'66 Le Mans...keeping the Pontiac Spirit alive

[PBarkley]

Not a majorly huge update, but it appears that we (my wife and I, that is) are going to be homeowners soon...which prompted me to get the car back on the ground ASAP! I tossed the rear axles back in without the diff (gotta love the BOP axles...just bolt them to the brake assemblies and they're secure). I gotta have it ready to move since we close in less than 3 weeks!

If anyone reading this ever frequents Roebling Road Raceway outside of Savannah, GA...you better lemme know if you're in town! I'm going to be living very close to the track!

Also, snatched this up from a close friend...


Brand new, never been installed...and for a third of the regular price.

[PBarkley]

Well, I've been busy...but not exactly with the car.

Finally bought a home! The car hasn't moved down here with me yet, but in due time...gotta get a handle on the yard and other things first.



Now for the cool part...I have a constant source of motivation:



Yes...this is a screenshot of Google Earth as it overlooks Roebling Road Raceway. However, my house is also in this same screenshot. If you think the UPS guy showing up at your house is exciting, you have no idea how it feels when you're in the garage as you hear a Daytona Prototype banging through the gears during a private test day on the other side of the treeline.

Best of all, my wife actually thinks its cool.

[77LT]

Welcome to Savannah, GA, I live here as well. I know a guy that lives adjacent track as well and has a super cool 1950 Studebaker Champion street rod. You know the one with bullet nose. Enjoy the Pontiac and the warm weather!
Todd

[PBarkley]

^ I appreciate it! I'd be interested to see the Studebaker!

[PBarkley]

I almost feel bad crawling back here to do an update since it's been so long...once spring semester rolled around, it's been non-stop for me between yardwork, married life, school, work, and the car.

I honestly forgot where I left off, so I'll try to pick back up at a reasonable spot.

Finally got around to trimming the inner fenders on the car so the 275's fit, I'm sure it'll have to get a little more taken off since the rear end may have some lateral sway, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it. For now, I just wanted to get the tires clear.


This pic really makes me rethink having 17's all the way around...kinda leaning towards 18's out back with a taller tire, but I'll wait until the engine is in the car with the front fenders on before I make my final judgement.


Ordered a bulk amount of loom clamps from Del City. I doubt I'll use them all in this build, but I still want them for the next car, regardless of what it is.


Terminal stack-up similar to how we assemble them in the aerospace industry...


Fuel feed(-6AN) and return (-4AN), more on that in the next pic...


Nicely tucked into the frame rail, third clamp is for the brake line. For now, I'm going with a -6AN feed since I'm rebuilding the 326 to go back into it. When I finish the 400, I'll probably be stepping up to a -10AN feed, and at that point I'll go hardline on the fuel feed which will be an almost identical outside diameter to the stainless braided line. Fuel return will likely stay at -4AN.


Striking a pose before the engine teardown began...and to give y'all a sense of how small of a garage I'm building this thing in, haha.


The only real victim of the 326 teardown...front timing cover. Corroded from the inside-out, took a 5 lb sledgehammer to get it off since the bolt was spinning, but corroded to the housing. If I could've gotten the crank out, I would've just spun the entire timing cover off, but that wasn't gonna happen, so I had to get violent on it.


I took all of the engine parts to Simon's Balancing & Machine in Charleston, SC. My Uncle Pete trusted them with all of his engine work before I was even born, so they were the ones who got my business, and will continue to. Boss Dawg inspecting everything on it's return from machining...


Turns out the 326 had already been rebuilt once 0.040" over, and it unfortunately had some inconsistencies and I had to step it up to 0.060". At this point, CID is 336 and it has a nearly square bore x stroke. 3.750 stroke and 3.800 bore.


Connecting rods were inspected and deemed worthy of being re-used, fresh OEM spec slugs and pins with ARP rod bolts.


Luckily the crank came out not needing any major work. Polishing on the main journals and the rod journals had to be ground to 0.030" under.


Went through and checked all my clearances, everything came out to an acceptable spec. Rod journals were a little tighter than I'd like them to be for a street engine, but the mains were spot on. But, she turns smooth and consistently which is the important thing. Boss Dawg making sure I'm working hard...


Rotating assembly complete with camshaft and timing set installed...


Speaking of the camshaft...I probably went a little more aggressive than I should have, but since it's a 326 it was never going to be fast so it might as well at least sound like it goes fast, haha.


Continued in the next post...

[PBarkley]

Ditched the 8.5:1 comp #92 heads and went with some #46 62cc heads that my friend had leftover from his Poncho build that never took off. From my understanding, these should raise compression to 10.0:1. The only downside to these heads are the pressed in rocker studs...I've got a set of threaded studs on standby, but I'm honestly not sure if I'm gonna need them right now. I plan on keeping the factory rocker ratio.


Dual valvesprings, fresh parts all around.


So for now, the short block will be the original 326, and the top end and front of the engine will be updated to factory '69+ 400 standards. I'll be using an OEM 400/455 4 barrel manifold with a 750cfm Quadrajet. I'm saving the Edelbrock manifold for the 400 build later on.

Which brings us to the transmission...originally planned on going with a 700R4, but I had a co-worker basically give me a Pontiac TH350 from a Firebird. Turns out it was in fantastic shape, but as with everything else on this car, I wanted to go through it to make sure it was going to be safe to operate.

Mid-teardown...




And awhile later, after everything was completely cleaned, fresh frictions and shift kit installed, all reassembled and ready to go (aside from paint, haha.)


*WHEW* I think that brings me up to speed on updating this thread...like I said in the last post, once we moved in it was non-stop around here. I've basically been watching the UPS guy drop off boxes and then they get moved to the garage and sit until I had a block of time to knock it all out. But, having the parts at the machine shop while I was in school was a great move on my part, and when the spring and summer semesters were over, I had about a month to put EVERYTHING together, and I somehow made it happen. Unfortunately, fall semester starts on Monday so I'm sure it'll be awhile before I get to work on it again.

[WSSix]

Looking good, Peter. Good luck with the car and the coming semester.