Project: BLACK METAL - '67 Camaro

[72Z/28]

Yea it sucks that the work gets delayed due to having wrong parts. This hobby becomes frustrating because most of the time parts need to be ordered or wrongs maybe sent to you. At least for me it is really frustrating I live overseas, and when by mistake the supplier sends me a wrong part it will be too costly to send him back the wrong part. Unless they agree to keep the wrong part and send a new part free of charge.



Anyways, hope you receive the correct part and get your car back on the road man

[1nastyZ06]

Wow. Looks like a nice build

[67rally]

Apparently Wilwood changed the register size over a year ago, so I can't blame Strange on this one. They just looked up my brake kit # and went off that. I wanted to keep my existing brakes since they only have a couple thousand miles on them.

Unfortunately Strange has to turn down the new registers to fit my application so they won't ship out till sometime next week. But they simply bolt in, so it should be a quick swap and then I can continue the progress.

[Earltj96]

how much were the hotchkis tubular arms?? and its progressing nice and steady

[67rally]

how much were the hotchkis tubular arms?? and its progressing nice and steady

I didn't use the Hotchkis arms, I have the SpeedTech tubular arms. They were a couple hundred less than the Hotchkis arms, and have an adjustable steering stop built in, in case your front tires scrub the subframe. I wanted to run a 245/40/18 up front, but knew that clearance might be an issue at full lock.

[BigJoe29]

great build. Always makes me feel better about my projects when watching other people hit snags on theirs. Your car is amazing.

[rickpaw]

It's always something, isn't it?

What did you decide on the headers?

[67rally]

What did you decide on the headers?

Not sure yet, I'll know more tomorrow. It's between milling down the headers I already have, Doug's 3337's or a third surprise choice.

I think I'm sticking with ceramic coated regardless. I'll post more in the next two days.

[67rally]

I got my coil relocation brackets in yesterday and mocked up a set of the coils. I have a couple of ideas where I can hide them, but I can't get to my engine bay right now.

Here's the brackets I'll be using, they were $60 on eBay:



Here are one set of coils mocked up:


Here are the LS3 Coils on their stock bracket and then on the relocation bracket. A little more compact:

[67rally]

I also got my the smaller (2.8") registers from Strange Engineering to replace the 3.06" ones that came on the axles.



3.06" on left, 2.8" on right:


Not a great pic, but it's a simple as peeling off the old decal and removing a single hex key bolt:


Fit like a glove, and Strange even supplied replacement 'S' decals:


So I was able to re-install my calipers. I shimmed them so they're centered on the rotors, and safety wired the bolts that hold them to the backing plate. I also reattached the remaining brake lines.



That's it for a couple of days, my Dad's in town tonight for the weekend and the garage ain't big enough for two people and a car!

[sebtarta]

Good job with the brakes. Nice for Strange to help you out on that.
How are you going to run the coil pack wires?

[67rally]

Good job with the brakes. Nice for Strange to help you out on that.
How are you going to run the coil pack wires?

Yeah, I guess it was nice of them...I mean, it was their mistake in the first place, so I'd be kind of pissed if they didn't make good on it. Granted, they just took the register size off the Wilwood site, but it only took me 30 seconds to measure the hub of the rotor, I would have been happy to measure for them. Regardless, it only cost me a weekend of waiting, and there's plenty of time before spring actually gets here.

I haven't decided where the new coils are going to go. Once I decide on a location, I'll try to keep the wires on the stealthy side.

[Hardware]

Great thread... Thanks for spending the time.. a lot of useful info for any ls swap...

[796spdbu]

Great Build! A lot of good information in this thread! Keep it up!

[option]

This a fantastic build thread man, really nice documentation and the car looks awesome. The best part for me is where you talk about keeping the car on the road while you build (my sentiments exactly) and the comments made by the old-timers at car shows. I didn't have my car for more than 5 minutes and my neighbor was over telling me about how when he had one, and this that and the other thing.

"Oh I plan on swapping this 350 out for a nice fresh LS, I'm gonna do a coil-over setup, convert this 2spd PowerGlide to a 6spd, etc, etc."
"Oh, I wouldn't do that. I would do this, I would do that."

It's enough to make you want to rip your hair out sometimes. ;)

[67rally]

Great thread... Thanks for spending the time.. a lot of useful info for any ls swap...

Great Build! A lot of good information in this thread! Keep it up!

This a fantastic build thread man, really nice documentation and the car looks awesome. The best part for me is where you talk about keeping the car on the road while you build (my sentiments exactly) and the comments made by the old-timers at car shows. I didn't have my car for more than 5 minutes and my neighbor was over telling me about how when he had one, and this that and the other thing.

"Oh I plan on swapping this 350 out for a nice fresh LS, I'm gonna do a coil-over setup, convert this 2spd PowerGlide to a 6spd, etc, etc."
"Oh, I wouldn't do that. I would do this, I would do that."

It's enough to make you want to rip your hair out sometimes. ;)

Thanks guys, glad there's some useful info in there for someone.

[67rally]

Finally made some progress. I decided to replace the cheapo eBay headers with something that actually fits. I wanted to get the new headers in before ordering the new driveshaft (since the S60 is longer than the old 12 bolt).

Well, after a few weeks of researching, emailing, PM'ing, three different threads on three different sites...I had narrowed it down between the Dynatech's and the Doug's 3337's. I ruled out the Texas Speed because there just wasn't enough info on them, and I wasn't crazy about the design.

The guys from Dynatech were great with trying to help, but it's the same design as the Texas Speed stuff (still wondering if Texas Speed copied them, or if Dynatech is making their headers).

So I ordered a set of the Doug's 3337's (jwcarguy's pics helped push me to the final decision). My only hesitation was that they look identical to the ebay brand headers that I was looking to get rid of. In fact, when I first got them, I thought they were identical, but there are subtle differences in the tube design (i.e. the guys in China didn't do a perfect job on the knockoff). I installed them this weekend. I ended up moving my engine and transmission about 3/4" back towards the firewall and I'm very happy with the clearance.

ebay Header passenger side:


Doug's 3337 passenger side:


ebay Header driver side:


Doug's 3337 driver side:


Doug's clearance:






Doug's driver side ground clearance:


Doug's passenger side ground clearance:


About 4" of clearance on passenger side, and 4.5" on driver side:


And just for reference, I'm using the tall & narrow '69 Z28/350 frame mounts (3945507/8) and the tall & narrow Energy Suspension motor mounts (3.1117G). Along with the Dirty Dingo Sliders, and a BMR adjustable T56 trans crossmember.

[67rally]

It's been a few weeks since I've done any updates (or made any real progress), I'm still waiting on my driveshaft to arrive from Denny's, hopefully it gets here next week so I can finish this project up.

In the meantime I made a driveshaft safety loop out of 1/4"x2-1/2" steel plate. I got the solid ring from Jegs, and the rest is bar stock. I mounted this between the T56 mount and the trans itself. I thought I'd get lucky and make a straight run back, but the loop needed to be about 1" higher than the front mount.

Jegs loop:


Bar stock:




Basic shapes:


This is what I came up with:




Here it is installed:





Notice the hack job on the exhaust H-Pipe. That's not my work, and yes I paid to have that done. When I get back from Jamaica:hurray:, it's going to a real exhaust shop and I'm having them install a Magnaflow X-Pipe, with new pipe running from the new headers to the existing Magnaflow mufflers.

[67rally]

I also figured out why I needed a couple washers between my shocks and the DSE multileaf shock plates. I didn't realize that the monoleaf setup just used a bolt and washers, where the multileaf uses a stud.



Multileaf stud:




I made up a press to remove the bushing in the Bilstein's. I just used a 5/16" bolt, some washers, sockets and a nut to press it out. This was super easy.



New stud going in:


And here it is bolted up:

[67rally]

I also made some lowering blocks/spacers for the new rear end. With the multileaf spring perches, there was about 5/8" gap (can't remember exactly now) between the Hotchkis springs and the DSE shock plates. I had temporarily put the rearend back together with the rubber pads, but wanted everything as solid as possible. I have also always had a slight lean towards the driver's side (even without me in it), so I decided to correct that problem as well.

I bought some 2 1/2" wide steel plate in 6" sections. I used a 1" thick piece on the passenger side, and then a 3/8" & a 5/8" piece on the drivers side.

Here's the 3/8" and 1" pieces:


I drilled a 3/8" hole for the centering pin (I bought some 3/8"x3" grade 8 socket head cap screws for the longer centering pin)


Then I worked my way up to a 9/16" bit to counter bore for the socket head. The socket head cap is 3/8" tall, but the hole in the spring perches is only 3/16" deep, so they bolt heads need to be recessed 3/16":


But this left an angled bottom to the counter bore. So I bought a sacrificial 9/16" bit, ground the end flat, and ground some reliefs on the back side of the cutting edge, so I could drill the bottom truly flat:


Here's the 1" block on the passenger side, notice how the cap only sticks up 3/16"::


Here's what the passenger side looks like bolted down:


And here's the driver's side:


It looked pretty level, but I won't really know until I can drive around the block and let the suspension fully settle. I can also swap the 5/8" and 3/8" piece around if the drivers side needs to come down any, or I have a leftover 1" block if I want to set it up like the passenger side.