The New Project: Part Deux!

[Xplantdad]

That's cool Steve~!

[njsteve]

To save some $$$ I signed up for the intro to bodywork course at the local poly-tech located at our high school. It's a night course and its filled with old guys who want to hang out and work on their cars in a nice shop environment. I am having quite the fun time. The teacher is a local body shop foreman and is happy to give advice, and supply extra dented fenders to practice on.

He said if you have a project, by all means bring it in. So last Tuesday evening I worked on the scale on the trunk floor. The poly-tech supplies all the materials and air tools to work with. They have a state of the art paint booth and even have a nice sandblasting cabinet.

It is well worth the $400 tuition fee for 12 weeks, every Tuesday night. The only rule is that you have to be able to get whatever you are working on, home at the end of the three hour class. So I drove the Firebird there, worked on it for three hours and headed home at the end of the night (covered in dust, of course).

So here is the trunk. As you may recall, I had previously derusted it and then painted POR15 on the now cleaned scaley spots. Here it is in mid sanding.

[njsteve]

Here's a neat piece of historical evidence I found:

There has been all sorts of arguments over the years that only GTOs got the "455HO" air cleaner decal in 1972.

Since my original owner photo shows the unrestored engine compartment with the decal plainly visible on the air cleaner, that of course caused the doubters to say that the owner must have put it on there.



That was until this Holy Grail/Smoking Gun document was uncovered in a recently found 1972 Assembly Manual. (1972 was the impossible year for locating assembly manuals as the UAW struck the Norwood Assembly Plant and killed the 1972 model year from April to September 1972. Very little assembly line info survived the strike).



Since the assembly line instruction sheet plainly states: "Engine Designation Label: 455HO Except Trans Am", that would clearly indicate that the Formula 455HOs definitely came with the decal, since that was the only other F-Body to have that engine and use the Ram Air air cleaner assembly.

[firstgenaddict]

So are you going to body work and paint it black?

[njsteve]

As Clint Eastwood said: &quot;A man's gotta know his limitations.&quot; [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/cool.gif[/img]

I think I'll just settle for the behind the scenes stuff like the trunk and maybe the trunk floor dropoffs.





I purposely left the original caulking mess around the rear drain plates to keep the factory made look.

[njsteve]

And after sandblasting the original aircleaner lid, I repainted it and applied the correct decal.

This decal is made by a Pontiac guy who specializes in 455HO stuff: http://www.455-ho.com/ It is an exact replica of the original in font, color and material. It's nothing like the cheapo sticker sold by the repro venders.



Maybe next week I'll sandblast the rest of the air cleaner. It's a much more involved process due to the complex snorkle assemblies.

You know what's gonna happen eventually:

Give a mouse a cookie.....

[njsteve]

BTW, the rear main seal leak stopped leaking!

After running the car for 400 miles since it hit the road, and using up an entire quart of oil in the process, I went out and bought a quart of the Lucas Engine Stop Leak last week.

http://www.lucasoil.com/products/dis...7&amp;loc=show

I put the Lucas stuff in and then spent an entire day with 0000 steel wool and lacquer thinner removing all the baked on oil residue from the new Gardner exhaust system. I had made the mistake of removing the bellhousing inspection plate and driving the car with it off for several weeks. I figured that would help me find the leak....not really. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/rolleyes.gif[/img] All that did was create a giant tornadic vortex effect that coated the entire underside of the car with oil (and anyone traveling behind me). It also directed a bunch of oil onto the right manifold pipe, creating what looked like a burnt hamburger of carbon on the pipe.

Imagine trying to clean a lasagna pan after overcooking it in the oven for a couple weeks. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/no.gif[/img]

Anyway, I reinstalled the inspection cover and have been driving it for a week and there are no more drips under the car. So either the entire bellhousing is filled with oil and hasn't breached an internal levy yet, or the leak stopped. Only time will tell.

[img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/grin.gif[/img]

(Oh, and yes it does still have oil in the crankcase. I just went out and checked the dipstick)

[napa68]

Every once and again........................snake oil can save the day!!! [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/headbang.gif[/img]

[njsteve]

I ended up ordering a new windshield from Pilkington Glass with the same date code as my original which got a rock bullseye that was not fixable. My collector car policy through MK Insurance via this site covers it without a deductible.

Before the windshield arrived, I had the old one removed so I could do the inevitable repair/paint work in the lower corners that every second gen Camaro and Firebird requires. The areas in both lower corners are always corroded from the low spot where water can collect with no way to escape. Sometimes there are big holes rusted through on what appears to be an otherwise rust-free car.

If you are looking at a second gen F-body, always look at the lower front edges of the windshield. If you can see crud and corrosion above the window/dash line, the car is already in bad shape there.

To my utter astonishment, once the orginal glass was removed, the surface was absolutely perfect. Even the original butyl sealer was still pliable. The glass guy confirmed that the windshield had never been out prior to this week's removal.

Here's a shot of the original backwards date code on the passenger side. What I thought was corrosion in the corner was just dirt collecting there.



And once the windshield was out, I did reshoot the dash and mounting areas since the removal process nicked up a couple spots. So, here it is after a quick misting with flat black from a foot away, to maintain the grainy texture:

[njsteve]

I got the original carb back from Cliff's High Performance http://www.cliffshighperformance.com/ yesterday and immediately bolted it back on. Now I can put the 1972 donor carb that Cliff did a month ago, back on Gramma's Firebird where it belongs.

The car runs awesomely now (if that is an actual descriptive term). It promptly breaks the tires loose just by hitting the gas pedal hard. You can't even tell when the secondaries kick in, it's that smooth of a transition. Between the HEI distributor that Rocky Rottella set up for the car and Cliff's carb work - WHOA NELLY!

She still pings under hard throttle, though. I can't wait to pull the engine over Thanksgiving weekend and swap the cam out for the new 068 Melling cam I have sitting in the box.

I figured out that the rear main seal only leaks oil when you do a hard throttle run. So maybe it's a combination of a crappy rope seal and too high a pressure oil pump. I bought a nice melling M54DS oil pump which is also sitting on the shelf waiting for holiday engine pull time.