Awesome!
Awesome!
Some parts have arrived for phase 2 of the Malibu revitalization.
Still missing one package and not entirely sure my plan is going to work - hopefully I'll know in a few days.
Good for you! Nice when a plan comes together. Happy to see no problem with your head transplant. Gonna make it handle better too. Should give you that new car feeling. I guess it turned out to be a budget friendly rebuild. Plus you got the knowledge you were seeking. Carry on.
I don't have much to add other than I have been silently following your thread and enjoying the updates.
In reply to Blunder :
Thanks for tuning in!
Alright! Made some more progress over the last couple days.
long story short my new ($15 each on rock auto close out) struts got combined with eBay coilover sleeves and I was hoping it would get really low, but it didn't. I'm still happy though, because I've always wanted to play around with the coilover sleeve thing. Seems like the spring rate is higher now so the car feels a little sportier. 
Heres the mess assembled. In hindsight I probably should have cut off the stock spring perches but I was afraid that would be way way too much, so I left it be.
And here's how it sits presently. I bought 2 new tires because these wheels were previously on a 64 fairlane and had the "bigs and littles" rubber setup. Now I have 215/50s all around and the ABS won't be angry anymore.
An unintended success of this whole thing is that the car feels flatter in turns and that is cool.
So not maybe the stance boy look I had imagined, but more performance than I intended so a fair trade off. If in the future I decide it really has to be low I can always cut the springs or order different ones since the rest of the setup is fairly "universal" to accept a 3" diameter spring.
Fun times!
You bottomed on the bumpstops? Out of downward travel on the collars?
The sleeve thing can be frustrating to get the stance right. Mine still doesn't sit how i want.
In reply to Dusterbd13-michael :
The rear was on the bumpstops and I took it all back apart and trimmed them, that helped. Now I'm out of downward travel on the sleeves.
Considering this was an experiment based on very little actual research I'm not at all unhappy. I'm going to give it a couple hundred miles to settle and figure out what I want to do from there.
Not a lot to add but I took the car on the first "road trip" since the head gasket saga and it ran great! About 160 miles round trip up to Millacs and back this weekend for a bachelor party. Sweet!
No pictures but I did the transmission filter service this weekend. A simple but gross job on your back in the garage. Seems like no matter how hard I try I always get a bunch of trans fluid on the floor.
Managed to have minimal spillage on the floor and the transmission seems happy enough. I haven't really put it through the paces but it feels like it shifts a little nicer, and if nothing else I know that it has clean fluid and a new filter.
Keeping it on the road!
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