70 Firebird "The 14 Car" Performance Therapy project

how did you cut the holes in the pockets so neatly?

Beautiful work, as always. Show-quality, although I know you will really drive the heck out of this car. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I have to admit that the my purchase of the 78 Esprit in my barn was heavily influenced by seeing what you have been able to do with yours.

Gearheadotaku wrote: how did you cut the holes in the pockets so neatly?

I marked off an approximate window for a standard non spherical application knowing I'd need to open it up for the movement the spherical allows. Then drilled 1/2" holes to make the curved corners, cut the straight sides with a right angle grinder, and then opened up the window with a carbide bit on a die grinder. Once it was the size I wanted I finished it off with hand files and emery cloth because paint doesn't like square corners.

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SEADave wrote: Beautiful work, as always. Show-quality, although I know you will really drive the heck out of this car. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I have to admit that the my purchase of the 78 Esprit in my barn was heavily influenced by seeing what you have been able to do with yours.

I sure miss driving the car. It's become a case of "Be careful what you wish for". I used to wish for better brakes, lighter wheels, etc. Since I got them and took the car apart I haven't been able to go to any events because it's apart and any spare time & money go to the car. I went through the same thing back when I did all the safety upgrades but it still sucks not being able to use the car 1-2-3 years.

I have no problem with imitation and am flattered by it. There's several cars around the world now that are close clones to the way my car was before the current project. The owners/builders contacted me asking if I minded etc. and wanted parts lists, paint codes and so on. I had no problem with it and always offered any information and assistance.

You going to build the 78 as a TA clone car? I'll be working on a 78 pretty soon as I need something from the owner, details will be in this thread when I do.

In reply to Rad_Capz:

The '78 is in hiatus for the moment as I have a (real) 1981 WS6 5.0 TA to play around with. The '81 5.0 is interesting as it was the only stick shift TA you could get in 81, after no manuals for '80. At some point I should put up a thread on the 81.

The Esprit is a virtually pristine California car body that also has a 305. It has a factory rear spoiler and now has a Formula hood so the easy answer is Formula replica. I have factory front flares for a '78 TA, but to build a true TA replica I would still need a shaker, shaker hood, fenders (or at least put vents in the Esprit fenders), front center spoiler and rear wheel spoilers.

The parts I have accumulated for the '78 are: B-body spindles and 1LE rotors for the front, blazer brakes for the back, a 3.23 Posi disc brake rear out of a 79 400/4sp TA, an LT1 T56, a manual trans pedal assembly, plus a Scarebird bracket for a Wilwood clutch master and the master itself. So whatever direction I go with this thing it should be 6-speed and have discs and posi.

Oh and the 78 is now on gold 15x8 snowflakes from an '81 special edition TA, although I may put them on my 81 to get rid of those ugly turbo wheels and put 17 inchers on the Esprit.

Sorry to derail, but once I actually get to work on the '78 I will definitely put a thread up here.

In reply to SEADave:

As I continue this project it will involve both a 78 and an 81 becoming one car with leftover parts you might be interested in. A bud owns them and we've made a deal for me to do the surgery that will put him in a better position to complete his project and give me a piece I need. He'll be selling off all the unused pieces. I'll probably actually be the one selling off the stuff so if you have a list of stuff you're looking for PM me.

I've been working on stripping a lot of the small body parts that have to be painted. Some get media blasted and some sanded bare. When I get sick of stripping I recondition a part I can install or have ready for install when the time is right.

With the cowl painted I removed the windshield and reconditioned the inner cowl, wiper motor, and wiper transmission. Since I didn't relocate the wiper motor to make a fully smoothed firewall I decided to jazz it up a bit with custom paint and made a flat cap for the washer pump since I don't need windshield squirters and I really don't like the look of the white plastic (usually yellowed) piece with the hose nipples.

One of the things I'd wanted to do while doing the safety upgrade project several years ago was to block off the trunk area from the back seat in case of fire. These cars were designed with several large holes in the seat support and package tray and a back seat made with burlap. So I made some panels for the large openings and spot welded them in, the smaller openings are also being covered with metal. The idea here is to slow a fire down as much as possible without getting carried away fabricating a new rear firewall. I will retain rear shelf speakers but will make them removable to be replaced with steel plates for track days, races, etc.

I'd removed the stock padding/sound deadener on the firewall behind the dash when I was closing off the AC opening and blower opening and I wanted something to provide a heat barrier that isn't easily flamable. I decided to cover the firewall with Thermo Tec Cool It aluminized heat barrier and ordered it from Ron Sutton Race Technology. It's a thin adhesive backed lightweight material designed for radiant heat applications. http://www.thermotec.com/products/13500-adhesive-backed-heat-barrier.html When it arrived I tested pieces of it for flamability and heat resistance when stuck to sheet metal and it seemed to work well so I installed it on the firewall, toe panels, and front of the transmission tunnel.

I media blasted the park brake mechanism and gas pedal then installed Modo Innovations pedal pads.

In reply to Rad_Capz:

Its looking really good! That wiper motor reminded me that when I restored my Formula 400 many years ago, the wiper motor for some reason never got removed. I finished the car and just a few weeks later moved from Ohio to Oklahoma. I got about half way there and it started to rain. I turned on the wipers, and everything was fine for a while, then the wipers stopped. So I ended up swapping the motor out at night in the rain. The old one was full of sand from when I blasted the car. Live and learn....

I was working on a 68 Mustang about a month ago installing gauges. Went under the dash for wiring and got a face full of sand. Owner had the car blasted without stripping the dash!

My donor car arrived today. If all goes well I'll be using the subframe out of it for my car.

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That donor tub looks way too clean to be a donor. Things look much different from a northerners point of view.

In reply to Gearheadotaku:

+1

You guys are correct! It is waay too good (solid floor pans etc.) so it's only donating the subframe for my own project. I made a deal with a bud of mine who also has another one which is a TA (I think) and I'll be swapping the front of the other car onto the tub of this car in exchange for the leftover subframe. I'm going to attempt to move as much as possible from car B (windshield forward) intact and roll the tub from this one up to the loaded subframe of car B. I may have to remove hood & fenders but hoping to avoid that.

I'll be selling off a bunch of the left over parts. This one has the disc brake option which will be probably be sold off.

I am thoroughly enjoying this build!

Crazy good build.

A while back I cleaned the subframe I took out of my car. Then I started checking alignment of the mounting points and found that the lower control mounting points on one side didn't line up as well as I would have liked. Soooo, I brought the subframe to a buddys body shop and mounted it up on a frame rack to tweak it a little with help and guidance from an experienced bodyman who straightens frames damaged in collisions in a production shop. We chained down the frame and started bending things a little at a time getting the LCA mounting holes lined up better until..... Oooooops! We kinked a rail. So after searching around and not finding a good used subframe for sale locally (new aftermarket out of my budget) I made a deal with a buddy of mine.

My bud wants to build a 78 TA for his wife and has a 81 Formula with a good unibody and a 78 TA with rusty back half from being in the Northeast early in it's life. I made a deal with him to take his cars and swap the front of his 78 to the rear of the 81 and he'll finish the tail panel swap later himself so it will look like a 78 TA. I get the leftover front subframe in exchange for the work swapping things enough for it to roll away (on a trailer) in one piece. This will save him a lot of work trying to do rust repair on the 78 unibody.

I began by having the 81 Formula dropped off to strip to the unibody. Stripped it, checked the subframe I'll be keeping then started cleaning the frame while waiting for the 78 to arrive. The 81 was a rear disc car so I'll be selling off the rear end and disc/disc specific components as a package.

Once the 78 arrived I started taking it apart enough to roll the unibody away from the subframe. Once it's separated I'll join the two halves. I plan on leaving the front of the 78 as complete as possible with the engine, trans etc. all in place. I've disconnected the driveshaft, shift cable, backdrive, speedometer cable and am working on the steering column now. I only have a couple hours a day after regular work so it'll take a few days to complete the swap.

Looking at your pics reminded me that I still want your Nova.

The Nova's on vacation in Boca while I do the TA/Formula swap. It's sitting on the trailer that my bud used to bring the birds over and will return when he picks up the car I'm swapping around for him. City would give me grief if there's too many unregistered cars in view and I'm already over the limit so I've gotta finish the swap ASAP. Removed front sheetmetal tonight.

Although the LCA mounts were off a bit on my original subframe they certainly weren't out enough to be worth going through all the effort moving cars and labor swapping to get another frame! The LCA alignment was only off roughly 3/8". If I'd known we'd damage the frame I would have left it alone and used it as it was ( car drove fine and no binding of control arm) OR I would have stopped trying to make it perfect when we were within 1/8-1/4". Hindsight is 20/20 ahahaha.... live and learn!

I finished up the body swap over the weekend and the owner picked up the car with his trailer while the white shell met up with it at the owners shop via a rollback flatbed. Now (maybe eventually) the owner will swap the interior etc. from the white shell to the new car. Also he wanted the fenders left off for bodywork.

Whenever possible I have someone watch when I do weird stuff just in case something goes wrong or I need a hand. I had my bud Jeff hang out a few minutes while I moved the body into position and bolted the subframe to the new body. People ask how I do these kinds of swaps by myself so I had him shoot a quick video of moving the body onto the frame. Body was within 1/4 " alignment with the subframe at the end of the video and all bolted up in about 15 minutes.

Very short video. No it's not speeded up or edited video, thats real time. Just over a minute up the driveway and ready to bolt. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-XA4JM20W8&feature=youtu.be

I've been working on figuring out the differences between the early and late 2nd gen frames so hopefully I'll be able to modify the 81 frame so it's suitable for the 70. It's better to use a 70-74 frame for cars built during those years or a 75 - 81 frame for cars built 75 and later. I looked for an early frame for quite a while locally without finding one so I'm trying the later style with mods. Meanwhile I've been prepping the top and bottom of the rear shelf area for paint. The inner filler panel between the rear window and deck lid on 2nd gens usually get rusty and need replacement. This one had surface rust but was only rusted through in one small area so I cleaned the whole area, used some panel bond to fill pits, put in some new metal where it was rusted through, and skim coated the whole area with filler. Will seal it up with epoxy primer.

My adjustable G-braces made by PRO-TOURING F-BODY under the Gen-II Racing Products label arrived. I got them from a member on a forum that purchased them and decided against the install. The spherical front spring eye bushings I showed in previous posts were from the same company and I also purchased them from a member on a forum. I'm planning on using PTFB solid body mounts. I was running Poly body mount bushings previously with bolt in frame connectors because thats what was available many years ago when I first built the car but now I'll use the PTFB solid mounts and weld in connectors.

These G-braces triangulate the firewall with the subframe attaching at the upper control arm. I'll be making additional braces to work with these to stiffen them up more.

I shot some epoxy primer and then some high build primer on the inner filler panel and then did some prep work on the underside of the filler panel as well as the rear seat firewall I'd welded the panels in. Then I shot them with some red epoxy primer that kinda resembles the original primer which will show in the trunk in some areas after splatter paint gets applied giving the trunk a somewhat stock appearance. I know it seems silly "restoring" the trunk area appearance of such a modified car but it's what I want. I even have a reproduction trunk mat I use unless the cars getting raced or tracked.

I made a panel to cover the rectangular opening in the package tray I haven't installed yet and am still considering options to cover the speaker holes during track/race events to complete the firewall between trunk and passenger compartment.

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What about replacing that whole panel with something flat, maybe with a little bead rolling to add stiffness, but otherwise simple and clean?

I still have a stereo so I want to keep the speaker openings. I thought about a metal panel that could be put in place of the stock (flammable) interior shelf panel for events but there's no way to get into the backseat area once the interior is put back in the car. I guess removing the speakers from the trunk and putting metal panels over the speaker openings is the easiest option. There's no fuel cell in the trunk area (yet) so that'll probably be the way I go for now.

Anyone ever seen lightweight 6 X 9 speaker enclosures that are fireproof? I'm going to stop in a stereo shop and see if they have anything like that or perhaps something that will make swapping the speakers to sheet metal panels quicker.

If you're looking for a fire barrier but want to keep speakers, rather than the PITA of swapping speakers for filler plates as part of track prep, how about just make some steel speaker boxes that you weld to the underside of the shelf panel. Would give you your fire barrier without swapping stuff around, and as a bonus the speakers will sound better.

Certainly could fab something up, but it would be hard to beat the price of a couple of these - http://www.amazon.com/STEELMASTER-Fire-Retardant-Security-Includes-221614003/dp/B00006ICA8/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1418488131&sr=8-2&keywords=steel+box. Cut the lid off, profile it to the underside of the panel (though it already looks pretty flat), and done.

BEST. DRIVEWAY. EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!

There is an unfathomable amount of awesome in those pics!