garage with me that day for some reason, but I basically cut the good wiring off of one of the bad housings and soldered and shrink tubed it onto my good housing. So, you’ll see the parking light assemblies already installed in some of the later pics.

I also had some small trinkets that I ordered show up from NPD. The biggest thing was a new glove box insert that I probably won’t even get around to installing for quite a while, but since I hadn’t reached my shipping rate limit yet and had to pay at least $8.00 shipping regardless, I went ahead and added it to my order. The rest were things like the nylon nut inserts for the headlight brackets and headlight bezels, molding clips for the reveal moldings on the tops of my doors, another chrome trunk lock bezel (broke the last repop one) and a few 3/16 speed nuts…….nothing great but stuff I needed anyway.



So here’s some pics of what I was able to do with this stuff. Here is one of the headlight brackets with the new nylon inserts…..and then both of them after with the buckets and adjuster screws installed on them.





Next I was able to bolt the headlight brackets in place. I had also cleaned and painted this hardware earlier in the week. Also you’ll see I had the turn signal assemblies in place by this point as well as the new nylon nuts that the headlight bezels screw into.


Next I polished up the headlight retainer rings and headlight bezels and installed them over a new pair of Halogen headlights. The driver side bezel is bent up from that fender getting hit and it also didn’t polish up as well as the passenger side. So that one will one day need to be replaced. Also, the parking light lenses could probably use a good dehazing/polishing too. But, the way I figure it, I’ll have plenty of time to do that sort of stuff some day when the car finally goes to paint jail. You’ll also see in these pics I had by this point set the newly painted grill into place, but I haven’t bolted it in yet. Since this is an aftermarket fiberglass nose, I still need to drill the grill mounting holes, add the nut clips, and drill and install the center divider bar. Oh yeah……that’s another thing I did was painted the center divider (not pictured).





Finally here is a shot of the upper door reveal molding clips installed on the studs and just a random underhood shot I must have taken before I got started with any of this stuff. I have to say that I should have had the door moldings installed but they were fighting me tooth and nail going onto the plastic clips. So, I guess I need to do a little more research for a trick to snapping them in place.





Hopefully I’ll get a few more little things done like this over the coming weeks as my back heals. Thanks for checking in on my thread.

 

Thats great to hear you are up and about. I think the Camaro is the best physical therapy a man could have. Your down and out with back surgery and getting more done than some healthy people on here. Headlights look great as does the grille. Are you going to add all the trim and then have it stripped back down for body work and paint? Are you just test fitting everything for now or are you gonna stick with the matte black? I personally like the the black and am thinking about either the matte black or olive drab green on the 72 4x4 truck. Take care of yourself as the car will be there when your healed.

 

Thanks man. It just feels good to do something at this point........anything really. I have never been very good at just hanging around the house doing nothing, and of course, the car is gonna be one of the main things on my mind while I'm doing that. I went for my first post-op check yesterday and the doc said everything looks great and that it's good for me to be up and moving around as long as I don't over do it (like trying to do heavy lifting or a lot of extreme bending/twisting). Said listen to your body and it'll let you know when you're overdoing it, and so far I feel great.

I'm basically putting all the trim back on now because I know realistically (read finacially) the car isn't getting painted anytime soon. That's more of a "someday" type of thing and won't be for at least a few years the way I'm seeing it right now. We should be moving back to VA late next summer and since I plan to eventually retire from the Army there, we're gonna be buying a house and settling in.....which is going to require as much cash as I can put towards it.

So, I'm just putting the car all back together (1) to keep all the parts in one place during the move, and (2) so it looks more complete and legal as I drive and race it over the next several years in primer. I really love the matte black look on this car too and sometimes have mixed feelings about ever putting anything more on it too. But it's the banged up appearance of EVERY PANEL on this car that makes me want to get the bodywork done. And since I'm never gonna make this car straight myself, I just can't see paying someone good money to do the body work and then not having them paint it too. It's a real dilema, but I think the car will either always be flat black and banged up or straight and shiny.

But for what it's worth I think either the matte black or an olive drab would be great choices for your boy's 72 4X4! It's an inexpensive way to make it all one color, it's a bad-*** look, and you'll never feel bad about getting the finish scuffed or scratched.....ya just scuff the rest and reshoot it! Perfect for a young man's first truck!

 

I think you are right about the no fear scratch and dent part. I am with ya on the "if your gonna pay someone to fix all the dents you might as well have them paint it" theory. I spent around $8500 just for the body work and paint and I wouldnt have wanted it in primer when I got it back. Say your moving to VA? I wont be too far from you if you move. I am just north of Winston Salem, NC. I plan on visiting VMA with my car in the near future. I wont be doing too much autocrossing but will blast down the drags a few times. Take care of the back and make the move, that would be great. There are several of us on the east coast that paln on meeting up once our projects are complete and take a couple of days cruisin around and having a good time.

 

Cool! I should be only about 3.5 to 4hrs away from you then cause if all goes as planned I'll be in Charlottesville, VA. I assume you meant VMP and not VMA? I should be around 2hrs from VMP.

A cruise with a bunch of us would be a lot of fun! Right now, some of my good buddies and I plan to do the Power Tour in 2014 because that is the summer I am eligable to retire and will likely be on terminal leave that spring and summer. But, it really depends on the route they take that year. Obviously I'll have to at a minimum swap in a much tighter converter in the Camaro, but I've thought about wimping out and just taking the TA. There's something more appealing about taking the six speed, air conditioned ride on that sort of trip. But, we've also talked about doing a similar tour of our own later in the fall time when the leaves are changing and the weather is cooler.

Either way, we'll definately have to all get together for sure. I should hopefully be getting there around July-August 2012.

 

Sorry yeah VMP. Sounds like a plan. I am sure a tour of the countryside is not all that hard to plan out. The Power Tour would be awesome to follow but I am like you it all depends on where they start and finish. Let me know when you plan moving and maybe we can all arrange a get together of some sorts.

 

Anyone care to guess what went down yesterday?

 

makes me miss my 70

 

Car looks awesome!!!

Videos?!?

 

I am taking it your back feels pretty good, huh? Finally I get my black marks, awesome! Car looks great and its good to see it out on the open road. Now for some "test and tunes" and a dial-in. Any plans on running it at the track soon?

 

Great cars, aren't they? You should get another one and drop an LS in it!

Thanks man! It'll look a lot better once I get the springs cut to drop the front end down where it needs to be. That's the pics I'm looking forward too.

Sorry no vids yet. That would've required and accomplice; well that or a tripod, but that woulda been a little too obvious if Johnny Law decided to show up .

Thanks man, and yeah the back is feeling pretty decent. But honestly, the manual steering kinda worked me over pretty good since my harness holds me back so far from the wheel.

You know it's funny. I actually went back this morning to take a pic of my black marks......which is why I waited to post this. I just couldn't disappoint you guys with no marks.

Believe it or not, there's still a fair amount of work to do prior to hitting the strip. I still need to put the door glass back in, clean and paint door channels, install weather stripping for the windows to seal against, install hood pins, Caltrac bars, and a driveshaft loop. Not to mention cutting the front springs and getting an alignment. So, I'll get there soon enough, but not without some more work. For now though......I'm just enjoying cruizing and flogging it. I've got 80 miles on it so far. I took it out today and weighed it. It went 3240 with a completely full fuel cell, but I've still got at least 50-75 more lbs to add with all the stuff above and a few other small things.

 

What brand paint is on the car?

I have some Pontiac billet center caps that I need to paint matte black for my new wheels.

 

The paint is Summit black epoxy primer, which is basically re-branded Kirker brand primer from what I've read. It was about $100 for a full gallon of paint and a gallon of activator, which was enough to do the entire car and still have a little left over.