So as I posted in my other thread that I sadly had an interior fire tuesday in my baby of ten yrs.Redbull will be put down.Torn and swearing I was done with this hobby for awhile..my best friend drags me out and finds me a near mint 87 transam hardtop gta clone at a great deal and buys it for me.

I just got ole girl home..its a 305 carb auto with 160,000km on it,no a/c,power windows,4 wheel disc, never winter driven.Drives nice..very slow to what Im used to lol.Im going to swap everything I can possibly think of into this car most likely after winter and save up for some upgrades along the way.

For the sake of budget since Im no longer working I wot be trying to maggie the lq4.I will stick to n/a and swap to 243 heads and hawks 1 7/8 longtubes with 3inch y pipe and cutout.Then work on the interior with some custom touches..maybe put my gta molded door panels in..I hate the boxy transam base panels,add a custom overhead console...really missing ttops

I need a new name for this project of fresh blood.I have something to look forward to over the winter months.Pics of the new car will be up soon..pouring rain right now.

 

Here are pics from the ad when I bought the car.Very clean..paint is faded but I cant complain.

 

Carbed LS? Lol

 

What did you find was the cause of the fire?

 

We are thinking it had something to do with a faulty door pin and the passenger footwell light since my alarm silently went off giving me a door open report on my 2way..and thepanel for the passenger side underdash had melted right by the light.I think maybe the door pin triggered the dome lights on and the bulb melted through the white plastic cover..landing on my custom kick panel speaker and burned up nice and quiet :S.Took me awhile to wake up from the lil pager going off and when I did..the smoke was pouring out from every window and I could hear the windshield cracking.Crappy experience but I reacted quickly and the hose was next to the car and outted the fire before anyone else on the street even realised it happened.Then engine ecu..was 4inches above my kickpanel!

 

Its already weird going back to a carb 305 lol..I miss efi :P. So far..3 times I caught myself forgetting its auto and looking for the clutch pedal..or turning on the key listening for fuel pump to prime haha.

 

Sorry to hear about the fire. Quite a setback after all your hard work. It is going to be tough going without a T roof, that is one of the things I like most about our cars.

Good luck with the new build.

 

Thanks..minor set back lol but its also a new beginning.One thing I liked this morning driving this new car in the pouring rain was not having to bring extra towels from the tops leaking lol.But I kept looking up wondering why inside the car was so dark..doh.

 

The leaks of the t top I hate, the weakness of the frame from t tops I hate, otherwise, I would like a cruiser with T tops, but not for the rain so I avoid them. Leaving this carbed or going efi when oh swap?

 

sticking efi..just doing direct swap of the drivetrain...and appears Ill be swapping lot more over.This car is a wiring nightmare..the headlights go up n down when they want and use the older 86 style headlight motors and wiring setup.Someone has also altered the wiring to a push button to sometimes make the motors go down.I want to graft the newer style headlight motors and the wiring to suit and same for the fog lights.lol if i turn the head lights on and then turn on the fog lights..I cant turn any lights off unless I unhook the relay under the hood..smh.Hoping I can tackle pulling everything dash wise off in the burnt car and transfer it to the new car...I hate driving during the day with the lights up :P

Also need to swap steering columns,centre console,add power locks...Im getting too old to manually open my doors,swap the rear hatch..i hate the upper third brake light on the glass.

Im sure Ill find more to do as I dig deeper into this cars previous workmanship

 

That really sucks about the fire. At least you caught it before it got out of hand.

Sounds like you are going to have your work cut out for you with this new car. Good luck with it.

 

Yeah..wiring i dont mind fixing,its what i do for a living lol.Today I swapped the entire headlight system from one to the other and now works fine..re wired the fog lights.Swapped my clusters and gauge panel and wired in the factory trunk release.had to do some required maintenance on the motor,new plugs/wires etc.Carb needs to be adjusted..seems to be idling low and I havent touched a carb in decades so Ill leave that to my old school mechanic.Im going to swap in the 4thgen console asap..i miss the cup holders haha.and see if the ebrake is unhooked at the lever since it pulls up freely.Then look into running 0guage to the spar tire well for my battery relocation and transfer my carputer system into it and call it a day and drive the car till the end of the season

 

Nice find on the 87, sounds like youve got some great friends.

 

Yes I do,and my race car mechanic is going to help me build this car even better than the last one.he does great metal fab work too..custom subframe connectors will be done,hes got a 12bolt rear hes been storing for when I break the stock rear(cant afford to buy it off him yet lol) sandblasted and fill holes in the engine bay,maybe a roll cage..the list goes on but yea its going to be a long swap

 

sorry to hear about your misfortune! sounds like you've got yourself off to a good start and a fresh chasis and body though! i agree on the third brake light outside of the glass....no bueno

forgot to add, i love the gold crosslace wheels!

 

Yea its funny..I have always been looking for gta rims in decent shape but the prices for them were ridiculously high.Ive already put quite a bit of work into this car electronically making it sound.Ive found a few other issues that are minor.

Im swapping the hatch and the hood tomorrow,Ripped off the black spoiler because it was soo badly rotted..rust was falling out of it on every bump.And literally I took it off the car accidentaly opening the trunk and just came off the clips lol.

I did give Torched(new nickname) a quick bath from sitting over a yr and here is how she sits now.

 

Just a thought, but you might be able to buff that paint back to shiney bright red again. I used to have a T/A that looked like that. My friend buffed it out with Finesse-It and it looked almost like new again. Worth a shot.