1969 Firebird Project - SR71

[Josh69]

I'm continuing this from the project introductions, but at this point, SR71 probably isn't the best moniker. I went with the original Parchment interior and didn't go as far with the monotone scheme as I originally envisioned. In any case, it'll be easier for me to find it this way, LOL!

The car ended up being a bolt-on style car built on a reasonable budget and done mostly by yours truly. I chose the '69 T/A as a source of inspiration and used a few of those styling elements, along with painting the front bumper body colored much like a '70 GTO. It looks infinitely better that way, IMHO. It must not look too dated, I was recently asked if it was a new Challenger....well, let's assume that guy knew NOTHING about cars, HAHA!

[Josh69]

The car came with new quarter skins, one already tacked on so we worked with what we had. The outer wheelhouses were replaced along with the trunk outer dropoffs. The rear valance was partially missing, so we grafted on a '69 Camaro rear which had the added benefit of a more flushed license plate. I used the Camaro fuel door/license plate holder also. I also had the PONTIAC holes welded and covered above the bumper for a cleaner look.

[Josh69]

The original doors were in overall good condition, but needed a patch in each corner. I didn't want to use aftermarket doors if possible because of the thinner metal...or so I'm told. As long as the doors were off, we rebuilt the hinges and made sure everything was cleaned up and coated with epoxy and sealer. I got a good pass. ft fender from Franks Pontiac, and we patched the drivers side on the bottom by the door. We fitted the T/A heat extractors after everything was blocked out and sealed.

[Josh69]

I was really torn on the T/A hood versus the '400' style hood. I felt that the '400' hood was actually a better fit design-wise when used with the T/A fender extractors. They perfectly mimic the '400' scoops, and the T/A hood was just kind of awkward to me. John Haley here in town has a real T/A hood and is making the molds for carbon fiber versions with it...so I may change my tune once I see one of those babies. In any case, with the T/A spoiler and fender extractors some may think it odd to see a '400' hood on there, but that was my line of thinking, fwiw. So I picked up a new '400' hood from Goodmark. I ended up buying two rear spoilers. The first one was twisted, the 2nd one was better...but not by much and took a bit of work to live with. I hear they have an ABS version out, that has to be better than the fiberglass ones.

[NovaBlue71]

Nice project,keep us updated when you get color on it. Joe

[Josh69]

It's already in color Novablue71, I'm just late to the party with the build thread!

In order to make sure everything was fairly square, I replaced the broken rear leafs with DSE's 2" drop leafs and we welded in the Global West tubular subfame connectors and fitted the solid aluminum body bushings before the majority of the bodywork was done. I had to replace all the hardware for the front leaf spring cups, the bolts were turning in the clips. We ended up cutting access holes in the floor then covering those back up. Since the car had to be mobile during the bodywork phase, the drivetrain was left in place.
What started as a quick quarters, prep and paint job, turned into a full blown restoration somehow....still not sure how or when that exact change happened. But I'm pretty sure it was before I spent two weekends in 95F heat in a blasting suit and $500 in blasting materials later underneath the car. Some may say I was committed at that point...others would say I needed to be committed. I was glad I blasted the entire bottom though, we found some pinholes so we welded in new front floorpans. Once everything was sealed and epoxied, we sprayed the bottom satin black.

Here is the car finally in paint, and on it's way home from the painter...I think it was about 8F that day...but I was glad to avoid any salt spray from the winter roads. Trust me, it's not as dull as it looks in the pics...it was covered in dust and my old crappy digital camera, I think 2megapixels was all. The gentleman that did all the bodywork and paint is a neighbor of my parents, and one of the few guys around that still has the patience to do the necessary metal work on these old cars. Speaking of patience, it took a full year to get to this point.

[Josh69]

Along with the DSE 2" drop rear leafs, I went with a set of Hotchkis 2" drop BBC front springs. I probably could've used SBC springs, but figured the Pontiac mill weighed about in the middle of the two. I went for the firmer rate and could probably stand to cut a half a coil out, it sits a little higher in the front than I'd like but still has a bit of rake to it. I chose not to use coilovers because there just isn't enough spring to do the job with these heavy motors. I chose Speed Tech's tubular upper control arms with del-a-lum bushings and performed the Gulstrand mod in conjuction with these. Since I wasn't doing coilovers, I had the original LCA's powdercoated and installed del-a-lum bushings as well. I also used Koni single adjust shocks front and rear. I've had good luck with these in my past BMW's. To round out the front suspension, I picked up a 1-1/8" hollow Hotchkis sway bar.

Since I wasn't thrilled with the design of the Firebird steering linkage, I switched to a Camaro set up and had the center link powdercoated, along with the steering arms. I picked up the complete front end rebuild kit from DSE with all the MOOG goodies, etc. I painted the stock drum spindles with cast iron paint after the local machine shop drilled and threaded them for the Wilwood brackets. I also picked up a reman'd Iroc Z high ratio steering gear from the local parts house and a set of Lee's hose adapters to use the original rebuilt power steering pump.

I got one of the initial sets of 6-piston Wilwoods with the 12.2" rotors from Frank and had them shipped out in Red. I used a matching set of rear 4-piston Wilwoods with the Explorer style E-brake and the Wilwood billet manual master cylinder. I used stainless hard lines from Inline Tubing and braided lines with the Wilwood prop valve, and finished it off with a Lokar E-brake cable set.

[Josh69]

The rearend is a Moser 12 bolt I ordered through Frank as well. It runs a Detroit Tru Trac with 3:73 gears and 30 spline alloy axles with 1/2 studs front and rear. I went with the Torino style big bearings so no need for c-clip eliminators. The housing is narrowed for future expansion to minitubs if desired. It's as narrow as they could go with the spring pad in the stock location. This allowed a deep offset on the American Racing TTII's for that minitub look with a 10" rim. I was able to fit 275's on the 18x10's since we trimmed the quarters when they got welded up. The car has 18x8's up front with 235's and wears BFG KDW2's.

[waynieZ]

Nice job the car looks good.

[Josh69]

Motorvation

When I got the car it had the original 350 and was supposedly rebuilt. It ran, but I drained about 2 gallons of gas/oil out of the pan and knew the bearings were toast. The previous owner kept flooding it in his attempts to move it around the storage areas over his period of ownership.

That brought up an interesting dilemma. It's a Pontiac, so pretty much any displacement block will fit right in it's place. What to do, what to do. A stroked 400 or 455 seemed too easy. I felt somewhat required, or rather, possesed, to do something with the original block since it was still serviceable. About this time Pacific Performance Racing had some cranks made with a 4" stroke and small journal 3" mains. This was a 428 crank essentially. When combined with a 350 block bored .030 it would produce 383 cubes. That seemed like a match made in heaven, and you can imagine the quizzical looks I get when I tell people it's a 383 and they are clearly looking at a Poncho. Ace at PPR just so happened to have built one for High Performance Pontiac magazine. It churned out 462hp and 446ft lbs of torque. More torque than any stock stroke 400 with similar modifications could hope to manage. Since this was a street car with 18" radials, I figured that would fit the bill. I called Ace and had his ultra light balanced rotating assembly sent to me. His motor had a Crower hydraulic roller. I chose to run a Crower hydraulic flat tappet, but had the same essential lift and duration. His heads are fully ported iron 76cc heads. Mine are pocket ported and milled 67cc closed chamber '67 GTO heads I had with big 2.11 and 1.77 stainless valves. As fate would have it, the '69 350 blocks were blessed with valve reliefs on both sides which helps unshroud these monster valves. I don't know what the output is, but it should be in the neighborhood of 450hp. An otherwise completely stock version of the stroker still managed 440ft lbs, so torque is abundant in the little 350 that could.

The machine work and short block assembly was handled by a local machinist I've used frequently and is a big Buick guy, so he understood some of the nuances of properly building a Pontiac.

The specs:
.030 over 1969 354 Pontiac, 3.905 bore
4.00 Tomahawk crank, ultralight forged pistons and rods with ARP bolts
Fully balanced and blueprinted
Stock windage tray and pan
1967 #670 heads, 2.11/1.77 valves with guideplates and 3/8" studs with Crower springs, milled to 67cc
PRW 1.52 roller rockers
Static CR 10.75:1
Crower 292 Hi-Draulic Hauler Cam, (236/242 @ .050) .516/.523 total lift
Tomahawk single plane intake
PPR Aluminum valley cover
Quick Fuel/Pro Form 750cfm dp built by Mark Sullens for E85
RobbMC 550hp Pontiac mechanical fuel pump
PRW aluminum equal flow water pump
R.A.R.E aluminum pulley set, clear powder coated
Professional Products Harmonic Balancer
Hedman 1-3/4 ceramic coated headers

To round out the exhaust I went with Flowmaster's American Thunder system because I like the sound of Flows and I liked the stainless tips. With the rowdy cam and flows, it has just the right amount of attitude. That might be an understatment for some.