70 Chevelle

There she is!



So my wife is awesome and bought me a 70 chevelle for my birthday/Christmas/you're-never-getting-another-present-again present. She awesome. She found this gem in Toronto, Canada. originally she wanted to get it to me for a surprise, but then decided she didn't want to have to figure that out, so she sent me to go get it and do the import paperwork, etc. So I flew to Canada, and drove it to my parents in Detroit. (in hind sight, a 260 mile road trip at night in this thing was a really bad idea, but we made it--i'll post that story another time). I've got some more pictures of when i first picked it up that i'll put in later.

It's a 70 malibu with a 72 350 in it and at some point someone converted it to a 4spd manual from a 3 spd auto. The goal for this car is a cruiser/GT restomod ish. Here goes!

Mod list:
Exterior:
-New steel SS cowl hood (no induction flap)
-rearview mirrors
-lower profile hub caps

Drivetrain:
-Holly Sniper EFI full conversion kit (probably the best bang for your buck for your time mod i've ever done)
-new air filter
-Yukon grizzly LSD diff
-Yukon 3.55 gears
-Yukon chomoly axles

Suspension:
-Willwood 11" front disc brake conversion
-Summit racing 11" rear disc brake conversion (note: buy nice name brand stuff, this kit was ok, but not nearly as plug and play as the willwood kit)
-Summit Racing brake booster
-Bilstein HD shocks all around
-Moog coil springs (HD in the rear)
-body bushings to be installed yet

Wheels/Tires: (need to be upgraded soon)
-currently stock ralley rims
-235/70/15 fronts
-245/70/15 rears

Pictures!
First time I saw it!


Proud new classic car owner!


Tucked in well after midnight! crazy trip.


my rides






Mods:
(even without wheels on this thing looks cool! I think it'd make an awesome flying car) Getting ready for new brakes! Because 4 drum brakes are bad!!!!


Old cars are nice to work on. so much room!


new booster

nice brakes!

These things were wonderfully easy to install. the rears, not so much. had to grind a bunch and then had to get the axles machined so the rotors would fit over them...


So the brake install snowballed...when i got to the rears, i had to take pull the rear axles to remove the drum brake brackets...and when i opened the diff...this is what i saw.


oh, and no pieces came running out, so the previous owner buttoned this thing back up this way...punk. But then on top of that, couldn't get the passenger axle out...when we FINALLY got it out (had to break the LSD clutch pads) it let loose! it hit the wall which was about 2-3' away. then we saw this.

So new axles, diff, and gears. I decided to go down to 3.55 from 4.11s because cruising on the highway at 60mph doing 3300rpm is loud.


me getting a nice pattern on the ring and pinion...but then i learned that pinions are not hardened steel and i hit it a bit hard with a hammer...(so dumb in retrospect, what was i thinking) I mushroomed the thread end so had to get a new set, and it was not as easy to get shimmed, so i took it to a place and they did a wonderful job. It was a very cool learning experience though. really got to know how rear ends work. it was just a little beyond me and i didn't have a hydraulic press to keep pressing the pinion bearing on and off to get it shimmed right and i got sick of taking it to a shop to have them do it.

i also learned about panel gapping...and that 70 chevelle doors are heavy! taking the door off alone was kind of a mistake, but i couldn't get to the bolts well to adjust them. it ended up working out perfect and i was able to get it back on and much more closely gapped


Then i had to replace the sway bar because the end links where rotten. like literally rusting away.

The reason i took this picture though, was out of pride. on the driver's side, both of the threads in the frame completely rusted out. i removed the old bolts and a bunch of dust came out...turns out that dust was the threads... so i had to feed these two bolts from the other side with a coat hanger....yup. actually didn't take as long as i thought it would. Handles WAYY better now. great improvement. It's a Hellwig bar. i think 1 5/8"? basically one size up from stock and hollow.

more pictures.











Hood complete!

 

awesome!!!


There is a musician, Billy Strings, from Michigan that has been doing some work on his 2 Chevelles during this covid time. Probably my 2nd favorite car, the old Nova's are my favorite for some reason.

Good luck, and subbed to see the progress.

 

Beautiful ride ! Brings back memories of the old 68 chevelle ss convertable my friend had in high school

 

Nice car

 

nice build

 

Nice! Just 10 minutes ago I snapped a pic of this on a lift

 

68 or 69?

 

I don’t know

 

Just getting some groceries

 

McDonald's sells groceries in Canada??

 

Yes, ready to stuff in your pie hole type groceries

 

lol, it was just in the background.

 

Nice ride!

My lady has a 72 that needs some work. Got it in 04 as a graduation present and drove it for years till she finished college. Parked it and been sitting ever since.

 

Tell me what you think of these wheels. (they'd be in 18x8F 18x10R)

 

Sweet car!

As for the rims I vote for #2.

 

photo dump!

replaced the front springs...raised the nose a bit more than i wanted, but i also learned i need new lower ball joints, so i've got some longer ones ordered that'll help lower it about .5 in.


Goals! Some kind of cool blue like this. But with stripes


Love how my daughter loves to cruise with me!





Car show!

 

Did a few things.
Added some chrome wheel well trim (i went back and forth on this for a while and decided i wanted to go a more fancy look than matte racer) I'm digging the look. Old cars sometimes just need chrome.


Then i replaced my lower ball joints with some .5 inch taller ones. the old ones were shot and apparently these improve the suspension geometry so win win. oh, and they lower the fron about .5 inch, so that helps take care of some of the front lift i got from the new front springs.


-it was a nice day for a few hours before a big ol' Oklahoma storm, so i took my daughter for a cruise.