New here - '78 T/A that wants to be pro-touring!

[Trevon]

I have spent the majority of my time on the www.78ta.com and the www.transamcountry.com forum and am somewhat new to this forum; have been reading many posts here for a while. I really want to make my car more or a pro-touring car than stock or a show car. Just always have liked the look of pro-touring cars batter than drag/pro-street cars.

Got it a year ago, PO put in a 1970 Olds 455 connected too a TH400 with 3.08 gears in the rear end. The engine does have a decent cam in from the PO.



Dynoed a year ago at 263hp and 303ft lbs. Disappointing. But I did bring the car up more than 2,000 ft and didn't really tune anything. About to finally get a wideband in and make some good adjustments; messed with it a bit already and felt a world of difference. May get around to going on the dyno again in a month or so (no engine mods since, but it was so rich I think a good tune may get me over 300hp - still losing it somewhere though)

Right now the stock snowflakes are off of it because they really need some cleaning up, just a set of Cragar Soft 8's are on there right now (can't beat getting a set of 4 wheels for $150!). To go down the pro-touring road I would love to get the 17" Year One snowflakes, but I have learned that I do not have nearly as much money as most people on here and $1000 for wheels (wihout tires) is quite a lot.

Interior was shot, so I wanted to fix that first:

Still gotta dye quite a few trim pieces, headliner, and door planels.

I am, however, planning on redoing all of my suspension within the next 8 months. Pretty new to all performance mods and such but I have come up with what seems to be decent(price/performance) I just hope they will all work together:



BMR Upper and Lower Control Arms
QA1 Pro Coil Systems 1 shocks/springs
Hotchkis rear leafs (unless I do go to 4 link - is that preferred?)
Hotchkis HPS 1000 Rear shocks.

Hopefully a complete Hotchkis steering setup too.

Since I don't have the room or resources to take the fronet end apart either, I hope this can all be swapped out on jack stands with the front clip together. I want to do brakes, but they get expensive QUICK and I have no idea what works when it comes to changing spindles and ball joints...I need that stuff spelled out for me.

Already have subframe connectors. May change the sway bars but the stock WS6 setup doesn't seem too bad. 2nd gen F-body's seem like they were already a decent platform for the pro-touring type of things.

I may want too replace my rear subframe as well, but am finding it impossible to locate any. I have a small hole on the left rail and don't know what exactly to think about it...

Even with 3 electric fans and a new aluminum radiator I think it still wants to get a little warm on me so I have to figure that out.

There is some paint bubbling on the bottom of the passenger door and some rust in the usually places - behind the rear wheels and bottom front section of quarter panels. Want to get it fixed eventually but body work gets expensive quick. Car is red, too, so its a lot harder to just rattle can over some stuff; if it were black I would have no problem sanding and rattle canning it flat black...

Thats all I can think of right now, a lot of stuff on here seems to be over my head right now but I am learning quite a bit of performance info here.

[mplecha]

Welcome! Your car looks great.

[CruizinKev]

nice T/A! welcome aboard!

[ManwithNoName]

Nice car! I was looking for a '78 T/A before I found my Camaro. The WS6 package is a pretty nice place to start & there is a lot of aftermarket support for these cars from Hotchkis, DSE, Protouring F-Body, etc. You have a really nice car there & it should be a good build.

[NOT A TA]

Welcome! Nice looking car to start with.

[The Stickman]

welcome to the forum. Looks like you have a good start already.

[killer67]

Good looking T/A! Welcome

[Hotchkis]

Trevon – Welcome to Pro-Touring.com! Nice car!

Thanks for considering Hotchkis suspension products for your Trans-Am. It sounds like you have a few projects already planned.

Here’s a video we put together with a nice ’80 Trans-Am:

http://youtu.be/rtCbzhTAilM


Good luck on your project!

[Chad-1stGen]

Looks like a nice car. I like the interior upgrades so far.

There is another member on the site, Brett, who has a 79 with a 455 Olds motor. What's with the olds motors lol?

Anyhow welcome to the site.

[Trevon]

Thank you every body. I like the old motor in it...but I am losing my mind trying to keep it cool. Trying to work on that; messing with timing is proving to be nearly impossible, never had problems on other engines but I, for the life of me, can't figure out my timing now.

Has a little bit of rust in all the usual places of the F-body's which can be frustrating but makes it easier to drive all over the place (don't have to worry so much about an expensive paint job!)