66 Chevelle Project

[Rubes]

NIce job Mike.

[hmartin]

Awesome! I especially like the interior.

[Mike Holleman]

You guys have seen the afters. Here is a couple of befores.

[Mike Holleman]

And a couple of in betweens.

[dropit69]

holy crap you weren't kidding..hated to seen your bill when it was done..came out awesome !!

[Mike Holleman]

The man spent some serious bucks building it, but mainly because he choose the best available parts and pieces. My son and I billed for less than 600 hours on this build. That is each. Considering we did about 90% of the build that is fairly cheap at least labor wise.
Had the car been in the condition we all thought it was in, he would have come out much better. Once it was stripped, there was strong consideration to ditch it and find another car. It was that bad. When he left my house with it today he was all grins. To quote Mr. Natural, " another job well done."

[Yelcamino]

"Another job well done" is a serious understatement! Awesome job Mike!

[Mike Holleman]

Thanks Herb,
I'm always glad when they are finished and gone.
Now to get serious about an El Camino.
Mike

[Mike Holleman]

A sad update on this 66 Chevelle build. Today the customer called me sobbing, I could barely make out what he was trying to tell me. He was standing in front of his car watching it burn. Not sure exactly what happened yet, but it was an engine fire and gas related. I rushed to the scene and damn near cried myself. What a horrible sight. The engine will survive but most everything else under the hood is trash. Melted the bowl off the back of the Holley. Said it knocked off, he rolled to a stop and saw flames. It had a safety pressure switch for the fuel pump, but it looks to me that the fuel pump was feeding the fire. I'll know more when I can break it down.
Mike

[dropit69]

oh my Mike i dont know what to say that just sucks hard..such a awesome car..

[Yelcamino]

You ain't kidding! That sucks!

[Mike Holleman]

You ain't kidding! That sucks!

You guys are right, but sucks put's it mildly. Here is a reminder of what it looked like mere hours ago. It will return, but did I mention it is not insured.
Mike

[jackfrost]

i just put a fire extinguisher on my parts list.

[Mike Holleman]

i just put a fire extinguisher on my parts list.

The owner has already told me a fire system is a given on the rebuild. I put a fire system in my Elky, but it only sprays inside the car. I might now consider adding an engine nozzle.
Mike

[Mike Holleman]

You guys may remember this post from last fall. My customers 66 Chevelle had an engine fire and was nearly destroyed. Well, It is nearly back on the road. I have tried to improve everything on the car. The 502 now has Accel's Thruster DFI. Should pick up 60 to 70 HP. I did the engine compartment even cleaner. Went to black paint on items that had finish damage but were still good. Believe it or not that is the same valve covers. I built him a custom dash. Just a little nicer than the Covan stuff that burned. The car is at the paint shop getting a Cortez Silver and Gun Metal Gray paint job. And man am I glad to be nearly finished. Seems like I have been working on this car since fall of 2006. Except for the nine months he had it, I have.
Mike

[jackfrost]

what caused the fire?

[Mr.VENGEANCE]

awwwww man that sucks!!


but thats good to see it back out looking better than ever.

[Yelcamino]

Mike, it looked great the first time around, but it's even better this time! Nice job.

[Mike Holleman]

what caused the fire?

He had a sticking secondary float. It backfired and a little fire started. If he would have restarted it would have gone out. He panicked jumped out leaving the switch on and fuel pump running plus two big Spal fans adding O2. Fire lasted about two minutes.

[Mike Holleman]

Mike, it looked great the first time around, but it's even better this time! Nice job.

Thanks Herb. It did turn out nice. It is a whole bunch more work to recover one from a fire than to just build one. Tom has it now for the paint and I will only need a day to finish afterwards. And there is still a little fine tuning on the EFI. Most likely Ryan at RPM will get it for a dyno tune. It is quick but the Elky has him covered.
Mike