1971 Firebird455 - Project

[LeighP]

Dinner was late coming tonight...wife had friends over.....so I pulled out the new flash looking chrome master cylinder I got from Jegs and bench bled it and fitted it up. Looks nice, I think.

[LeighP]

Pulled the old steering column and shaft out, been messing around getting the brake pedal hooked up...its a matching design to the accelerator pedal by Clayton Machine Works.
Of course, bolt in accessory stuff never just bolts in. I'm using a replacement booster with an adjustable clevis hook up...didn't suit the aftermarket pedal so I had to get a bracket made up by a friend at his engineering shop.
Then I pulled the new steering intermediate shaft out, painted it up and found the special bolt I had here for the old shaft didn't suit the new one...off to the shop for a new bolt.
Tomorrow...stick the dash in, change the ignition lock and paint and fit the actual column I'm using..not the temporary one thats been in there till now.

Everything is so time consuming....even the little stuff seems to take forever as it all needs to be "adjusted", lol.




Shameless plug here....thats one of the new intermediate steering shafts my friend repros...nice thing, all new.

[ryeguy2006a]

Looks great Leigh. I like the flip flops.

[LeighP]

Aussie safety boots.....I don't wear shoes unless I'm at work!

Laid out the harness the other day and ran some lighting and engine wiring through the firewall together with the DSE wiper kit's wiring loom.
I decided to put the main electrical panel behind the glove box lid.....once I had the dash in position, it became obvious there wouldn't be much room for a glove box anyway....prefect spot for the fuses and relays etc.

Made up two braces and mounted an alloy sheet in there for something to attach stuff to.....




And then mounted up and ran the harness, fuse box and relay pack.



Just working outwards from here. :-D

[gsxrken]

Nice work! Keep it up. Gonna be sick.

[LeighP]

Thanks.

Spent today taping harness and arranging it up behind the dash and down along each side of the car...running he audio RCA cables down one side and the rest of he harness and Amp power down the other side. Everything seems to be laying out OK....till I forgot to run the power for the rear window blower....oh, well...guess it'll be run down the centre console instead.

[LeighP]

Things are slowly progressing, now that I have to go back to working for a living. Having 5 weeks off is such a nice break....lol.

Finished restoring the steering column, replaced the lock barrel with a new GM one, and when I pulled it apart, found the turn signal switch was broken, so that cost me a few more dollars...all painted and bolted in the car.



Finished the trunk, except for the speakers and the rear screen blower....looks pretty tidy.



I'm still working on wiring and other stuff....all time consuming, but not worth taking pics of.

[cobragt]

car is looking awesome! Love the color!

[LeighP]

Thanks very much.

I was making brackets for the windscreen washer tank this afternoon...got that sorted out...its an alloy (black annodised) repro of a GM Holden washer tank...nice size, fits where it needs to neatly. Then I started thinking about the shift position indicator system....I've got a Dakota Digital sender unit for the gear position display, but until I looked at it last night, I didn't realise its also set up to give you neutral/park safety and the back up lights. I'm not going to use the micro switches that came with the B&M shifter, I'll go with the Dakota Digital control box.
The sender unit can be mounted externally on the side of the gearbox, or anywhere else you like...I set it up to run off a convenient tab on the shifter itself. Now I'll just mount the control box forward of the shifter...easy.

[67speedfreak]

Now those are some sexy parts right there ! Looking good !

[ryeguy2006a]

Leigh, are you not using the factory heating box? That one looks different than the stock one, is that some Aussie version of a stock box?

[LeighP]

Its a heater unit out of a little Diahatsu 4WD - I picked it up some time back for another project, but it fits nicely in the 71.....I like the clean firewall, I've always disliked the complicated heater assembly on GM cars.

[LeighP]

Received the insulation for the roof panel so I finally got a chance this afternoon to line the upper side of the headliner board with this light weight insulation.
I'll be fitting the headliner tomorrow and working on the parcel tray board as well.
Interior upholstery trimmer was here this afternoon test fitting the rear seats so we could work out what needs to be modified.....at least thats pushing forward now.

[OLDFLM]

So you're putting a later headliner in the car?

[LeighP]

Yeah, when I got the car, the factory bows and headliner were gone, and this late 73 board was with it. I checked that the later style front/rear and side supports for the board will work (looks like it will) ...so I thought it was a better idea to run the solid board...a little more headroom maybe .

[LeighP]

Got the headlining board in today, and the other trims that hold it up....started working on the parcel tray this afternoon.
Man, holding up the board while you stuff about trying to get a screw started is fun....lol.

You can see the upper replacement seatbelt mounts that I guy I know makes...lets you bolt modern single point mount belts into one of these older style roof mounts.






Heres how the eye level centre brake light sits.....should attract people's attention.

[geberhard]

loving the build! I so want to do a second gen build! keep it coming mate!

[LeighP]

Pushing on with the parcel tray project....I want to get this finished so I can have the auto trimmer cover it before the seats are done.

So, I had the board cut to shape, I took a page out of the audio guys book and used some polartec fleece stapled over the seatbelt bulges to form the "humps" to clear the belts.
I used silicon spray on the metal covers I'd previously made.
I soaked the fleece with fibreglass resin, which set up nicely to give me the basic shape.




Once it had hardened, I popped the board off the tray and trimmed the fleece to shape.




Next, I laminated some chopped strand mat over the fleece to make it more rigid and give it a little more strength.




I trimmed the edges after it had cured a little....tomorrow, I'll sand, smooth and use some polyester body filler to smooth the whole thing out. Doesn't have to be perfect as the tray will be foamed and covered in vinyl....which should hide small imperfections.

[LeighP]

OK...spent today finishing this off so I can get it to the trimmer asap.

Filled and sanded the two cover areas, cut out the slots for the belts to run through. Clearanced the rear inner corners of he covers for the speaker covers, so they'll sit flat.

[CruizinKev]

cool good work Leigh!