Zetsaz

They have a tendency to do that.... when I was pulling my axles I ended up getting a sharp screwdriver to hit between them so I could pry and separate them from the companion flanges.

Got the front suspension done. Rear is also about ready to bolt short of a modified drop mount for the finned cover and brake hoses since the old ones were dry and a couple were near impossible to pull. This week I'll be pulling the engine and at least bolting it in, and seat mounts. Once that's done it's just a matter of bleeding brakes, and stuff all the interior and wiring into the new shell at a minimum so I can finish working in it in Washington. Getting close! On with the project. New shell won't be Flintstones powered either, I'll power this thing to Washington myself if I have to

Aftermarket fenders are pretty much all from Tabco I think. I bought one from blackdragon when they were going out of business. Wish I'd bought both only because it was clean metal. That being said, they will most definitely not fit without some work. I spent a few hours trimming excess metal from the stamping and bending some parts to properly curve with the rest of the car. Bolts up front did not fit very well and required some serious pulling by the headlight to fit. Can't speak for how well the lower bolts into the rocker panel fit until I swap them onto my new shell. Last shell had replacement rockers which of course also require some work to fit.

Ah! This is perfect timing for this post. Are those just plain holes in the new rails you made? Or do they have a threaded nut welded on the other side? Last question, did you just use some 1x2 steel for that? New shell I got doesn't have seat rails and don't quite feel like reusing the originals from my old car since my hair skims the headliner at stock seat height

This definitely seems like the easiest way to do it. Might just do this with some extenders between the rails to support a bit of the weight of the seats and bend the tabs on the end of the original rails. Only reason the bolts are at an angle is so the supports carry the weight of the seat and not the area they're bolted on. Those universal brackets mounted to the same area would probably be easy to bolt in to the stock location to be able to swap between seats if I ever decide to do that in the future

@Jboogsthethug, send me a picture of your mounts, either on pm or on a reply here. Need more ideas. Definitely don't feel like I need a huge amount of room, I'd just prefer to save a tiny bit of head room. Aside from my hair skimming the top, the whole setup is actually really comfortable for me. Distance to steering wheel, shifter position, leg angles, and the door top is perfect height and distance to comfortable rest my elbow on and still keep my left hand on the wheel haha

A very very very big thank you to @jpndave and his sone for helping me weld these things. I don't have a MIG and even so I don't trust my very minimal experience with it enough to do something like this on a critical component. Welds turned out super nice. Made sure to cover all threads and was able to do a rough sandblasting job on them before welding. Covered all the threads and tried to cut the tap right where the black coating on the new pieces meets the silver, or just above it. Used Krylon rust protectant stuff in satin black. Surprisingly good match to whatever black BC is using on these! Not a perfect job, but these are mostly out of sight anyway. Excited for my bearings to arrive early next week so I can start putting everything back together. Next job is probably figuring out whether I want to make custom floor mounts for my seats or hack them out of the other shell. Other car will probably become a parts car and eventually be parted out when this project is "done," so chopping them out doesn't seem like a bad idea, but I need an inch or two more of head clearance. Currently, my hair just barely skims the headliner.

Checked multiple dealers they had as well as amazon. Jegs seems to be the cheapest from what I've seen. Some guys on the jalopy forums who have lots of experience with it on multiple vehicles seem to say that it covers more area than they claim. @jpndave, I'll definitely take you up on using the stuff you have and buying you new stuff when I figure out how much it covers. If the interior really is this much smaller than some people have said, I might end up using only 2 gallons of the ceramic to get the right coating. Regardless, your 4 gallons will be more than I need and I'll happily order you a new batch of however much I end up using.

I can never seem to find accurate measurements of interior, and don't care much for over-estimating when ordering product or coming up short. Went ahead and took some rough and conservative measurements of the interior and added them up. Not that these measurements cover floors, roof, "trunk" space, doors and firewall, but do NOT cover the rear quarters. I did my best to measure things not accurately per se, but conservatively. Leaving room for error and extra material. Here's a sheet where I did my rough sketch. Not that I assumed the doors were square from their largest measurements, which I tried to do for everything. I included the transmission hump as part of my floor measurements. Everything was estimated on the high end. Total estimate after converting sq in to sq ft was 65 sq ft. Does that sound right? Some other threads I've read have said used over 100! Have I done some measurements wrong or is this just because of the wasted material from cut and stick types of insulation? I think 75-80 sq ft would be fairly accurate to cover a portion of the wheel wells and quarters. I used the Lizard Skin Coverage calculator and came up with 3 gallons of ceramic insulation and 3 gallons of sound control. Price total is close to $500 without their applicator. If I got this route, thankfully @jpndave is close and has used it before. For the cost of that much material, I'm definitely leaning towards just insulating with the ceramic heat material to cover everything, then down the road using the Dynamat Dynalite or another semi-lightweight, but much cheaper alternative to the LizardSkin Sound deadening. You can come to your own conclusions of what materials will be most cost effective for you based on these rough measurements or the estimates others have given of as high as 100sq ft or more if you're not being very careful about how you cut the mats.

Before and in progress shots of the OEM fuel tank I've been trying to clean. I was conflicted about cutting into the new shell since it has solid metal all around. I was getting frustrated that OEM tanks were so expensive and I couldn't find any in junkyards. Was lucky enough to find this fairly straight but rusty (as they all are) tank out of New México. Ordered a POR15 sealing kit for it, but trying to get as much as possible cleaned up with the chain like some other guys have done on different projects and a LOT of vinegar. I think it's doing a great job. Trying to make sure I only drag the chain around and don't ram into pieces of the baffling. I'm removing the sending unit any time I need to slosh things around and break stuff loose with the chain so I don't break it. Making progress! Goal is to get the new shell on refreshed suspension and working brakes at a bare minimum by the end of July so I can take it to Washington with me and actually make progress.

Small progress today on getting the new shell moving. Chopped the spindles to mate the coilovers to and split apart the entire suspension. Will be redoing the rear wheel bearings while I have anything apart. Took the rear pieces to a shop a block from my folks' house to have the spindle pins pressed out. Will be pulling them and putting antiseize or swapping out for the grade 8 bolts some people have used instead. Don't want to have to deal with stuck spindle pins down the road and take everything apart again when I decide to upgrade the rear arms. Will need to figure something out for my seat rails since none were replaced when the floors were redone on my new shell. Past owner was going to use racing seats in a lower position so the originals weren't needed. Still deciding whether I want to take the time to make some shorter custom mounts or cut the floor mounts out of the old shell when I'm ready to move everything over.... will have to think it over while I'm finishing the coilover upgrade and brakes.

Can't help there... closest I've seen to what you're describing is someone welded another piece of 1x2 at an angle from the top mounts. Not much difference between that and what I assume you have other than creating a more fixed point for the "front side" of the fuel tank to sit against and creating short straps.

Regular Car Review has been part of my Monday routine for years now. This one was pretty good, mostly because there were SO many of them and so many had such identical mods haha.

I did the same thing. Going with an original tank now, but if I'd kept the camaro tank I'd just cut whatever you have just outside of where your tank straps/mounts are then weld that to new pieces that run side to side. Essentially you're just shortening the piece you already have mounted to the car then running it to new pieces that go side to side so any impacts don't instantly mess with your tank mounts and cause serous problems.

Not directly related, but are you posting your progress on that bike anywhere?

Would love to! Highly unlikely that I'll be able to do it this summer since I just got that new shell haha.

Clarifying one piece of info.... aside from the axles being thinner, the Rock Auto CVs would basically just allow you to weld in the adapters, grind down the stub axle, and bold them right in?

Depending on how things go this summer, I might be interested in the September dates

Like others have said, from the doors back just about everything is different. The only thing you can really use at the rear is the lights, suspension, diff, fuel tank, vapor tank, filler neck, filler door... basically anything that's not a body or interior panel. Of the stuff you've mentioned, the dash, front seats, and gauges would be the same.

@seattlejester

I got it. If you quote any part of anyone's post they'll receive a notification. You can also tag now like this @wrenchtech

One of the best. I love the molded flares and the subtle approach you've taken to the exterior appearance.

They have two others that are more common, one with a blunt nose, and one with a G nose style front

That was an old rendering for the Carbon Signal kit https://www.facebook.com/pg/carbonsignal1/photos/?tab=album&album_id=942013415847778