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Corvelle Build (69 Chevelle + 05 C6)

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#261 · (Edited)
Still plugging along TR (y). Amazing the amount of work you have done. Its looking good. You must have spent a lot of time standing on your head under that dash. Your patience is unmatched. I just installed a Dakota Digital Gauge pod in a 50 Ford convertible yesterday . I'm putting a Dakota digital dash in my 69 this week so that will be fun and that will be enough of that for me lol!
 
Discussion starter · #263 ·
I figured I had the wiring in good enough shape to start the car. I had full confidence in the engine. It ran fine in the wreck I bought and I didn't do anything to it but change the oil pan, windage tray, and pickup tube, all factory parts except the pan (Holley). So I was sure I could start it up when I got the wiring in pretty good shape. All the fluids are in, bled and leak checked.

So. first off the brand new fuel pump wouldn't hold pressure. Second fuel was sitting in the rails for 5 years and had turned to turpentine. Luckily I could change the pump easily with my hatch in the trunk. I bought a new name brand pump for $80 and a China one for $25. The China one had a full installation kit with it!. So I put in the $80 and will keep the $25 for a backup on the road. My friend has a homemade injector cleaning apparatus that sprays the injectors into a Mason jar. Works great. With all that done I am attaching the first start video.


I said it must be a rod hitting the windage tray. I have had that happen before. Solution, throw the windage tray away. In this case I decided to "clearance" it. We checked with a stethoscope and determined the noise was coming from near the front of the oil pan. The oil pan is almost impossible to remove with the engine in the car, but not quite. Half a day of wrestling with it got it off. There was a small mark and dimple at exactly the right place for the #3 rod bolt would hit it. Clearanced all that and checked that there was plenty of room. Spent a day or two putting it all back together. Started it up and it sounded exactly the same.

The pan was no easier to remove the second time. Tray off,oil pickup off, plugs out, belt off. Rotate the engine easily until the #2 and #3 pistons are at TDC and it takes around 50 Ft. Lbs. to pass thru that position. We put the camera down the plug hole and found a fair amount of carbon. We figured a chunk of carbon got out to the edge of the piston where it comes close to the head and was blocking rotation. We spent the next 3 days cleaning the carbon out of those two cylinders. I bought the full inventory of Berryman B-12 from Advance. We made a number of special tools and finally got them clean yesterday. No change in the stuck rotation.

We can't figure it out so engine is coming out for disassembly. Very big disappointment. My pristine chassis is all beat up and oily.

If any of you have any ideas of what this could be please let me know. The car is winning Chris.

TR
 
Discussion starter · #265 ·
After removing the engine and taking the heads off we still had the problem. We noticed that the #5 piston was coming up short of TDC by about 3/16". Oh shucks, bent rod. since the rod was shorter it came down lower and was hitting the crank counterweight at BDC.

With all the fooling around with the stale fuel and bad fuel pump we somehow hydro-locked that cylinder and the starter bent the rod. Maybe that injector was leaking or stuck open before we cleaned them. Starter seems OK. I found a LS3 with the same problem online except the bend was worse and it broke the starter.

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The piston was also cracked. Below the crack you can see where the piston was hitting the crank counter weight. Probably a good thing I didn't rev the engine up.

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So, cleaning up the engine internals, ordered new rod and piston. Then begin the long process of putting the car back together....

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Discussion starter · #268 ·
While the heads were off I disassembled them and cleaned the valves. The exhast valves had some pitting (common evidently). I took them to some local guys that have worked on heads for a long time. The guy touched them up on the spot, 8 valves, $1.00 per valve.

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I deglazed the cylinder with a ball hone and put her back together. The rod bolts and head bolts are torque to yield fasteners so I had to get a degree wheel to properly tighten them.

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Put it all back in the car and re-connected everything, refilled the fluids, bled the clutch .... and started it up.


Here are the speciality tools I acquired for the LS. I had never been inside one of the LS motors.

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Harmonic balancer installer, 4" piston installer, flywheel locking device, valve spring remover / installer, balancer puller, Transmission output plug, degree wheel, and ball hone.

That piston installer worked really well, you can install the piston with one hand.

The fuel system still loses pressure quickly. I replaced the injectors and sent the old ones to Injectors RX for rebuild. I ordered Bosch injectors that turned out to be the exact same ones used by GM. They are made in South Carolina. I tested them with air pressure, no leak. I replaced the filter regulator and I previously replaced the fuel pump. Still loses pressure quickly. The Corvette manual says that on shut off the pressure should drop to 50 psi and hold. So finally I installed a check valve in the fuel line. That fixed the problem. (If the pressure drops quickly you get a long start.) (I don't know how the fuel system in the Corvette worked but it was complicated, two tanks....)

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Discussion starter · #273 ·
With the engine running well I took her out for a few laps around the block to check the speedo, cruise control, wheel speed sensors, etc. I did bolt in my shop roll around chair to give me something stable to sit on. All worked well. (The car is registered and insured, the tag was in the back floorboard)


I needed to mount and align the rear bumper to finish up the exhaust and get the tips in the stock position.
It took a cople of days of put it on, take it off before I figured how to do it correctly and get the gaps consistent.

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I made a jig and bolted a straight pipe to the frame in the correct position for the tips (2-7/16" out from the lower rear bumper edge and 7/8" down from that same edge according to the assembly manual.

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After sitting and looking at it for hours and trying stuff I finally figured out that I just needed one 45 degree bend and one 60 degree bend to mate the two ends up.
The fit-up has to be perfect for me to be able to tig it.

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I was practicing welding some scrap tubes and noticed how bad the "sugaring" was without back purging. So I welded up another sample with back purging.

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So there is why you need to back purge with stainless exhaust.
Here is the rig for welding the last four welds on the rear exhaust tube.

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I fabbed up the last two hangers and welded them on. They bolt to an existing slot in the frame.


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Finishing up the rear end. The repop tag light didn't have the correct hole spacing. I cut and welded it to fix that but then it was too far under the lip of the bumper although now I think that was probably correct. Anyway I made a little stainless extension to get more of the light on the tag.

I bought a repop tag door and it needed modifying too. I thought it would be quicker than spending a day cleaning and painting the original. Nope.

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Just have to do the wiring for the tag light, manual trunk release button, rear antenna for the fob and that should do it.
 
#276 ·
You're a man of many talents, and a hell of a lot of patience. It must have been a thrill to take The Corvelle for a spin!!
 
#277 ·
Car looks great. I appreciate how clean all your gaps are aligned, plus your fabrication skills are remarkable.

Two things I have questions about...is your exhaust hanging low because the fuel tank is oversized?

For us hack welders, can you explain what back purging means & how it's done. The difference is night & day.
 
Discussion starter · #278 ·
Thanks for the kind words guys.

Pete,
The gas tank is 20 gal like the original and is in the stock location relative to the body. I could not figure out a way to ge the exhaust down without going under the tank. The coil overs obstructed the normal path. At full jounce the pipes will be at the level of the bottom coilover mounts. If this doesn't work I will have to figure something else. Note that I have a V band clamp just after going over the diff so I would only have to replace from there. I could move the tank way rearward and shorten the filler tube but I really don't want to do that.

You can see the back purging rig in the pictures just above. You need two argon tanks (which I happened to have) or a dual regulator on a single tank. You cap one end of the tube and introduce argon, about 5 CFM is what I use. Then cap the other end (tin foil will work) and punch a small hole in it. Let that run fro a few minutes and all the oxygen will be evacuated and the metal will be protected on both sides.

TR
 
Discussion starter · #279 ·
Had to take a couple of weeks off for the Hot Rod Power Tour. 2200 miles, 18.6 overall mpg on my LS2 powered 65 Chevy truck. That was her 8th power tour, never let me down.

The electronics are just about sorted out. Last thing not working is the column lock, at least it is frozen unlocked. The last FOB function not working was the door locks. Recall that I spring loaded the lock mechanism so that they are always locked. The computer sends a pulse to the C6 lock mechanism and that pops the doors open. I my case it would just power a motor to pop the lock knob up long enough to manually operate the Chevelle latch. The problem was that the pulse is just a fraction of a second. The lock knob pops up but not long enought to operate the latch mechanism.

The only solution I could think of was to make another module that is an off delay relay. So the pulse from the computer becomes just a trigger to start the off delay that I set to about 2 seconds.
Works like a champ. so from inside if you lift the door handle and the car is "unlocked" the lock knob pops up and you can open the door. Same from the outside. If you have the FOB in your pocket the door will open "locked" or "unlocked". The Chinese make little boards that do most anything for a few bucks.

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more wiring in the doors. Hope I can get the windows in.

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Another issues is where to mount the antennas for the FOBs. I thought about it for a long time. The corvette fiberglass body allowed the signals to pass thru. Chevelle body, nope.
I decided to put them up in the head liner where they can "see" thru the window glass. I used the holes used for one of the shoulder belt clips to mount them. (and one mounted under the rear bumper for the trunck operation).

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I'll tape the wires and maybe make a plastic cover, some time.

Next I started installing the interior working from back to front. My third package tray finally worked out. (UPS folded one of them up - Summit replaced it quickly) I'm using the old school speaker grills because they screw down and hold the package tray firmly. I also mounted the Sirius XM radio antenna on it. It seems to work OK thru the glass, we will see. I intend to drive this car on Power Tours etc. and the XM is really nice for travelling.

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I have been fighting carpet all this week and the front still has a long way to go but the rear is finally good so the rear seat could go in. Using my wife's clothes steamer really helps. You can get the carpet really hot without fear of melting it.
I'm using Morris seat belts. They are a local company and make nice modern type belts in the US. (Morris Classic Concepts, LLC)

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My funky console is problematic for the front carpet .....
 
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TR65
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