I made this up today to show the difference a bit of detailling and minor restoration can make to a car for a buddy. I figured as long as I've got em I might as well post them. The after images are at the top, the before are at the bottom. They arent quite accurate since the true before pics show the car with rust spots, missing centercaps, FO MULA decals, etc... and the after pics are at least a year old. Anyway...







The 'restoration' entailed a lot of cleaning, clay, zaino, Phoenix Graphix decals, 82-84 Trans Am hood bulge screen, and a lot of work on the wheels and interior.

Edit: forgot to mention the 97 T/A exhaust tips.

 

Man what a diff, mighty nice of you to help a friend out, Im sure he's pleased I would be:hail:

 

Boredom and the desire to play with photoshop is enough motivation to resize and paste some pics together. I should've put the befores first, but oh well it gets the point across.

 

Yup. Its something what some work and cleaning can do.

 

The real improvements are on the interior... I'll fab up some shots that show the parts I replaced...

Inside the following was replaced...
carpet
console
shifter plate
radio console
passengers cupholder
security shade
treble **** on radio
seat track adjust ****
shifter ****
performance suspension badge

And I added the rear hatch release, so the switch itself, the trim panel, the solenoid, and relay... And I rebuilt the steering column.

I also had to replace the antenna assembly, various clips and retainers, etc... And I had a large cigarette burn in the back seat repaired.

It's funny you don't realize how much really goes into a car until you look back and take inventory.

Edit: I don't have any good before pics with matching after pics, so here they are... its easy to tell before from after.

 

All these pics are ****ty quality... once the snow melts and I can pull the cars out of the garages I'll have better shots.

 

 

Looks like a nice amount of work went into that. Is that your IROC-Z in that picture a little there?? Why no pictures of it ever?? Those rims stock or polished??

 

It adds up, I've had the formula a lot longer than I tend to remember... Probably because the last two years of my life have been a living hell... but on to the Iroc...

Yep, thats the 87 Iroc thats in my sig. Its a 5.7L TPI, ttops, 58,000 miles, all the normal jazz. Its all stock except for the edelbrock catback, K&N filters, and an incorrect battery. I dont post about it much because it was a crossover car. I went from 3 years with my 83 Camaro to 6-9 months with the Iroc, then I got the formula and lost interest in Camaro's. The basic long/short story of the Iroc is that my 83 got totalled, I couldn't find a good thirdgen so I was driving my moms car while I searched, and one saturday after a week and a half of looking Mom got bitchy so I bought the S10 with the insurance money. The deal was that when I found the thirdgen I wanted Dad would cosign the loan. The 88 GTA we were looking at fell thru, and we found the Iroc. After a week with the Iroc Mom and Dad fell in love with the car and I got tired of coming home from work to take the Iroc for a cruise and having it gone. So I started saving my money and I sold out my half of the Iroc to my parents and put the cash into a down payment on the Formula. Eventually I'll inherit the Iroc, and I do all the maintenence crap to it, etc. So thats why its still in my signature.
I don't post pics or much of anything on the car because since the time I bought the formula, its been ont he back burner. It sits in the garage and it'll sit there till I either get really bored or I inherit the car. Since I've moved back in here (see details of my failed marriage) I've started working on it, or at least thinking about it more often. It runs like crap, needs a complete tune up and some TLC. Not to mention a complete tune up. Short term plans include plugs, cap, rotor, adjust the IAC and TPS.

It needs a bit of restoration too, its got some hail, I still have to get the factory louvers from Willie, one of the hood louvers is cracked, the drivers seat cover has a hole from a broken spring, the rear bumper needs repainted, it needs door hinge pins, cargo area carpet, etc. I'll throw up a pic or two just for fun. The only pic of it I have on this computer is this one, I'll post some others later if I get a chance... BTW its on just about all of the Iroc sites if you look. The only one I actually submitted the car to was Mark Locks Iroc page, its still around has a shot of the engine, and one of the interior.

 

It looks good in that picture.

 

It looks better in person... its just the hail on my standards are way too picky. If I were thirdgen shopping now I probably wouldn't buy it due to the hail.

 

You said you replaced the "Performance Suspension Badge." Is that the one on the passenger side below the map pocket thingy? If so, where can I get that. Mine seems to be missing.

 

GM, $12.

 

Where did you get those tips ofr the formula and what did you have to do to get them to fit? I want them but my pipes are oval and they point down (like factory)

 

The muffler, tailpipes and tips all came off a low mileage 97 Trans Am. The muffler is identical to OEM, pull the muffler off the intermediate pipe, slide the 97 t/a setup on, and its done. I paid a local shop $15 to do it for me since it had to be heated up. I've got another set of the tips alone that I was/am going to use ont he V6 Firebird when I finish the V8 swap.

 

As for the mufflers I had a buddy that gave me a muffler from a 95 T/A and had the dual tips, the tips were a little messed up from sitting in their driveway for 6 months. I called SLP and they sent me a new set takeoff set of tips from one of thier conversions and I installed them. I paid like $12 for the pair. I don't remember how much been a few years. But it really spruced up the exhaust.

I recently bought the SLP catback so I took it off, I think I will put the my old exaust on my 2nd 87 tho...

John

 

The #1 beef I have with GM about our cars are the exhaust tips... we totally got shafted. On the late cars with the invisible turn downs, they really look like crap.

I've got a set of the square tips I had planned to put on my convertible, but the cars too nice to mess with, and I'm planning on selling it soon.

 

Hey Drew, pretty impressive work there. I do have a few comments and questions:

In the two pictures of the car's rear end, one shows a small logo below the left turn signal. I assume that this is the "before" picture, and that's just some car dealer's insignia....right?

I really enjoyed your article on the power hatch retrofit. I obtainted a three-switch panel from the junkyard, even though I have no fog lights...... I got the rear pull-down unit from the same car, but it was identical to the one I already had.............it would have taken me a LONG time to find that relay socket without your article! Instead of getting the GM relay, I used a standard one from my inventory as a stereo/alarm installer...I crimped male blade terminals to its harness, and inserted them into the proper locations of the factory plug, with no cutting.

I know some aftermarket carpets are better than others, and I'm also told factory ones are no longer available...what brand did you use, and how did you like it?

Is the 4thgen muffler/tailpipe setup any louder than the original one? I always prefer factory parts to aftermarket, but I'm looking for a noticeable sound from the exhaust.

 

The badge is a Sioux Falls Ford badge... The fun part is that their logos use the same F for the Ford and Falls, with the Ford below the sioux falls. As a result when they applied it to the 1" tall raised edge on the bumper it just read "Sioux Falls". It came off about a week after I had the car.

I'm glad the artical helped... I really have no idea how many people have followed it, but I've sent quite a few people to look at it. On my V6 bird I plan to add a factory power antenna, and some other stuff that I might write articals on also. I should probably go back and update the artical sometime with more part numbers and include some information on the second generation hatch pulldown that GM started using mid-91. The 91.5-92 hatch pulldown doesn't use the same release solenoid, so I'd imagine that cars with the late style pulldown had the same setup regardless of whether or not the car had the hatch release.

The carpet I used was ACC carpet from Classic Industries. I haven't tried anyone elses, I'm looking at possibly using carpet from Summit for my gray car, since I really jsut want the carpet clean and the right color.

As far as I could tell the 97 T/A muffler is the exact same part number as the OEM muffler. I was kinda hoping for a louder exhaust note and a little improved performance but considering the entire deal cost me $60, I can't complain. I plan to swap to an Edelbrock muffler when I can afford it. I've got an Edelbrock catback on the Iroc and I really like the sound. Not too loud at idle, no buzzing/humming, no tin sound like a Flowmaster... Just about perfect.

I actually got the muffler and tips from a buddy of mine that works in a Midas or Meineke or some other muffler shop. He had a complete Z28 catback, a Z28 muffler and pipes without tips, and the 97 t/a muffler and tips I took... He said the 4th gen guys just tell them to trash em. Also the tips were BLACK... Completely covered in garbage. 000 Steel wool and Mothers aluminum polish and Nevrdull and a lot of polishing got them like new. I did the same thing with another set I paid $15 for off the camaroz28.com classifieds.

 

Great job Drew!! I too took ut my carpet and put new one in, seat's were a pain, but interior look's brand new. Did you re-do your front bucket seats, can't tell from photo? I didnt take photos of before and after though. Andy

 

Thanks,

Actually the seats are all original, with very little visible wear... strangely the last car show I entered it in, they ripped me a new ******* cause my seats were worn out... WTF?

 

I see that you have the same dash button of the rear trunk release, do you have the motor latch assy too? Mine is a pain in the butt resulting in me not openiing the trunk because evrytime I do, the trunk latch assy wont close for a few days, last time it stayed open for a full week, and on the 8th day I went out and opened the panel and WD40-ed the motor and banged it a few times and when I put all the screw back in and the panel, it closed. Since then told my wife never touch that buttom or open trunk again! Andy

 

Yep, the hatch pulldown is standard on all fbodies from 86-92. Sometime in mid 1991 GM changed the design, mine has the older of the two designs, but my V6 has the later of the two. They're pretty easy to damage, just slam the trunk a few times and they break. You have to close the hatch slowly, bring it down slowly then push down gently till it latches and let the trunk motor pull it down. There's quite a bit of discussion about hatch motors and problems with them and how to fix them, but of the 4 cars I own with pulldowns I've never had a problem with any of them that wasn't resolved by pressing the reset button on the motor. Its just a black plastic tab/switch that is in the latch, when you push it down the motor goes down, when you release it the motor comes up. You might want to run it thru the cycle a couple of times to free it up.

 

another thing with the hatch pulldown mechanism. i just recently purchased my iroc and when ever the release button was pressed the hacth would go up and i back down if i didn,t runback and pull it up. i replaced the hatch struts and haven't had a problem since (including the occational guiloteen i used to get).
another thing to check is to make sure the electrical connections are well connected and clean.

steven.