your doing a hell of ajob, very clean install man, you should be proud.

i read all 8 pages of the thread, but i couldnt see if you were using a spacer for your th400/a different flywheel

 

Thanks man, I appreaciate it!

I am not using a convertor spacer for my TH400 set up because I have an LS-specific torque convertor. In other words, the flywheel side of the convertor was built with the 4L60E spacing on the mounting pads and the longer LS pilot snout to reach the pilot hole in the crank. Everything on the trans side of the convertor is TH350/TH400 specific to mate up to those transmissions. The convertor is an 8 inch 5000-5200 stall from PTC. For the flexplate I'm running the SFI approved TCI piece; part #399753.

 

just read the entire thread. gotta say man, i'm beyond jealous. looks like your doing an amazing job.. SUPER clean cant wait to see how she turns out!

 

Gc99TA,
Gotchya. Well thought out.
thanks,
JIm

 

Thank you!

No problem Jim!

By the way, I just ordered my L92 Victor Jr. intake and I got a smokin deal on it!

 

Get wrenching dude lol

 

LOL....yeah,the intake should show up tomorrow sometime. My wife had an outpatient surgery today so I took today and tomorrow off work to help her out with the kids. I'm not sure I'll get much done this weekend but since her surgery wasn't till this afternoon I got some more stripping done on the quarters and tail panel this morning.

Late last week I rebuilt my Craftsman compressor and today I added a water separator/filter, so that'll come in handy when I start spraying primer. Plus I think some of the hard to get parts that need stripped will get blasted, and I've had water issues with that in the past too. As a matter of fact, I'm sure it had something to do with the early death of my last angle grinder. Shoulda added one a long time ago.

 

Best wishes for your wife. Hope everything works out.

Remember they're YOUR kids too LOL

 

I've got a fair amount of stripping done lately. Basically the complete tail panel, trunk jam area, rear window lip, both full quarters, and one rocker panel are completely stripped. But these pics were taken before I was completely done. I also made an attempt at welding up those holes in the lower passenger quarter panel, but no pics of that until its done. It won't be pretty, but hopfully the holes will be filled in for now.




Also my Victor Jr. intake did arrive last week. It's a real nice piece, but since it's basically the same casting as the fuel injected model, it has the injector bosses cast into the intake runners. That doesn't bother me so much on the outside of the runner because that just makes a good place to plum a DP N20 nozzle, but they also left the hump inside the runner as well. So I'll be taking a carbide cutter to those before the intake goes on for good. I started a separate thread about it (now in the new carb section) and it seems a lot of other guys have done the same thing. For now, here's a few shots of it just sitting in place.

 

This project has taken yet another minor turn since my last update. Throughout this thread I’ve been saying that I’ve never done body work before and don’t intend to learn/practice on this car. Well, I was talking with a good friend of mine earlier in the week, and he’s got me talked into at least doing a “temporary” job on the body so the car looks at least presentable while it’s out in primer over the next couple of years.

I’ve planned all along for the final body work and paint to be the last thing to get done on the car, and financially speaking, that’s still likely to be several years down the road. That part of the plan really hasn’t changed. But recently I decided to strip the car to expose all its flaws, in order to be able to show the body man what he’s up against when that time comes. The plan was to primer the car and leave the bodywork untouched.

But what we decided was that I could just take pictures of the car stripped down to show the body man, and then I could cover it back up with a little mud. It would let me get my feet wet on the body work side of the house with no real fear of screwing up the end result because I still intend for whoever does the final body work to redo all of my work. In the mean time though, the car will be better protected because I’ll be filling in a lot of the holes in the quarter panels and roof, and it’ll look a little better while I’m cruising and racing the car in primer. I won't be replacing any major panels...I'll leave that for when it get's final paint. I'll have to patch the lower passenger side fender, but other than that I'll just be slingin mud!

Well, enough jabber….here’s some shots of what I’ve been up to. I’m still working at stripping the body, but I also took the time to start filling some holes with All-Metal.

 

And some of the pit and hole filling I’ve done so far……..just roughed in.













I also ordered my Summit Racing black epoxy primer the other day. I’m not sure how long all this body work is going to take, but I’m hoping to be spraying the shell by mid-November. I guess we’ll see how that goes, but I know it’s gotta be primed before mid-December when hunting season starts. After the shell is primed, I can take my time because I’ll basically just be stripping, priming, and re-hanging one panel at a time……starting with the doors.

 

You might have to put a very thin coat of plastic on the roof, and other areas where the pitting as real bad. That will be the only way to really get the surface flat enough for paint. It might end up looking wavy otherwise. Once you spray a coat of primer you should be able to tell if it needs more body work and blocking. It looks good so far though! Keep up the good work.

 

Thanks man. Yeah, I plan to skim coat and block the entire roof with plastic. I don't have any durablocks or anything like that yet, so I messed with sanding a few of the All-Metal spots down with the DA. If I take it clear down, the pits are filled, but not completely flush with the surrounding metal to where you can still feel their texture. I assume I'm digging the very top layers off because I'm probably not staying completely flat. If I don't take it down that far, it looks good, but you can feel with your hand that you've created a slight high spot. Again, I was hoping with that many spots to fill on the roof, skimming and blocking the entire roof would even it out. Thanks again for the compliments and advice. I'll be needing lots of both as I tackle this....LOL.

 

GC99TA,
Glad you are back at your build. I check almost daily. LOL So are you still gonna replace the quarter panel? I hope so. I want some insight before I tackle mine. LOL Keep up the good work.

Jim

 

The quarter will get replaced eventually Jim, but not by me. I'm basically just going to be doing a rough job on it with filler so it looks "decent" in primer. But when the final paint job goes on, I'll have the full quarter replaced. I'm not ready to tackle something like that just yet. I'd like to think I'd do OK at it, but I don't want to make a $400.00 mistake on this car. A $40.00 mistake (some filler and sand paper) I'm good with, just not $400. Since it's my first experience with body work, the standard will be no holes, pits or major dents showing. minor waves are expected. Again, this won't be the body work that the final paint job will go over. This is just my temp job for running in primer. I'm actually excited to see her in black suede.

By the way, how's yours coming along? Haven't seen any updates lately.

 

Gary,
I just took the time to READ your post fully. I should of waited til I did before asking questions you all ready answered. Mybad. LOL Be sure to take alot of pics during your temp. bodywork.

My basketcase swap is on hold until next spring. Hopefully during the winter I can save up enough coin for the headers, harness/ECM reflash, cooling system and finish the fuel system. Basically just get it running. I am thinking on purchasing a Miller Diversion180 tig and Millermatic 210/211(?) mig. to aid in the swap and because I want them LOL Time will tell what I can afford.

Jim

 

Awsome thread and a great motivator.

 

Thanks man! I know I've drawn motivation from a lot of build threads on here, so it's nice to think my project could do that for someone else.

Not a lot of exciting stuff to update here. I've just been slowly plugging away at getting this thing stripped down. It doesn't feel like I'm getting anywhere fast, but at least I can finally say the shell of the car is completely stripped of paint, including the PITA door and trunk jams........




......but I did find some more damage to address in the front of the passenger side rocker...



I also pulled the dash......



Here's some shot's of the warped stock pad (typical 2nd gen). This will be replaced with an OER dash pad.




....I got the deck lid completely stripped....




.....and started on the passenger door....




This is the door that started it all.....the one that had all the bondo in it that made be want to strip the car like this. You could surf on those waves, but it's definately salvagable in my not-so-expert opinion. I'm going to remove the crash bars in the doors since the car is getting a six-point, so I think having them out of the way will give a lot more room to straighten this door from the inside and some filler will take car of the rest.

 

I'm still following along, I love the progress!

If you did research along these lines, does the LS swap work on any year F-body? I can't seem to get hold of a 70-73 bird project, so I might have to compromise with something else.

 

Thanks!

In general....yes, but each generation (1st/2nd/3rd) seems to present it's own issues. To be fair, I guess it's not that they're issues, but different requirements due to the different chassis. If you're interested specifically in a 2nd Gen swap, the only real swap difference within the generation that I'm aware of is that a 70-72 will have the older frame stand style motor mounts and the 73-81s will have the clamshell style. This isn't really a problem, but each style of motor mount will work better with an LS adapter plate designed for it. For example, the first set of adapter plates I had were designed to work with the older style mounts (didn't know that when I bought them) and they wouldn't work with my clam shells. Once I bought the Car Shop brand plates, everything was perfect.

I hope this answers your question and good luck finding a swap project F-body.