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FBIRD69's 1969 Firebird

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1963 Grand Prix


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Got the new (to me) hinges today. It'll be a couple of days before I can play with her though. Gotta get the Delta prepped for paint this weekend.

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Well I've got almost both sides of the GP in skim coat and sanded flat. Decided to work on the hood some more. Got the truck all set up to use as a press again and pressed the hood down 3/8". Let the weight sit on the hood for about 5min. When I released the with the hood sprang back up. Maybe 1/16th of an inch difference but that's arguable. My son and I set the hood back on the car anyways justa to look at it and see if maybe we could see any change. Nope, none. When taking the hood back off I noticed what looks like rub marks on the fresh epoxy primer (first 3 pics). So I sprayed the underside of the hood with black paint in that area, yeah I know flat black primer and gloss black marker paint. :lol: It's what I had handy. In the last picture you can see paint transfer from the hood to that part of the cowl or upper firewall or whatever the proper name for that spot on the car is. Also, after seeing these marks I check the driver's side, yup its rubbing on both sides. So, my thoughts are to tap it lip down and see if the back of the hood goes down any. If the hood is still warped I may justa need to locate another one as this one pops back up every time I flex it down.

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Edited by Wrongway
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Thought the back was fine, so I went back to look at your pics.

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Back edge against the cowl looks perfect. Door gap is good. LIL high at the top.  I was thinking before maybe you should add a shim and raise the front.  What kind of shim material are you using to press the hood with the truck?  Know you were trying to use a 2X4.  If it pops back you need to go 1/4 in at a time farther.  Put something 1/4in under the middle of what you need to straighten. Continue to use the long 2x4 on top.  Justa go lil at a time at this point you have nothing to loose. Esp if you have an eye out for another hood.  Are you using the new hinges?

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Your 100% right Justa, the hood to cowl fit does look good. I hadn't thought about that. As far as adding a shim to raise the front, I have a 1/8" shim at the back corners of the fender to cowl. No shims at the 2 bolts going from the middle of the fender to the inner fender and 3  1/8" thick fender washers at the radiator support to raise the front. For the press set up its exactly the same except I switched to a short 2x4 instead of the long one. The one I used this time is about 18" long. I have those new or rather rebuilt hinges I justa bought but I have not installed them yet. I figured that without hinges the hood should lay flat. Am I wrong? Do the hinges actually pull down? Excuse the dirt and dust I've been doing a lot of sanding on her.IMG_3640.thumb.jpg.6b82b691c5d767cc624eaa988cd7e3c5.jpgIMG_3641.thumb.jpg.cbf66aebbd3bb26451bca868675d51ff.jpg

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1 hour ago, Wrongway said:

Yeah bro, it justa won't flatten out and stay flat. I'll try the new hinges tomorrow and see what happens.

Hmmmm , that won’t be the skin 

it will be the support 

Keep trying mate  it’s good steel. 
it will move 

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Since its too cold now for body and paint work, I want to go back and tackle what I think might be an issue. Back after the test drive I had said that Rosey (my GP) felt "under powered". Like there should be more punch when leaving from a stop. Kind feels like a power wheelchair right now. We messed with the timing and everything else. Not much changed. During the past few months that's been in the back of my head' and I got thinking a couple of weeks ago, torque converter. So, when I had the 400 turbo rebuilt, I told the owner of the shop that I didn't want a big stall. Because it was a pretty close to a factory build. Now I'm thinking that the stall is too low for my motor/trans/weight of car combo. Its leaving around 1100-1200 rpm. From what I've seen using the online calculators I should have a stall between 1800-2200rpm and the higher (2200) the better. 428 bored 30 over, TH400 fresh rebuild, 323 gears in the rear end (I believe). If I'm going to change the converter, I would like to do it before paint goes on her this spring and have time to drive her around a bit and work out the bugs before trying to make Woodward this year. 

Second question, if I do change the converter, I'm going to pull the motor out. I painted the motor during the build, but she got hot, real hot and turned the paint brown, remember, I was the genius that painted my engine white. Does anybody know of a way to strip the paint off of an engine while on a stand that does not involve total disassembly?

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I waay agree on the converter.   Your the painter, scuff best you can N repaint with engine HOT paint.  You would never get a chem stripper off totally with all the sand imperfections in the castings.  Paint would peel back off.  That said, you wouldn't get all the old paint off the casting.  I LOVE my Dremel tool with a LIL wire wheel, if ya wanna go the hard way.  So happy to hear your gonna try to make the DC this year!!  AWESOME.  Keep in touch and we will try to get you in with our Pontiac Widetrackers so we can park together and hang out.  Great news.

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Yeah bro, I did use a high temp paint :lol:. VHT Engine Enamels SP129 to be exact. But during break in I was sitting behind the wheel watching the gauges and my son who was 8 or 9 at the time was sitting about 8' away in front watching for leaks and got distracted by a butterfly or god knows what. By the time I seen smoke, shut her down and got out it was already too late. Turns out the petcock on the radiator was wide open. My fault, guess it was clogged and blew out when it got hot. But its looked like crap ever since. Dremel is a great idea, I also planned on using an air scaler. Justa didn't know if yall might have a new trick :lol:.

So, you think 2200 should be ok?

Yeah, I was going to wait until the DC got closer to mention it to yall. But I was in Novi last week for a Dr appt (justa a quick overnight trip) and reserved room already. Lord willing and the creeks don't rise my son and I will be there in August bro.

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8 hours ago, Wrongway said:

Yeah bro, I did use a high temp paint :lol:. VHT Engine Enamels SP129 to be exact. But during break in I was sitting behind the wheel watching the gauges and my son who was 8 or 9 at the time was sitting about 8' away in front watching for leaks and got distracted by a butterfly or god knows what. By the time I seen smoke, shut her down and got out it was already too late. Turns out the petcock on the radiator was wide open. My fault, guess it was clogged and blew out when it got hot. But its looked like crap ever since. Dremel is a great idea, I also planned on using an air scaler. Justa didn't know if yall might have a new trick :lol:.

So, you think 2200 should be ok?

Yeah, I was going to wait until the DC got closer to mention it to yall. But I was in Novi last week for a Dr appt (justa a quick overnight trip) and reserved room already. Lord willing and the creeks don't rise my son and I will be there in August bro.

Gees if chad is good To be at next years Woodward , I think it would be great timing for me and Pete to be there too !!!!

Pete !!! What’s your thoughts ? Can you do it ? Ask your boss and I will ask mine !👍

Chad . Easy way to clean the block …. Sand blast it . Easy to do , justA plug anything you don’t want the sand to get into … thats how I cleaned up my 389 . 
I have a basic hand gun the sucks out of a bucket. And have my compressor up at max volume 👍

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It would be awesome if we could all meet up bro.

Sand blast an assembled engine, man your brave brother! I'd be afraid that I would end up with a block full of sand :rofl: but that may be the way I have to go. It really needs to be removed before painting again.

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7 minutes ago, Fitzy said:

Ask my Boss??? Screw that. I go where i want to go, and when. I'm a little concerned at what it's gonna cost but what the hey, keep me informed. I'm easily swayed.

We're going to Hooters and a lobster shack, aren't we?

Hell yeah ! And if we get time we can go do some car stuff :rofl:

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5 hours ago, JUSTA6 said:

Wire wheel on drill and Dremel for the tight spots.  I like Chris's idea of the blaster. I have the same setup.  Most everything I can pickup is wheeled on my bench grinder.  

Meeeee toooo ! 
my old wire wheel was my dads … I used it when I was a kid ! 
now it’s in my bench . It’s a belt drive to a really old motor !!!

the sand blaster justA nakes life super easy and quick :cheers:

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Thanks for the input guys. Gonna see if Summit or Jegs runs any kind of Christmas sale and get the converter put it after the first of the year. Ill repaint the engine then.

Yeah, it would be awesome if this comes together. Like I said, I've got a room reserved already, it's in Novi but trying to get down around Berkley/Royal Oak area is almost impossible. If you do find a decent place, they want a small fortune for that weekend. But I do have plans of being there.

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So I'm trying to get a few parts together before it turns warm and need some advice. Along with the torque convertor I would like to swap the rear end gears. How much of a difference is there between 3.73 and 3.90? My thought was 3.90 would be better in town but I'm concerned about driving on the interstate. I had 3.73 in the Impala years ago with a TH400 and didn't have an issue. I'm thinking, I may need to go back to 3.73. I plan on this car being daily driven, mostly around town. The only real interstate driving will be trips from Kentucy to Detroit every now and then.

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So apparently there is only 200rpm deference between 3.73 & 3.90 gars according to the gear people. But I have a concern. I know there is a difference in BOP parts and chevy. So, when I told him my set up 428/th400 and was looking at 3.73 gears he recommended this set up. My concern is it says Chevy not BOP. Can somebody please confirm that this will work in my 63'.

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