Project Sicario by Speedtech

[Ben@SpeedTech]

Some great thoughts here, and thanks to everyone for sharing. At Speedtech we build what customers roll in the shop, and in our hobby popularity rules what cars get the attention. This particular car was built for a 19 year old by the way, and his dad's 1st gen Camaro will be headed this way for a complete build soon.

In the case of Pro Touring I think it's safe to say that 1st gen Camaros have the popularity contest market cornered. Considering specifically GMs, if we look around for a variety of cars other than the Camaros a person might even ask where are all the 60s-early 70s A bodies? Personally I think they're great looking cars and a 70 Chevelle is as much a muscle car icon as a 69 Camaro. But if you did a google image search for "Ultimate Street Car Challenge 2016" A bodies are near non existent.

I agree, there is great potential in what has been considered (while comparing to earlier versions) the ugly cars of the 70s and 80s. You guys have seen my ride, a dare to be different 79 Cutlass wagon. I bought this car purposely to be the as far to the opposite end of the spectrum as I could be anti-Camaro to showcase that our hobby and pro Touring can be done successfully with most any platform and on most any budget. I'm sure there are folks that might laugh at my Grandpa's grocery getter or consider it a later "ugly", not really a muscle car era vehicle, but I think this car illustrates well the beauty of Hot Rodding is that generally speaking most any car can be turned into something cool with increased performance. As the Pumkinator progresses this year towards what's in the rendering hopefully even the naysayers will concur.





The bottom line though, is that all of this is subjective and merely based on our personal opinions. Off the clock I'll say I'm not a fan of Camaros, but that's only because everyone else is. I still see the beauty in them, just as I see the beauty in the potential for a Pro Toured '76 Buick Century (or other 70s A body), which by the way has way better factory geometry than a 1st gen Camaro and weighs less than a 5th gen Camaro. The real challenge as with Sicario, is when building a "cookie cutter" car you have to be unique in design and execution. When the dust settles, I believe we've nailed that with this 1st gen Camaro build.

Back to the cool pics...

[Ben@SpeedTech]

More pics of the body work. Besides mods to the hood, on the exterior we filled in the marker lights but left the the rest of the body in it's original form.

[Ben@SpeedTech]

For paint we opted for mile deep black. This consisted of laying it down heavy and many hours of sanding and buffing. The end result was amazing!

[Ben@SpeedTech]

Having given the paint being time to cure we got going with assembly. We like to use 9" rears as much as possible, and have Dutchman build the housings and centers to our specific specs. If you were doing this at home it would be a simple direct bolt in with our Torque Arm package. We're also bringing back the Speedtech Chicane 9 Full Floater axle with improvements. Look for those rears on future builds.

Sicario got Viking's double adjustable coilovers with their special Crusader line autoX valving. These shocks have some serious dyno charts! When I swapped to them from the Viking Warrior line on my car I felt a huge difference on the track, they work extremely well! Sweet Mfg. custom builds our ExtReme Rack & Pinions with special valving to make them fast and durable with these larger sticky tires. Note on all ExtReme chassis and subframes we're using splined sway bars tuned to your specific application. Splined bars make life much easier when fine tuning and they're adjustable for different track conditions. For example you'll use one setting on the autoX and in just a couple minutes switch to the other setting for road course.

Note the channel that comes as part of the ExtReme frame connector kit. On one side it provides a path for tucking fuel lines and on the other we mount the e-brake cables.

[Streetbu]

Have to completely disagree with above ... I can't disagree that there are a TON of first gens getting built BUT late 70's and 80's cars had to be the Fugliest cars to ever to inhabit our planet, ya that generation may have grown up with those terds but put these cars up against a first gen Camaro or Mustang and there is absolutely NO comparison I don't care how old you are

Ben, car looks amazing

Cheers
Steve

I couldn't disagree more. Just another 67-69 Camaro.... How many THOUSANDS of times has this been done? I'm sure they will do an awesome job, but as a G-body owner, and someone that can't afford to drop 30K on car that then in turn gets completely disassembled and rebuilt from bottom to top, a mid 70's or 80's car would be a welcome change! Camaro's and Mustang's are like belly buttons, everyone has one. Why not try something out of the box?

But very good build so far Ben and I know you have my back since you own a G-Body :D

[cbpldc]

Perhaps this is not the thread for other people's preferences about what is cool and what is not. If you want to disparage the choices of other people, might I suggest a more private venue, like private message or email. Or better yet, just keep them to yourself.

Ben, awesome ride man, and I can't wait to see more.

[focused313]

Perhaps this is not the thread for other people's preferences about what is cool and what is not. If you want to disparage the choices of other people, might I suggest a more private venue, like private message or email. Or better yet, just keep them to yourself.

Ben, awesome ride man, and I can't wait to see more.

I'm a HUGE G-Body fan and I couldn't agree with you more. People should not be allowed to come in build threads and tell you that the car you picked sucks, is boring, is overdone, etc... That's not the vibe I get from this forum. Thankfully, thread titles usually let you know what type of car is being built before you even click the thread, so if you don't like the car...don't click it.

Either way, great build.
Pitbulls and cars >>>

[sheck44]

Yup, I have total respect for all the guys at Speedtech, Roger has been VERY good to me so when I saw that reply it kind of rubbed me the wrong way... as you said, if people have something negative to say its better that they keep it to themselves

Cheers
Steve

[Ben@SpeedTech]

Thanks for the support fellas. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, that's fair. I just hope we don't take too much attention away from this particular car and the owners that have initiated this great build. They have a passion for first gen Camaros and while lacking the means and skills to build a car to this caliber are at a spot in their lives to have us build it for them. We are open to thoughts, opinions, and ideas, but if we can let's try to focus on the fact that another 1st gen piece of automotive history is being taken care of rather than rusting away in the weeds somewhere or worse yet headed to the crusher to be recycled into a Prius. :D

[Streetbu]

Very true! So, any updates? :D

[Ben@SpeedTech]

A few more pics of getting it ready to drop on it's wheels. Note the ExtReme suspension is focused on max capability and uses street use spherical bearings on tie rod and sway bar links to reduce bind, free up friction and allow faster, smoother motion. No compromises here though, this design will last a long time and not wear out or make noise like the more basic race only joints. Note also how well the exhaust tucks up into the frame rails.

Our Torque arm is internally gusseted and uses a higher strength steel to keep it incredibly strong and simple and compact in packaging. We can easily tuck a full 3" out the back exhaust system. Not shown on this car is the now available rear sway bar for Torque arms, for those hardcore ExtReme guys that need to compensate for massive front spring rate.

We're a dealer for Rick's tanks because they fit great, are super high quality, have a really cool unique pump system and they're awesome to partner with.

Finally, Sicario got to soak up a little vitamin D outside. Note how low it is yet still has fantastic ground clearance, one of the goals of the ExtReme frames. Right here is close to optimum ride height for geometry purposes, however there is some leeway in going a little lower.

[berdunord]

beautiful !!!

[Ben@SpeedTech]

Turning attention to the interior, this is where I got to step in again. Our client came up with the name of Sicario, based on the movie. With that in mind I did a little research on the main weapons used in the film and a few others, and integrated some of their design features into the interior. I don't know diddly about guns so please don't ask about them specifically, lol!

Here's a couple of the original sketches. The seats needed a major overhaul, they're nice seats but didn't appeal visually to any of us for this particular car. The center diamond pattern was inspired by the grip of the gun on the upper left and we did a lot of reshaping to make the design smoother and flow better while the headrest were reduced significantly in size.

The custom door panels feature design cues from the other guns.








The end result of the rework on the front seats came out fantastic. For the back seats we decided to start from scratch and built them to match.

[ra11ysport]

I think the pro touring crowd gets kind of immune to the 67 camaro, its a remarkable car no doubt about it. The 67 was such an incredible creation from some amazing engineers and designers. Not to mention having designed something 50years ago and people are still lusting over this car. Not just to look at but to drive it aswell!

But, thats only one part of the allure to the 1st gen. The other is bolt on subframe and suspension design. Try doing what you can do to a 1st gen then do a mustang build! The car is my mind one the best cars ever created. JMHO

[1965_SS]

Looks great Ben!

[Ben@SpeedTech]

Nice thoughts ra11y and thanks Todd.

[Ben@SpeedTech]

More interior pics.

[Ben@SpeedTech]

Center console work, for convenience reasons we split the console in two pieces.









More coming soon...

[Mach1_Ron]

Awesome... Looks G R E A T !!!!!!!

[Machiatto]

Can't wait to see the back seat. I love split rear seats. One of the many things that sets the early Riviera's apart from it's contemporaries. In regards to "just another Camaro" - I'm building out a 66 Buick Skylark in limited Pro-Touring form (limited by my budget). I've already incorporated ideas from this forum which were done by the experts on the more popular cars. You're not hurting my feelings by doing amazingly creative work on "just another Camaro". That hood work alone will make heads turn. Thanks for the inspiration !!!!