1967 ss/rs resto/mod

[Too Many Projects]

I've owned this car since 2004 and re-assembled it from a basket case to drive "while I was restoring it". It never got past the driver stage until 2 years ago. I, FINALLY, got a 1 piece trunk pan, trunk drops, extension panel, right full quarter and left skin for it. I was just going to do the back half and drive it again.... uh, huh.
















The car came from the SF Bay area and was, generally, in good condition, but the salty air caused the typical rust thru at the rear window and the center section of the trunk pan rusted...badly.





I was going to just replace the center pan, but the car was hit on the right rear corner way in the past and the quarter was sectioned on over remnants of the original panel. The tail panel was sectioned in the center of the left tail light opening and the trunk floor/extension was still crumpled and not pulled out properly. This led to the decision to replace the entire trunk floor and "do it right".


The frame rails and left trunk drop are in very nice condition, so I preserved and left them.





The inner wheel houses needed repair on both sides for rust at the floor weld flanges. I had to replace much of the left, while the right only needed sections welded in at the flange location.











After fitting the floor and left inner house, with gauges, to be certain it was centered and square, I cleaned and sprayed galvanizing preservative in the frame rails.





The rails were still galvanized but I had welded up extra holes from previous exhaust mods and drowned the rusty steel shackle mounts in Eastwood converter.








Once all the pieces were ready, the weld flanges got coated with copper weld thru primer and installed.

















The floor killed my back and knees from leaning in the trunk. The wheel house required curling up in a fetal position inside the trunk. Good thing I'm not all that big.

[1crossram]

Wonderful work

[NorCam]

Nice work on the floors and the welding. Do you have plans to Day 2 this car?

[Too Many Projects]

I'm in our local Camaro and Chevelle Clubs and it was getting into March of 2019 and the Chevelle Club was looking for a "tech session" project to work on. I have held a number of these for both the Chevelle and Camaro Clubs during the long winter months over the past 12 years.

I had a complete front disc upgrade and Global West upper control arms sitting on a shelf for several years, so I said we could throw all that on for the club to have a meeting and get together.






I have hosted a few of these complete front end make-overs in the past and with 6 people working on it, we have done these kind of swaps in one Saturday.
I got the car turned around in the shop to face forward and removed the front wheels in preparation for the event. I was looking at the dirty, surface rusted sub frame and thought I can't just throw all these new, clean parts on it like that. Well, most of you know how steep the project creep slope is and I started removing other parts for access to the subframe to clean and paint. This is where I stopped...





I figured we could do a quick clean and spray of the frame and get all the parts on and I could finish it up the next day. Uh, huh. I, also, had a fresh rebuilt 350, that another member of the Chevelle Club had built for me and had just installed. The original 350 was long gone, as was the original powerglide.
After we had a meeting and pizza, the guys removed all the suspension and were encouraging me to remove what little was left and get the subframe powder coated. So, what the heck, lets do it.





The entire front sheet metal went out for chemical stripping.








Sub frame, inner wheel houses, core support and all small under hood pieces went out for powder coating.





And the firewall was stripped and rust found in the lower cowls. That turned into the usual repairs but I tried a product, new to me, that was supposed to be the greatest at stopping and sealing any future rust. More on that time consuming fail later.

[Too Many Projects]

I found some rust in the lower right cowl and repaired that.














As I was cleaning out the firewall to upper cowl seam, I found an area with no spot welds so put a few small tacks in the seam to get covered with sealer.

[Too Many Projects]

The left side turned into a much larger issue, from a seemingly, small area.





I cut out the side panel and when I saw how rusty the whole bottom 8" was, I cut off the front panel too and eventually the rest of the side panel and drilled out all the spot welds. I wire wheeled and sanded all the rust that I could reach and then treated it with a rust encapsulator.





In the process of all this removal, I discovered a misplaced panel and the spot welds to the firewall weren't holding anything. The panel had been allowed to be too far forward and was spot welded in place to the body mount supports. I drilled out those welds, pulled the panel tight with drill screws, clamped the support brackets together and welded it all up.








Then it could move on with the "tulip" panel as some call it.

[Lynn]

Looks like you are moving right along.

Nice pics of the progress.

[Too Many Projects]

After I got all the rust repair done, I reinforced the throttle pedal area with a heavy plate. It was already cracked and I was adding a Lokar Midnight series pedal and cable and I learned, the hard way, that the pedal stresses the metal and cracks the thin sheet. I added the same pedal to my '66 Chevelle a couple years before and had to add the plate after the fact.









Then I stripped the firewall bare and seam sealed it. Then I applied the Mastercoat rust encapsulator and let it dry for 2 days. It was still soft after 48 hours and was supposed to be dry in 24. I thought it would cure with their paint on it, so went ahead and shot that on. 5 days later, I scrapped and sanded the gummy crap off and started over, cleaning the metal until it was sanitized and tried the encapsulator again. It never did dry, so I got that off a second time and ordered my usual SPI epoxy urethane primer and shot it with that. All in all, I sanded that firewall 5 TIMES before I got a product that worked.
















Finally !! Ready to assemble.





I went to put the e brake pedal assembly back in and couldn't like this...





Gave it crushed glass bath in the blast cabinet and then painted it with the SPI, along with a "few" other things my perfectionism got the best of me on.








I installed the subframe and suspension/steering systems in preparation for the new engine and transmission.





I upgraded to power disc brakes, Global West upper control arms and a Hotchkis 1 1/4" sway bar.






The car was built with a pg trans and I don't really care for automatics in muscle cars. I had a Muncie sitting on a shelf for about 8 years and "thought" it was an M20. I needed to replace the main case and rebuild it, so I got it down and it is an M21. I had bought all new Italian gears for it many years ago, and obviously forgot which trans it was. I still needed to buy the complete bearing kit and assemble it.











I had bought a, rather hard to find, Hurst conversion shifter for '67-68 Camaro's with console a LONG time ago, anticipating this swap.

[COPO]

Looks like a nice project and certainly excellent progress. It's great you had been stockpiling parts for many years which certainly helps with the cash flow.

[Mr70]

Awesome work & coverage Mitch.