Golden Lime SC360

[LetsFNgo]

Small update today:
The leaf springs showed up after their 120 day back order. I knew when I ordered them what the back order was and I’m very pleased with Kennedy Americans service and help for ordering all of the parts for the car that I’m currently installing. With a little luck I should be able to pull the car outside tomorrow and maybe start it up to move around and begin rebuilding the front suspension.
Got the leaf springs installed with new U bolts and the restored Lakewood Traction Action bars
Installed the parking brake cables and tied it all together. This’ll be the first time the parking brake works since probably the 80’s.
Driveshaft and brake hose installed. Tomorrow I’ll have to bleed the rear wheel cylinders, install the battery and wheels, and check a few more things.
Also need to wire the shutoff for the Mag. Very pleased the rear is back in the car.

[big gear head]

Why not put a set of one piece axles in it? I've seen a lot of those hubs slip on the shaft and leave someone stranded.

[LetsFNgo]

So I got the rear end all put together this morning and installed all the J bolts all installed. The traction bars came out really cool. Then I spent the rest of the day getting the car running. Turns out I had it 1 cylinder off when I timed it and installed the wires. So after quite a bit of time retiming it properly and correcting a mistake I made with the plug wires I got it running. And promptly shut it off due to a multitude of fuel leaks. Another hour was spent getting all of the fuel bowl connections to no longer leak. Then fix fuel leaks at the Y.

Now I was able to run it. And had to pull the carbs back off because I needed to lube up the internal linkage between the primaries and secondaries. Got them bolted back on and now it runs and works. I’m not sure if the Dominators will stay, but they sure look impressive on the intake and it seems to idle and move around the yard well. I need to spend more time getting the linkage to return properly so I didn’t drive it today.

I have most of the parts to rebuild the front suspension and after seeing how worn out the rear springs were I’m going to order replacement front springs as well. The new rear leaf springs must’ve picked the back end of the car up 6 inches on the drivers side. And another 3 on the passenger side.

Overall it was a good, relatively productive day. Car will get backed into the garage tomorrow to take the front end apart. And I can work on the drivers door with the car backed in.

Also, for Big Gear Head, 1 piece axles are on the eventual list. I just haven’t gotten to a point where they were necessary. I will order them at some point.

Thanks for reading.

[markinnaples]

Those Dominators definitely look cool.

[LetsFNgo]

Now that the rear sits up higher I need to start looking for wider slot mags and tires. I’m thinking 15x8.5’s with L60’s would look badass.

[LetsFNgo]

Moderate update today.
Been a little while. Ran into an issue taking the drivers door apart to replace all the rubbers and door hinges since they’ve been wasted since I bought the car. I could move the door up and down a solid 3-4” at the back because the pins were so worn. I picked up a set in Kenosha and finally got around to changing them.
Rebuilt the door after receiving a care package from a fellow AMC’er with a missing mount and bolt for the front of the window to the regulator. Then this morning I promptly broke the lower mounting stud that bolts to the door. Luckily after a little cleaning and some welding I replaced the threaded portion on the mount and bolted it all together after installing all new rubbers in the door.
Once that was all done today I pulled the car outside and tried driving it. Then drove it home because of how poorly it drove. It DID NOT like 36 degrees lol. After some carb tuning and playing around I ended up with about 30 degrees(initial and total, it’s locked), set the float height so it comes out when I shake the car, went 1/2 a turn in on the idle mixture screws to lean it out a smidge, and changed around my throttle linkage more. It still needs more work but I drove the car on an approximate 10 mile round trip to CVS.


It runs great. No idea what fuel mileage is. But it doesn’t smoke, sounds good, has pretty much instant throttle response once the tunnel ram is good and hot(this is important), and idles at 800. Still a ways away from “good” but I can drive it right now without a problem. My only real issue is returning to idle. I have to wack the throttle so it goes back to a base idle, if I let off nicely it returns but sits at about 12-1500.

Next will probably be replacing the carpet one day soon, and then the front suspension will come apart to get completely rebuilt. I took a week off work at the end of April to try and get ahead of this so I have some time to drive and tune it before its big trip to South Bend.

Also included is the order form from Racetec for the new pistons for the stroker engine. Crank is done. Pistons will be shipped in 4-6 weeks. Then I can come up with a bobweight to have the crank balanced and shipped back to me. So that’s coming along. Just slowly.

Enjoy the photos