1966 SS - snail pace project

Here are some pictures of the eBay advert.

I am trying to post this stuff in the order of the project. I will keep posting so no proding is nessesary

This was a while ago. I have worked on the car but I did take a year off last year for a family adventure. Back at it now.

I am very very talented at taking things apart.

First thing I did was take things apart.

Here are some pics of the first days at home.

A little about the condition of the car as purchased.

The good:
12 bolt axle
very rust free, low mileage, straight body, straight and rust free frame.
actual mileage 41,000.

How it was ordered:
Super Sport, 360 HP, M20, 3.31 non posi (CW)
Manual Steering, Manual Brakes.
Tach and gauges
rear antenna
Bucket seats and console. I thought it had headrests from an old picture but they may be aftermarket ones from the early 70s.

If it had any other equipment it was gone and I don't know about it.

The bad:

Most of the bad is from a previous owner that I will refer to as the "that guy who chopped up the Chevelle" from now on. I think I shall capitalize the name "TGWCUTC". In an ironic twist he probably saved this car's life. He never completed his dream of turning this into a drag car. So the car sat for more than 25 years. The story I have is that he died and his brother got the car. I am unsure if I remember it correctly. I get tunnel vision when buying a new Chevelle.

He cut out the rust free floors and threw them away. He welded in a roll bar. He cut a fuel cell hole into the trunk floor. He rolled the inner wheel well lips on the rear for tire clearance. He also cut a notch on the driver's side for wheel clearance. He drilled 5000 holes in the fire wall and pop riveted aluminum to cover the holes left from the heater, wipers, and fan (which he threw away). He cut off the lip at both sides of the fire wall to save about 3 ounces of weight. The firewall now has no structurally integrity.

12 bolt has c clip eliminators. This probably blew his budget. It had 5.13? gears in it with a spacer plate on the 3 series carrier. New brakes and new clutch discs. Never run. I will take this apart and try to make it a CW rear again. OK that's a lie, I only run posi.

Big block hood is gone. Rumour is that the car used to run around Boise ID with a blower sticking out of the hood. The car came with a flat hood with a blower hole in it.

Car has a few dings and dents from sitting around, nothing too bad. I have the original gauge dash with 41,000 miles showing. I had to buy this separately. All the small parts are missing. EVERTHING. No interior, no engine parts, no tranny parts.

Here are a few pics the Original Owner sent me. Not TGWCUTC
These pics are probably from the early/mid 70s?

Where to start?

First thing to do was to cut out and throw away the roll bar. It was welded to the frame. PO cut up quite a bit of the car to install this. Ironic that all my initial work will be to undo his efforts.

Now what…Lets take some more stuff apart.

I made a wood frame to hold the body shell so I could get the frame out from below. Lucky for me all the body bolts came out. I see that there is one bent cage nut at the driver’s front. I wonder what happened there. No other damage.

I jacked it up a little at a time putting large blocks at all corners until my frame fit. The large zip ties at the front were to keep the frame together until I bolted it. Not having a floor made all this work easier. I have more tools now so I would use a different method in the future.

I bought a rotisserie so that I could do all the welding required. Which will be considerable even though I won't need quarter panels. I put the firewall marking on there as an inside joke to mock a friend of mine.

I also made a little wood cart to work on the frame. I had to straighten the middle frame a little, probably from that drive shaft that was thrown. It looks great now. I also had to weld up some cracks at the rear shock bolt holes. Pretty common repair. You can see that I stripped all the components off. My daughter helped, nice day for me.

Since I don’t have great MIG skills I will start on the floor patches. When my skills improve I will move onto more visible areas. I was a good gas welder and am a good stick welder. We will see how these translate.

Here are a couple small patches at the front. First I removed the remaining central floor behind the main cross seam. Then I patched the two sides where the floor was cut for the rollbar. The other side looks the same.

I bought a patch panel for the gas pedal area. It is difficult to find a donor that has this area in perfect condition.

Cut, cut, cut....fit, fit, fit, weld, weld, weld, grind, grind, grind, repeat, repeat, repeat.

Turned out pretty good, the fitment was great after a lot of hammer work. I filled a few pinholes and was generally happy with my welding. Confidence is increasing. As I work with the car I find more and more areas that need attention. Isn't that the way with all projects.

I removed the middle of the trunk, needed the room to work and it is coming out anyway.

That guy cut out a notch for the rear tire, one side only? Anyways, I cut a patch out of good floor metal. Fit and weld. Turned out pretty good.

Next I repaired the back of the same tub. It was a mix of light rust and cuts. It was a more difficult piece to make as it has a dual curve formed into it. A lot of bashing on a custom wood jig I made. Fit pretty good. My welding is still a little on the blob side. Too much grinding. I think I am a good fitter so that makes up for fair welding.