It's not moving under it's own power just yet but it's darn close! Earlier in the month I dropped in a 454 and TH400 out of a donor truck. Since then I've been doing little odds and ends getting things wired up, changed around and working together. Over the weekend I finally got to fire it up and break in the new camshaft but it almost looked like a scene out of a car hospital and mine was on life support lol. Still need to put a radiator in and I found out today the fuel tank is at least 2 weeks out. Soon as those two big items go in, I'll start on the body work.

Anyway, here's a short boring clip... probably hasn't had a running engine in between the fenders for 20+ years. YouTube- First startup of the 66 El Camino

Right on!:thumbsup:

Nice!

Cool!

Sounds pretty good man! Glad to see you are making some forward progress. Keep us updated on the build.:thumbsup:

Got a couple more little things done last night like getting the tail lights wired back up. The original harness is mostly there, just a lot of ends were cut off for whatever reason in the dash area. Which kinda brings this question out... Is there just one flasher unit or two? Or does the same one handle both turn signal and hazard lights?

Should be two. One for the turn signals and the other for the hazard flashing lights. Sounds good. Keep the updates coming.

Hi,
Sounds good. Interior done?

Dwight

Thanks BRKHRT2, I'll have to look at a friend's 66.

What interior? hehe That'll probably be the last thing on the list. All that was left when I got the car was the dash with almost nothing in it. It had a picked apart cluster, the trim strip where the ignition and lights are and the ash tray.

Actually moved it under it's own power yesterday, I put it away till the gas tank gets here.

http://bdrperf.com/66/66outside.jpg

very nice! keep up the good work! sounds good!

Got a nice surprise in my inbox, 2 FedEx tracking numbers for the tank and sender which will be here Saturday :D So it looks like the body work will start next week!

Great Job. How exciting!

thought hazards weren't standard until '67?

In one of the wiring diagrams I'm using, it shows a brown hazard flasher wire. Also shows a purple directional flasher wire, both of which are the two colored wires that in my car are hooked up to a single flasher unit. The turn signal switch is bad in the column I'm using so might pull that apart tonight to see if I can get anything to blink.

After kind of putting it off for a few days, I got the gas tank in and plumbed the 1/2 inch line. I put the 1/2 inch in now for a future fun engine that'll be going in ;)

Haven't been able to do anything for a while now. Recovering from a knee injury that I got on vacation, doh!

Bringing one back to life after 20+ years at deaths edge sure feels good don't it! For me the mechanical part was the EASY part. Getting the body / interior / electrical up to par was the butt kicker.

See if a 66 and 67 dash harness interchanges. I have a complete, un molested (non SS) wireing harness (underhood, under dash and even a factory AC harness) I was going to evilbay the 3 but if someone here has need......

Yup, getting it moving again was easy and lucky for me, the wiring harness was in great shape. Now comes the 100's of hours of sanding, banging out dents, sanding, welding, grinding, sanding, body filler, sanding, primer, filler, sanding, high build, sanding, cleaning, painting, sanding and buffing! Oh, there might be a bit of sanding too.

mmmmm I love the smell of rust dissolving gel. Passenger fender is almost rust free, on the outside surface anyway.

Before, just went over it with the DA sander
http://bdrperf.com/66/66sandingstart.jpg

After some rust removal. Taking the fender off next to finish it and to start banging dents out.
http://bdrperf.com/66/rustremoval.jpg

looking good

We have primer! Had to do some spot treatment with a sand blaster on the fender and did the whole cowl piece. There was some very thick paint on it and hardly a spot of rust. What rust the blaster didn't get, I took care of with the rust dissolver.

Looks much much better in one solid color and only has a couple of more serious repair areas. Lower fender is banged in and rusted out and the front has been hit. There's some other dings and dents but it's in better shape than I thought it would be. Probably start on the driver's fender tomorrow.

http://bdrperf.com/66/pfenderprimer.jpg

http://bdrperf.com/66/cowlprimer.jpg

Still plugging away at it. Took my time with the bad knee bugging me.

Little slide hammer action to make it go from concave to convex.
http://bdrperf.com/66/porcupinefender.jpg

Roughed in the filler work and shot some more epoxy primer on for now.
http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/dfprimed.jpg

Started on the rear driver's quarter by the tail light and found out the thickness of the filler back there. It was at least 3/4 of an inch thick in spots, and that's after being gone over with a grinder before I got the car. I've got a lot of work ahead of me.

I give you a lot of credit for having the skill and patience to do such nice bodywork, I'm sure it is going to turn out awesome when its done!

+1 to what Marv said !

Mine sat for 19 years without moving, and building a 100% new (mechanically) vehicle was the easy part.

My roof, cowl, rear glass area was swiss toast. Took 3 years to find the parts to rebuild the entire body structure in that area, including all of the internal bracing, etc.

Your bodywork is coming along great! Those fenders put my originals to shame. I took the easy way on them and bought new replacements, which have a ton of incorrect features. It will be easier to bring back the damaged and rusted originals than to correct the new ones.

The one repro part that was good is the 2-piece dash/cowl stamping set. Those 2 parts were an exact fit... which I suspected in advance, since they were not EDP'd. I was told that metal stamped here in the good 'ol USA is usually left bare.

Here is a shot of the stampings I am yapping about:
http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/aero80/8269f01e.jpg

The cut on the dash necessary to fit them:
http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/aero80/fc8ec59b.jpg

The lower of the 2 pieces, and it was a dream to install. No kidding.
http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/aero80/59bc5a3d.jpg

An idea of what I was starting with... this is the upper roof rail, but the entire roof and cowl and rear glass area were dissolving from years of being wet. Remarkably, the floors and lower cowl structure are in good shape.
The car was parked all that time nose-up (slanted ground), and so the water entering into the 'cheezed roof structure ran down into the rear door jamb area, which I am replacing with all new steel. Have to fab my own, since Elco jambs are not available for the '64-'67 cars.
http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/aero80/00fe997c.jpg

I have more pics if anyone is interested.

Eric

Ouch! and good to know on the repo fenders, I was tossing the idea around of getting some later down the road but I'll just spend some more time on the originals. The passenger one needs that lower patch panel since it's beat up and rusted. I haven't popped the windshield out yet but from what I can see so far, it doesn't look rotted out in the channel. It hasn't had trim on it for who knows how long so I'm hoping that'll help with not being able to trap moisture there. The rear glass is missing the lower trim too but looks like someone just used silicone to hold the window in.

Well, I knew it was going to be bad but holy smokes :eek: Sure am glad a friend of mine has a straight '66 that I can make templates off of to get things correct on mine.

The filler was over an inch thick in spots where the metal looked like a topographical map of the Grand Canyon.
http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/nastyquarter.jpg

If you can believe it, it actually was worse than this starting out. Also, the whole bottom edge needs to be pulled out by a couple inches. I'll have to make some sort of clamp so I can pull it out with the winch on the truck.
http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/nastyquarter2.jpg

Started chipping off all the bondo boogers inside and decided to start pounding out a big crease. Well, the filler cracked and I pried it out, just gives you an idea how thick it is in spots.
http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/nastyquarter3.jpg

Bumper is coming off next so I can get into that corner.

I always think its funny that because bondo can be had in 5gal pails people pile it on like crazy.Bondo is awsom when used properly.I would concider replacing some of the mangled sections just to make life easier unless you can straighten them out.

I'm gonna give it a go at pounding everything out best I can. Probably end up either buying just a body to get panels off of or just skin it.

Just got back from a nearly 500 mile round trip to pick up a couple rear quarter panels. 200 bucks and they're great looking so far. The areas they're damaged are in good shape on mine so with a little cutting and welding here and there, I'll end up with some pretty straight sides with little work to get them really good :)

Not perfect but a lot better than what's on the car now. Far as I can tell, the only filler work that has been done was on the forward part of the wheel opening which on mine is in good shape.

http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/oldnnew.jpg

Lookin good!

and it looks low..... I like it!

Matt

Very nice!!

Finally got a Blair spot weld cutter (11094) and I'm starting into it! First time ever replacing a panel like this :eek: On a side note, replaced the original 1966 ball joints and got rid of all the wheel slop. Imagine that eh? lol.

http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/qp/swcuttingblairpre.jpg

Slow going but only have a little bit left to separate around the door area and spot welds around the wheel opening plus that lower part. Got crunched pretty good in that rear corner but I have replacement parts for that. Got one chunk out of the way for now :)

http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/qp/cutqp1.jpg

http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/qp/rearcrunch2.jpg

There was quite a bit of lead here, really surprised how thick it was. Now is this just tacked, soldered or spot welded together or all three? lol
http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/qp/quarterseam.jpg

Got a couple more little things done last night like getting the tail lights wired back up. The original harness is mostly there, just a lot of ends were cut off for whatever reason in the dash area. Which kinda brings this question out... Is there just one flasher unit or two? Or does the same one handle both turn signal and hazard lights?

There are two. The turn signal flasher is built into the fuse box on the top right hand side. The hazard lights or four way flasher is under the dash and to the right of the steering column right behind the ash tray.

Got a flasher unit a couple weeks ago along with a new turn signal switch for the column and still a no go. The spot on the fuse panel has the 2 holes for a signal to fit in but no contacts. There was another plug in the harness that the flasher plugged into though. I'll just have to look over a friend's '66 to get an idea of what's going on. Really no use to find something in the stock location, all the wiring is loose and laying everywhere behind and through the dash so I'm tracking stuff down by wire color.

Finally. Now I have to do it all over again on the one I bought lol Also have to repair the rear corner.

http://bdrperf.com/66/bw/qp/qpoff.jpg