Finally, we have final seat assembly... the recline buttons weren't installed yet, there are a few minor wrinkles in the cover (like the lower corner of the upper cushion), but they are close. I had to sneak one out for a picture on a day where we actually had sun without rain.

Overall, I'm really happy with the results. The Legendary covers are an outstanding reproduction of the original covers. The seats are incredibly comfortable, and we were able to sit in the car the for the first time since it came home! The best part is that I fit without requiring seat extenders or having to add a tilt column... mission accomplished.

Now I gotta finish these up with the small details and get to work on the rear seat...

 

Nice job on the seats!!!! Those Legendary covers are definitely worth the extra $$ My '68 still has the original covers & they're in great shape except for the drivers cushion,it has some small cracks in the diamond pattern at the front. Now after seeing yours I know I can at least replace the drivers cushion for now & it'll match the rest. The PUI cushions that I've seen just look horrible,they're way to flat. You said you're getting ready to do the back seat. While checking out some websites for upholstery I noticed that Fusicks says the rear seat doesn't use a molded foam pad??? I had to take my lower rear cushion apart to restitch the panels in the center. The vinyl was fine just the 47 yr old thread was bad. It does have a fully molded foam pad just like the fronts,luckily mine was still soft & in great shape even if I had to replace the cover the foam was fine. Hope you don't need one on yours, it looks like it might be hard to duplicate since it wraps down around the frame.

 

Thanks Rob. You are correct, my rear lower cushion also uses molded foam. However, as you noticed, nobody reproduces it. Mine has mouse damage in the bottom, and while it's still pretty soft, it smells pretty bad. I figured it wasn't worth trying to salvage it or live with the odor.

The majority of the A-body back seats were actually made with multiple layers of cotton batting. That's what I'm going to do with mine so it will wrap around properly as well. You can buy generic foam, but it makes the install significantly more challenging (Ben's feedback to me, he has done it). You aren't going to notice that much of a difference anyways, unless you are the one that did it and are bothered by the "originality". In your case, your foam is in good shape, so you shouldn't have too much to worry about.

Thanks for the picture, nice to see how the foam laid for reference.

 

Those seats look great!

 

Very nice..and they don't have the overstuffed look. Well done.

 

Thanks guys.

 

Nice Work! You are now seat-guy approved!

 

Rear seat time... here's the lower. Pretty straightforward... burlap, jute padding, 5 layers of cotton batting, thin layer of plastic so the seat cover will slide, then install the cover while using copious amounts of profanity. Reused the "wave" listing wires from the original covers.

The wife was a huge help, having two sets of hands on the rear seat makes life much easier, as well as some zip ties to help stretch the cover evenly.

 

ya done me proud boy!
Looks great!

 

The upper rear seat is a bit trickier, because you have to create the "shelf" on the top of the seat. The factory used a ~3" burlap strip with listing wire in it to set the width of it prior to covering. Per Ben's direction, we used zip ties to set the initial compression, then used the burlap and jute to create the "shelf" for the padding to rest on.

Re-used the wave wires in this one as well. Except for the lower because it was corroded to heck... put a cardboard covered listing wire in there.

After we covered it, we had to go back and re-stuff the upper corners to make the contours look more correct.

We are thrilled with how the seats turned out. They feel like brand new factory seats, not too firm, but supportive and comfortable. There are some minor things to finish, but most of them aren't picture-worthy.

Overall, recovering seats isn't super difficult if you watch the Legendary videos, review example pictures, take your time and DOCUMENT the seat disassembly (some of mine were too far wasted to be useful). You need to be patient and not try to rush it. These seats wouldn't be half as nice as they are without Ben's assistance. There are a lot of small tips and tricks throughout that lead to awesome results without a ton of rework. Ben is the man... he has answered no less than 20 emails from me during this project (always within a day), provided coaching throughout, and knows what he is doing. We owe him big time! Thanks again!!!

I will say that the satisfaction of "doing it yourself" makes it worth it, and my wife and I both learned a lot from this project. So if your seats are looking a bit dingy and are due for a refresh, don't be afraid. Talk to Ben, get his installation kits, some Legendary interior, and get busy!

 

Like a Pro! Cant wait to see the finished car...Im sure Im not alone!

 

I fixed it for you as I wouldn't think there was any other way


seriously though, nicely done. Just let me know when you want my interior ...

 

I never buy anything from the Parts Place because I don't like Chinese stuff. I wish I new before you made the purchase on the scoops because WWW.TheGoodOldsDays.com sells an exact reproduction of the 68 scoops (a 300 pound guy can actually stand on them without them breaking) along with many other parts and the best part he is one of us and he makes sure that they are made in the U.S.A.

 

you know it! I'm not afraid to admit it. How about after I move back next year...

Thanks for the info. This was buried in my original post about the scoops, but I called him no less than 5 times (spoke with him on the phone at least 3 of those) and traded about 4 emails with him over the course of 3 months, but he never could even tell me if he had any to sell (and I would have bought immediately). I wanted to get scoops fit up before tearing apart the front end (so everything goes back together nicely)... he's a nice guy, and helped with other information via discussion, but must not have been interested in my business.

 

Luke, that is a real crime. He used to list them on eBay. I feel for you as it took me a year to convince him to make me the straps that hold the hoses up to the filter housing. I guess he is built for comfort and not for speed but a nice guy indeed. Nice trade, that is the kind of project that I would do a rotisserie restoration on it but that would hold you up longer.

 

Interesting, good to know. I bought the NOS OAI hose clamps he had on eBay.

This car has to come off the frame, the lines are in rough shape and everything needs to be cleaned up under there. It will eventually be a full rotisserie restoration... I don't have the budget to write the check for someone else to do the whole thing, so it's just going to take some time as I work through it. Seems like an odd way to approach it, but I had to get the seats done first so I can store them safely in the house. I'm sort of doing a component restoration during disassembly process. That way I don't have a bunch of greasy/dirty/rusty junk laying around. Trying to stay organized is the hardest part.

 

Luke, I had the replace both the fuel and brake lines on my 68 442 and I opted for stainless steel and bought them thru "Inline Tube" and other than minor adjustments they fit very well and they were only slightly more than the steel ones. Staying organized is the biggest challenge. I also used "Dynamat and Dynaliner" to keep heat and noise away and it makes a world of difference.

 

Thanks for the info on the lines/dynamat.

I took a break from finishing the seat trim today and decided to drain/inspect the rear end, since it was slowly dripping fluid onto the floor.

I counted pinion turns, and there were more than 4.5 turns per one tire revolution. Thinking I was losing it, I had the wife come out to watch the tire. Sure enough, 4.7 turns. Check the rear gears, they are stamped 9A42. 42 / 9 = 4.66!!!

Somebody swapped a set of 4.66 gears into this thing... no wonder the original engine is gone, lol. It makes me even more curious to try to research the history on this car.

Unfortunately, there are two chunks out of the pinion gear, 1 piece out of the ring gear, and the cover took some damage too. Looks like I'll be searching for 3.91s soon to use with the original 672 carrier.

 

Got the original OW trans back from the rebuilder, who did an incredible job rebuilding and restoring it. A good friend also spent time helping get the refinishing done, which made it look awesome without any painting.

Attached a picture of the before and the after. I recreated an 'OW' ink stamp on the bellhousing this weekend and started refinishing the dipstick tube. Unfortunately, after clearing, a bunch of the tube turned dull/white, so I'm going to have to re-do that.

Paul's (Hairy Olds) reproduction trans tag decal is outstanding. It installed very easily and looks awesome. Unfortunately, I let it sit for 5 days before trimming the rivet hole while we were out of town, and some moisture was trapped around the rivet that I used for setting the decal. This caused it to rust a little bit. I bought a second decal just in case, so I'm debating re-doing that as well.

Last picture with a question... does anybody reproduce an original-appearing vacuum modulator? Trans guy wasn't aware of one... picture of the original vs reproduction one is shown below.

 

Leave the decal as it is. Looks more natural.

 

Thanks Paul... that was my other thought...

 

I was going to say leave it also.

for the modulator - NOS .... or a known good used one.

 

Progress on the car has been slow due to house projects. I never posted final seat pictures with all the plastics/chrome installed, so I snapped a few outside over the weekend. Added a picture of stupid detailing underneath that nobody will ever see.

Got the Ames seat trim installed, which is a great reproduction from OEM. The bullet end caps they sell, not as much... they are a bit smaller diameter, you have to open up each one to get it to snap on, and clock them towards the outside so they look right. It was somewhat of a pain, but seats are finally completed.

I've started "engine bolt hell" in cleaning engine bolts to get them ready for use. I got sick of scrubbing, so I picked up a small ultrasonic cleaner. It has made bolt cleaning significantly easier.

 

Time is flying, and progress is... crawling... house projects, the serpentine project, and other priorities have kept me away from the '68 for a while.

I have been collecting parts, and need to start sending stuff sent out for restoration soon like the booster and master.

I added some pictures of parts...
Got an NOS grille and a bunch of small missing engine parts from Randy, found a correct '68 trans pan (need to figure out how to properly restore the bare metal finish), obtained an original '68 emblem for my decklid, and also got NOS OAI hoses from Dean. You can see the NOS hose on the bottom vs the reproduction from Fusick on the top. The difference in sheen is noticeable... but the NOS hoses are short, hopefully they work on a BBO.

Really want to find a correct date coded 1100767 alternator, but haven't had any luck.

 

Send the pan to Sparkys carbs for zinc plating. It will be a bit brite but the pan won't rust.

 

You do great work bro. This things gona be a bench mark car when you done!

 

Thanks Paul. I have a few other things that will have to be done, so I'll start a pile. I had taken it out of evaporust just before taking the pic... there are some scuffs and very light damage/pitting in a few areas. Should it be wire wheeled or anything to help the surface finish, or is this a "just let Sparky do it" deal? I was thinking about trying the wire wheel next, but I'm scared to just try it since it's not really reversible.

Thanks for the kind remarks! I've never done this before, so I owe a lot to people that have helped me out, provided a ton of advice, taken the time to post detailed pictures of their restorations here, and sold me parts at very fair/reasonable prices... or even just provided motivation. I really don't think this hobby would be as fun if it wasn't for the people. I have no patience, and want it done rightnow, but doing something from the ground up the way I want it is pretty cool.

 

Don't wire brush the pan. You could just use Boeshield if your good with the look it has now. Greg will lightly sandblast the pan.
Just remember with metal that is being coated will show every mark on it before and after its plated. Plating won't hide pits.

 

Understand... thanks. Worried that the plating might magnify the minor defects. A lot of it is from the transmission sitting around and getting dragged a little every time it got picked up or set down. I attached a picture that shows it on the edge, I can snap a better one tonight... Hmmmm.... dilemmas...

 

I have a NOS 3 dimple pan for my car and the surface looks ok. No rust just age spots. The better a pan looks more people will scrutinize the condition. Not that a lot of middle aged folks care to look that hard.

IMG_6733_zps18pdp7vw.jpg

 

Wow, can't believe it's been 3 months without any updates. Engine is approaching completion at the machine shop, but I really don't have anything photoworthy to post.

I've had the opportunity to land quite a few NOS or nice parts for the car recently, so that's where most of the progress has been made.

Picked up NOS trunk trim with mint used end pieces from Greg at MCACN. Also got an incredibly nice rear notched bumper from marxjunk... it looks perfect in pics, but will need a few dings worked out and replating for show use.

Dean put together a package of rare NOS parts from his collection, which included marker lights, turn signal lenses and bezels, HVAC control head, door handles, interior ***** and dash cups, rear view mirror, sill plates, quarter glass chrome, ashtrays, spiral shocks, and a ton more... parts I would never even dream of finding, let alone having. These will take the car to a new level someday, thanks again Dean! The pictures below only show part of it, there was another two plastic bins off to the side.

I certainly appreciate everyone who has either sold me parts, offered them up, or tried to find them for me. There's a lot of great people in the Olds community, and I've been learning a lot.

 

Luke,
Sorry I couldn't add to the parts haul. Your parts collecting has brought some great parts.

 

man that is a nice bumper...i shoulda kept it...nah....its going on a worthy car...mine is not a special car..so i am glad to see it go to a good car and a good guy

 

No prob Matt, thanks.

Mark, yes it is, I gave it a quick clean up and the cell phone picture makes it look perfect. Really appreciate you passing it along to me.

The most exciting part of the project that I forgot to mention earlier was that I ended up talking to the guy who had the car from '73 until it went into the barn in Shell Rock. He confirmed they bought it used from Friedley Olds, it already had a holley carb, headers, aftermarket intake, and the service engine installed. He street raced it a lot and installed the 4.66 gears in place of the 3.91s, but did not track race it. He also knew who the owner was prior to it being traded at the dealership and was going to try to look him up. I need to call him again and ask more questions this week.

I never thought about it earlier, but the car likely has quite a bit less than 60k miles, as the 4.66 gears would have increased the mileage count, since the speedo gears weren't changed.

 

Luke,Nice to see an update! That's a nice haul on those NOS parts! I don't even want to think about what that trunk molding cost$$$!!! I finally broke down & ordered the Legendary covers for my seats,after seeing how nice your's came out,should be here in another week or so. I don't know if you saw my recent post on it but as long as I'm replacing the covers I've decided to add the headrests.I just like the look of them,they really finish off the seat. Can't wait to see more pics!!!!

 

Thanks Rob, I missed your other thread! Trunk molding was affordable relative to the price of rechroming one, so I pulled the trigger while it was available. I'll hop over to your thread.

 

The fact that GM had to have the engineering done to be sure that millions of cars would meet specification on cooling performance.

I bet GM spent millions on cooling design.

Flow Kooler did not.

 

I'd bet GM spent millions on that ignition switch design that's now world famous, too...

Nothing tried, nothing gained. I don't run my timing curves per CSM spec, either.

 

I updated Post Number 4 in this thread, where it contains the history of the car....

[Edit] Thought I found the original owner, but it was actually another '68 H/O non-A/C post in the same area.

 

wow thats great stuff, wow 3 engines then again 466's I'm sure had something to do w it