The 70 LT-1

by Larry

I bought the car in 1998.  The engine was out and apart, but was complete and the numbers matched.  It included a set of genuine GM pistons and cam.  The car had a tacky ground effects sort of spoiler under the nose, and an eight inch whale tail spoiler glued to the rear.  The headlights had been sawed out and homemade Monza style lights installed.   The front clip had been replaced with an original one, but it was put on crooked so the hood latches didn’t work.  It had an aftermarket L88 style hood.  It had been painted black with gray graphics down the sides.  The wiper door vacuum hoses were missing, as was the vacuum tank under the fender.  But it was a numbers matching car and had the build sheet to verify its original equipment.  For some reason, I didn’t take a single picture of it in that state. 

Besides being an LT1 car, this one was highly optioned for a high performance model, so was even more desirable.  It was originally red with a black interior.  It had factory 4:11 gears, power brakes, rear window defogger, wheel covers, deluxe interior with leather seats, plush carpet, tilt and telescoping steering, power windows, and AM/FM radio.  All these were verified on the build sheet, and were still with the car.  There was no trace of the alarm system except the switch under the hood and evidence of where the hole for the switch had been glassed over in the rear panel.   

     Patching old headlight openings.                              Waiting it's turn at restoration.

The first summer, I rebuilt the engine and installed it.  I found a correct appearing hood from a different year big block car, painted it black, and installed it.  I took off the rear spoiler, fixed the fiberglass, and shot some black paint on just the repaired section.  I took out the Monza headlights and molded in new fiberglass to fit the correct headlight assemblies.  I installed all the hoses, actuators, and vacuum relays for the headlights and wiper door.  It wasn’t possible to get the correct vacuum tank under the fender without a lot of disassembly, so I mounted an aftermarket tank.  Everything worked!  Then drove it for a summer!  That fall, we parked it in our store, and started  gathering parts.  I found one NOS grille, and finally the other.  I found a nice center grille.  I arranged a three way swap so three of us ended up with exactly correct hoods for our respective cars.  A customer brought in an NOS center console cover with the LT1 data plate.  Over the years, the interior got stuffed full of parts.

                      Filling up with parts.

Finally it was time to get started on a restoration! I took it home and backed it into the garage. The first thing I did was to remove the damaged front clip and order a correct press molded replacement for the front clip and a damaged right rear quarter panel. Since the front fiberglass had been replaced at some point, I thought it would be a good idea to have the frame checked. Sure enough, the left front frame horn was pushed back a bit. A couple of day later, it was back from Andover Frame, all nice and square.

Engine repainted.                                                      And put back together... Waiting to go back in.

Since the engine had about a thousand miles on it, I decided to just clean it up, put in new gaskets and seals, and repaint it. I disassembled all the aluminum pieces and sent them to Fred Hudson to be renewed. He cleans them and plates on a microscopic layer of new aluminum so they look brand new. I sent the valve covers, intake manifold, thermostat housing, alternator, and smog pump. They came back so pretty it was almost a shame to put them on. One tube of the A.I.R system had its fitting twisted off. I took it to Creative Metal Works for repair. When it came back, you couldn’t tell which tube they had fixed. I found all the correct fittings and controls for the A.I.R. and the TCS system. The engine is now completely assembled and wrapped in plastic on its stand, patiently waiting for a home again.

While waiting for new fiberglass, I stripped the paint off the rest of the car. I prefer to sand it off so you can see what is under each layer. There were no surprises. I found quite a bit of the original red still on the car. There was no sign of any other damage. The right rear quarter had a crack in the wheel well that had been poorly repaired, which was why I decided to put on a whole new quarter.

Old, cracked quarter panel.                                               Replaced with a correct new one.

I sawed out the rear quarter well short of the bonding strips, then worked my way up to the edge of the strip.  I peeled off the remainder of the quarter panel, and ground out all the extra adhesive.  The new panel fit perfectly, so I drilled a few screw holes to line it up and hold it in place.  I used 3M 08115 panel adhesive.  It needs a special gun, which we have for the use of our customers.  It has at least 90 minutes of dry time, so you have plenty of time to get everything in position. 

Then it was time to mount the new front clip.  I made sure the hood fit properly in the opening, and set the assembly in place.  They make the new assemblies with a little extra fiberglass on the back of the fenders so you can get the door gaps just right.  A little sanding, and shimming under the core support, and it looked fine.  I ran strips of tape across the gaps to have alignment marks for reinstalling.  Then it was time to spread a LOT of bonding adhesive on all the contact points.  A couple of people helped lift the assembly in place and get it back on the alignment marks.  And it was done!  Well, at least it was on. 

Aligned and ready to glue.                                    All Glued on!

Then there were hours of fitting the grilles, side gills, bumper bracket holes, etc.  At one time, I had the entire front completely assembled , then took it all apart again to do body work and paint.

            Front trial fit makes it look like progress.                  We have lift off!  Note the ground cable I missed.

It was also time to send the bumpers out to be rechromed.   Off they went to Keystone Automotive.  They were back long before I was ready to install them.  They are still wrapped up and hanging from hooks on the wall.

There are many opinions about the best way to go about removing the body, doing the chassis restoration, and doing the bodywork.  Due to space and equipment limitations, I decided to remove the body at this point, restore the chassis, and put the body back on.  Then finish the bodywork and paint.  This presents challenges that could be avoided if I could do the body and paint off the chassis and then reassemble them, but it seemed the best choice for this project.  I will cover the chassis with plastic and tape it to the floor so it doesn't get dust and overspray all over it. 

Almost everything was disconnected, but I took a good look again to see what I had missed.  There are cables that bolt through the floor to the seat belts.  The parking brake cable goes through a pulley and back to the rear cable.  The shifter goes through two boots.  And finally there are the body bolts.  Only one broke, which is pretty good.  It was one of the rear ones that goes into a captured nut inside the rear storage area, so if needed, I can replace the riveted-in nut assembly.  One head was rounded off on the bolt just ahead of the rear wheel.  I ground the head off, which left a good shank to get hold of for removal.

I have strong hooks in my ceiling from similar projects, so I hung lift straps from them and down to the metal cage of the body.  With my brother Sam doing most of the hard work, we slowly started lifting.  The only other surprise was the rear ground wire I had missed.  With that disconnected, we were able to lift the body free of the chassis, and roll the chassis out from under.  I built wooden sawhorses under the body to keep it from swaying, and ignored it while I worked on the chassis. 

Restoring the '68     Dick's '63 Convertible     My Three 'Vettes       BIG al's 98     The '70 LT1

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