1966 Chevelle Restomod; Back to the Basics

[ryeguy2006a]

Hey guys,

If you had been following along, I recently sold my 1955 Nomad. The car was great as it was, but I was really wanting to drive a car with a manual transmission again. That among some other things lead me to want a different platform. Ever since seeing Tom Farrington's 1966 Chevelle when I first joined this forum 15 years ago I've always loved that car. They have killer body lines, and when they are lowered a few inches, they have an amazing stance. I didn't necessarily have a car in mind as I was setting out for a new project car, but there was a local 1966 Chevelle that had popped up on Marketplace that really piqued my interest. The body was pretty solid with nice wheels and tires. As I looked at the ad more closely, I saw it had a cammed 6.0 running on Terminator X, T56 and a 8.8 rear, ridetech/UMI/SMP suspension parts, Big Wilwood brakes, New TMI interior, and much more. I went to look at the car and it was a little rough around the edges, but the body was really solid overall. It will need some lower quarter patches, door patches and window channel repair, but overall is a really clean car that hasn't been messed with. Even the original wiring harness looks really nice and uncut.







After I got it home, I took it for a quick ride up and down the road. The car handles really well and rides really nicely, but the tune needs a lot of help. I pulled it into the driveway and got some better pictures off the trailer.







I'm not sure that I would have gone with the tan/cowhide interior if I was buying new, but it's growing on me. I think if the color was different that it would definitely pop more. But it's definitely growing on me and the seats are so comfortable.







Here's a few shots under the hood. There are several things that I want to change in this engine bay, but first is going to be getting rid of the hydroboost and moving the Terminator X under the dash. The Hydroboost is leaking and the hoses that they used are mis-matched and not routed that well. I'm also going to swap out the truck water pump for something different so that I can route the hose in a cleaner path.







I downloaded the tune to my laptop to see what I was working with and it was pretty obvious by the VE table, timing table and AFR tables that no one ever adjusted anything after they installed the canned Holley tune. That would explain why it had a hard time transitioning between idle and 2500 rpm.

Timing Table



Learn Table. Yikes, it's way off



Got it pulled back into the garage and will continue to closely look everything over and see what all I got myself into. I have quite a few parts on the way.



So my main goals with a new project was first and foremost to have a manual transmission again. This time around I'd like to keep things more simple and stay N/A. While I loved the turbo, I think I prefer to have short gears and torque down low. At least for the short term, I'd like to stick to the basics and build a clean, fun to drive car. I picked up a nice 6.2 L92 short block from a buddy and will likely build that for this car at some point down the road. I've done the supercharger then turbo, but what I haven't done before is a big cubic inch engine. So I think that's the direction that I'd like to go for the future. Another big reason for selling my Nomad was to start a fund for building a 30x40 detached garage, but still have a cool car to drive around.

I'll be updating this along the way. Right now I'm waiting for some fittings and brackets for the first wave of upgrades to the car.

Cheers,
Ryan