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I purchased this Car from a Ford dealer in Peoria, IL in 1988. At that time it had a factory stock 402 / turbo 400 open dif. 2.73 rear in it. It was a Malibu with SS badges on it. It was in rough shape as the person (s) doing the work on the car were unskilled welders and most of the work stuck above the rest of the body. Found a guy selling a 454 in the local classifieds out of a '74 truck and picked that up for 450.
In 1989 I was at a party and let a girl making a run to the store drive my car. She found a way to get the front end up over a 3' concrete retaining wall. Wow what a mess... With the help of family and friends I got the car down to South Carolina where my folks live to do something with it.
In '91 my father found a '71 that didn't fair to well during Hurricane Hugo so we got an entire car for $200. We stripped it down and steam cleaned the frame and painted it black and between to 2 cars was able to piece together a front suspension that would roll straight. We clean up some of the body work at that point but didn't go much farther than just getting it road ready.
I was then able to get some cash together an in '95 started taking the car apart again this time to paint it and get it to good driver status. There were some rust spots in the normal location under the window trim front and rear and the drivers rear quarter had some rot in it. Picked up some patch panels from NPD and removed the rust at that point. I also finally got around to doing something with the 454. I tore it down and found that it had a missing lobe on the camshaft and that is why the guy couldn't get decent towing / gas mileage out of it. My father is a mechanic so we did most of the work at the shop he was working at. I spent a week porting the 820 oval heads on it. I was going with some large dome pistons but several people recommended that I keep the compression down or I would have trouble with getting gas for it. I wish I would have gotten the TRW 2465F's I was looking at. :) Anyway I got some TRW forged flat tops so I could run junk gas if necessary as this car was my daily driver. I put a Holley 3310 that I picked up from a guy for 20 bucks who was selling it as parts. I had to just buy a rebuild kit and remove the remaining choke mechanism. Picked up an Edelbrock Performer RPM put an HEI GM unit in it. I also put on a new 2 1/2 exhaust system. I painted the car a Metallic blue-teal color and wasn't sure if I wanted to put the band aid stripes on it and never got around to it. I did put on new SS badges around the car and put the 454's on the fenders.
2002 I am married now and have a daughter and my wife said either I do something with the car or sell it. It has been sitting the garage for 4 years with about 300 miles on it. She said it was too loud, smelled funny. Well this year I am getting back to work on my car. I have completely gutted the interior putting on a new fuel tank and picked up some closed chamber heads from a local machine shop to bump my compression up. I am also undoing the clone project. I plan on removing the SS badging from the car and going with the "Stealth" look.
2003 - I have a 1 1/4 front sway bar (ebay) and rear boxed lowers with sway bar (ebay). I am installing an Eaton posi rear end in the car and run 3.73's I still need to order some Moser C-clip axles to finish it up. I have the '702 closed chamber heads with 2.19 / 1.88 valve upgrade back from the machine shop. I should end up a little over 9:1 compression and have decided to run a solid cam. I am going to pick up a Comp Cams part # 11-551-5. Solid cam for big block Chevy, 396-454 cu. in. Intake Duration @ .050, 244, exhaust, 252. Intake lift, 571, exhaust, 603. RPM range 2800-6300. Lobe separation 110. Looking at the projected #'s its going to be fun! I have also picked up some 71/72 SS factory 5 spoke rims that I am going to put on in place of the 15X8 rallys.
I did find something special when I dropped the fuel tank to replace it!!!
I will be updating the site over the next couple of months while I have a work in progress.
Interior kit: Seat covers, carpet, door panels, headliner, sail panels, insulation, rear deck cover, trunk board and insulation.
Console parts, various screws and bolts.
NPD: http://www.nationalpartsdepot.com/
Fender patch panels, gas tank
Ebay:
NOS Turn signal lenses, cigarette lighter, floor shift round speedo, wrong new fuel sending unit. boxed lower arms and rear sway bar, 1 1/4" front sway bar, Holley DP and Proform HP body, NOS temp sending unit, Eaton 3 series Posi unit and bearing kit, optional 4 spoke SS steering wheel. Floor shift column.
Chevelles.com http://www.chevelles.com
Pair of BFG Drag radials 275/50/15, 72 SS dash and wiring harness, Comp Cams 924-16 valve springs and 10* retainers..
Summitracing.com, SDPC2000.com, Competitionproducts.com, quickfueltechnology.com
Gaskets, gauges, valve train supplies, carb parts.
Future plans:
1: finish current interior restoration
2: finish installing the 3:73 gears
3: Install a floor shift tilt column
4: Install an X pipe and dynomax ultraflo's
5: paint the car Mojave Gold Metallic the original color as there are just to many blue
Chevelle's almost as bad as
the red ones. 