Beautiful find. Keep the pics coming. No such thing as stupid questions, or too many pic. We love pics.

 

I just noticed the utah plates! Wish I found that when I lived out there. Lived in salt lake on and off since 91, left in 2014. You'll have a great time in the canyons when your done!!

 

Roger,

Vibguys Barn find has California plates. My red 1973 has the Utah plates and came out of Florida Via Milwaukee.

Karsten

 

Looks like a cool web site. I tried to register but something is broken on their end. I will try again later. Thanks!

 

Man you said it right! Today was cleaning lots of old dirt. Fist off it didn't start so good because my underpaid intern decided not to show up. I think he knew what he was in for today so maybe he is smarter than I give him credit for. So I went at it myself with the power washer and dust mask. For those of you that romanticize about barn finds let me show you the ugly side.... First off, who doesn't want to find a cottage cheese container in a car that has been sitting for 25 years???? And then you find the skeleton of a dead mouse in it. Yum. Next up is rat chewed underwear. It really was the nastiest thing you could imagine. All this work under the careful supervision of the old garage dog.

I did get stymied on removing the hard top. It looked like there was a non standard bolt and nut holding the right rear pin location. The left side had a pin. So catch 22 is that I wanted the top off to clean the back. But it looks like I will have to stick my head into that Sh** pit to remove the nut. I bailed. Gonna give that job to the intern. he he he.

I think I am in luck with the frame. The spots I could test passed the screwdriver test. There is surface rust but no softness.

 

Here's a late "Welcome to the Forum"! It's good to see you are saving another Corvette from Mouseification......( my project was a home for raccoons).

Keep a camera and spare batteries in the garage

 

Here's a link to a write-up on that Zemco CompuCruise that was from the 1980's:
https://www.hemmings.com/blog/2015/0...o-compucruise/

 

Another book cool to read.

 

As far as the hard-top goes. Unlatch the front three then unlatch the rear deck lid (right side lever). Then lift the front and with it up you can get to the rear attachments easy. I use an old cardboard tube to hold the front of the top up. Sounds unconventional but it works for me. I leave my soft-top in the car and this is the only way I've found to get to the studs when installing/removing my hard-top.

 

Thank you so much. You have no idea how helpful a simple tip like this is to a newbie like me. I didn't even know the deck lid came up with the hard top attached.

 

I never knew that either. I would get a helper to hold the top while you unbolt it. Its not super heavy but it is unwieldy and if it came down on you, you might end up in a cottage cheese tub.

 

Yep. Thats the way to do it. He only needs to get the front edge of the top up six or eight inches.

 

Congrats Paul. Love the barn find stuff.

What's the 'back story' on your '71? I see the rear damage, was it hit and then parked perhaps?

 

Unfortunately there is not too much of a back story. I could make something up about it being owned by Neil Armstrong or something like that but I don't think that will go very far...

My old mountain biking buddy got tired of hearing me talk about a muscle car project. I kept yapping about how I was going to find an AMX or El Camino. I was looking for a restoration project but they are hard to find if you are looking for something that has not been all buggered up and at the same time is not worth too much to modify yourself. My buddy kept telling me that his brother parked a 71 Vette at the family farm back in Illinois and I could get it if I wanted. My Dino is running strong, I just finished converting a 79 MGB into electric, and the old TR4 seemed happy, so I said, why not be a vette guy? I drove out to the mid west and rented a trailer and pulled it home. I didn't know much about the car but I knew my buddy wouldn't steer me wrong. The owner (friends brother) was in the Air Force and had put a lot of miles on it. I think it has over 120K. He told me about the bumper issue and that he replaced the heads and that is about it. He drove it in the barn and just parked it back in 94.

So that is all I got. From here on out it is just a discovery project. I am still working on my plan for this car. I can tell you I am 99% sure it won't be an electric conversion

 

On that weird tacked on control panel thing,
I dont believe its cruise crontrol, even though the name makes one think it is,
But rather an old school mpg computer, these odd early computers used in some cases magnets glued to axles and or those old cruise control gas flow transducer things to give you an idea of gas mileage, trip etc, so you might find other weird parts from it,
I have one new in box somewhere, grabbed it years ago at a meet just for cool shop art,
Too bad on the loss of the classic rock tape

 

Since I have been encouraged to ask questions by all you nice folks, I have to ask about the ignition shielding. It is not on any car I have ever worked on and I am curious to the purpose. Was it performance related or for noise on the radio? My gut feeling is to remove stuff that is not functional. Since the heads are not original I think this car is past being one of the "numbers matching" high value cars. So why not make it into a really good reliable driver? If I go with electronic ignition and fuel injection I think based on what I have read here on the forum that this could be a good way to go. Then I would pull off this shielding if it doesn't really help with anything. Then there is the thought of keeping all the old parts so if I sell it I can make the case that it could be returned to mostly original. I have to tell you I am not crazy about that. I have too many old parts in my garage anyway and I told myself that this car was going to be different. I bought this car to have fun cleaning rusty parts.

I am sure the mod vs original topic has been beat to death here so I don't really want to start that back up. I am interested in opinions on if by saving all these old parts for an unplanned resale it is worth it for the car I have. And what is up with the shielding in the first place.

Thanks in advance, Paul

 

Hi Paul,
The chrome ignition shielding was PART of the radio option, so cars with radios got it. The two brackets that support the distributor shield however was installed on all engines. They were installed when the engine was assembled in Flint if it's a sb.
The heat shielding for the spark plug wires and spark plugs, which some folks think is part of the radio shielding, WAS installed on all cars.
Regards,
Alan

I would save ANY old parts you remove from the car. You may not be interested in them but the next owner might be.

 

On my 1973 there was nothing making it Numbers Matching so I just did it my way. I dropped a 375 HP 350 in that required HEI ignition so the chrome cover had to go.



Note, if you go to HEI be sure to get one that drives the tachometer.

Karsten

 

Yes, it is my understandung that the shielding is supposed to help with radio interference. If you remove it and it is decent shape, you may want to list it in the parts for sale section. I bought the one for my car (which I am trying to keep orginal) for $100.00 from someone who removed it from their car and did not care about orginality. If it is decent, I would not throw it away as you can help someone out who really needs it.

 

Still a pretty good story, and the 120K miles are fairly reasonable for the year.

Good luck with getting it all sorted out, that's always been my favorite color for a 'Vette.