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I have been reading posts here for a few years and thought it was about time for me to share my Camaro with the community.
History
My dad who is a GM technician special ordered this Camaro for $15,992.00 and took delivery on May 8, 1984. He drove the car off an on, sometimes as a daily driver and sometimes just a weekend car until 1997 when he decided to park it and drive something more fuel efficient. 20 years later dad mentioned selling the car to make space in the garage for his daily driver. I proposed working with him to get the car back on the road and taking it off his hands. On February 16, 2017, Dad signed over the title to me with 86,967 miles on the odometer.
We turned over the engine with a breaker bar to make sure it wasn't seized, bought and put on new tires, changed all fluids, replaced the coolant hoses, repaired a power steering leak, replaced the hood and hatch shocks, resurfaced the brake rotors, installed new brake pads and replaced the spark plugs and wires.
In preparation to get the car to a point where it would pass inspection there were several other issues that presented themselves.
The plastic fitting connecting the shifter to the transmission disintegrated and had to be replaced. The fuseable link next to the starter burned through when trying to use the electric windows the first time. The sway bar endlinks' rubber dampers were cracked and worn out so they were replaced.
The largest issue we had was trying to repair the steering column. Probably 10-15 years ago, someone broke into the car and did some damage to the steering column by cracking open the shroud and ripping off the turn signal stalk. Until we fixed this, the turn signals, high beams and windshield wipers would not work and prevented us from passing inspection. We kept coming back to it off and on for a few months, ordering parts online that never quite ended up working but could not seem to find the correct pieces or all of the parts we needed. We got lucky and one of dad's co-workers is restoring his own Camaro and bought a parts car for some of his needs. We ended up taking the steering column from him and moving over the final parts.
I knew I was going to autocross this car so decided that a steering brace and subframe connectors would be wise investments to avoid any structural damage from sharp sudden turns.
I also purchased Alston Subframe Connectors from them as well http://www.top-downsolutions.com/cha...rd-(aka-f-body) . I will say, these were not as easy to install as anticipated. The passenger side was difficult to maneuver around the exhaust and the ends didn't really conform to the frame the way I expected and we needed to hammer on them a bit for a tight fit. It was really handy to have access to a lift.
We decided it was reliable enough for the 200 mile trip back to my house in Raleigh, NC, but the morning of the drive, the starter gave out and we had to postpone until after parts had been ordered and repaired.
Finally, on February 3, 2019, almost two years after transferring the title, I was on the road back home. There were no problems on the drive, but upon getting off the highway, I noticed that a belt was squeaking. I told myself, "that is just a thing that old cars do."
A few hours later on my way to a Super Bowl party, I was changing the belt that runs the alternator and water pump. I have had to change this belt multiple times and have not figured out why yet. All pulleys are spinning freely and appear to be aligned on the same plane, though the pulley on the alternator seems wider/deeper than the crank and water pump pulleys. If anyone knows if that is correct, or has any suggestions on what may cause the belt to wear down and break frequently, let me know. I have just resorted to carrying tools, a spare belt and pre-mixed coolant. I have gotten quite good at replacing this belt and my record time was 8 minutes from pulling over to driving off again and that was set in the dark on my way to an autocross event.
A week after bringing the car back, she got her first real bath in I don't know how long and now proudly parks in my garage. Dad finally has an available spot for his car in his garage.
I haven't had to do any major work on the car since. I have replaced the dome light cover that was disintegrating, replaced the light with an LED, polished the foggy gauge cluster lens, fabricated my own grill inserts from gutter guards after the originals crumbled away, replaced the cracked window sweeps on both doors, did some detailing of the interior and under the hood, cleaned up the t-top bag and added a front air deflector to decrease temps on the highway.
The driver side headlight only comes on when the high beams are triggered. I suspect there is something wrong with the connection between the passenger and driver headlight in the low beams circuit but haven't had time to dig in to it. The lights that illuminate the speedometer in the gauge cluster are either burned out or, more likely, there is some missing connection in the circuit behind the gauges. I would also like to replace the headliner that is starting to fall down a bit in the rear. I consider these minor and will hopefully get to some of them this winter.
The car is also 35 years old now, so in North Carolina, no more inspections are needed for safety or emissions. Someday, I would like to remove the AIR system to clean up under the hood, add some better headers, replace the exhaust that is starting to rust and put on a catalytic converter that does not require the AIR system.
Autocross
I have taken the Camaro to 7 autocross events this year with one left later this month. I have been running in CAM-T class which is a bit of a money pit to be competitive in. The biggest improvements I need to make right now are new wheels and tires and improving the nut behind the steering wheel The all season tires I have right now look period correct for when the car was new, but are pretty terrible for autocross. There is close to no grip and I am constantly fighting to keep the rear tires behind the front tires, failing only twice this season.
During the off-season, I plan to put some 275/35R18s on the car but haven't picked out wheels yet. I think 18x9.5 Corvette or 4th get wheels are the way to go. I don't know of any wheels that size that would not require spacers or adapters and come in under $800. If anyone has advice on wheels, my ears are wide open.
She cleaned up nice. I was worried about the interior. [img]images/smilies/goodjob.gif[/img]
The interior is actually in really good shape no rips in the vinyl seats, no cracked dash pad and no stains in the carpet. There are some scratches on some of the trim in the trunk but I haven't bothered with those yet.
I ordered up some LED lights last night for the interior. I will add some pictures once those are installed.
Back in October 2019, I resolved the headlight issue. It turned out to just be a bad headlight. I also went through and replaced all of the interior lights with LEDs from superbrightleds.com. The lights in the footwell and console were a breeze, but the gauge cluster is a different story. I struggled for quite a while trying to replace them with a piece of hose and long reach needle nose pliers, but save yourself the trouble and just pull the whole gauge cluster. The toughest part of pulling the gauge cluster is unhooking the speedometer cable, but that can be done pretty easily with a long screwdriver or pry bar pressed against the clip from underneath. You will need to take some of the panels below the steering column off, but trust me, this is the way to go.
Footwell, Shifter, Climate Controls, and Gauge Cluster - 22x - 194-NWHP5 - https://www.superbrightleds.com/more...ens/3305/6774/ (Note about the 194s, I initially purchased 194-NW5-CBT which were cheaper, but they flickered too much for my liking.)
I bumped the kilometer needle when I was trying to get the lights in and it snapped off. I still haven't glued that back on, but since then, the speedometer seems to be unbalanced and a little floaty. I have purchased another speedometer from a user here that I will be swapping in at a later date that goes to more than 85mph.
Months before, the driver's side door key lock had a failure and the front broke off. I have no idea how this happened. The lock was fine when I locked it before playing a round of golf, and when I got back, the metal had sheared off all the way around the keyhole and the springs and shutter were laying on the ground. In November, I decided to order a new set of locks and had them re-keyed to my key. I replaced the driver side lock and still have a spare in case I need it in the future. While I had the door panel off, I removed the door handle, sanded it down, and repainted it with SEM Trim Paint.
Over December and January, I fixed some leaks. I had transmission fluid leaking from the speedo gear housing that I easily fixed with some new seals from Classic Transmission Solutions.
The bigger challenge was my power steering pump leaking from the front seals. At first, I thought I would just replace the seals, but there was paint missing from the power steering reservoir and the hoses were still original, so I just ended up going to Rock Auto and bought a remanufactured power steering pump, high and low-pressure hoses and a power steering inline filter.
This video from J Robling on YouTube was helpful.
I purchased a Pulley Remover and Installer set from Harbor Freight and ended up having to take off my fan to get the pulley off. If you are having trouble with getting your power steering pump loose, I would bet good money that you missed the second bolt in the back. I was able to get it off with a box wrench. I struggled to get the belt tight after replacing the pump, but an adjustable wrench on the little square nut provides adequate pressure. DO NOT PRY ON THE RESERVOIR!
On a positive note, when I had to take the fan off I noticed that there were dirt dauber nests between my radiator and AC condenser. This probably attributed to some of my overheating problems. I am going to start calling this car the Dirt Dauber because any time I uncover a new area of the car, there are always remains of their pipe organ nests.
In February, I finally pulled the trigger on wheels and tires to help with autocross. Last year, the BFGoodrich Radial T/A's were good learning tools, but they were never going to be competitive. I pulled a few 180's with those tires and really learned how to ride on the edge of grip because I was there frequently.
I ordered a set of 4 - 17x9.5 OE Replica wheels from Hawks Motorsports and 275/40R17 Falken Azenis RT615K+ tires. I grabbed the spacers from Hawks Motorsports as well, but 2" in the front was not enough to clear the tie rods so I had to add an additional 1/4" spacer there. Someday I will try to find 2 1/4" spacers to replace the stacked spacers I have now. If I were going to do it over right now, I would get the 18" wheels instead of the 17" wheels. I thought I researched the subject enough, but there aren't that many tires to pick from in 275/40R17 and the 18" would give better clearance.
Having both sets of tires stacked next to each other, you can really tell how much extra grip the wider tires have. I did get to one autocross event before Covid-19 quarantines, and they were worth every penny. I knew it was going to make a huge difference, but it was like a completely different vehicle. It took me a while to get used to how far I could push it and I still never got to the limit. I finished 72/123 in PAX where before I would have definitely been over 100. I am not blind to the fact that I have a long way to go to be a great driver, but this was a very nice upgrade.
The perspective plays tricks on your eyes, but the diameter on both the old and new tires are almost identical, so there is not a giant gearing change here.
Last edited by jakethasnake919; Apr 23, 2020 at 03:54 PM.
Reason: Spelling corrections
Very nice looking Camaro! I like the wheels, bit you definitely need to lower it now. Eibach springs are totally worth it. Also, some nice KYB AGX adjustable shocks and struts. Your road course times will thank you. Maybe some weight Jack's, if you are getting serious about auto-x. They shouldn't bump you into a different class (Your subframe connectors already did that, I believe) and they will definitely improve your performance.
Car looks fantastic!
DR.K.
Last edited by drknow90rs_ss@y; Apr 24, 2020 at 03:13 PM.
Reason: Syntax
Thanks for the advice. The car is already classed in CAM-T, so the only limitations are 200TW tires and some aero stuff like diffusers, splitters, spoilers, etc. I was already planning to put Koni yellows on at some point this year, just waiting on money and time. I haven't done a lot of research on lowering springs yet. I am not sure if there would be clearance issues with the tires, I don't have any plans to cut up the car. I am also not sure how lowering springs or weight jacks affect the suspension geometry and what changes I need to make to correct it.
The all season tires I have right now look period correct for when the car was new, but are pretty terrible for autocross. There is close to no grip and I am constantly fighting to keep the rear tires behind the front tires, failing only twice this season.
