jay_d

just remember its the details that makes resto work so cool, be sure to grind down all your welds flush and make it so nobody but you knows its been patched, and for gods sake make sure you weld it right, if it comes loose in a wreck you might be in for a surprise

userchemical

well, i will be doing some grinding, but for the most part, i could care less what the welds look like. They are all on the inside and the car, is pretty much going to be a track car that is driven on the street, no interiour, roll cage.

So the welds will be clean up, but i have not been trying to make it look perfect.

ezysk

I am restoring a car right now, where the driver’s side flood plan looked almost identical to yours.
Glad to see you posting pictures of your progress.
I have two pet peeves in do it your-self restorations. One, there is always some guy out there that says what you are restoring is not worth it, and that they can find mint conditions cars for the same price you paid for your restoration project car. In my area if there were a rust free car for $200.00 for sale, it would be gone before the ad even went up. That does not mean that everyone does not claim their cars are rust free, until you waste your time checking it out.
In my area, $400 - $600 means there is at least one major problem with the car.
As for $200.00, well, I am yet to even see a 3rd gen within 200 miles from my home for sale for that price.
I guess its possible, but I have yet to see it.

My second pet peeve is watching people bash on someone else’s hard work.

You automatically earn a ton of respect in my book by doing it yourself.

Not everyone has the tools that Hot Rod TV has. So we use what we have and do the best that we can, within reason of course.

I think you are doing an awesome job, and I am really looking forward to seeing more pictures.
When do you hope to have the project done by?

Good luck to you.

userchemical

hey man thanks for the kind words, best of luck to you on your project as well. People just cant imagine putting the time and effort into something like this so they bash you when you do it, or say its stupid. But its my car, and when all is said and done i will have a completely restored car, that I did myself, cant see anything more satisfying.

As far as completing the car, I have no real time limit, sooner then better. Once the floor is done, i will have to do the underside of the car, and then also paint the car.

The 305 needs to come out and the 355 needs to go in. I basically have a whole drive line to swap, and a paint job left once the floor is finished up. As long as i have some nice weather i should have a few updates a week.

jay_d

I never bashed anything you are doing, and as far as "some people" not being able to imagine doing interior sheet metal work goes, ive worked in a restoration shop for over a year now, so changing interior pans is no big thing to me, ive worked on cars that sold on barret jackson for over 250k (and yes, it had a hemi) so believe me i know what you are going through, its tough, and it sucks.....but believe me, if you gonna be running much hp in that car it needs doing well, the floor pans under your feet are what really holds the car together, JUST like a crossmember on a full frame car. And im not being an ***, it would just suck for the welds to break when the car flexs on a hard launch, Just make sure everthing is right, if there is any doubt go fix it until you are doubtless about the whole car

userchemical

never said you were bashing, i was just commenting on your comment about people bashing projects like this.

As for my car flexing off a hard launch, wont be much chance, have a 8 pt. cage going in along with sfc and x brace the frame together. I don't move on until i am satisfied with the work.

ezysk

Nice move with the 8pt. and other improvements. I still need to do that to my 85 TA. But it all takes money and time, both of which I never seem to have an abundance of.

I think we are almost in the same spots with out current projects.
I am still under the car, working on blending some of my floor pan patch into the car, making them less visible. I have cleaned up my axle and looked around the underside for additional rust, but was pretty amazed to find that the underside is pretty darn clean besides that one spot. But it looks like the car was undercoated at one time.

I still have to clean up my engine bay. Planning on using POR on all my lower components, such as radiator support. Then priming up and painting the engine bay to match the car. I am not going to do a perfect job, but it will be a better job than I have done before. This is going to be a daily driver for me, so really I don’t want to put a fortune of time and money into this build.
I reserve that for my 85 TA.

I should create a link and start posting progress pictures as well.
Been really enjoying reading yours, it is really motivational.

userchemical

the majority of my parts will be made by me, either by getting my hands on some after market parts and making my own, roll cage is easy enough to make on your own, but really at a rough cost of 175 bucks, its not to expensive, nor are sfc at around 200, depending what you want to spend, and what you want done to your car.

ezysk

I agree, roll cages not really all that expensive.
But for me, adding a roll cage to my 85 TA would just lead to all my interior work, and well then that is where the money starts adding up.
When it comes to working on the 85 TA, its more of a time thing, I have an 86 TA I have to finish up, then restore / modify an 86 Firebird.
After that, if given time, I will begin my work on my 85 TA, I always try to do at least one improvement to it per year. Last year was a transmission upgrade.
This year, not sure yet.

userchemical

well i got out there for a few hours today, did some hammering and drilling and all that fun stuff. anyways here are some pictures.











still lots of work left. but she is a work in progress.

ezysk

How is floor flex treating you?
I notice you have no reinforcements on the floor pan.
Did you use a heavy gage steal or do you have flex?

For mine I had to weld on some reinforcements to the bottom to remove the flex, but I tried to make them look like the original factory channels.
Tried being the key word, on mine its far from perfect, but is very functional.

userchemical

well its not finished so their is some flex but not much, the floor is welded down at a lot of points, the rocker, near the seat mounts, to the frame itself. once the next piece is put in i don't expect much flex, and once the sfc and roll cage go in...i wont be worrying about flex. Im sure if i put the other piece in all flex would stop.

ezysk

Are you planning on painting the entire car when you are done?
If so, what color are you thinking?

I am going with either a solid tone blue metallic, or two tone blue metallic with silver metallic ground effects.

userchemical

yes car will be repainted in primer black for this season.

squelch

cool good to see im not the only one doing this sort of thing,
im lucky in someways as my floor is solid but the firewall is shot so im building a new one to weld in to the 83 Z28
and then when that one is done im starting on the same thing on the 84 TA lol

userchemical

hahaha sounds exciting and lots of fun

i know im having fun on this car

userchemical

well its been a little while but i have an update, did a bit of work to the rear of the car this weekend. just have a few things to touch up there. floor is almost down and ready to be finished on the bottom. Still lots of work to do, but the weather is getting nicer and staying nice, so more progress.

anyways here are some pictures.

ezysk

Nice Pics, and thanks for the updates.

I see you have your rear bumper off, reminds me I that I have to do that same thing.

I really need to open a thread on my project as well.

userchemical

took the rear deck lid off today. Cleaned it up and tried to realign it. Its not the original that came on my car and i cant get it to line up at all.

does anyone have any advice an aligning the rear glass? If i need to take it all apart again its no big deal, only takes about 15minutes.

anyways some pictures.

userchemical

floor almost finished, got a bunch done today.

only one picture tho lol.

BMAN90RS

come on no one else noticed the hockey stick holding up the rear lid. lol you damn canadiens and your hockey.

anyways, looking good man keep it up

userchemical

hahahaha. it was the perfect size, and up here our garages are filled with them.

userchemical

well almost finished the drivers floor up today then my g/f came over and asked if i could fix some rust on the hood.

so i have lots of pictures! can see some fun bondo repair almost from start to finish.

userchemical

userchemical

userchemical

DanTheAngry

Should wear a mask when doing the bondo.

userchemical

i do when its needed, my sander has a vacuum built into it and does a rather good job at catching it all.

82Five-O

where did you get the sheet metal you are using? what gauge is it?

ezysk

hmmm.. I could be wrong, but that does not look like an 84 Camaro to me.

Man, you can’t let your girl friend get between you and your camaro work, next thing you know you will be marrying her and selling your camaro because it is not “practical”.

Priorities man, priorities. That car will increase in value as it gets older.

userchemical

hahah i know priorities...cant lose this car to a girl. Yea its not a camaro, but its kinda like a trans am...just its not...lol

84Z28406

After you painted it, you could see the line where you had masked off. How did you get rid of that in the later pictures? I've got a few panels on my Camaro that I need to do this to, but I don't want to repaint the whole panel.

userchemical

once it dried i sanded away the line and as close to the body work as i could back to the original red under the new red i sprayed. i then did another spray of red a very light one to blend the new area's in. once that dried i did a light sand with 1000grit and buffed it up.

I would have rather repainted the whole hood, but was not worth it.

The key with getting rid of lines on body work is to lay your first coat of primer, then you will see your highs. Block sand the area, prime again and you should have a nice smooth layer of primer, if you still have some highs, sand again.

Good luck.


The floor is now hole less, but the rockers still need some work. I should have a nice update tomorrow, weather depending.

userchemical

okay guys, finally have a bit more of an update for you. Sorry haven't been updating much lately just been trying to figure out how im going to repair my rockers. ill have a pic of those later, but for now the finished floor, from the top, bottom still needs to be welded. but here is what i got, passenger side is finished.

DanTheAngry

Looking pretty good man. What are you going to be welding on the underside?

I'm just getting started on mine. First on the block for me is the rusty frame rail.


Also, excellent choice in soft drink.

userchemical

theirs some work on the rockers, and a few seams i need to weld.

Thanks, Dr. Pepper only way to go.

userchemical

well guys i exposed my drivers side rocker/fender well area place...

anyways havent had a chance to attack it, but it looks worse then it is, i know what youre thinking right now "holy ****ing ****! this ****er has some work ahead of him!" but really if you can work metal, and with the help of my sheet metal brake i should have no problem fabricating a piece to go there. Then i just have to re-weld my fender back on lol... if you have been following my thread i have some pictures posted in here.

HarmonyCamaro

wow thats a lot of rust... oh well its just a project car to work on plus a good stress reliever when your girlfriend yells at you

userchemical

just wait till you see the finished pictures. i find my stress reliever best smoked...

eddie jr

UC, great work, it is coming along quite nice! Hats off to you for tackling it and trudging through. Not many are willing to take something like that on thinking there is no hope for the car. I can say from experience (i restored my 85 and went through exactly what you are going through), keep your eye on the prize at the end (finished product) just like you mentioned. It took A LOT longer than i originally anticipated so i started getting discouraged at certain points due to slow progress.....but man did i feel good when i rolled it out of the paint booth!!! Now i look back at the album of pictures and chuckle a bit. It was all worth it.....5 years now and not a spec of rust.

Can't wait to see the finished pics!

But that spot where the fender mounts (that whole corner), I had the EXACT same thing and on the drivers side. I just wanted to mention that i actually have some detailed pics of the repair to that area if you are interested in seeing how i tackled that problem. That is a structural area though so i used thicker metal to match what is used there. I can't remember the gauge though, i would have to doublecheck. Having a metal brake would be really sweet, that's for sure. My trick was to use oxy/acetylene torches to mould the patches to the contour of the area i was working on before cutting out the rotten stuff.

userchemical

right on man, thanks for taking the time to write up a nice reply. I know that area is structural, so i will use a bit heavier gauge, but i also plan on having sfc's in as well, which will help stiffen up the car a lot, not to mention the roll cage. But yea, do you have a link to the pictures of the repair?

Ricco

I think you guys would **** if you saw what that area of my car looked like right now!!!

userchemical

well how about you show us??

userchemical

alright so today was a nice day and i got a bit of work done on the camaro. driver side rocker is now complete.

If you have been following this post ive been working on the trans cross member. The 2 of the 4 bolts that hold it to the frame have been broken. so i had to open the frame, remember the factory nut, and weld in a new one. Drivers side was done some time ago. Today i completed that passenger side.

anyways too the pictures

Ricco

Here ya go..

userchemical

good luck thats dedication man.

Ricco

Dont think just welding new metal on top of the old rusty stuff is a very good idea though..

userchemical

----------
the rust was cut off, theirs just no pictures of it. The reason you see it before i closed it is because i left it there as template so i could get the same shape. Once i had the shape, i pulled the metal bake, cut the rust off, sprayed some rust convector/paint inside the rocker, then closed it up.

DanTheAngry

Looking good man. Come help my *** out. I'm having a hard *** time fixing my frame rail.

userchemical

why, whats the problem man?