Just wanting to introduce myself & my cars. I usually hang out over at nastyz28.com, but my resto on that car is pretty close to finished. I have a 94 convertable Vette, a 79Z28 & my newest project, my 81 shark.

For my first post, I was wanting to give you as much info as I could to try to get an overall assesment of weather or not I should restore the car to a nice driver or fix whats wrong & dump it for another.

I had a mint 86 Monte Carlo SS that I traded a guy straight up for the 81. The 81 is a # match car as far as the vin# & the block pad indicate. The bad part is that the rest of the emissions parts, the intake & carb along with the computer are missing. The guy I got it from had the carpet replaced & seats redone. He also put in new power window motors & regulators. A/c blows cold. Also the tires are brand new.

The color combo is white with cinnabar interior. The interior itself is in real nice condition, crack free dash, no rips in the door panels etc. I had to replace a few small plastic pieces (eBay )....and do some "refitting" of certain piecse here & there.

The exterior is decent , but its a 10 footer all day long :o No real damage, but shows its age.

I found that there is some rot in the metal parts of the doors. That bugs me& I wonder how much it will be to get a used pair. The frame is solid & the rest of the metal under the car is solid as well, just has surface rust on it.

Currently, I have the car in the air about 20" up on jack stands. I have been cleaning & scrubbing the underside of the car front to back in order to see any damage or things in need of repair. So far just rear yolk seals, assorted bushings, e-brakes need work, strut rods need replaced etc. Mostly normal wear items.

I have been de-rusting the front end parts & cleaning out the wheel houses from all the previous undercoat happy owners.

To my surprise, I see the ball joints & the A-arm bushings have been replaced fairly recently.

To my dismay & another big concern, the body bushings look pretty beat! I tried a couple of easy ones, one came loose & one is spinning. How hard is it to do the full set on these c3's?

I am thinking of pulling the engine to freshen up the engine compartment & the engine itself. It was recently rebuilt, but sports a chipping chevy orange paint job & looks hideuos

So what the consensus here? Do I go ahead & work it over completely or make it safe, clean it up & sell it? What would you do?

 

I like projects personaly. The bushings are a royal pain Especially if the bolts are spinning. This problem from my experiance requires a frame off to do the repair properly, safely. The decision is yours.

The members here are a wealth of information with some great advice.
Welcome to the forum.

DR. Jay

 

Welcome

Kona

 

I say have fun with it.

 

Welcome to the forum I think you will find that a lot of people here like projects.

 

Welcome to the Forum. You will learn allot and spend allot.

 

Keep your eyes peeled for anything posted by Lars, Twin Turbo, Gkull among many others that other forum members will surely point out, enjoy

 

for the warm welcome. I was afraid the body bushings were gonna be a chore. I guess something had to spoil the fun huh? I like projects also. Thats the main reason I traded the Monte SS for the Vette. The SS was completed & I was bored. I gave $5500. for the Monte, plus put about $400. in it doing a tune up & a new set of tires. I guess if you think about it, I gave $5900. for the 81 Vette I suppose thats a good deal for a non smoking Vette with a nice interior, new tires & presents itself well overall.

I dont have the body sling deal, is it still a viable option to do the body bushings w/o one? BTW, how do you get to the rearmost cage nuts, & the ones that are about midway?

 

Welcome.

There are people here that have replaced the body bushings without completely removing the body. If I recall correctly it involved some sort of wood blocking. It's been awhile since I saw the post, the search archive doesn't go back as far as it used to so you may have to pose the question again. A separate thread will most likely get you more responses.

There is access to body mounts through the kick panels and an access door in the rear wheel well. You can get an assembly manual for the '81 most corvette parts places carry them and I believe it would be well worth the money.

Again Welcome.

 

 

welcome to the form!well if you have some extra time,and like to restore, I would restore it.And if you have any extra time left will you sell me some?