1970 Chevelle SS restoration
 

I bought this car in 2016 and have been collecting parts for it and waiting to get started on a restoration. A move 3 years after purchase and a "mild" restoration of my Camaro that turned into a full blown, rotisserie resto kept putting it back.
Early pics of what it looked like when I bought it. It came with some crappy fitting repro fenders that I swapped out for an original pair from another '70 I had. No engine, trans or interior. My typical stripped, gutted basket case vehicle. It had a full set of factory SS wheels but the seller wanted too much for them and I have a set from the '70 I bought in '73, so the wheels were mine.

Once home, I stripped the black '70 of all the parts I wanted fro the Blue car and then put the parts off the Blue car on the Black one and sold it.
The Black car was an automatic, but I had already purchased everything to change it to a 4 speed, but never got around to it, so the Blue one, being a factory 4 speed got all the goodies I had accumulated. Once I got into the assembly process and discovered the clutch pedal in the blue car had been cut off for an auto at some time, I had to drop the column and swap pedals with the stuff I had bought for the Black car. After I had it all together, I bought a new gas tank and sender, so the car would run and move under it's own power. Then it went to a friend's pole shed for a few years.

The floor and trunk are complete toast, but with the front clip off, I looked over the usual areas of the upper and lower cowls and it is surprisingly good.

I bought the buckets from the same guy I got the car from and about a year later, he called and asked if I was interested in a 1 piece floor for it. He buys abandoned projects and other assorted parts and the car the floor came with wasn't worth saving so he sold me the floor for about half what it cost back then. That price is about 1/3rd what it would cost now. About that time I met a guy who was an AMD dealer and he said he would sell me the trunk floor with a 20% discount if I would order it right away, to fill a truck load order to get free shipping. I said hell yes to that too, so they are both sitting here waiting for "someday".

It seems like a customer ordered car, with 4 speed and buckets but no console. Standard 3.31 gear but with posi. No clue if the original gears are still in the diff. The ladder bars could indicate a gear change and some rambunctious usage...:grin:

I had some "decent" front fenders I acquired over time and the Black car had a cowl hood I kept and swapped the power bulge hood from this car onto the Black one. I had ordered Goodmark full quarters in 2003 for the Black car and they supposedly had been stamped with the original tooling in Michigan before the dies were sent to china. They have been sitting here ever since too.
About 18 months ago, I came across an add on Hemmings for both NOS front fenders and a left quarter panel on Hilton Head in SC...NO SHIPPING. I called and explained I wouldn't be down that way until 4 months later, I mid February, but I would pay cash and pick them up. He agreed and when I arrived he insisted we remove the quarter panel for the first time ever to inspect and make certain they were to my liking. He explained that he had bought these parts in 1990 when he lived somewhere up near Virginia, but shortly after moved to AZ for nearly 30 years. He had his '70 SS restored down there and they didn't see any need to use the NOS parts, so he held onto them and even had them transported to SC. Soon after, he decided it was time to sell them instead of continuing to pay for storage since he had no room at his town home now. The quarter looks like the day it had the EDP applied and was put in the carton. The fenders have NEVER been out of their cartons and I can see the EDP is just as nice, with no surface rust visible anywhere !!
I could not believe I had fallen into this dream. That stuff happened to other people.

And so, it begins. I have been waiting on my bodyman/painter to take the Camaro to his place for interior paint for 2 months now and today I kicked it into the back storage building and brought the Chevelle into the shop to start this project.
First order was to remove the seized calipers, so I can roll it around..LOL The pistons did push back into the bores, so they aren't rusted completely. Then I removed the seats to take them back to the storage shed and get them out of the way. I had procured a rear seat core over time too, but thought ahead and left that in the back shed before I drove the car to the shop building. Thought I took a pic of the interior without the seats, but that is on my phone and NO, I have a heck of a time getting pics from there to here. I'll take one with the camera tomorrow...
REALLY looking forward to get started on this tear down.

About 10:30 this morning i was going to remove the hood, but decided to see what I could do with the little "bump" on the nose that listed slightly down. Yeah... that turned in 1.5 hours of Pandora's box. Oh well, I took it off at 12:40, after lunch and parked it in the back shed...

I could see a fairly deep dent and got the DA out and sanded down to it. Found a WHOLE lot more dents and plenty of filler. As I was chasing the grey filler out, I came across something white and at first assumed it was a different filler. After I wiped dust off, I could see it better and it's the original White stripes. The filler was spread right over the old paint and leveled from there. This was quite typical of repairs in the later 70's, when these cars weren't worth much. The repair person didn't bother to even attempt to pull the dents up, just slathered filler in them and moved on...:frown: Once I realized the old stripes were under all the other paint, the straight lines of chipped/peeled paint made more sense, as it was the stripes.

Afte that, I was more careful to preserve the original black and strips to see what was under the filler. Some of the dents were rather deep. The one with the straight edge is on the left side of the center ridge and stretched. That will need a stud gun to pull up. I chipped the filler out of the dent on the nose and dang, that is deep. I worked on it for an hour and reduced the amount of filler it will need to level off, but it's rather crude right now.

So, after lunch, I got started on what I thought I was going to do with the morning. After I got the hood off and loaded in the pickup, I started draining the coolant and putzing with removing the left fender to sell. I work rather slow, but methodical and after 4 hours, I had the front clip on the floor. I removed the spark plugs and will get a can of fogging oil and spray the cylinders down good for storage this time. The engine runs quite well and I'm glad it didn't seize up sitting for over 20 years. It has been run at times during that period, and I'm sure that helped keep it loose.
I was looking closer at what I had to get yet for parts and discovered someone had cut the rear wheel openings down to nearly nothing to clear tires. There is still black marks in places where they hit. Curious if they just had L60's/N50's for the street, or if this car really did race at one time. Now I'm really curious as to the gear ratio. I never did take on a street to see, as the front brakes either didn't do anything to slow it down or when they did apply, they never released..LOL.
DANG, the wheel house pics are vertical in my file... I can't do anything to get them upright on here... sorry

What is your vision for this one Mitch?:beers:

Just a nice driver, Tim. Not certain on color and probably have plenty of time to decide. Original was white with black top and interior. I don't plan to put a vinyl top on and the interior won't be black. Those are the only "for sure" changes.
The engine in the '66 was supposed to go in this car, as it is a CRT code for '70 LS5 with manual trans from the '70 I owned from '73-'79. I have a 427 block, crank and heads to build for the '66, but don't see that happening for a long time now, if ever anymore.

Is that the 427 that you got from me? Why don't you think it will get built for the '66?

Lack of funding, Freddie

Hopefully this rotates the wheel opening pics, Mitch...

Very nice Mitch,and congrats on those full rear 1/4's.

Thanks Bill, and Rick.
I have it on jack stands to begin the war to get the body mount bolts out. The 4 in the trunk were fairly easy. I cut 2" holes with a hole saw, minus the center drill, and clamped the cage tight to the nut with a vise grip. 2 spun out, with a lot of fore and aft "rocking" the bolt and 2 snapped off, which is a win. I was surprised that the 2 in the cowl are just square nuts, no cage and they are just loose. I tack welded them down and 1 spun out and the right side snapped almost immediately from the bolt shaft being rusted very small. Now I need to look at getting in that opening with a burr and cut the nut loose again so it can come out. The 2 under the door are just plugs and after the right side bolt, under the quarter structure brace, spun in the nut, I was very careful to slowly work the left side loose with my breaker bar. There is a hole in the floor brace right near those bolts that I didn't see on the right side, as they are rather hidden by the ladder bars, but I was able to spray deep creep on the left bolt and after 10 minutes of rocking it in and out by hand, I got it to thread out. There is no cutting into the floor pan under that brace without first removing the brace, so now that all the rest are out, I will lift the body the 1" of clearance I got by removing the bottom rubber mount on the right, cutting out the top mount and will get in there with a sawzall or my plasma and cut the bolt off. All in all, not bad, a little over 2 hours to remove 7 of 8 bolts .. LOL. Oh, the 2 over the rear axle bolts are already missing so no fight there. Hmmmm, it just occurred to me, they may well be plugs too... Either way, I will buy a full set of mounts and bolts to use all the holes with the replacement floor, as long as it's equipt for them.
Speaking of the ladder bars, as long as I had the car up, I removed the rear cover, as it does weep a little anyway and apparently the ladder bars were just to control the inevitable wheel hop, as it retains it's 3.31 gears. I guess its possible the carrier was replaced with deeper gears way in the past and then reinstalled to sell...:dunno:

Great project!

I got the welded nut with broken bolt off and the spun nut bolt out too, good day... Hmmm, forgot to take a pic after I hit it with the long barrel air chisel. It snapped right off the weld. Meanwhile I tried for about a 1/2 hour to find a way to get at the spun bolt from under the car and finally realized I could cut out a section of the floor and maybe see it better. OK, it's right there in plain view. A little lift with the floor jack and 20 second with the sawzall and that fight was over...:laugh: The body is now sitting freely on the frame and ready to be lifted off. I need to figure out where to get some GOOD body mounts and fasteners and get them here first.

Looking at the pics on here, it seems the frame is cracked right above the ladder bar bracket... :eek2:

You're right, Mitch....good eye! Should be able to weld that up once you get it all apart.

There is a plate inside the frame there for the 2 attaching bolts for the ladder bar. I will be looking closely at that when I get it out, to see if it is going up into the frame radius and stressing it there, causing the crack. It could be the car was raced and run hard, it just doesn't seem likely with the 3.31 gears, but never say never.
I just "talked" with Chris White thru FB about his suggestion for body mounts. Of course, he would be looking for NOS, but I'm not in that position, so he suggested looking at In-line tube.

Neat project Mitch - looking forward to following along. Stop and say Hi at MCACN.

I plan to make the rounds. You/Dave, Bill and Erik all going to be together again ?

Yes

A little more "get ready to lift the body" work. As of this afternoon, it is ready. And I received a set of all new body cushions and fasteners today. I need to load the rotisserie on the trailer and bring it up to the front shop building.
I started sanding on the roof to quarter seam to expose the lead and melt it out, but there is no lead ?? The filler feels like a plastic. It's very dense and hard. I chopped most of it pout with an air chisel. Anyone familiar with this, or has the lead already been replaced ? It doesn't seem that way, as the original white paint goes right up to the seam. I'm going to sand more carefully on the other side and try to determine if it is original.

A bit surprised to see nothing on the transition panel over the axle... I see no evidence anything was ever on there and as difficult as it was to get the bolts out/broken off, this body has never been off the frame. As rusty as this cars body is, the frame only has scale. ALL the mount holes are great !

Dug into the right A pillar cancer and did a lot of amateur butchering.

I need to do some of the same on the left side too, but not as extensive, I hope. I'm already thinking it's going to be an interesting experience getting the new floor back inside the A pillar and accessible to weld in on 3 sides. I got a really good deal on the floor with all the rockers already included, but finding a way to feed that brace into the pillar while lowering the body is going to take some imagineering for me.
The first new piece came today, almost done with that side..LOL. I need the mount bracket first and that won't be here until next week, which doesn't matter now anyway. I'll be leaving here tomorrow night and not getting home until Sunday night anyway.

Back to work on the car. The first piece of the rebuild puzzle is welded on.
I have an LED shop light and it makes the pics appear blue, sorry about that.
Once I had the right side stabilized again, I cut into the left side. I made the mistake of taking too much metal out of the right side before realizing I needed to repair the mount under the roto arm and having to be imaginative with holding that corner up to move the arm.... not making that mistake again.
Laying on the floor to repair the mount isn't ideal, especially with a rotisserie that is supposed to rotate to make working on the underside easier. Not possible with only 3 corners being held, so here we are...
Second piece welded on. While fitting the patch and tapping around the cutout, I found the metal to the inside of the patch was whisper thin, so cut that out too. I'll have to make a small patch for that too.

Been a little sidetracked from the Chevelle since last Saturday, but here is more of the brace extraction process.
And Tim S thought he had a lot of "stuff' in the rockers of his 'Vette...

The goal was to extract the A pillar brace that is sandwiched in between several other pieces, with out disturbing them, for now. It connects the inner/outer rockers to the floor pan/toe board, and body mount bracket as well as the inner cowl. I want to be able to use drill screws to hold all the together before I cut out the rocker on the left. I felt I removed too much of the structure on the right before realizing that brace needed to be replaced. I was able to get all my dims back but wasn't going to do the same on the left. So, I started drilling and grinding out a couple dozen spot welds. Once I had the brace free of the other pieces, I just needed to cut it off below my tubing brace. I grabbed my cut off wheel and oiled the tool before using it and when I hit the trigger to get the oil in the tool, my compressor kicked on, made a high pitched screeching noise that changed to a horrible grinding and then the motor caught on fire and quit running...:eek2: The fire only lasted a few seconds and was out by the time I got over to it, but the smell of burned electrical was really strong. I pulled the rear cover off, hoping it just needed new brushes, but I knew better than that and was rewarded with molten metal having fallen into the copper windings and causing a massive short. It felt like an old friend had passed on, as I bought that compressor new in 2001 and it had at least 10,000 hours on it. And so started the saga of replacing the entire unit or the motor.

So, I close up shop, go in and start looking for a replacement motor. What a shock that was. The direct Baldor was almost $1,000 :eek2: I'm thinking, I only paid $900 for the whole compressor !So I start looking for a less expensive alternative. I found them for $250 to 450 but they all have aluminum wires in the windings and are very prone to early failure when used for near constant run time, which mine had done hundreds of times, so I didn't pursue that direction.
I started looking at complete replacements, since the compressor is 24 years old too and found another Ingersol Rand, like mine is, at Tractor Supply on closeout. 5hp 2 stage 80 gallon tank, for $1150. Seemed like a no-brainer, so Sunday I went and got it and got it all wired and plumbed it by that evening. Started it up and it vibrated so bad, I couldn't read the labels on the tank and it walked across the floor until the wire cable stopped it. That was all for Sunday. Monday morning I call IR customer service to have a tech come out and diagnose it for warranty replacement/repair. The don't send techs to private homes, only a business...really ??? why do I have a warranty, if you aren't going to honor it ? She said I could bring the entire machine to the nearest service center for diagnosis and repair, IF it is a warranty issue, or return it to the dealer and they will handle the warranty, whether replace or repair. I called Tractor Supply and they said just bring it back and they will send it to IR under warranty and refund my money. OK, that's all fine and dandy but after 3 hours of removing it from my set up and returning it, now I'm back to square 1....
I came home and started looking for something to get me back up and running and remembered there is a manufacturer right here in MN. I looked up Castair, in Spicer, MN and called about a complete unit but then asked if they sold only replacement motors. Much to my relief, the salesman came up with a motor that wasn't a direct replacement, but had all the same power and running specs as the correct one and it was made by Baldor with copper windings. It was a motor they had made for them to their specs for a single stage compressor, but would work just as well on my 2 stage. He even cut me a discount that paid for the shipping and a pulley, as the shaft size is smaller, at a total cost of $400. There is a local shipping company called Speedee Delivery and they had it here by noon the next day !!! It did take a while to adapt it to my mounting plate and get it dialed in so I didn't use it yesterday, but I did today and it was just like having my old friend back...:grin:

Speedee delivers down here also. Their trucks look like old FedEx cast offs but they give great service.

Cut, final fitted and screwed in place the left A pillar support bracket.

Moved on to imagineering how to remove the rest of the cabin floor. Not going to be fun with the angle supports, as they were put in after the pan. Plan is to cut around them and leave them in. Then drill and grind the spot welds from above and below to remove the rest. As I was looking at this, I decided I better find a way to hold the pillars in place after I remove the rest of the floor and left rocker. When I cut the right rocker off at the A pillar it dropped about a 1/4". I could easily push it back up into place, but knew the B pillar was going to need support. Sure enough the right side was 1/4" lower than the left, so I used my 2 floor jacks and leveled it all up and welded in the 2 supports to the roof structure. They are dead on even from 2 matching areas of the angle bracket to a locating hole in the supporting structure now.

Wow Mitch - that is quite the project. Your fabrication skills are to be commended.

I trimmed and fitted replacement toe board patches.
Spent a bunch of time removing the left rocker and cleaning up all the mount areas for a test fit of the floor. That should happen tomorrow

The photos with the floor and rockers cut out on the rotisserie looks intimidating! You are very confident and skilled sir.