Lots moving along.

The piggyback ECM powers up:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/pb42JpBG7XZWDDso8

The factory ECU is still not powering up. Every electrical problem so far has been a missed or bad ground, so I'm not giving up hope yet.
I did get all the weather strip replaced and the top in for what I hope is the last time.



Sadly, there's interference between the seals on the door and the car at the base of the A pillar, so the door won't close. I'll fidget with them a bit more and if all else fails, the razor blade will make the space.

Driver side door is also back together:



The passenger side is giving me problems. The panel is worn out and won't hang from the door or secure itself at the top edge. I found the TSB where GM had the same problem back in the 1990s and specified gluing some brackets to the panel to remedy that. I probably need to get some 16ga sheet metal and make some brackets.

I also have the rearview mirror back in and the map lights work. Still need the doors to close before I can troubleshoot the interior lighting and the delay bus. But we're getting there. Once this interior is finally back together, I'll be moving underneath the car. The first thing on the list there is the differential. It's a 2.42 and has 199,000 miles on it. It's coming out and getting rebuilt with a 3.73 and all new bearings. then we'll move on to the fuel system, suspension, and eventually forward into finishing the engine and transmission. Lots to do.

 

Manged to get the mouse **** damaged carpet off the driver side under-dash panel and recover it with Alcantara. Mucho bettero



Short list of other stuff I managed to get done this week:

Finished the passenger door
Power locks
Power Windows
Trunk release buttons on the doors
HVAC Controls (Fan motor is screaming at me, need to replace it, bad bearing)
Fished out the Cruise Control Model and got it plugged back in.
The vacuum motor box is back in the proper location

Irritating things that aren't working that I can't figure out why just yet:

Center console hatch release button doesn't work.
Right turn signal indicator in the dash doesn't light, but the right turn signals work. I've verified connectivity and the bulb works if I energize the cluster connector, so the problem is somewhere in the harness.
ECM still doesn't appear to be powering up, even though it has power. the BCM seems to be working fine, DAB is working, too.

Going to switch gears away from the electrics this week and move over to paint correction. Going to correct the orange peel and then hit it with another couple coats of clear.

 

This isn't healthy. A few more of these rebuild posts and mine is going to be in about 1000 different pieces scattered across my house. Keep it up

 

Only a thousand?

 

Frustrated with this board software. Type out a whole reply and then it just farts it off and blows it away.

And the back button doesn't take you back to your post draft from the error page, nope, it re-renders.. Everything you typed is gone. Because everything is broken. The internet is now nearly useless and everything on it is designed to just **** us off.

So, no update today, just this rant. I'll try again tomorrow.

 

Let's try this again.
Orange peel mitigation experiment on the targa top came out gangbusters.





And out in the sun:



Basically wet sanded with 800 grit on a soft block, then laid down three more coats of clear. I did try the denim polishing pad trick first. It helped, but I just sucked too hard when I shot it initially.

Now to repeat on the rest of the car.

 

Been awhile, busy. Also had to detour away from the Corvette to do an overhaul on the engine in my Grand National. High copper in an oil sample had me drop the pan and found some trash had gotten into the engine and tore up the bearings and the oil pump. Had to pull it so I could properly clean it. Luckily the crank and camshaft weren't hurt, so it went back together pretty easily with a new set of bearings, and now I can pivot back to the Corvette. If you're not doing oil analysis on your engines, you should. It'll catch a problem well before it turns into a disaster.

The big fun recently is the suspension and brakes.

I ran off and bought pretty much everything AfterDark Speed has for the car:


Full coilover conversion front and rear with some geometry correction in the back. I also have a full set of the elastomer bushings C&S sells to go with it all.

Once the Buick is off the lift, I'm going to get the last few coats of clear onto the 'Vette, then I can push it onto the lift and install all this prettiness. I'll be rebuilding the differential and putting 3.42 gears and a clutch kit in it while I have it dropped for the suspension install. The existing LSD has 199,000 miles. I'm sure it's shot.

I also got what I'm going to do with the front brakes nailed down. The car came with a set of spare C5 front calipers, so I'm going to run those with an adapter bracket and a C6 rotor. I rebuilt the calipers, and while I had them apart we went ahead and sandblasted them and powdercoated them to match the car. They should be more than adequate for track work and the whole kit and caboodle cost under $650 with pads and quality high-carbon steel rotors. Compared to $2400 for a Wilwood kit and I think I did good:



The 4L60 is at the transmission rebuilder now, so when that gets back stuff is going to move rapidly.

 

We have re-assumed the position. The Buick's engine is done. I had to recondition a Nissan Maxima for my kid (her Camry got totalled by an inattentive driver) and fix the transmission in a 2016 CTS. But all that's done and now we're back on the Corvette.



Tomorrow begins masking, then the cleaning, then we'll get the last of the clear shot. At this point, I think I'm coming up on two years working on this thing. Very excited to be approaching the home stretch.

 

There is a special pl;ace in Corvette heaven for you!

 

Sorry if this sounds dumb, but are those regular old Harbor Freight small furniture dollys?

 

It's not dumb at all.

What's dumb is folks thinking you need to spend $200 a corner for car dollies when HF furniture dollies do the trick for $13 each. $8 if you catch them on sale. I think I bought these for $4 five or six years ago.

 

Guess I'll be buying three more to add to the one I own already. Thanks!

 

Well, that's come out definately good enough for internet pictures.



I'm now out of clear. I laid it on pretty thick, so there's a few sags and runs, but those are easy to fix. Gonna let it sit and cure a week, then I can push it onto the lift and start on the suspension.

 

The paint looks great!!! And stellar work thus far!! Were you able to get the ecu to power up? If so, was the issue a missing ground as you had thought it might be?

 

Haven't circled back to the ECU yet. I have some decisions to make on that. I'm contemplating ripping the harness back out and making a custom harness for the Microsquirt and abandoning the stock instrument cluster for an AEM e-dash. Or, maybe finding a 1996 harness and swapping that in. I'm going to be replacing the OptiSpark with the TorqueHead front cover, so the 1996 ECU will be able to run my LT1.

Decisions to be deferred to another time. Next up is the suspension, rear end, and the fuel system from the tank to the engine bay.

 

Wow, love to see the car out in the sun, she looks beautiful, and Spring is right around the corner!

 

Hi,

Another quick question about your garage set up. I noticed the drop tarps attached to your ceiling. What are you using and how did you mount it?

The paint looks fantastic love the color.

Thanks,
Patrick

 

The tarps are plain plastic HF tarps. I hung them from the ceiling using threaded hooks screwed through the drywall into the ceiling joists. I rigged up a rope and pulley system that's a giant Roman shade. It works really well to keep overspray off the rest of the shop. I run a box fan with a filter on it in the corner furthest from the door. That grabs most of the paint particles out of the air before the main exhaust fan takes the fumes out the back of the garage. It's not the best, but it's good enough for my purposes.

If I had to do it again, I'd spend some extra money on white tarps. The blue creates some lighting problems that can lead to me doing stuff like missing spots when shooting. This should be the last whole car I need to paint for a long time, so that's not on list of to-do's right now.

 

Wow,

Thanks for the detailed reply and the close up of the paint!

Patrick

 

Ooof.

Suspension. Started here:



Tearing it down was pretty straight forward. The rear LCA bolt sucks, it hits part of the cradle brace, which you have to remove to get it out. Easy enough with the engine already out, but one of the captured nuts in the frame broke loose, so I had to cut that bolt, fish the remnants out of the frame with a magnet through a hole near the UCA, and then hog out the hole and install a rivnut to replace it.

In any case, cleaning the thirty plus years of grime off these suspension parts was an adventure. I really need a parts washer. I also don't know how this crap can be soft to the touch but require a chisel to remove. It's crazy. The spindle took about two hours:



The bearing feels great and nothing beats the OE units, so I'm not replacing these until they start making noise.
Upper control arm took about an hour to clean up and refurbish. The rivets in the old ball joint had to be drilled all the way through on the drill press, they had merged with the arm itself and wouldn't come out with a punch. Yes, I installed the new ball joint upside down, I didn't take a picture of it flipped back.



The lower control arm bushings were a real bear. They kept cocking sideways while being pressed in and firing themselves across the shop. Many awful words were exclaimed. After an email with C&S Corvette (dudes down there are super on it, I really enjoy doing business with them, they didn't pay me to say that) about how they installed them gave me an idea, I got creative with some ball joint press accoutrements to keep the bushing contained during the pressing.



The sleeve contains the bushing and the C-clamp is keeping the bushing from pudging out from under the sleeve. Looking at this photo now, I probably need to move the bench vise away from the TV. High risk I'm going to launch something through it. Derp. But it worked:



Front right corner is completely torn down and I got the spring out without losing any fingers.



I cleaned it up and hit it with a coat of flat black. Letting it dry overnight and tomorrow I can start putting this side back together.