66 Nova SS Project
 

Figure I will call this project Body Slam. The car will be a full frame car built for road racing and street use. Bought the roller in July 2012. We will see how long this takes overall, hopefully it doesn't turn into a year long project.

Started with a pretty good shell, the body appears to be nice and straight and that is what I was most concerned with given the level of modifications I will be doing to the car otherwise.

started on full frame
 

I built the main frame section over my holiday break at the end of the year. Square and level. Actually, having a square and a level meant I already started with more tools than the average large scale, spec home builder :peepwall: I am lucky enough to have access to engineering tools at work so I was able to perform various analyses and optimize tube locations and actually reduce the weight of the cage by quite a bit from my first cut with a fair amount of triangulation "by eye".

Attached is the analysis model of the proposed chassis design. The cage in the rear will house the sequential 5 spd transaxle I have and the engine will be set back about 6" to get nearly all of its weight behind the front wheels.

I am gutting my current road race car to build the Nova, so instead of a Porsche with a mix of Chevy parts, I will have a Chevy with a mix of Porsche parts :D The 16x11 and 16x12 wheels will be utilized on this car for road racing and I may bump up to 18s for the street use as there is a good selection of 11" to 13" rubber out there for that diameter these days.

Crazy how much cleaner my garage was then :D

The 914 has a de-stroked 400 (353 cubes with a 327 crank and 6" rods). Simple flattop combo with alum 23deg heads and tappet cam. 525HP/438 ft-lbs when I broke it in on the dyno 7 years ago in Placentia CA with only a 1% correction factor. Been beating the hell out of it for 7 years now and she just keeps rockin'.

Took the car out last Saturday for the final hoorah on an open track day and it was the fastest car there and ran a lap 2.1 seconds faster than the SCCA Super Production class record which happens to be held by another 914 V8 but it has a 402 cube all alum brodix tall deck engine and 150 more HP. In fact, even in light traffic, I have over a dozen record breaking laps, so it makes it hard to tear it down but I need something new.

I intend to have the ride height the same as the 914, about 4.5" at the front of the rockers, a 1" rake overall, and then hope to find someone local to build a good air dam and put the splitter at 4" just like the teener as well. Frame clearance will be 4" front to rear, parallel to ground, with the body raked.

Started installing the rocker rails and frenching them into the existing floor pan. I am likely going to just do a full floor but for now want to keep the body and interior pretty stock looking. It would be way easier to just replace the floor pans so I may just do that in the end. The driver's pan will need a fair amount of work anyway as I have one of the first Tilton floor mount pedal assemblies and intend to keep using it so that will have to be worked in.

I set the main frame section under the car and will now be working on frenching that in as well. Got the torch out for easy interference removal on the lower control arm/engine mount and the caster links.

Killer project. Really enjoyed your videos with the P-car.

:thumbsup:

Nice project My favorite years 66-67.

thanks guys. I have to admit, I am going to miss the 914 for track days but look forward to having a more streetable car all the same. I finished editing some video from last Saturday and some laps from my last track day are on Youtube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Io3V...bYVTLw&index=1

The rear was really loose in the less than optimal weather conditions here in Colorado in January and still posting some awesome times. I really believe this car, in the late spring or early fall here would be a 1:53 car on the local track. I ran one day a friend timed me in three segments and traffic varied a fair amount, but the best pieced together lap of the fastest of the three sections was a 1:53.8 and I am actually better and a couple sections now than I was then. So it makes it hard to tear the car apart.

I too like the 6 and 7 the best, just a great overall look of a 60s era car.

Excited to watch this one come together
 

...and I will miss the P-car as well. I assume that you will keep it and maybe bring it back to life one day?

I am waffling on the 914 - once I have everything transferred over to the Nova, what is left is the tube chassis, wiring and body/dash work. Otherwise all suspension, brakes, so forth go to the Nova. So, if I can find a buyer for the "scraper" for a price I deem good enough, I would let it go, otherwise I am more likely considering tying some pulleys into the roof of my garage, hoisting the scraper up over the Nova, and just keeping it in case I get the jones to go crazy again.

I also thought about buying another 914 tub, cut it up to replace the super hacked up tub I have now, go back to full doors, wipers, all lights working again, a 377 cube destroked 400 and a more standard transaxle in it and make it a driver again as well. That would take a lot of work tho' but if I fitted an A/C-heater assy that it never had into it I could have a hell of a daily driver! Suspension I can just copy again from all my engineering files. I have so many 914 parts over 20 yrs of messing with them including the doors, good decklids, blah blah I could do it. 550HP, 2500lb daily driver with a 72" wing on the back :idea:

little update of yesterday's work, was out with friends planting lead into hillsides up in the mountains today but hope to get some more progress tomorrow as well.