not sure if this is the right place to post but i hope so lol

So i purchased a 83 trans am dt500 car that was stored inside a barn for many many years. car was decently clean with no rust except for under the battery where it exploded over the years. i got the car running ( crossfire auto) and drove it for about 6 months and now i decided to tear into her. im building her the way i think it should of been built from the factory. i figured id start this thread and post some updates and pics. im not much a pic taker so if you want to see something in more detail please ask

ive been restoring cars for 15 years now and i do it for a living at my day job. i will be working on this at night in my barn/garage in hopes to have it on the road by the end on the year. limited budget cause i have 2 other projects going at the same time now as well. ( 1956 chevy nomad and a euro 1960 vw convertible)

i purchased the car for 1100 bucks. put about 150 in her to get her running and 300 for new tires. i also purchased a 84 trans am that was a 5 speed for parts. i have parted out the ta and took all the parts that i need for my car. i made a profit of 400 off the parted ta so i am under 1000 total invested in this daytona trans am. i hope to be done and painted under 2500 but we will see

so far i have pulled the engine for resealing, im about to send the tbs out to be rebuilt. i have installed the 5 speed steering column, pedals, and master. i am getting ready to weld in new battery tray and repaint the engine compartment

only mods engine wise that i am doing is the 5 speed swap of course. im keeping the crossfire fi. adding headers and full custom exhaust. i will also be porting the intake and i still have not decided what im doing about the computer. any help or suggestions will be noted and greatly appreciated

body will be next and interior is very very clean except the carpet. dash pad was cracked but a got a later one for 15 bucks at u pull it







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Build threads are always fun to follow. Definitely keep us posted!

 

likewise, and this sounds interesting

you mention building it the way it should have been - aside from the 5-speed, what other enhancements do you have planned?

love the aero wheels btw. If I didn't have ls1 brakes, I'd seriously consider putting a set in black on my GTA

 

well i am on a limited budget so i cant exactly do what i really want to do. i just feel that a sports car should be a 5 speed and should be sporty lol. these stock crossfires are dogs. im hoping that the little mods that i do with the 5 speed should wake it up a little. cam and heads later on maybe. ( i should actually do a cam now the the engine is out ) im planing on lowering the car a little and even though i do have all the caps for the aero wheels i may be putting a set of the 16inch trans am wheels off of a 86. ( i love the way they look polished) i have a couple other tricks up my sleeve but i dont want to let it all out now cause then you wouldnt be waiting for new posts like waiting for yorue fav tv show to have a new episode my origional plans were to drop teh crossfire and install a carburated twin turbo setup but im saving that for the nomad build.

 

Wow - those seats are in nice shape. The car is worth it just for that.

 

yea i couldnt belive it. the drivers seat just needs to be built up a little from teh foam wearing. no big deal there. the headrest need some repair. i actually have a set of pmd seats i was going to use for a build till i got this car so now my pmd seats will still be sittin in the garage

 

I don't know a whole lot about crossfires but I do know that the 2 major restrictions of the system are the exhaust manifolds and the intake.

The intake only flows 450ish cfm which is what really killed these cars when they were new. I've read that it was popular to replace the intake with an aftermarket one and that would really wake the motors up.

It may be worth the time/money to replace that now while the engine is out. I know Summit sells a couple different dual intakes that are offset.

 

well as stated im porting the stock intake. also ive had a set of headers laying around for years that i will be installing. i believe from reading that the ported stock intakes will be perfect for what im going for. this is not going to be a race car just a daily driver. my onlything im not sure about yet is the computer.

 

The builds are fun to follow. You got a great deal on the car and parts car. Please keep us up to date with write-ups and pictures.

 

here is a update as of today sat 8-4 over the past week i took everything i could take out of the engine bay. i welded in a new battery tray from the donor car. i also had to fabricate part of the shock tower and the radiator support from rust that i could not see. etch primed the engine compartment and painted with nason fulthane paint. this is a single sage ( no clear) paint that is very used friendly. when i paint the car i will be using a base cote clear cote but as far as the engine compartment it is hard to make the clear cote flow smooth in some areas from the brake lines and valve. once it dries i will be por-15 under where the radiator sits and the subframe. also i will be repainting the black tops of the shock support and using some dark grey for the prop valve. and of course clean everything else up and paint where needed for the cruise control and other parts in there. by next weekend i should be tackling the engine and getting that detailed up.

 

I really should have done that to mine when I had the engine/tranny out...

 

Engine bay looking good!

 

well the bay is done. total cost for paint and a few materials that i needed was $45.00. not a bad outcome now time to tackle resealing the engine and cleaning that up. along w some intake porting, headers, and rebuilding tb.

 

Wow, that's a cool car and is looking great. Why not go ahead and grab a new overflow bottle too. They are cheap and will make that compartment look even better. Looks great so far!!

 

yes the overflow is the only bad part of the engine bay right now. i will be getting a new one as well as a new washer bottle, but they are easy to change so im in no rush for that right now. im prob going to wait till i need to order my window sweepers and some other gm parts and just get everything at one time.

 

also a side note, i had to re-rout the brake lines and the fuel line for the headers, when i test fitted the headers they were about 3/4 of a inch away from the lines, a little to close for my comfort also went through a bottle of degreaser and about 20 old shirts for rags to clean everything up lol. time to hit the goodwill and get some more rags

 

well engine has been resealed, intake ported, all torqued down and ready to go in. this time w a 5 speed behind it

 

Looking good so far! Definitely wanna see updates on this one.

 

Nice car! I can't wait to see how it comes out, and those Recaro's are awesome!

 

Yes very sweet car and so far looks like very good work. Can't wait to see this one done.

 

ooh looks good ill be watching this thread

 

I am subscribed. Watching for something special.

 

subscribed

 

looking good so far! Hey, I painted my heads too

 

hey guys sorry for not putting any updates on here in the past 3 weeks my brother in law ( brother to me) was helping me with this project, my last post with the painted engine was on fri the 17 well that weekend we were going to be installing the engine and sat morning he got in a fatal car accident. i wasnt able to even go in the garage for 2 weeks. not looking for a pitty party or anything, i just want everyone on here to know that tomorrow isnt promised. make sure you tell those you love how much you care. and dont drink and drive please.

now today i did do some work and got the engine/trans installed. i havnt got any pics yet, i will be welding the o2 bung in the header and having them coted. i was bored at work the other day so i took one of my wheels there to polish up here are some pics. they are the 89 ws6 16 inch wheels. i scored them off craigslist w tires for $60.00. not to bad for a nice set of wheels. ill be taking some more pics of things as i have time. right now spending time w the fam is more important so not to sure how often i will be working on the car. here are some b4 and after pics of the wheel. ive only done one so far

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Sorry to hear about your loss...

 

As far as the ECM goes, it's directly related to the cam and you're gonna have to learn to tune it and burn your chips. Do a search for the 7747 ECM and you'll be on your way.

You'll want to upgrade the cam as well. It's roller time with fuel injection. You can probably score a used set of retrofit roller lifters for a Chevy small block if you keep scrounging. An LT1 cam can be had cheap and will work great in your target area of horsepower.

You'll probably want to port your intake after the cam install, too.

Good luck!

 

well its been a while since i last posted but here is a update. engine /trans is done and running good so far. i need to get the exhaust finished up but i will be doing that next week at my shop where i have a lift to work under. all new struts/shocks. lowered the car but i hope i didnt go to far in the front. it sits perfect in the front now but there is no sheet metal up there. the back im sure will sag once i get it all back together. everything but the roof and sail panels have been stripped down to bare metal and primed. i will be doing the sail panels and roof mon at my shop. my garage is just getting to cluttered lol. i got lucky no rust at all. all 4 wheels have been polished. orderd new decal kit from phonix graphics. should be putting paint on her by next weekend

 

Awesome, subscribed!

 

thanx. i will be posting more pics offten for the next few weeks as i do the painting. ive been doing paint and body for over 10 years now and we have slowed down at work enough to where i can finally bring her in the shop and not worry about getting in anyone's way. i will be doing base cote / clear cote on here though for a better shine then factory.

 

Coming along very nicely!

 

Very nice!! Makes me want to work on my trans am.

 

Yep, coming along very nicely! I love watching builds "-)

 

well update as of today, the body itself has been painted, got a couple pieces of dirt that should buff otu w no problems. going ot paint the ground effects and bumpers this weekend, i got a package today from phonix graphics so the decals will be going on next week. enjoy, and oh yes i decided that base cote clear cote is a much better way to go then the factory single stage

 

lookin good

 

Paint is looking good. Looking forward to seeing this finished up.

 

Great job for a great car ! Makes me wish I had painted my engine blue.

I need to get a set of 16" Formula rims.

You should come by earlythirdgen.com

 

Shouldn't your rocker covers be black? I thought for 82 and 83 only the LG4's had blue block with blue rocker covers and CFI had blue block and black rocker covers.

 

yes i believe you are right, when i bought the car it was in a barn since 96 and the block and the covers were both black. i wanted some color in the engine compartment, im not putting the car back to 100% stock im just building it the way i think it should of been built. as you can see im also using formula wheels and not the aero wheels. and you can also see headers in the engine compartment.

 

I just stumbled upon this thread and thought that I had entered a parallel universe and was reading a post that my double had written....

With the exception of the latter part of this thread (paint) I went through the same car work as you.

I bought a DT500 about this time last year. Over the winter i pulled the motor and trans, sanded and painted the engine bay. Put rust inhibitor (just like you) on the core support and part of the undercarriage. Crappy thing is once i got the car up and running again, i was bleeding the brakes (all new calipers 4 corners) and dripped brake fluid over the driver wheel well, will need to repaint a little bit (oh well)

I also debated painting the engine Pontiac blue (actually bought blue engine paint) but was boring and went with factory black (should have done blue after seeing yours, but my thoughts with my build is keeping it CLOSE to factory.)

I also upgraded the suspension, put on tubular control arms lowering springs and all new shocks struts and tie rods.

And i was literally at the junk yard a few weekends ago about to buy the same wheels that you got on there. I may go with them now after seeing them polished up.

I am now saving for paint and some body work and new graphics.

Differences are, my car is a factory LG4, T5 and is a hard top.

Where are you located? What paint codes did you use for the white and two-tone lower?

Also: sorry to hear about your loss, your right in saying we should stop and think sometimes about how great life is.

Looking forward to see the results of the build.

Some of my pictures: (yes its got new valve covers, and i still need to clean up the wheels and get paint done.)

 

ive got the paint codes written down somewhere but they are stamped on the tag on youre core support. i would definitely go with a basecote clearcote asd the dark graphite color is really brought out w clear.\

i really wanted the flat 16 inch formula wheels but i found these wheels and tires on craigslist and got them for 60 bucks all together so i couldnt say no. i do have over 28 hours in polishing them.

its rare to find a hardtop one especially a 5 speed so you have a nice car there. i love my t-tops though i just hope that the 5 speed along w the complete new exhaust and the pnp job on the intake wake this car up enough.

 

Yes, i know what you mean about trying to add a little pep to the car. I was very close to dropping in a cam when i had the engine out but time and money got the better of me.

Forgot about the codes being on the cowl tag, good point. I think i would love having t-tops but I love the uniqueness of the car even more.

 

Sweet build! Keep at it! I personally like the stock wheels, but Formy wheels are nice as well

 

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A 84 vette cfi ECM will give it a little more pep. I added one to my 84 camaro when I put a 83 CFI engine into it.

 

yes im lookign for a 84 ecu but for a stick vette not teh auto, they are harder to find, well teh 4+3 vette

today was hell and luckaly i forgot my camera cause everythign went to **** lol, i burnt through 2 spots doing some buff work so i had to respray part of the car, just nothing wanted to go right today, im going back in teh morning to put the car together so hopefully tomorow is a better day

 

When I did my cfi conversion. I also used a 84 5.0 h.o. edelbrock TES exhaust, electric 84-86 fan, kept engine in the 195-220 degree operating range which help for a crispier sounding exhaust (probably better fuel atomization and less puddling) a 5 speed trans with 3.42 gears.

was a strong running car and easily beat my friend stock 82 cfi trans am and could run with 84-85 h.o. cars.

 

i have a fan setup off a 84 that i parted, just dont know how to hook it up excactly to the car

 

I pulled a electric fan harness off a front drive Lumina and grabbed a junction block from a 90's tbi camaro. Ran the battery feed to the starter and fused, ignition feed to fuse box, then a in head thermal sensor. Real easy to do. CFI's love heat, my 82 vette reacted the same to hotter temps from a thermal electric fan.

 

The cfi exhaust is a massive bottle neck change it even if you use TPI 3 inch exhaust it will help.

 

yea i have a pair of headman headers and 2.5 exhaust. no cat. sounds good. took it out today for teh first time since i got it back together with the exhaust/5speed/ and port job, and all i can say is WOW what a difference. that really woke it up