UMI's Newest Test Car- 1971 Camaro- Pro-Touring Build

[UMI Performance]

We just picked up UMI's newest test car to help us finalize the development of our 1970-1981 Camaro and Firebird line.

The car we purchased is a 1971 Camaro (non-Z28, only badged by previous owner) The body was recently redone and car painted, it looks good for us and saves us that step. The engine currently is a very weak 305 with a TH350 transmission. We currently started building a 383 for the car, details will follow.

We hope you follow along as we transform this car, develop off of it and test our products using it.

Here's some pictures as it sits right now: Stay tuned!

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[UMI Performance]

First step on our '71 is to test fit and test drive our new UMI non-adjustable direct bolt in monotube shocks. Front springs and rear leafs will be the next step.

UMI shocks are tuned by UMI, made in the USA and feature a larger piston and shaft size. We have had excellent results and feedback from our A and G-Body crowd on these shocks.

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[Ron Sutton]

Cool. I'm following.

[Nicks67GTO]

Me too

[CampbellshotrodsAZ]

Very cool, nice looking car. Looks great with the full front bumper too, please leave it on there. Haha.

[UMI Performance]

Well it took a year and half but we are finally back on this project and have it in full swing. We have a goal to have this car completed for at least half of next years season, so follow along and lets see what we can do.

Before dismantling the car we had a few projects that need finished first, we dialed in our height for lowering the car using front springs and rear leafs. We also finalized on front a-arms and have them in production. Our development can now continue using our house '78 Camaro.

We began the major dismantling yesterday. The front subframe will be removed, blue printed, welded, powder coated and prepped for LS power. The body of the car was completed by the previous owner and looks decent so it will stay as is. The car will receive new frame rails, road race cage, fuel cell, mini tubs with LS/T56. Stay tuned.

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Dolly is patiently waiting for the body, it should be on it tomorrow.

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[UMI Performance]

A few more pictures of the progress from yesterday.

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[wheatie8252]

Looking forward to the updates and new parts.

[UMI Performance]

More progress last week on the Camaro. We got the body on the rolling stand and started drawing out ideas for the cage. The floor has some fiberglass repair patches we will cut out and repair. We also got the rear frame rails ordered from Auto Weld, which is another PA based company and seemed great to work with.

In the meantime we are finalizing some of our new suspension items for the 70-81. We installed some more prototypes on our '78 house car to confirm height and fitment as well as ride quality. We are also working on front shock extension mounts using front clips we have here.


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[UMI Performance]

A few more updates.

When we purchased this car the big selling point to us was the body was already done. The new quarters look nice, no signs of body work the paint is decent. The paint quality could be a little better but for a car that will spend its life on the track it's perfect. While the body was done nicely I assumed the floor boards and underneath of the car would be a little better. The 1" thick rubber undercoating really hid a lot of the problems we are now finding. And the "new" truck pan was fiber glassed in and over top of old rusty sheet metal never removed.

We cut the bad floor areas out and replacing them with front floor pans. The truck area is cut out and we will be prepping it for the fuel cell. The new frame rails are in as well. To keep moving forward we will be selecting seats to give us the seat location which will help with the cage. Fuel cell will need purchased soon as well.

Updated pictures:

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[UMI Performance]

Next update.

The car had a lot more rust in the floors and rear trunk area than expected. The trunk was a disaster, the new trunk pan was attached to rust using fiberglass. The more we cut at it the more that needed removed. The rear trunk is completely out, the inner fenders and frame rails removed too. We will rebuild the trunk around a fuel cell. You can see below the piles of rusted metal removed from the underneath of the car.

We are also beginning to mock up the cage and the cage mounting points. This requires boxing in and reinforcing areas where it will mount.

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[UMI Performance]

Progress continues. We worked some on the factory subframe and reparing it. We are blue printing hole locations and straightening up factory a-arm mounting holes and making sure our a-arms pivot freely. We are repairing the body mount holes and will offer that as a kit sometime soon. We will strip the frame and grind out all factory welds and reweld the frame. Lastly we removed the factory shock mounts and cut an opening large enough for a shock and 2-1/2" spring. With our newer a-arms you will be able to run a 7" stroke shock mounted bearing to bearing. This will be a cool kit as well and coming soon.

On the body, we are mocking up the front floor pans. Also removing the rear inner wheel wells. We prepped a few plates for the cage to sit on as well.

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[dcozzi]

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Template.:ssst:

You are doing what I have been doing to my car for 10 years in a few months. I'm jealous!! These are good cars. I want to see front shock mounts when done. My car sits on the ground with the RideTech stuff in front. I should have read the manual better about the 2" drop. Is your system going to start at stock height and be adjustable from there??

[UMI Performance]

The guys are starting to build the back half for the car and removing the inner and outer wheel wells. We will maintain all the stock mounting points, such as leaf springs ect.

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[UMI Performance]

Template.:ssst:
You are doing what I have been doing to my car for 10 years in a few months. I'm jealous!! These are good cars. I want to see front shock mounts when done. My car sits on the ground with the RideTech stuff in front. I should have read the manual better about the 2" drop. Is your system going to start at stock height and be adjustable from there??

Hey Dave, Well it helps we have a team of guys, haha.

I have some pictures of our extended mounts from a display we just built, they came out AWESOME. I will post them up soon along with some of our a-arm designs.

[UMI Performance]

Rear subframe and minitubs are going in place.

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[UMI Performance]

Some work on the factory front subframe.

We used our new frame repair kit #2662 and repaired the body mounts on the factory subframe. We are also mocking up our new a-arms and aligning the shock locations. Lastly, we are repairing the factory a-arm mounts to make sure they are true. One side was a full 1/2" off binding the a-arms drastically.

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[UMI Performance]

The front subframe is in the weld shop. We have repaired all the body mounts and blue printed the a-arm mounts to make sure they are perfectly inline and at the same location side to side. We are grinding out all the old factory welds and completely welding the front subframe and preparing it for powder coat.

We also continue to work on the new frame rails and mounts for the cage.

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[UMI Performance]

We are now finishing up the shock extension kit. The kit is turning out really good and will be available shortly, the shop is just starting to laser cut production pieces.

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[T_Raven]

Nice progress. I can't wait to see what new products you guys come up with for these.

[UMI Performance]

Our new Bowler Performance Tremec 6-speed is in along with the Quicktime bellhousing. We have it mounted to a mock up LS block and setting in the subframe to determine the driveline angle and also motor location. We have the minitub kit installed and now welding the frame rails in while starting the cage.

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[UMI Performance]

Our American Racing LSX headers for the 70-81 came in and they look nice! We sat a set of factory heads on the block and started mocking up engine location. Our Holley oil pan also came in so this allows us to place the engine where we want it now. Now that the engine is located we begin to build LS engine mounts and a T56 crossmember.

While we are doing that we also started bending up the cage for the car.

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[UMI Performance]

A few more updates. The guys started setting the cage in place and it is looking good. The Boyd Welding fuel tank came in and looks really nice, this should work perfect for us. Nate also finished the transmission crossmember.

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[UMI Performance]

A nice surprise from Currie showed up. Fabricated rear end, nodular iron case, floater axles, Tru Trac and more. A very nice unit!

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[chevelletiger]

We are now finishing up the shock extension kit. The kit is turning out really good and will be available shortly, the shop is just starting to laser cut production pieces.

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I like this design better than the first one you came out with for the abodys.
Much better looking!

[UMI Performance]

Seats are in. We decided on the Sparco Evo II's, they are very comfortable, fit the body tight while still allowing a few different size people to use them. This is was important to us as we have a few people that drive.

We are also finishing up the cage.

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[UMI Performance]

Finally a little work completed on the project. We are prepping the Currie rear end to go in and building the correct mounts to maintain leaf springs. We are also fabricating LS motor mounts in both solid and polyurethane.

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[Underliner6]

Awesome build so far! You guys make a really nice product. Cant wait to see some more updates.

[UMI Performance]

Awesome build so far! You guys make a really nice product. Cant wait to see some more updates.

Thank you sir. We hope to update this soon as the racing season is winding down some and frees us up some.

Thanks for looking!

[UMI Performance]

Holy cow! A year has passed and this car isn't finished. The Camaro got put on the back burner a bit, but is now back up front! Our hope is to have it finished before the end of the season to do some testing.

Here's everything laid out we are installing on the car. This is our Second Gen Corner Max kit for the front end. In our opinion it's the best performance front suspension you can install on a stock sub-frame.
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Watts that you say? The rear suspension with a Currie rearend and Wilwood disc brakes has been installed. Here we are starting the watts link installation.
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The engine and transmission are permanently installed as well! Right now we are installing the Painless Performance wiring harness. The fuel and brake lines have also been ran now as well.
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More updates coming soon!

[Dragonfly]

nice stuff