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    1. #1
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      1967 Camaro Restomod custom IRS

      I figured now after a year, it was time to make a build thread
      Edit: Been at it a while, lot of learning done, still more to learn and do!

      Kind of a crazy story behind the car, unsure of where it was between its original sale in 1967, but it was sold out of a dealership in San Fransisco, California and then between then and the 1990s, it made its way up to North Pole, Alaska.

      I purchased the car from my friend who got the car for $2500 bucks from an older lady who he was helping with yard work and other things. Her son apparently was working on restoring it and fixing it up until he passed away from Cancer in 1993. Luckily for me and the car, she had a cheap $1000 dollar paint job put on it so it wouldn't rust away. Fast forward to 2015, the car had sat the entire time, until she was having some work done by contractors who offered to trade the work they were doing on the house for the car (which was about $2,000 worth of work). My friend Chris instantly offered her $2,500 cash and she saw that as the better deal. Her condition was that once it was restored, he had to take her for a drive. She unfortunately passed away in 2017 =(

      The car mostly sat at my friends for a few years, up until I bought a house in 2017. Before I had furniture even he had it in my garage (as you can see in the pictures from before, he didn't exactly have a good spot to work on it)

      His plan: Strip it, rattle can paint it, and flip it for $15,000

      I had other plans and talked him out of it luckily.



      CURRENT BUILD PLAN:
      Paint Color: White
      Interior: TMI Products Black
      Front Suspension: QA1 Level 2 Handling Kit with TruTurn Steering Package and Borgeson 12.7:1 Ratio steering box
      Rear Suspension: Ride Tech 4-Link with narrowed (54.75in) Currie 9in with TwinTrac Diff 31 spline axles
      Engine: LQ4 Bored 65 over, stock LS3 rods and pistons, 823 Heads, Elgin Hydraulic Roller Camshaft .585", LS7 Injectors, LS3 Intake
      Transmission: Tremec Magnum XL



      CURRENT STATE OF THE CAR:
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      Here is the car as it was when I first saw it:

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    2. #2
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Year 1

      We got to work, with both of us having no real clue of body work, but are both pretty decent mechanics. I've built a few 400hp+ Subarus and dabbled in stage rally. I work of Aircraft for a living as well. He used to be a heavy equipment mechanic. He's good at making things work that shouldn't work together, where i've got the perfectionist mentality.

      After a day of sanding, we decided it was going to slow, so the messy job of Aircraft stripper began.

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      We very quickly found out the previous owner also had no idea how to do body work.

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    3. #3
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Year 1 Continued

      Don't have a lot of pictures from after, but we tried our best at fixing what was messed up, welded and blended in a few new pieces and they matched, but not to my liking. At this point, I told him I'd buy it for what someone offered him 6 months earlier. While there was some rust, the floors pans were immaculate, the frame was in great shape, doors were for the most part cancer free (was a minor fix on the one) and from what I could tell, very little rust anywhere on the car minus where the drip rails were.


      I'll let the pictures speak for the condition of the car.

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    4. #4
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Year 1 - Part 3

      At this point, I was thinking to myself "what in the f*** did I get myself into..."

      But i was determined, and have the mindset that I can learn anything if I put myself to the task.

      After a week or two of using way too much body filler for things that should have been tackled with body hammers and dollies, it was time to get it cleaned up and primed. (Don't worry, I went back and did that work correctly this year)

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      With winter only a few months away, I bought a paint gun and some 2k primer (after chatting and picking the brains of our local bodywork/paint supply store, The guys at High-Tech in Fairbanks are amazing). Though the climate up here is extremely dry, I wanted to protect my new investment.

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    5. #5
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Winter of 2017

      With the car mostly covered in primer, I started relooking at each part, tackling a bit at a time.

      Over the winter, I shaved the drip rails, decided that the fenders were too much trouble to try to fix and ordered new ones (OER brand).

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    6. #6
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Winter of 2017 - 2

      Before snow hit, I had at least gotten the entire car down to bare metal and got it coated with primer and realized for what I wanted as a finished product (better than off the factory floor), I didn't have the tools or knowledge to tackle it correctly. I had at least learned the proper technique of washing the entire car, wiping it down, washing again, wiping more, then doing the same with wax and grease remover, then coated the car with Nason Ful-Poxy 2k Primer, since I wanted something I could do some filler work over and wanted good rust protection while I worked on the car. Most of the shoddy body work that was getting done was before I decided to buy the car and do it right. I couldn't let it get redneck repaired and sold to someone else. (Love my buddy to death but hes hard on stuff and has never been one to go for a showroom quality fix and is used to broken **** lol).

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      As the winter progressed, I had a laundry list of body work that needed to be done and some major issues with the right rear quarter panel, so I decided it was time to step my game up and replace it. This was going to be a summer job, so I saved up until spring hit and bought a Miller 211 and a 60 gallon compressor and wired my garage for 240v outlets.

    7. #7
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Spring 2018

      With the School semester finishing up, I finally again had time to put some serious attention back on to the Camaro.

      This is how it sat over the winter:

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      Like I had said before, I had saved up and bought a Miller 211 w/ gas setup and a 60gal compressor that could actually let me use air tools and my paint gun (we had used a 110v 20gal all last summer that was about 20 years old)

      Spring to do list:
      -Media Blast and re-coat the under body
      -Remove Engine and Transmission
      -Remove front sub-frame, refurbish
      -Replace Rear Quarter Panel
      -Remove and Replace front Control arms, sway bar, brakes
      -Wire Garage for Welder and Compressor
      -Remove/Replace* Rear Suspension

      *Still was undecided

      As the summer started and snow began to melt, It was finally warm enough to work with the garage door open and not be freezing my butt off.

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    8. #8
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      A-Pillars

      After I decided to shave the drip rails (I still need to do some more metal work to clean the edges up and smooth it all out, more than likely going to weld in some 1/8th inch steel rod to get nice lines and blend it in to the roof line), I decided I wanted to run the flush fit glass kit, which means no window trim. The problem was I hated how the A-Pillars met up with the fender lines, so I made some brackets up to weld in to get a nice transition into the fender line.

      Here is before any work was done.
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      After making a metal piece for both sides, I welded them in and blended the welds with a flap disk. I used a bit of All-Metal to shape it slightly, as my metal work wasn't 100% perfect.
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      More progress to clean up the A-Pillar ends.
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      Mostly cleaned up, will revisit to make perfect later, coated with primer:
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    9. #9
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Front Subframe

      Next, it was time to get started on cleaning up the front subframe, which had about 50 years of dirt and grime on it. Coated it with POR-15 and then painted with High Temp Engine paint I had laying around (I was going to use it on the 327 block that was in the car, so it wasnt going to get used for anything.) Still undecided on the color right now, but it looks cool for now.


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      Also installed all new bushings and hardware while I was at it, can't have a single part of this car untouched and made new.
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    10. #10
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Rear Quarter Panel

      With the subframe mostly delt with, I started work on the Right Rear Quarter Panel, spending a good 20 hours at least reading and watching videos about it. Luckily too I had a new friend in the area that knows a thing or two about body work, but I made it clear I wanted to do it, so he gave me a few tips throughout the process and stopped by once to tell me where to trim and drop off some Clecos to hold the panel in place as I fit it.

      First though, was making sure my doors were lined up, a process that is quite the challenge when you're working on it by yourself, I got them close enough for what I needed to do, but not quite perfect.

      I went to the task of removing most of the old rear quarter panel, bit at a time. Was much easier than I had anticipated, but finding all the spot welds and drilling them out was extremely time consuming.
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      I left a good chunk of the panel on since it hadn't arrived yet, and had my friend come verify the gaps and door alignment before removing the door jamb area.
      Total Removal time was approximately 8 hours. I found a bit of the frame was rusted and thin near were the drip rails were, and if you look you can see where I cut and patched the frame.

    11. #11
      Join Date
      Apr 2007
      Location
      Utah
      Posts
      534
      It is looking really good, keep at it.
      Sam
      Northern UT.
      '68 Camaro "Bodacious"
      '56 210 2dr "Buckshot"

    12. #12
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73
      Thanks! It's been a hell of a learning experience but I'm excited to be trying something new with this rear end idea.

    13. #13
      Join Date
      Oct 2007
      Location
      Georgetown/Austin, TX
      Posts
      307
      Country Flag: United States
      Hey! I've also got a 67 Camaro and a WRX ('11 hatch)

      Dude, we are like car twinzies...lol

      Good start on the Camaro and I can't wait to see your plan for that IRS come together!

    14. #14
      Join Date
      May 2013
      Location
      San Diego, CA
      Posts
      265
      Country Flag: United States
      Enjoyed reading through this, thanks for starting this thread. Are you still going to refresh that 327 and put it back in? Wolf be great to find an LS somewhere to put in it.

    15. #15
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73
      Got an LS3 sourced already ��

    16. #16
      Join Date
      Nov 2006
      Location
      Ma.
      Posts
      5,567
      Country Flag: United States
      It looks good.
      Wayne
      Car FINALLY home !!!!!! lol
      Project FNQUIK https://www.pro-touring.com/showthre...ghlight=FNQUIK

    17. #17
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Replaced Rear Quarter Panel

      Rear quarter panel replaced, can't believe a year ago I had only a general idea how to do body work and weld.

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    18. #18
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      QA1 Front end goodies

      Installed all my QA1 goodies =) Insanely stiff compared to the old suspension, may need to rethink my spring weight and im not 100% sold on the color I painted the subframe, but then it was just some Orange-Red Chevy paint i had laying around, No places to powder coat around here so I may end up going with a truck bed liner after stripping it again and repriming it.


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      Notice the size difference in the sway bar. Should handle like a dream.

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    19. #19
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Mini Tubs and rear subframe mock ups...

      So this is the part of the build that goes off the beaten path some, and so far I've only read about one other person using this rear end and it was in a Ford truck. Basically, I wanted to do something that hasn't been done on this car and a good friend of mine helped solve that problem and my want for Independent Rear suspension. so for $450 + about the same in shipping (Alaska apparently is international) I got this rear end from Iowa. Took about 2 weeks to arrive, but im itching to get to the fabrication work to get this thing mounted to the car.

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      First though, we figured it would be easier to get started on tubbing the rear.

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      I will say, doing the tubs are more of a pain in the ass than that Rear quarter panel was, just harder to get to everything and a lot of measuring. Unfortunately we got a bit carried away and cut a bit too much, which isn't a big deal, i'm just debating now weather to split and widen out the tubs for more clearance, or just do some closeout plates.

      For now though, we cut and made our own closeout plates with some thicker steel to reinforce the rear subframe. Going to leave the tubs out for now to have easier access to making measurements to fab up the IRS mounts.

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    20. #20
      Join Date
      May 2018
      Posts
      73

      Clearance for days...

      So for right now, the car sits with some clean up work needing to be done on the rear, but I'll wait on that for a bit. Rob (friend who suggested the rear end fab) and I mocked it up a few times, looks like it will be easier than we thought to mount to the car. It's honestly looking like the mini-tubs are going to be more work than the rear end.

      Look at the clearance though, those are 225/45R18s with 10mm spacers (mazda wheels that needed the spacers to clear the axle nut)
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      Above: Before the closeouts were welded in, but it looks like I could have no problem fitting some 335s even without splitting the tubs.


      It is a little tricky since the track width was originally 60" with the stock solid axle, with the new one, it changes the rear track width to 64.9″, in addition to the 5x114 hub pattern change. My plan is to send in my front rotors to get re-drilled (running 2'' drop spindles in the front) to a 5x114, which I've noticed Moser engineering will do for $90 a piece. Having 5x114 for both will open a lot of options up for wheels that arn't 1800 bucks per wheel. The car isnt going to be a show car, but it'll be a nice looking daily so I'd rather not spend 5-6 grand on wheels alone only to have them get beaten up.

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