Snowman's C3 555 Bruiser Makeover

Snowman

Member
Joined
Jul 22, 2008
Messages
24
[I apologize that I had a failure in links to my pictures that caused all my pics to disappear in all my posts across the land (here, CF, everywhere).

I will start a new conversation when I get the car back from having roll cage installed. Will be painted by Christmas.]


Hello all!

I've sent a few notes about my project car on different forums but I think it is far enough along to start a formal thread as things really start to get interesting. I will build this a bit at a time. Please be patient as I get the pics installed and bring you up to speed.

To begin:

I bought a very clean-looking 71 BB convertible early last year. It was represented as numbers matching, restored car, Keisler 5 speed, everything in the car redone pretty much stem to stern. The car was in such good shape (I thought) that I recommended that Andy Bolig do an article on the car which he did in Corvette Enthusiast October 2008 Issue entitled Blue Monsoon.

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I did a lot of work to make the car right. Got all the vacuum stuff to work, horn, replaced side windows, complete new key set, some minor paint stuff, mostly little stuff to bring the car up to snuff.

On the way to BG (10 miles from my house) the shifter pin sheared off, leaving us only with 4th gear so back to the house it went. The Keisler had to come out. They repaired it for my shipping costs only but said besides a Tremec design fault, the tranny hadn't been installed properly.

While waiting for that to be done, I noticed an oil leak at the back of the motor. Off came the oil pan, rear main, and I discovered that the rear bearing was scored right down to the copper. Ditto the main.

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So out of the car the motor came.

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When disassembled, we discovered that many of the name brand parts claimed to be in the motor weren't there and what was there instead were no-name Chinese parts. The cam gear had been improperly installed and had machined its way into the front of the block, sending metal shavings throughout the motor, so much that the oil filter bypass was stuck open and other parts were starting to go.

While block was repairable, I didn't want to take that project on so began to conspire to build an entirely new car with a lot of support from my friends.

I'm member of an awesome non-car-club group of guys and ladies who make the trek every year from Houston to BG for the Cruise-in. The NW Houston Vette-Rods Group. Many great folks. A number of really good mechanics and many with ideas about how others should spend their money.

I planned to get a new 454 block, bore it out to a 496 like the motor I'd taken out but ended up with encouragement building a 555 cu inch motor. Dart block, Dart heads, Callies cam, SRP pistons, etc etc. Will print up a parts list at some point.

Great mechanics at G&G Performance here in Texas did the work on the block and heads.

>> Picture of Joe and his guys

The motor has been spec'd and built by non other than The Great Temptor Jim Moore. What a labor of love. He has been the point man for working with manufacturers to get the parts we need; from time to time he sends me a shopping list and I go to work on Summit Racing to pull them all together.

First purchase was 555 insignia for the hood...then I was committed!

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Some pictures of the Great Temptor himself, Mr Jim Moore in his secret laboratory (his car in the background)

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These are all rough, don't have final valve covers, carburetor and is setup for dyno testing of several different cam combinations, carb and intake combinations which we intend will be a magazine article.

I asked the great Temptor if the Keisler would hold up with 700+hp at the crank and he laughed and said "yes for a while." So now a Son of Tranzilla 6 speed sits in a crate in my garage waiting to be installed.

I then asked the Temptor if the stock rear end would hold up and once again he said with a smile "yes for a while." So through Chad at FL Speed Unlimited I arranged to buy a Tom's rear end, offset trailing arms, upgraded 4180 half shafts, new springs, a whole lot of stout stuff. We are in the middle of installing the rear now and should be finished within the next week or so.

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In the meantime, I have added Hydroboost power brakes, installed new proportioning valve and Hurst roll control.

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I stripped out the entire vacuum system and replace headlight controls with electric actuators (Thanks to Chris McDonald).

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Okay that's it for now. Will get pics installed in the next night or so then continue on.

Back to you soon.

Doug
 
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Here are more pics:

Out came the old HVAC. WOW does it ever clutter up the engine compartment!

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Out came the old power steering and installed Steeroids PS. I think that is a really really clean setup. Can't wait to try it out.

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Out came the entire dash for Hot Rod Air system. Replaced the entire dash section itself and with all new gauges Autometer Cobalt series that glow blue at night and top of the line Alpine unit that also glows blue at night. :D

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Same for matching Speedo and tach. Upgrading to tilt-tele wheel then will put the entire dash back together. Right now, it is a bit of a mess.

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Pulled and recovered the seats in blue leather.

>> Pic

Ordered and got some killer wheels from Vintage Wheel Works, had spokes powder coated a gunmetal metallic color. They turned out well. 17x9's in the front, 17x11's in the rear.

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Have stripped the car of brightwork and polished everything. Will have fender flares courtesy of Stan (Road-Race Vette), doing headers and sidepipes so will fill in rear panel, going to long L88 hood, so might as well repaint the entire car. At the moment, I am committed to staying with Bridgehampton Blue but I am tempted to use a C6 LMB color to match my Z06. We shall see.

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Shark bar setup is going in now.

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Then steering and dash, finishing brakes, stripping and repainting rotors and calipers.

Took out the gas tank and cross member, had the tank boiled and powder coated. Welded on a sump and have plumbed for Aeromotive 1000 fuel pump. AN-10 feed, AN-8 return. Rear end is coming together.

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Got a PM about the gas tank. I took the tank out of this car, had it boiled, modified a sump box, had it welded on then painted the tank. Hated it. So went back to the drawing board and had it powder coated. WOW what a difference!

Let's see if I can find you some pics here somewhere.

Nothing fancy.

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With sump installed.

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Hated the paint.

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So had it powder coated.

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Had an AN-8 bung welded in for the fuel regulator return line.

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As promised, pics of the rear.

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Son of Tranzilla Tranny in a box waiting

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Car's a little light in it's shoes at the moment...no motor, no interior, no gas but you can see we will need some flare work. :D

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Next steps:

1) Motor should be complete and ready for motor dyno by end of the weekend. We are sceduling dyno time in Houston in the next 2 weeks (hopefully), then back into the car it will go.

2) Painting calipers then back on the car.

3) Finishing air ducting for Hot Rod Air A/C unit in car.

4) Install tilt/tele wheel assembly

5) Install dash

6) Tidy up underhood wiring and bleed entire brake system

7) Pictures with motor on engine stand with all March bling, serpentine, headers and side exhaust. Want to make sure everything fits and is accounted for before putting back into the car.

8) Correct length driveshaft (Son of Transzilla is longer than Keisler/Tremec)

9) Finish sharkbite safety harness setup.

10) Seat (at least 1) back in the car.

11) Wire up fuel pump

12) Reinstall radiator, rest of AC plumbing underhood

13) About 100 other things

14) Fire up the car and drive it to let rear end settle some

15) Flares fitted and glassed in front and rear. Fit the hood and glass in lower rear panel.

16) Drive and drive the car locally, maybe some side trips to Austin and Dallas for shake down cruises.

17) Head to BG for track time during CF Cruisein.

18) Final body prep and paint upon our return.


Okay. Questions? Comments?
 
Good show, snow, over the top of a Minnesota storm.....

:bump::bounce::bounce:

Edit, why did you stick with the stock rear leaf spring....??

you do such nice work, can I get you to do my car???
 
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Why did you stick with the stock rear leaf spring....??

you do such nice work, can I get you to do my car???


I actually took off stock spring, had put on Shark Bite IRS and liked it but felt I needed something more stout given the HP Bruiser will be putting down. So got 7 leaf short spring from Tom's. May take keeper plate out once I see ride height with full load and fatboy driver.

With the power I'll be putting down, didn't want to be wondering if the non-std rear was going to hold up.

Thanks for the props on the job so far. It will be a magazine car when it is done (already promised) but it takes a LOT of time and money to get it there.

Next project will be a BB C2 vert probably 66.

Doug
 
This is an amazing car, it really is. You will have one badass vette when it is complete!

Please keep us posted with pics. I am very excited to see this car take shape...another resurrection! Any idea when you plan on having her done?
 
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Sorry so long with no updates. MUCH has been accomplished.

Motor work:

Build of this motor is going to be covered in a 3 part series in Corvette Enthusiast starting later this year. We built a 555 cube motor, went to the engine dyno with SR, SRT and HR cam setups, several different intakes and several different carburetors, mostly Holleys.

First some pictures:

At the gym

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At the prom

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Some videos of engine dynos. I am being coy here about final numbers but on motor with pump gas we were close to mid 800's for hp and over 700 for tq.

Enjoy!

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTK1AnhTLyE[/ame]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rCXQsGfICM[/ame]

This third video, we got up over 7300rpm. They had a monitor on my blood pressure for this one but you can hear the motor is stout and is "well broken in"!

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmE3ffrGZ2U[/ame]
 
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Next was shoehorning the motor into the car.

Okay boys and girls!

On the third attempt, we did get the motor in the car. Took a really big shoehorn but we got her in. Sometime I'll tell the story but right now, just the results.

We have done several motor installs in recent weeks and we are starting to get good at it. Rob (Tool Man) recommended rolling the front of the car off the lift so we could install the motor "level" into the car and raise the back end if we needed better angle. Wow did that ever work well!

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Big shoe horn time! :D

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Okay now THAT's better! I'd forgotten my car had a decent paint job. It's been covered up for 6 months!

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Oh yeah! :cool:

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Keep sidepipes from getting dinged up for as long as I can.

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Best part here was being able to clean out my garage! Boxes and boxes and packing materials and tables and shelves...almost all gone!
Doug
 
With the phase 1 body work done, we then had e (countem THREE) days to install and adjust hydraulic clutch, a massive amount of electrical work, the interior and actually start it and drive it. Every day we thought the game was over but we hung in there and got er done.

This was a post from mid-way through that weekend.

Here are a couple more from 2am Saturday morning. We knew we'd have some bugs giving their lives for the cause by painting at night but it was that or nothing for this first round. You can see a couple in the rear flare. No worries, this will be worked and worked before it is done. I snuck back in and caught a couple of shots before heading for bed.

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What Stan was kind enough not to say is we did come across some bondo along the way so more BS from the jerkoff who I bought the car from. Yes, David, I mean you. It's fixed now though!

The engine compartment is BECOMING neat as a pin. I particularly like how the billet spark plug looms worked out. Got the wires out from under the headers, not draped across valve covers. You can't see but there is a 4 hole loom that attaches to the back of the heads on the outer corners that help the wires make the turn without chafing on hot motor parts.

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Dave Blocker and I put the brightwork back on on Sunday. Sorry no pics from the front as yet but I will get them on. Figured the car should look a LITTLE like a Corvette for the Cruisein. It will all come off again when we get back. You can also see the great glass work Stan and Tim (that is Skeeter and Rick James, sir to us) did to the rear panel as well.

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We DO have a little work yet to do to clean up the interior.

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This will be much improved but not by any means finished by the time we get to BG next week. I have taken off work and Mike will come back down....we will work straight through the weekend I imagine and get the car so it will actually DRIVE. I will send another post to list what is yet to be done, including some challenges you could help me with.

I have also bought back my old car trailer which you saw in the background on some of Stan's pics. No way was I going to try to make the drive this year to BG as my first shakedown cruise! :D I had the trailer built about 6 years ago and recently bought it back. Have repacked bearings, new tires, and done some other cleanup to get it ready for the trek to BG next Tuesday. We will likely do some additional work in the parking lot at the Hampton Inn next Wednesday afternoon to get Bruiser ready for the track.

BTW, the video I made the other night does NOTHING to represent how the car sounds. The camera sound recording was overwhelmed by the volume. I will shoot another set from outside the garage this week when we fire it up again. Wait for BG to hear Bruiser in person!

:party: :party: :party:

DP
 
Long story short, we DID get it done by Monday night before Memorial Day weekend, drove it up and down the street and loaded it on the trailer to go to Bowling Green. A 4 block shake down cruise!

In BG, we did some more tweaking and fixed a couple of electrical problems, most notably that when I revved the motor, the MSD 160amp alternator threw lightning across the front of the block looking for a good ground.

We went to the track with about 2 miles on the car. Here are the videos:

Okay as promised...living PROOF that Bruiser lives!

First run was a test run given Bruiser only had single digit miles on him. White helmet runs have me as the driver. The black helmet ones (the really good ones) have Jim Moore, the Great Temptor as the driver.

http://www.fototime.com/0D10B91B2836863/conv.wmv

Second run, I tried to go faster but made the beginner's mistake with the T56tranny of trying to guide the 2nd to 3rd shift and missing a gear. I have same troubles sometimes with my Z06.

http://www.fototime.com/F172138650D42BA/conv.wmv

Then after some adjustments (lowering tire pressures significantly being one), Jim took the wheel. We have some in car shots as well as out of car shots.

http://www.fototime.com/C26C813763CC895/conv.wmv

http://www.fototime.com/D352C03D7B8F8A7/conv.wmv

http://www.fototime.com/B2F3EA7061DA745/conv.wmv

Okay, there you have it!!

Doug
 
A couple of other BG pics

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Here are pics of an interesting transformation:

Drag setup (workout mode with sections of 3/4 inch pipe on the hangers to raise the car)

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Street setup (prom mode with full sidepipes, spiral baffles, visors re-installed etc)

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Okay last post for now. Brought car back from BG, hydraulic slave unit took a powder so tranny is out of the car at the moment while we sort that out.

Here is the link to phase 2 of the body and paint work. We discovered in phase 1 that the car had been hit at one point and repaired. Tail section sagged a bit, front clip was off center so we did a LOT of intense work on fixing all of that.

Here is a link again to the good pics and the state of the car as it stands now.

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c3-tech-performance/2266447-snowmans-c3-project-car-15.html
 
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