Mikespeed's 72 Drift Camaro Build

[mikespeed95]

Hey guys. The last 5+ years I've been looking for a smallbackwindow Camaro to play with, but being broke didn't help. Well found my dream on Craigslist, sold a car I got for $500 I was driving, and used funds to pick up this 72 Camaro. This is the moment after I got it outta dude's garage.



Rusted floorboards, lower quarters, lower rockers, but the roof is super solid. Had a 10 bolt in questionable condition, no drivetrain, original 4 speed car with some bodywork I'm gonna have to redo and resprayed yellow. Was originally the olive drab green type of color, but basically a rusty roller. Drove it home from Dallas, and went home, have a broken hand so couldn't really get it off the trailer myself, which sucks but whatever.


Went to my shop today, my cousin JC and several friends came today to see it, and my friends Jason, Jonathan and Robby heled me a good bit today get the shop organized a bit and this car off the trailer and was finally able to really check it out. This car is totally awesome. It has personality, character, it has [i]style[/b]. The doorpanels are a piece of leather with a piece of aluminum breaking up the materials, the dashboard is laid out awesome, obviously different guages are needed, but i love the stock bezels. Threw an old Sparco in it to see how much room, the whole car just fits like a glove, I love it. So much cooler than the boring mass produced stuff nowadays, granted I loved my 240, and it looked awesome, but this camaro is just gonna blow it outta the water, I'm really excited about it. I
ve seriously spent 5 years looking for it, and its perfect, exactly what I wanted. 4 Speed car, a lotta rust in repairable places, cheap, roller, love it. Came with everything exactly how I wanted, no turn signals on front, the spoiler, its so awesome.

Dash:
Iphone and LED shoplight




Doorsills, its so cool the stamps people took pride in stuff back then, now everything is purely marketing, this is soo cool to me.



I cant wait to put these on:


Still have broke hand, but gonna go ahead and do what I can taking some stuff off. One the things I'm excited about is I'm gonna take some these parts I'm not using to a swap meet, I just need to find one to go to. I've always wanted to go to one.

This is so fun for me, this is what playing with cars should be all about and I'm super thankful the opportunity to play with this happened. Sooo stoked.

Plans are to put my Ls1 / t56 / Magna Charger on it, build some suspension for it, keep it streetable (read: turn signals/doorpanels/dash/radio) but build it as a full blown caged racecar. This is gonna be a lotta work, and a whole lotta fun.

[ItDoRun]

Looks like a fun project. Keep us posted.

[waynieZ]

Nice project keep us posted with pictures.

[mikespeed95]

Now that I'm actually getting to work on this I'll start posting again.

So I was at the shop doing something besides organizing today. Recently me and some friends got the shop next door as well, so now were at 2,000 sq feet. Been re-arranging and cleaning a lot.

Not today.

Well today, for about 3-4 hours. Built a ghetto wood tire rack, and organized the new shop.

Then to the American Icon in the making.

Over the last couple days and about 6-8 hours worth of work this is what has happened.

About 3-4 Days ago.


Then i dedided to glance at the rearend, remove the wheels, and gander at it. I bought a steering wheel at Game Stop from my awesome girlfriend, and it was twofer Tuesday at Double Daves, so needless to say, motivation to work on Camaro wasn't really there.



Then today. Met Derrick up at the shop early evening, and after my friend Jonathan helped clean up the other shop (it is finally all organized mostly, yay) he headed home, and I decided to start cracking on the Camaro. Removed the front clip, more body stuff, chassis harnesses (which are actually in decent shape and I like the simplicity of the connectors, may reuse) and the glass (40 year old glass is a lot easier to cut out!). Rust really isn't as bad as I thought. Still a bit sketchy but not a big deal. Was able to benchbuild and get a lot of ideas having the car down this far though, pretty stoked about it.

This is how I left it tonight after about 4 hours of on/off working on it. Most I've done so far.



I'm excited about this.

[bonecrrusher]

Whats DK stand for... donkey kong?

LOL... jk.

I like your plans for the car... I need a blower too.. Ughhh.

[mikespeed95]

Little update on the Camaro, not anything huge yet, still stripping down.

Had to use the plasma cutter (which is soooo awesome) to cut an access hole to get to the subframe washer/bolt dealie, then got that off. Just been bench-building, and did a 60k service on my friends truck today.

Was tryin to shave some weight, and will be using an OEM Aluminum spindle with some custom control arms, gonna start playing with that tomorrow, as well as the rearend setup a little as well.

This rust is becoming a huge pain, finding all of it is annoying, also looking to take the tub somewhere to have it blasted, am extremely open to suggestions here.

Some pictarz, but not any huge progress.

Mostly bare tub:



Subframe, with rusted non removable bolts I have to cut out:
http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-[img]snc4/hs222.snc4/38444_10100324914171274_8356319_65644067_1484223_n .jpg[/img]

Will hopefully get some more progress made tomorrow. 'Tis coming along though.

[mikespeed95]

Didn't get much done today.

Went to Woodlands with my friend Garrett, wound up doing this:


I got to take the controls a couple seconds after this picture, and I really wanna learn how to fly. Its friggin cool.

Spent the hour I was at the shop trying to remove 3 bolts that were stuck in the LCA's. Big hammer? Nope. Sawzall? Nope. Had to get pretty creative but eventually got the bolts out of the way and got the LCA's off. Gotta be up early in the morning so called it a night pretty early. Madman Derrick is still at the shop working on his super-overcomplicated headers for his silly little woman car.

Derrick is awesome, and had these laying around, which will wind up on the Camaro. OEM Aluminum Spindles, win. These are everything I could want designwise, and they're an OEM application. Win!


Gonna redrille the Vette hubs to 5x114 so I can fit my large quantity of Foose wheels off the 240 on here since they're awesome and free, then we're gonna start mocking up suspension stuffs. Plan is to run a 18x8 with a 225/235 up front and absolutely no smaller than a 275 out back. I'd like to run a 235/305+ stagger but theres no way I could afford tires for the thing as is, so I'll just run 275's for now.

Small progress. Not much, but progress none the less.

I also ate steak fingers at Wings N More today. +20 American points for me. STEAK FINGERS.

[coolwelder62]

Look's good.Keep postin the photo's. My 72 is in about the shame state as your's

[Ravenous70]

subscribing to this one

[mikespeed95]

Got some progress made tonight.

Cut rust out with the plasma, now to get it blasted, and start patching.



Also had to cut some access panels to get the front leaf braket's locknuts, which were just spinning inside the unibody. Finally got it out, check out this cutting edge technology right here. 40 Year old rusty nuts kept getting caught in my sockets though was kinda annoying





And here's where we're at. Not one bolt left on the unibody. Need to blast/prime this thing, kinda wanna dip it but don't know where to go.



Gotta lot of work ahead here. Movin' along slowly but surely.