Hi, my name is Ryland and I'm 16 years old. I'm in the middle of building my first car, a 1957 Pontiac Chieftain Catalina. I got the car with no engine and trans and a floor pan delete kit. Over the year and a half I have had it I have managed to stuff an LS1 5.3 backed up by a rebuilt th350 inside. I'm stoked to get this 68 year old piece of history to a full daily driver. I have had so much fun so far with her and can't wait till I can rip it down the road. If your interested in what's been done to it or have any tips or ideas I'm all ears. I'm so thankful to have this opportunity at this young of an age to get into the world of hot roding. 

P.S. I only race for pinks 

Hello Ryland,

  And welcome to the group.  There are a few of us around here that have LS swapped so if you have any questions, ask. There are no dumb questions.  

Nice car and you will learn a lot from it!!  Start a separate build thread discussion elsewhere on this site and I'm along for the ride with you.

Rick

Welcome, what are your future plans?

Once I get her running and driving good I want to do a full interior and keep the patina look mabey lower it a bit idk. Kinda just do what feels right at the moment 

Well young blood, there is a lot of great people on here. Very knowledgeable people that are willing to share their knowledge and experience and are eager to answer questions and help however they can. If you have any questions, give a shout out and keep us posted on your progress. By the way, we love pictures, so keep them coming.

hi Ryland, what a awsum car to be your first !!! very very cool !!!

get it running and drive it !!!! then work out what you want to do after !!! i see you already have some trick brakes on the front and a master cylinder modification done to the fire wall...

like wrongway said we love pics so ...... tell us a bit more of what you have already done.

i see you have a great workshop to work on her ! and thats the very first thing that helps !!! nothing worse than grovling around outside in the dirt when your learning to build your new toy !! 

Oh and hay !!! tell us the back story ! how did you scored your 57 ? 

Edited May 16, 20251 yr by 64 kiwi boni

I've always been into classic American cars and had been keeping my eye out for a cool old project, I never expected it to be something this old tho! I was really aiming for a 1969 z/28 (my dream car since I was like 6 up to 12) but as I got a little older my dream car morphed into a 50s era car because of the movie Christine. I didn't necessarily have a specific car in mind for that as long as it wasn't a shoebox ford. And in November of 2023 my dad showed me a listing for the Pontiac on marketplace, and both me and my dad fell in love with that car because it was shining with rain water and the patina looked amazing. So we went to look at it and even tho it was dark out I kinda felt a connection to the car, like it was begging for some much needed attention. So we bought it the next week. I'm fortunate to have a shop that I can work in because my dad works on a farm. Since I got it I have swapped out the frame mounted single pot master for a duel pot corvette style and booster, I put in a universal brake pedal, an electric wiper motor, i cut up a 55 chevy stearing wheel and the original 57 pontiac wheel and Frankensteined them with bondo, I replaced the front door windows, put a new ignition in, I took a front disk conversion kit and swapped it out for the old drums, brand new locks, I painted the engine bay and the trunk, I put a new sending unit in the fuel tank, had a th350 rebuilt (my dad had them build it to handle 700 ponies) and built a crossmember for it, I stuck the LS in there with a shorter oil pan and had the cpu tuned, mounted a vintage air heater in it and tossed out the giant bulky factory heater, I got a line lock for it, slapper bars, we still have to do exhaust but the motor and trans needs back in yet, we are gonna strait pipe it with 2 1/2 inch exhaust, I have aftermarket flow master manifolds instead of headers but that'll change within the next year along with some other things I wanna do to it like a bigger cam, bigger injectors, higher stall tourqe converter, wider tires on idk what wheel yet, a posi unit for the rear end cause it's only a one wheel peel right now, and I really want to lower it a little bit. I'm sure I'm missing something so if you have any questions about specifics I can answer them.

Hi there Ryland, welcome to the Poncho land of awesomeness.  It's great to see another '57 join the forum, especially one being built by somebody so young. Please keep up the build updates, which I will follow with much interest.

Nice work on the steering wheel Ryland !!!

we have had many of us, having to rebuild the factory steering wheels !!! its soooooo much fun !!! NOT 

 i can relate to your back story ! the christine movie inspired me too !!! i have  a mopar mate who built a christine, detailed right down to the correct number plate !!

 i too Like Russel have a 57 , mines waiting her turn to get a l98 and 6l80 trans with full corvette front and rear suspension, but it has to wait till i have the 63 wagon going.

 

Thats fantastic that your dad is on hand to help and clearly encourage you ! hope he has lots of tools he happy to let you use ! 👍