So I finally got to move my cutlass out from where it has been stored for the last 10 or so years.

I was ready to do this last January but in November of 2023 my dad decided to retire and sell his manufacturing business. He turned 81 so he was ready. He then decided that he was going to fix up the shop and spent the last 12 months tearing it apart and redoing the insulation, sheet rock and electrical. He is close to being done so I was able to get my car into the shop.



So here it is in the warehouse where it has been sitting.




Almost out of the building





Hooked up to my truck. Had my son help me tow it across town to the shop.







Here it is in the same spot it was when I first started working on it back in 1981 (43 years later I feel like I am back at the start)

Where the tarp is used to be the back of the shop with doors.

Over the years we have expanded the size of the shop.







And then I moved in to the corner where I will start working on it.

 

Nice that you are getting it done finally

 

Nice, and I congratulate your Dad for doing all that at the age of 81. I hope I'm that vigorous when I'm that age.

 

Is that a white or blue interior?
that should be really nice looking when you’re done.
shoot us a picture of the data plate on the firewall if you can.

 

It is Nocturne Mist with Blue Interior.
Here is the data plate.



Car was built first week of October 1964

I had the seats done back around 1983. they are mostly ok with some sun damage and minor rips and tears.
I will probably have them redone later.
interior panel have wear and tear but are ok. the original paper door panel seals are still there.
kick panels need new carpet but otherwise ok.



Trunk has a little surface rust but no bad spots.


So far only found one rust spot on the trunk drop off behind the drivers rear tire well.


I guess the strangest thing is the car is a Cutlass but it has a 442 frame (which is original)

 

That’s an early build… Fremont car.
It’s a standard I presume?

 

if I recall, all stick shift cars got the 442 frame

 

Yes, it is a 4 spd

 

I did not know that. I went off of 442bro's site and they say only the 442 had that frame.

 

Both front floor pans are rusted so I am going to replace them.



the rest of the floorboards are good.

 

The HD frame was also an option on these cars. What I don’t honestly know is if the HD frame was exactly the same as the 442 frame.
a lot of people that were planning on towing a trailer ordered the HD frame. And it did come standard with all manual cars.

 

The heavy duty frame option was the convertible frame.

 

So all standards got the 442 frame?

 

Whats a 442 frame and whats a manual trans frame? The assembly manual shows three frame available for non wagons, 9780502, 9780503, and 3864503.

3864503 is what we call the 442 frame, code PA. Its actually the stick shift frame. 9780502 is also code PA. 3864503 is optional to 9780502.

9780503 is code PC and the convertible frame. And was available in non vert via option F35. We also know that frame number 9777400 has been found under Cutlass and 442 convertibles. With no difference noted.

Is the frame under your white hardtop code 9780502?

 

After work today I got the Rear bumper removed and taken apart and I got the gas tank removed.
Did not find a build sheet. Pretty sure I wont find one now because I didn't find one back in the early 80's when I redid the seats, carpet, and headliner.
So does anyone know how much the rear bumper weighs? When i took this one off it feels really light and it does not feel real thick.
Back in the 80's when I had the car repainted the body shop sent in the bumpers to get fixed and re-chromed.
The rear one was bent out in the middle from someone bolting a tow hitch directly to the bumper.
So I wonder if they had replacement bumper back then that were made more cheaply. The front bumper seams to be thicker.

 

my front bumper is also heavier than the rear

 

I got most of the front taken apart. I got to the last bolt on the right fender which is down at the bottom by the door and it just spun.
I will have to get a cutting wheel and remove the bolt. I will fix the nut later when I have the body off to fix the floor pans.



Don't know how long I have been missing two bolts on the crankshaft pulley.

Radiator support looks good, only some surface rust.
I going to take the condenser off and then take the support and some other parts to work and get them powdercoated.

 

Yep. Those bottom fender bolts almost always Break the welds on the cage nut, resulting in a spinning bolt. Next time I try to do it I’ll use an impact wrench to see if that helps. But I think those cage nuts were merely tacked on lightly.

I have a build thread where I show how to cut a hole in the towel and repair the situation with a new cage nut when you get to that point.

I didn’t know this was an AC car. Keep taking pictures and sharing!

 

So I took the bumpers, bumper mounts and braces to work the other day and weighed them.
The front bumper weighed 28 lbs with the mounts weighing 4.2 lbs each and the braces 1.0 lbs each for a total of 38.4 lbs
The rear bumper weighed 20 lbs with the mounts weighing 2.4 lbs each and the braces 1.6 lbs each for a total of 28 lbs.

 

Today I got the front fender off that was stuck. I sat there with a sawzall for a while and the realized that I was sawing at the shims and not the bolt.
So I got the plasma torch out and burned off the head of the bolt with just a little damage to the fender. Nothing I cant fix.



I removed the steering column, the master cylinder, and the brake/Clutch mount.
This bearing on the column is bad so needs to be replaced.


The master cylinder was empty. I'm going to clean and and rebuild it.


So now I am going to pull the motor and transmission next.

 

These braces must have been installed wrong because there was no way to get to the two bolts on the tail light.
Had to work a wrench from the side to get it. Both sides were that way.



When I pulled the bumper and took off the turn signals I found out that the person who painted my car back in the 80's put
them back on the wrong side. they are LH and RH. so they broke them while installing them.

 

Those braces look a little bent? Am I seeing that correctly?
Mine don’t line up very well but yours are way off.

Sorry about the signals… it’s always fun cleaning up someone else’s mess.
Nice work, keep at it.

 

Took these to work last week. They bead blasted and powder coated them today.

 

Today I got the doors removed. Parking brake and speedometer cable pulled out.


I then got 8 out of 10 bolts that hold the body on. Both bolts in the #6 pos had the cage nuts broken.
So i had to drill a hole in the bottom of the trunk to access them. missed with my guess on the first hole so I had to drill a second.


Got i right on the second one.

Sprayed some PB Blaster and going to let it sit over night.

 

Your making some great progress! Thank you for posting the pictures. This will help other members including me, that still need to cover these steps. John

 

I got my Master Cylinder cleaned up.
How do you read the date Code? I saw on TK-65's build thread that his was dated 76. which makes it March 17 1965, but mine is dated 155 which should be June 3 1964 since my car was built the first week of October 1964
Does it have something to do with the number 1 on mine and theirs has a 2? (its the number to the right of the date code)

 

I don't think that the #1 or #2 specifically line up with a year per se...but instead they represent changes to castings.

Now a #1 could have lasted into January of 65...or it could have changed by November 64. Does that make sense?

 

Got some more parts cleaned up and ready for powdercoat.

 

You’re rockin’ and rollin’ on this thing.

The steering/brake column was left bare metal.
the tail light brackets were flat
the reverse light and turn signals were anodized silver.

Not sure what kind of restore you’re doing…

 

Not really doing the whole get everything perfectly correct to original.
I am doing the make it a daily driver from spring to fall. I really just want to drive it again.
so I may powder coat or spray paint things incorrectly but really i just don't want them to rust again.

 

Since we have not finished the shop and don't have the car lift back in, I had to use the forklift to remove the body from the frame.


Found where the clutch spring went when I removed the Original 330 motor back in 1980.



Here are all the body mounts.
The first two and the last two are the same. The Third one has a shorter bolt and smaller metal insert. The fourth and fifth are just plugs.
The body does have nuts in those location even though they are not used.


Found the VIN derivative on the frame. Which matches the Cars VIN


Did you know they changed the rivets in October of 1964 to the rosette style. This car was built the first week of October and still has the round rivets.
The assembly manual shows the rivet number changed on 10/9/64

The VIN derivative was in this location.


There is a frame sticker here. It probably says PA with 3864503
I will have to see if i can clean it up to see it.


So next is pulling the motor and transmission and then start taking everything off the frame so I can get it cleaned, blasted and powder coated.

 

A little archeology! It’s cool to find those kinda things.
Glad your making such progress.

 

Today I removed the Engine, Transmission and Drive line.



Had a problem with this one bolt on the LH manifold. The lower control arm was in the way. Do not know how I put it on back in 86'.
Instead of fighting it I just pulled the exhaust manifold off and left it connected to the exhaust pipe.




Put the engine on the stand. Now ready to be rebuilt.

 

Today I got the rear end, brake lines and fuel line.
Tomorrow I will get the rest of the front end off.
Monday I am going to take it with me to work and see about getting in blasted and powder coated.

The rear end is an SC which is a 3.08.
January 1st 1985 the bearing on the drivers side went out and when I took it apart the shaft had wore a grove in it and the end of the tube was damaged.
The local wrecking yard had a 65 cutlass with automatic so I bought it and replaced the one I had.
My original was an SE which is 3.23. not sure what happened to it though
probably ended up in the scrap pile.


I do have a little repair to do on the frame before I get it blasted and powder coated.
The rear cross bar is damaged at each end.

 

Yesterday I got these parts cleaned and then primed and painted silver.


I got the headlight assemblies bead blasted and ready for powder coat.





I found out all four are the same except that each one has a single pin in a different location
the location are labeled LIB, RIB, LOB, ROB.
I believe they stand for left inner bucket, right inner bucket, left outer bucket, and right outer bucket.

 

I removed everything else off of the frame today.

 

The heavy duty frame or the box frame was a $12.80 option

 

Your a man on a mission!
it’s very helpful that they put those pins on the headlight buckets. When your reassembling and you’re looking down at all of the holes and four buckets that look identical you can see some of the engineering hacks that make it simple to reassemble.

 

Are you putting a trunk pan in it? If so which one are you ordering? I'm overwhelmed trying to find the right one to order.

 

No, the trunk floor is still good with just some surface rust and one spot to fix. I drilled a couple holes to get to the body mount nuts. I am going to weld in new cage nuts and then fix the holes I drilled.