1976 Trans Am Resto-Mod

[ryeguy2006a]

My name is Ryan, And I bought my 1976 Trans Am when I was a Junior in High School (Spring 2005). I first went to look at this car with my friend because my uncle was interested in the car. He said this was too much of a project for him, but I couldn't get the car out of my head. (And that's when I caught the fever for Pontiac's) So I convinced my dad that I could do this project and for him to loan me the money. Eventually he was convinced, and we came home with a brand new to me 1976 Trans Am 400 4 speed.



Now this car was 100% complete when I got the car. My dad told me that I couldn't touch the car until I completely paid him back. I worked so hard during the summer and finally paid him off. That following Saturday I decided to do a full frame off restoration, and little did I know what I had gotten myself into. This is where I started that Saturday afternoon.

When I first started working on this project I was going for more of an original restoration, but have changed where I want to take the project. I have been on this site for a while now, and decided to take more of a resto-mod direction for my car. I want to keep the car's original feel, but update it with all of the modern conveniences.

[ryeguy2006a]

As you can see the car needed a lot of rust repair, although it wasn't too badly rusted. It was isolated mostly to the lower quarter panels and a few sections of the floor pans. I put new quarter skins on both sides and put new floor pan patch panels from Goodmark.

[ryeguy2006a]

I cleaned up the rear end and put it under the car and got some primer on the shell.





Once that was done, I cleaned up and rebuilt the front sub-frame with all new bushings and ball joints and put it under the car. I sand blasted the A-arms and painted them with POR 15 along with the frame.

[LeighP]

Hey, mate...nice to see your build thread over here.

[ryeguy2006a]

Thanks, Leigh. I was thinking that since my build has become more of a Resto-mod, I should put it over here too.

[ryeguy2006a]

Once I got the car on 4 wheels it was time to start the body work on the car. My dad and I worked to get the car into primer and get the car prepped for paint. I was able to get some rust free doors and fenders. The rest of the parts that came with the car were in good shape so they didn't need to be replaced.








I wanted to remove the rear window because I thought that there may be some rust in the channel and I was glad that I removed it because there was some in there. Nothing was through so I cleaned it up and got it primed.

[ryeguy2006a]

Once the Shell was in primer it was time to get the other body parts into primer.




The one door had a little rot, so we grafted some metal from another door that I had that was in poor condition and sealed it all up making sure that everything was square and straight.






Once the doors were dry we mounted them on the shell to see how the fit. We were happy with the way that they fit with all of the gaps being symmetrical.

[ryeguy2006a]

Once the doors were hung and on the car it was time to do the rest of the body panels. We started with the fenders, then worked our way to the hood and trunk lid.








Then we worked on the hood.





And the deck lid. There were a lot of dents so I had to fill them in and make them smooth. Took more time than I thought.

[ryeguy2006a]

Here was my first attempt at going more towards a resto-mod. I got a good deal on some BMW rims, but ended up selling them as they weren't in as good of condition as I originally thought. They were Staggered 19x8.5 front and 19x9.5 rear. It just never really fit the car, so I got rid of them.

[ryeguy2006a]

The engine that I am using is a 1973 Pontiac 400 that has been mildly rebuilt. It has been bored .030 with TRW postions, stock rods and crank. The heads are 6x-8 and an aluminum Edelbrock P4B intake. I have several pictures of the various carbs that I have run on my car, when I finally settled on a Holley 750 DP.

Here is what I started with



All cleaned up and ready for some paint.


Painted Pontiac Blue, if you look closesly you can see the cross hatches from the rebore.


All cleaned up and back in the car.




Here is my engine with the stock quadra-jet.


And with the 600 Edelbrock carb,


with the 850 Holley DP race carb, Way too much for this engine.



And finally I settled with the 750 DP

Here is a picture of the Borg Warner Super T-10 all cleaned up too.

[ryeguy2006a]

I also upgraded to cooling fans from a 1999 Camaro LS1, and used a home build relay box with dual sensors to control each fan.



I cleaned all the brackets up and painted them with POR15. I also put on the rest of my engine accessories.







I mounted the relay box where the charcoal canister used to be on the core support.

[ryeguy2006a]

Now we are off to the paint shop!! The car was primed with high build primer and blocked roughtly 7-10 time to ensure it was super smooth. Then I had my body guy lay down 3 coats of Ford 2010 Dark Shadow Gray paint. That was followed with 3-4 coats of Clear for that deep finish. I also had them paint my dash and rear trim panel with SEM Trim Black semi-gloss paint to replicate what it came with from the factory.

Well to my surprise one morning when I started to work on my car there was a hair line crack down the side of my quarter panel where the skin was put on and come to find out we didn't weld the skin on with the correct technique so it cracked. I took it to the body shop for them to repair and paint the car.






Then the dash and rear deck panel got some color.




Then some Dark Shadow Gray

[ryeguy2006a]

Then a little wet sand and buffing.








Once we got the car back it was time to assemble the car finally.

We got the car home finally and put the doors on and got the deck lid adjusted. After fighting with the doors for a while we were finally able to get them adjusted to my liking. Then I was able to get the front end on and took the car out for a photo shoot with my dad's 1971 Chevelle SS.






And now the front end goes on.






I also replaced the factory mesh for a honeycomb mesh. Eventually it will get painted body color.

[ryeguy2006a]

And the photo shoot, with my Dad's Chevelle SS. Also here is a shot of my Custom Chromed Aluminum 17x8.5 rims. I got an awesome deal on them and couldn't pass them up. They are beautiful and the chrome is amazing. Gotta love Craigslist.

[79-TA]

That car is looking really clean. Your attention to detail is really paying off. I like what you did with the honeycomb mesh in the side vents.

[ryeguy2006a]

I am still adding pictures to try and get the thread up to date currently. I have been working on the car for a long time. Thanks for the compliments. I will try and add some more pictures tonight.

[ryeguy2006a]

Next was time to put some interior back in. I had a parts car that had the 160 mph speedo, so I upgraded to that, and I already had the 8k tach. I also got a perfect dash, door panels, front and rear seats, and the headliner board. I was able to get a lot out of the parts car that saved me buying all of the parts individually. I also bought the dual speaker upgrade from NPD, Year One rear package tray, refurbished 8 track player, and an upgraded factory AM radio with all modern internals.

Before I laid down the carpet, I bought some Fat Mat insulation and put that on the floor pans up to the trunk.






Here are the Speakers and the new speedo.





Here is the Upgraded AM radio that I bought along with the fully rebuilt 8 track player.






Here is the Year One rear package tray. I really like it compared to the factory package tray. I think that it really cleans up the rear of the car.

[ryeguy2006a]

Here is some more of the Interior being installed. I put in the seats front and rear, along with all the interior plastics. I applied some smooth faux leather material for the headliner. It turned out great considering that I had never done anything like that before. There are also some pictures of the crack free dash that I found in the parts car I bought a long time ago.

[ryeguy2006a]

The next obstacle was to get my exhaust done. I started with some Hooker competetion headers, and was unsure what I was going to run from there. I ended up finding a guy who was selling a custom 3" exhaust with SpinTech mufflers from a 2nd gen Firebird with custom 3" chrome tips that look factory. I bought it and started the intsalltion. Now what I thought would take me a weekend ended up taking me 5 weeks to get done working only on the weekends. I ended up having to cut a lot of the sections and welding/extending/contracting to make it fit the way I wanted to. Here are the pictures that I took along the way.





Before I had the tips to mock up the rear tail pipes.




Here are the massive 3" custom factory looking tail pipes. They are pictured with a CD to show you how massive they really are.



And the tips installed and just peeking out.




The completed exhaust hung.

[ryeguy2006a]

I also decided that I wanted to black out the chrome trim around the car includding the door handles. I will eventually do the front grills and fog light bezels.





Then I was able to get the rear of the car buttoned up.