The CAM-Z: autocrossing a Z28

In reply to Javelin:

"How do you know the wilds?" he asked with suspicion.

In reply to AClockworkGarage:

I've known Dave for about 11 years. He and Clint found the Grand Prix that SWMBO bought and owned for 9 years. Fun fact, I'm the 2008 PDXCGP drag racing champion.

In reply to Javelin:

ok. Go poke him with a fork for me. There's an autocross in Parkwood I'd like to compete in tomorrow.

Glad to see the car coming together. Bowtieoverdrives also has a great set up description and parts to make the 700's lock up convertor work right without the '89's wiring harness. You mentioned getting the axle from that car, is it a Borg warner 9 bolt or Chevy 10 bolt?

I don't recall mentioning the axle. I have a 3.73 locker, that axle will do just fine for me for a long while.

No major updates. Still waitinbg on that TV bracket.

Took a stroll through my local U-pull it and scored these beauties

They're from an 83 trans am, but they're the right colour and being pleather they held up pretty well. Got them out without breaking any tabs. $40 for the pair.

Not sure what I will do about the armrests though. I'm thinking nylon webbing pull straps.

She lives!

Ended up having to fabricate a new throttle cable bracket to line everything up but David drove it last night and it shifted through all four gears.

I can't get it until Thursday afternoon though. But I've got a three day weekend coming up... can't wait to drive her.

In reply to AClockworkGarage:

Awesome!

Very cool. Hope this is what you need to find some enthusiasm for the Z.

I am really surprised to see the low turnout for cars running the CAM classes in this area. Maybe having most of the events "on the far side of that huge mountain looming in the distance" is a factor.

Chinook Pass should be open now. The drive to packwood is suddenly lovely.

There's an NWAA event in Packwood this weekend, but I doubt I'll make it to that one.

NWR SCCA will be running in Bremerton the following weekend. I hope to make it to that one.

Well... like it or not:

It was about $700 all-told to get her up and running. The original linkage was... scary.

That was day one and I cleaned them up a bit when I rebuild the carb, but now they look like this:

Almost like it isn't going to randomly kill me...

The car still runs a bit like ass, wanting to stall out in gear at idle, and a bit if hesitation if you put your foot in it. I'll have to twiddle some screwdrivers this weekend and see what I can do.

Holley swap in the near future. with AN lines and a billet filter, and a real intake manifold and crap I've just spent a grand...

While she was away I bounced around on fleabay and found a N.O.S. seatbelt loop. like $25 or something.

It may seem obvious now that I'm saying it out loud but a car is sooo much nicer to drive when it isn't trying to saw your head off...

I also slapped one of those door panels on to make my car technically cam legal.

And that's where she sits now. Payday is a few days away, I'm going to buy a good timing light, a vacuum gauge and edelbroke's rod set and see if I can't get this thing running proper.

This build feels a lot like my rallyx focus, making progress to suddenly be batted back down by random issues, and somehow still make races, and love the car.

The grind continues. This past Friday one of the guys in my local 3rd Gen club put out a call for an impromptu meet up in Tacoma. I hadn't really driven the Camaro much since getting the new trans so I decided to pop the tops off and drive down.

When I got there I found that it wasn't a 3rd Gen meet up. It was a ricer meet. I did manage to catch some video of my reaction here.

I hung around for a few minutes, said hello to the other two Camaro guys who similarly got roped in then headed home.

On the drive home I was flagged down by a pair of Hispanic dudes in a murdered out CRX who wanted to tell me they loved my car. I don't believe them. A couple streets later a black dude in a dubbed Mercedes asked me if I wanted to trade. I had gone to a weird place...

Towards the end of my trip the belts started to squeal real bad, I nursed her home and decided that my Saturday plans would be to finally fix the accessory drive system.

I still had that aluminum water pump from forever ago and I ran out to the store to buy new belts and heater hoses. I would have a long day ahead of me.

If you recall my accessory drive brackets were rusty and awful.

So I began to tear everything apart. It quickly became apparent that my new water pump was not going to work, as the power steering pump attaches directly to it. So that's for sale here .

The car originally had AC, but that's long gone. I needed an excuse to buy and angle grinder to I chopped off the excess.

That's how you do when you don't own a vise.

After:

Then it got a half-dozen coats of my favourite gunmetal paint.

It was so hot on Saturday I was almost able to apply a second coat immediately. I don't know that I have any pictures of it, but my water pump pulley had been sprayed black, white, blue and orange, in quarters. It was awful. So I stripped that too.

When that was done,I bolted everything back together.

Much better. The valve covers will likely get that treatment soon too.

A proper water pump should be arriving in the mail tomorrow, but will likely not be delivered because I will be in tacoma picking up some $50 UMI lower control arms. Yay Craigslist!

Sat in traffic for two hours yesterday to pick these up.

Hopefully the weather allows me to mount those up tomorrow.

I slapped on my "I know it's slow stickers" this morning

Then I met up with another NW Third Gen club member and wandered out to Groits for the "All american" car show this morning.

Today was a good day.

RLCAs isn't the best location for double poly bushings on a car that isn't just going straight.

I went a similar route to this http://www.jonaadland.com/Z28/Mods/LCA/AluminumLCAs.html

I stayed up until 3am reading this thread. I grew up around 3rd gens, my uncles were always slapping together irocs and stuff. I always like helping because once we got them running we get to go out and do burnouts and donuts. 3rd gens got me into cars, but I kind of moved to the foxbody side. After I get my 86 mostly done, I'm going to pick up a 3rd Gen to drop a 5.3 into. I like just about anything with a motor and can be build relatively cheap.

So... this happened.

It was more than I was prepared to pay right now, but too good of a deal to pass up on. Another $100 in brackets and AN fittings are in the mail right now.

Parts limbo...

Saturday will be a parts thrash day, I hope to get everything installed. The following weekend I'll be headed to P.I.R. to check out the Lucky Dawg race, then Auto-x event #6 the following weekend.

In reply to AClockworkGarage:

Score!

Today was... dumb.

I'm prepping for the weekend's carb swap, took the dual snorkel off for a quick clean and repaint. For some reason I had the foresight to drop it one the new carb.

Even with the 1 inch riser, its a no-go.

I ran out to the local parts store to buy a new air-cleaner. I brought the carb with me and test fit every cleaner they had. I wound up buying the lowest profile one they had. Some sort of yee-haw chrome is custom mr. gasket jobbie.

Everything was chrome. I hate chrome. So a scuffed the hell out of it with some scotchbrite and took the rattlecan to it.

That's a little better. I rummaged through my sticker pile to see what would liven it up.

Yeah, that'll do.

Now that I've irreversibly modified it I took it down and dropped it on the car.

Yeah... the hood won't close.

gonna see about buying a drop base filter next payday otherwise... Nascarlo?

this project is going to kill me.

In reply to AClockworkGarage:

Tools like same air cleaner I just got for the Vette. I had to dimple the stud hole so the nut will clear the inverted ridge down the center of the Vette hood, but it sounds like you have bigger clearance issues than that?

Definitely, the manifold is an air gap, so it sits a good 2 inches taller than a standard manifold. I found a 1.6 in drop base cleaner for $45 that I know has been used on a 3rd Gen firebird with an air gap so that's probably the route I'll go.

Unless I can sell this hateful thing before then.