That’s exactly what I thought, Hot Wheels........I had parts on tables too and parts just kept disappearing. Great job you guys are doing!
Nothing wrong with Hot Wheels. For a lot of us a certain age, it is where this obsession started. Looks great Duane. Marc.
Marc, I remember for Christmas of I believe 68, I got 2 "packages" of Hot Wheels. Back then you got a long box with a window to see the car plus 2 pieces of track and a single joiner. I still have both of my original cars, and have a few others like the original Snake & Mongoose funny cars. I remember some that were not available in stores and you had to send away for them like, Boss Hoss, Mighty Maverick, and I think Jack Rabbit, and still have them all. I have a friend in the area that wants all of them bad. Duane
New pics from today, For Pat, we dropped the car down to the ground so you could kind of see how it will look. The tires are barely touching so the suspension is not unloaded. I also took a close-up of a wheel and some shots of the engine that's ready to run again. I will tell you this, the pictures do not do this car justice. Duane
wow Duane..I may just have to drop down that was to take a look at it when I head to Jersey..Looks extremely nice..
I got to make a new tool today!!! We were having trouble getting the Spring clips into the tiny holes in the trim rings on the Hurst wheels. They are a really tight fit and it's almost impossible to bend them to the correct angle to fit into the trim rings. We needed something to slide into the clip loop and then bend the hook part down after the clip is installed on the wheel. I started with a rod from an emergency brake handle off a 70-72 Chevelle and had at it. I bent it to the shape I wanted and then welded the piece I cut off back on and trimmed everything off. The last 2 pics show how it fits on the clip, and then how it bends the hook down. It should make for a quick job, and I will just keep the tool in the car, as I don't imagine I would ever use it anywhere else. Pretty cool isn't it. I love making this kind of stuff. This rod was in my spare bolt bucket. Hopefully it was not the one for Beth's Chevelle. If it is I guess I will need to find another one. Duane
Here is the spare wheel and a pic showing one of the clips installed. Duane PS. If you look closely at the hub for the spare, and the hub of the wheels on the car a few posts back, you will see that the spare does not have the "web" like the ones on the car. I like the look of the early webbed wheels best because they are different then what you see on most Mags. Jimmy picked up this wheel & trim ring at a flea market years after he got the car.
I like it, that's basically what my car would have looked like when it was first delivered. The only difference is mine had the white double pin stripes on the body and trunk lid, and came with red-line tires. Duane
No, Can't make it. Work is trying to kill me, plus trying to get parts shipped out, and will be working on the car this Saturday to help get it done. I'm kind of on a mission, and when that happens I get a real bad case of tunnel vision. I got this way when I was building the X-Camino. If friends came over to talk and see what I was working on I gave them two options, either start helping or get the hell out of my way.........and I had no problem telling them exactly that. I got the same way when I was writing the date code book. I even called Beth a "book widow". You guys will have fun down there, you don't need me for that. Duane
And that absolutely righteous white center on the hood love it! Buick should have done that to all of the GS's
It is a Baldwin motion trade mark I believe? my girlfriends brother in law back in 1969 bought a 69 Baldwin motion 427 Camaro marina blue with the white centered hood with the 427 stencil in the blue awesome car ! it was stolen within months
OK Guys, Today was Dyno day and boy did that 400 engine come alive. Nick took the motor to Cunningham Competition and ran it on Joe's dyno. They did a couple runs with different carburetors and the results were impressive. Joe said his dyno is a little conservative so the actual performance numbers are a little higher then shown. With the 3-bbl Holley 930 carb the engine developed 438 HP @ 5400 RPM. With a 4-bbl Holley 850 carb the engine developed 431 HP @5400 RPM. Then they put Joe's 830 Holley race prepped carb on and the engine developed 445.5 HP @ 5400 RPM and had 477 Ft lbs of torque @ 4200 RPM. All these pulls were with TA Roller Rockers and the TA 290-08H cam. I will list all the engine particulars below along with the displays for the 930 and 850 carb runs but I want to say something first. I want to personally thank Mike Tomaszewski of TA Performance for helping us put together the right components for this build. I talked to Mike for around an hour going over what we were doing with the motor and what my expectations/hopes were for the car. I of course am not really a motor head, so I could not give him all the parameters he needed. So Nick called him and that call was another hour. Mike made some suggestions, and the two of them came up with our build. Now it's not unusual to find someone that helps you answer some questions regarding your projects, but to find someone that is willing to take a considerable chunk out of his days, and shows real concern with trying to help you attain your goals, well that kind of guy doesn't come around very often, again I thank you Mike. Here are the parameters of our build, 400 CI motor punched 30 over for a displacement of 406 Cubic Inches TA_290-08H cam Arias 30 over flat top pistons with notches for the valves. (Basically an aftermarket Stage 2 Piston. The valve cuts also needed expanded for the Stage 1 Valves) Custom set of wrist pins. TA Eagle Connecting rods 6.600" Stock set of Stage 1 heads with 120 PSI Springs, and the intake pockets cleaned up (No porting was done.) TA 1.6 Ratio Roller Rockers Cometic Multi layer .027 head gaskets Early B4B Intake with the notch for a Holley 3-bbl Carb. Holley 3-bbl Carb. with a 1" spacer below it. Bore 4.070" Stroke 3.950" Compression height of Piston 19.680 Deck Height 10.518" Head CC (65CC) Resultant compression of 11.58 to 1 There was also Zero porting done to either the heads or intake. That about sums it up. The motor developed more HP then I was expecting, and I am very happy with that. The Dyno sheets are posted below. (930 on left, 850 on right) Duane
I cannot swear to that. The engine was decked when Jimmy got it, then Nick cut it some more. It is the correct numbered casting for a 69 400 and has the right date code. I believe it is also the block Jimmy got with the car, other then that I have no information. I do know that Nick does an awesome job putting them together. Duane
