S.Reef's Winter/Spring Project Thread

[s.reef]

Looks good Sam!

Question about painting the springs tho... Won't the paint split/crack and come off? Or did you use a certain paint with a flex agent or something?

Just a quick fix...I cleaned them and sprayed some black caliper paint on them havent decided if what type of front springs I want to end up with

[Curt_irocz]

Sweet project. Are you still going to be keeping that interior color? bummer if you are cause I threw away a full set, same color, we didnt need it cause its a full drag car. Iv been working alot on our school drag car, its a 1981 Monte. It will be at Autorama. I will take a pic and post it if you want.

Keep us updated with ur SS.

[MP81]

I believe Sam is recovering the seats black. He put black carpet in as well.

So, progress from today...

Putting a bead of RTV down to seal the gasket to the cover.


Two quarts of 75W-90 Royal Purple synthetic gear oil. This is a 7.5" 10-bolt - is two quarts enough?


The rear end all bolted back up. Looks absolutely fantastic! New components, red caliper paint and POR-15 for the win, here.


And now we moved to the front suspension - of course shit needed to be cut...in these two photos, Sam was grinding the head off the one sway bar bolt that happened to have a rounded head. The others were just fine.



Sprayed the rear wheel tubs with Duplicolor Rubberized Undercoating. Looks very nice, professional.



Stock front sway bar.


Spraying the areas we didnt POR-15 with the Undercoat


Now onto the front right suspension. We got the shock out this time. That's one small step forward!




...and then, of course, something goes wrong. Freaking ball joints won't release the spindle. We beat the hell out of the lower and upper A-arms, trying to get it to release. Nothing. So we decided to just jack up the lower A-arm, and remove the lower a-arm bolts, like we did on the left side. Well...on the left side, we had compressed the spring...So, we got one side out, and that side shot down and moved the jack over. I was just waiting for the spring to come flying out, but it didn't - however, we're now not able to get the other bolt out....this front suspension hates us, I'm sure of it.

Sam trying to get that bolt out...


How not to dismantle your front suspension, version 2.0!


We're gonna go back at it tomorrow, hopefully we'll be able to get it out, and not kill ourselves or the car.

[s.reef]

Thanks for the comments guys! Thanks for posting the pics Kyle. Should be easier tomorrow just ran out of time and patience today plus I dont feel well which didnt make it go any better.

[MP81]

No problemo.

I hope we can figure that a-arm out...and not destroy bones, cars, walls or other items in the process...

[BP_Z28]

I just realized what year Monte you have


And I must say.. I hate you lol. I love the aerocoupes. My 1st car would of been a 87 SS (bros car).. if I would have gotten one more A my senior year.. god damn math class and their nazi B+'s. Great progress!!!!

[bri2203]

No problemo.

I hope we can figure that a-arm out...and not destroy bones, cars, walls or other items in the process...

sometimes a pickle fork works well to separate a ball joint from a spindle. or hit the sindle with two hammers at the same time(one from each side)

I think someone owes you a few cases of beer!

[MP81]

sometimes a pickle fork works well to separate a ball joint from a spindle. or hit the sindle with two hammers at the same time(one from each side)

We don't have a pickle fork.

We've tried hammers, but I'm sure we'll hit it more.

[ITSSLOW]

Great to see more progress Sam!

[Gottork]

awesome progress sam and kyle, glad ita all moving along so quickly, are you going to be able to have it driveable for the meet and greet?

[meissen]

Looks great guys! Hey Kyle does the bolt thing remind you of someone's k-frame fun?

[MP81]

Looks great guys! Hey Kyle does the bolt thing remind you of someone's k-frame fun?

Yep - pretty much the same shit!

[MP81]

So, we worked on it some more tonight!

Here's the new upper tubular a-arms from Gbodyparts.com, compared to a stocker:



So, we regrouped and re-approached our issue on the front right end of the vehicle. We were able to jack the lower a-arm up enough and line the holes up enough to where it bolts into the frame, and get a punch in there to hold it. We then put some jack stands under the area where the bolts go through, and began working at the front bolt that was still stuck in. We were finally able to use another, bigger punch to wedge the a-arm where we wanted it, and then twist the bolt out.

We then pounded out the punch, and watched the back of the a-arm do EXACTLY what we wanted and come to rest (quickly) on the jackstands. When it did this, you could see the car bounce up about half a foot. . We then just used a smaller jack, jacked the a-arm up, lowered the stands and dropped it down onto it (watching the car bounce each time), in steps. We finally got it low enough and popped the spring right out! And we didn't die or break any bones/car parts/walls!


Then we just unbolted the stock a-arm, and had got that out after the same hassle as the other side, not too bad though. These ball joints are just stuck to the spindle.


Here's part of the spring from the front right - seems to have broken in the exact same location as the front right spring.


No front right suspension!


Cutting another half a coil off, to make for one full coil cut.




A rough estimate (only because of having to hold that one half of a coil) of cut on the left vs. full size stock.


Clear all the way under the car!


Note in this picture, we also removed the engine mounts.


Marine-cleaned and Metal-readied the sides and tops of the frame rails, as well as the engine crossmember. Will do the bottom tomorrow. Then just POR it all at once.


Good to get that front right suspension off without killing someone, though. Whew.

[Gottork]

glad it all came out without any injury.. I took one apart once a loong time ago on a 82 century and removed the top three and center bolt on the strut, I was not injured but boy it could have been real bad..

progress looks awesome keep up the good work..

[MP81]

Today was pretty much all painting. Got a lot done - my arms, hands and face are speckled and/or covered with spots of POR 15 . It's in my hair, too.

The engine crossmember after metal ready, and I believe it's been rinsed with water at this point.


New UMI lower a-arms came in. So freaking sexy.


Coated the brake dust shields with POR-15.


Painting the front swaybar with red caliper paint (same as the rear).


Pictures all covered with POR-15. The whole front part of the frame is POR-15'd (except for a lot of hard to reach areas, such as inside the frame rails...).

Left frame rail.


Bottom of the crossmember


Front of the left frame rail and body interface. The part of the body that is coated was just flaking away.


Underside of that same area.


Engine bay - POR-15 adds such a nice touch.



Right frame rail



Front of the right frame rail


POR'd some parts of the core support (we had a bit of paint left over, and it was either: find something to paint, or throw it away) that were rusting decently...



Looking at the inner part of the left frame


Right spring perch


POR'd Headlight buckets.



Nice. Ready for the new stuff.