Hi all....First real post here and its gonna be a long one...

This is my 1972 Cutlass. The year was 2000...it was a beautiful July day when I happened upon this car. I was 16, just got my learners permit and had been looking for a car for 2 years and this Ol' girl was on a back road for sale. I paid $2300 and drove it and raced it all through High school. I really got hooked on Drag racing so I did that every weekend with her throughout 2003. I then bought a 75 Camaro and raced it for 3 years and parked the Cutty.



It is funny how I had no money but lots of time a few years ago, and now I have some money but no time. Anyway, I was just gonna fix the crank and rebuild the suspension. (That was 4 years ago) So that turned into: sandblast all the front end, convert from a/c to non a/c ( those stuipid boxes on the firewall are just rediculous) and get rid of that boat anchor called power steering. This led to modifying the firewall, finding a non a/c box, finding a new rag joint and pitman arm....all things I didnt expect. Then since I removed a lot of weight, I changed to the front springs to 6 cyl non-a/c springs to drop it about an inch (available from carquest for under $100!).

I replaced all the bushings, ball joints and converted the from drums to discs thanks to my pal at the scrap yard and more cheap parts from Carquest.

I sandblasted, wirewheeled, cut, welded, bondoed, scraped and painted the firewall, a-arms, frame etc. Moving the hole in the firewall wasnt too bad since I had templates for the new hole (see picture of cardboard cut-out) I also was able to re-paint the inner fenderwells with Fusion platic paint....really worked well. Everything went together with grade 8 or stainless hardware. I did not want power brakes ( i know i'm going backwards here...but the power booster is a pain for staging at the track) so another call to carquest for a non power disc/drum master cylinder took care of that.

The pictures are not great....mostly cause of me but also because my daughters love of touching the lens...plus the wiring is a bit of a mess...I just started putting that back in and cleaning it up. I am now working on new brakelines....I am using the coated brake lines like on the fords....once again from carquest. I have some custom bending to do since i am using a adjustable Prop. valve and a line-loc.

I made the decision a year ago to get rid of ALL my carbs and carb parts (jets, gaskets, etc) so I wouldnt be tempted with 40 year old technology. I am installing a fuel injection set-up from affordable-fuel-injection.com. There is nothing in the world better than fuel injection...start-up, reliablilty, power, fuel economy etc. So I will keep everyone updated on that.

That is enough verbal diarehha for one night. Here are a couple pics...if you look hard you can see the rubber still in the rear wheelwells

 

some more pics

 

Annnnnnnd some more....you can also see the interior (which resembles a trailer park in a tornado, but i'll get to it one day)

 

Nice ride! Sounds like mine with no A/C, or power steering or power brakes. I think I'm gonna go to Car Quest and order a pair of those front springs. Mine sits too high as well. Looks good. We all enjoy pictures...
:-)

 

Nice work! You've done a lot and still have a lot to go. BTW, there's a market for the old parts you took off. Hope you didn't scrap them because finding a complete AC system for these cars is getting more difficult to come by. Nice work on the suspension rebuild, I'm doing that right now too.

So 'Fusion platic paint' worked on your inner liners? Is it a spray or brush? I need to freshen mine up. Got one coming from Oregon soon as a replacement for a damaged r.s. and it's apparently sun faded.

Ummm, just did a web search and couldn't find 'platic paint'. Did you mean plastic?

 

No, i meant platic....its how we say it in the states

Yeah thats the stuff. All i could find was gloss black, but it turned out to be semi-gloss. I washed the inners with soap and water, than wiped them down with prep-solvent and it stuck perfectly. 4 or 5 thin coats.

 

Nice looking car and good progress! The are ALL long ones...

Nice analogy... Are you in the south?

 

I understand that tornados really do not exist. It's just that Chuck Norris hates trailer parks.

 

Tot so! Zats how we say it in Canada, eh? So the gloss turns out semi gloss when it dries on platic? Good to know, the liners aren't supposed to look platicy satiny if you know what I mean.

I read that and laughed so hard I had to go pee

 

I dont' scrap anything related to this car.....thats why im not allowed to use the garage at the house!

 

Ok so its been a while, but I'm back on this project....And after much reading of garys68 LS swap posts, thats what i'm gonna do!

Some of this may be repetitive if you have been following his posts, but here goes anyway.

I got a gas tank out of a 95 caprice and it fit in pretty well. Trimmed just a bit of the rear frame rails and it fit nicely. I did not want to cut a hole in my trunk (the golf clubs wouldnt lay flat then) so i welded up some metal that looks like a ramp. about 3" was enough drop to give the fuel lines room. The stock tank hung 2 1/4" below the frame in the front of the tank, and the new one is only 4", not a big deal. I bent up some aluminum for the straps and put a nutsert in the strap for easy removal and install.

Now I am putting a new drivers side floorpan in, wire wheeling and cleaning the underside of the car, painting and then can start running my fuel lines.

Thats it for now, still waiting on an ideal 6.0L to come along. I have got time so I am being picky.

 

And some more:

 

annnnnddddd some more:

 

Just curious. Did you fish plate the area of the rear frame you cut out?

 

I'm not sure if i know what that means.....it only needed about 1/4" or less of trimming on each side

 

Did you weld in a new contoured vertical piece to box in the area you cut out?

 

No i did not.....this frame is not boxed in anyway.....and the amount i removed was minimal, so i think it should be fine.