The first step was to get the car road worthy
temporarily. Which equated to replacing the dry rotted rubber belts
and hoses, basic tune-up, and cleaning. Oh, and a replacement radiator
from Ebay.
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Our son, only 4 at the time, wanted to help, so Kurt let him assist with
the upper radiator hose. He was a bit
on the short side, so he had to stand on the splash pan, between
the grill and the radiator.
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The help earned the nickname"Mr. Meticulous" as he had to center
the hose between the radiator and the block before he would tighten the
hose
clamps.
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However, the original transmission and engine
were both leaking puddles, so Kurt decided to beef up this grocery
getter. A Turbo 350 transmission was found first (Ebay) and then later
a 327 cu engine from a 1968 Impala was located (Ebay again). With a
few additional parts, an Edelbrock Performer Manifold, Camshaft, and
carb, ram's horns exhaust manifolds from a 1958 Impala, dual exhaust
with Flowmaster 40 delta series mufflers, and a blueprinted distributor
from a 1967 Camaro, the powerplant was ready for installation.
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Engine bay before.
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Engine bay after. The wagon body style has so much
chrome that Kurt couldn't resist adding the fender birds.
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Engine before.
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Engine after.
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We located some original valve covers with the offset bolt holes required
for the original 265 heads. This is a close up of those 60's cast Edelbrock
valve covers, before the final stages of restoration.
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The rebuilt 327 with the restored valve covers.
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Kurt wanted the non-stock spin on oil filter for speed and convenience.
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The original log style exhaust manifolds just don't look good with the
60's cast valve covers.
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One 327 ready to go.
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Painted Chevy red as any good 1956 Chevy V8 would
have been. Kurt is going for that "retro hot rod" look.
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The infamous 350 Turbo transmission that was delivered during the rare
occasion of a hurricane, Isabel Sept 2003, blowing through the Northern
VA area.
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A better picture of the transmission, another Ebay purchase.
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The 350 Turbo trani and the 1900 RPM stall converter for a truck ready
for installation.
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Kurt's father-in-law, Jim, came out for Christmas with the family and
couldn't wait to drop the engine in the wagon.
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For Christmas that year, Kurt received all the
mounting conversion parts for the Turbo transmission. His in-laws
had arrived on Dec 19 to spend Christmas with the family and Jim couldn't
wait to put the engine in the car. By the time Kurt's wife, Michelle
came home from work, the engine and transmission were in, minus the
wrapped mouting hardware. Despite the convincing arguments of both
Kurt and Jim, the hardware was not unwrapped until Christmas day. So
the settled for sanding and repainting the dash instead.
Of course on Dec 26th, neither man would leave
the garage until the mounting hardware was in the car. And on Dec 27th,
the entire family and several friends gathered in the garage to watch
Kurt and Jim fire the rebuilt engine over.
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This is one hefty powerplant. Anyone for "fast
food"? Kurt's father-in-law assisted with the original engine implant.
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The help has to be right in the middle of things.
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She's in, but not quite ready to start.
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"You might be a redneck if you have a family gathering to start a car."
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All in all, not
half bad for a grocery getter that arrived in a snowstorm, had a transmission
delivered during
a hurricane, borrowed parts from Kurt's wife's 1956 (currently undergoing
full off-body restoration), has had numerous parts purchased from Ebay, and
has had 3 generations working on it.
All in less than 1 year.
But something was wrong in the engine as it was
still leaking. And it didn't have as much power as he wanted it to
have. So he decided to "soup-up" the 327. Someone pointed
him to Pete Barrows, a local old-school high performance race engine
builder. The specs
on the engine changed dramatically by the time Pete was done.
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