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I am late to this thread. Looks nice. It appears as if you have a poly bushing on the differential mount. During my body off resto on my 66, I used poly on the mount. When I had a passenger with me, the U joint at the differential hit the body at the tunnel. I switched to a stock rubber mount and all is well. The problem with the poly mount is that it is not as thick as the stock rubber mount. Keep the pix coming. Jerry
Hi Jerry,
I have delrin bushings on the diff crossmember, but I went with a rubber one for the front snubber.
It just felt so stiff with delrin and I wanted to give it some flex and room to move if whole diff needed it. Hopefully I didn’t make a mistake.
Matko
Looks awesome.
I can’t wait to start my 73 project.
I’ve been collecting parts for 5 years and I’m ready to start turning wrenches.
How difficult was it to rebuild your steering column and what was the total cost?
I’m trying to decide if I should rebuild mine or just buy a new Ididit replacement.
I don’t want to pick apart your build, but do yourself a huge favor and pull those painted headers and get them ceramic coated.
It will greatly reduce heat in the engine compartment and the interior.
Last edited by OldCarBum; May 8, 2021 at 12:18 PM.
Steering column is not that difficult, if it’s not heavily corroded just try to do it yourself, you can always fall back to Ididit. Personally trailing arms were a bigger challenge even though once you do it yourself you realize it’s all very simple if you follow rules and have few proper tools.
I had no choice as buying ididit and shipping it to Europe would cost me more than double, but now I am happy I tried it and it’s really not a problem.
From tools you will need wheel puller and that lockplate pressing tool.
I changed lower bearing, upper bearing, ignition switch connector, ignition cylinder (that was the hardest part to take it out as previous owner broke it and you could start without a key) and of course the turn signal. Total cost 100-120$ max.
The fun part is to figure out how to dismantle and later put back in a proper way the plastic ball joint on tilt/tele column. There is only one way to get it in and have lower and upper shaft correctly oriented.
Jim Shea’s papers were good read and this part was pure gold for me: If you reassemble the shaft yoke to the plastic spheres in the wrong orientation, your turn signals will not cancel properly. (You probably won’t notice this problem until you have the column back in the car!)
Here is the key to the correct alignment.
Look down the steering shaft from the steering wheel end. Place the pinch bolt notch (located on the very lower end of the steering shaft, where the steering column flange is connected) at the 12 o’clock position. Now when the upper steering shaft is connected to the plastic tilt centering spheres, the short flat should also be at the 12 o’clock position.
Sounds very academic I know, but once you get that far and have the shafts in your hands you’ll understand it
Also since I have Borgeson, I also shortened my steering shaft by 1in just to be close once I get the body back on the chassis. It’s much easier to do this when lower and upper steering shafts are out rather then slamming on your whole shiny steering column when back in car.
Thanks for the tip on headers, I thought about heat wrapping them?! Have to check if anyone is doing ceramic coating in my area.
Thanks,
That is all very useful information.
I will probably pull my steering column and rebuild it myself.
It doesn’t sound too difficult and the cost is much less than purchasing new.
I was more concerned about the potential cost of having to buy specialty tools, paying some labor and the parts making it close to the cost of the Ididit.
Most anyone who does powder coating will do ceramic coating.
I know most header manufacturers suggest against wrapping their headers.
Good luck getting your project completed and keep us updated.
You are doing awesome work.
Greg
...I hope I will know how to put things back again 🙈
In case I didn't already "say it"..........photos do not forget.
Take a pic of each component BEFORE REMOVAL/DISASSEMBLY.
If you are disassembling the internal parts of a component...lay the internal parts on the work bench in the order they were removed/take a pic!
Example...speedometer internal parts replacement/rebuild.....
Hi everyone, wow time truly flies…Almost a year since my last post
I’ll try and break it down and update you from my side - anyhow pictures tell a thousand words.
When I started with the project I took all AC components out and I was determined to go AC delete way. Now, I am so happy I didn’t throw anything in garbage as it’s a small effort to try and fix it as all components are there. More on this later Empty shell I went with chemical stripper, did it small sections as it’s a long and heavy elbow grease job. Had some rust in the corner, this is the repaired result. Malwood clutch finally installed, on man this was a tough one. I love how they call stuff direct bolt on - there is nothing even close to it. I guess it’s part of the fun. AC box finally back on the firewall, after steering column this one was the next in line on the most difficult parts on whole project. If anyone wonders this is the fresh air/recirculation vacuum actuated flap door. Located deep in the passenger wheel well. Photo is taken looking down the wiper tray. I wanted to keep everything stock, so no vintage air for me - I did Classic auto air upgrade kit. Vir eliminator and new sanden compressor with r134a upgrade Preparing body donuts About to remarry the body and chassis This was a beer call moment
Designer Imagines A Corvette That Looks More Like a Corvette Than the Corvette
Slideshow: A Jaguar designer's personal project imagines what a modern front-engined Corvette might look like if Chevrolet revisited the golden age of the Stingray.
