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Pontiac of the Month

J J Web's 1967 Lemans

2024 May
of the Month

B52bombardier1

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Everything posted by B52bombardier1

  1. If nobody chimes in around here, have you looked at Hemmings Motor News or the Bring-A-Trailer web site? Rick
  2. No matter how you decide to finish this, it looks good to me! Rick
  3. Hello, My biggest worry of yesterday was completely unnecessary. The headers fit and easily clear the steering box on the driver's side without any big hammer persuasion. The mockup engine is in straight and level with plenty of clearance for the headers and I now have the luxury of considering if I will install some header heat insulation tape wrap. Rick P.S - Yes, that head has a big chunk of aluminum missing out of the side of it. That is not an optical illusion. I bought the engine that head came on out of a wrecked Yukon and the damaged sheet metal appeared to have missed hitting the head by at least three inches. I think I got that wrong but the junk yard gave me another 862 head for free.
  4. Hello, I picked up my rebuilt engine yesterday after it only being there maybe three weeks - the bill was about $2190 at the machine shop. The two heads got done back in January and I paid $420 for the two. So, $2600 for a completed engine and in only three weeks of shop time ain't bad. The cylinders all got bored .030 inch oversize. The cam got polished and reused. The crankshaft got standard sized rod and main bearings. The con rods, rocker arms and push rods all cleaned up and reused. Got new lifters, trays and a high-volume oil pump. There is a twelve-month, 12,000-mile warranty from 3 May 24 with a 5000 mile break-in period and I'm to use Valvoline 10W-30 conventional oil for the 5000 miles. I can use any oil filter that I want except from Fram. I use mostly a NAPA Gold 7060 filter on my El Camino so that's what this new motor is getting. The first oil change will be at 500 miles. Then I promptly spent $860 on various AC Delco new parts: crank position sensor, cam position sensor, MAP sensor, two knock sensors plus their new harness, eight double platinum 41-962 spark plugs, a new engine coolant temperature sensor and six quarts of Valvoline oil. The pictures are of this freshly rebuilt engine and I spent a good bit of today putting some of these new things in and on. I had to go to the junk yard to get some bolts for the combined power steering pump and alternator bracket - the bolts didn't come with my engine. I also picked up a clean new appearing alternator for about $32.00 and a mass airflow sensor for $13.00 for this engine. My set of stainless steel headers also arrived earlier this week and I hung both sides on the rebuilt motor this afternoon. This was EBay item number 285058740603 for $119.00 for S-10 truck LS engine swaps and for the price, I am impressed. The metal appears to be high quality and the welds are solid. The flanges are strong and the kit included manifold gaskets plus two flanged pipe extensions that are already fitted with bungs for oxygen sensors. These headers fit close to the engine but I'm still concerned that the driver's side flange will hit the Catalina steering box. I am going to move that header to my other engine and set the motor back in to check the fit . . . I think it'll be good. If it's not, the guy that did my El Camino custom exhaust installation is a wizard with pipe. I will see what he can do to slightly modify the collector end of that header to get me some clearance. The dipstick location in this motor is on the passenger side and the stick has no trouble with the headers. The only other thing about the headers is that the middle two spark plugs on each side will need a very thin-walled 16 MM swivel socket to install and remove those mid-engine spark plugs. At least I won't have to drop the headers loose to change spark plugs but in reality, these are likely the last spark plugs this motor will ever need - fingers crossed. If needed, I might try some gentle persuasion to get the flange moved to the right a little. And lastly, these middle engine header pipes won't allow a standard LS engine spark plug connector fit over a spark plug. They make skinnier spark plug wires without the metal cans around the rubber insulation that will work. I've also ordered some additional spark plug wire heat protection sheaths. It won't be very long before I will need a starter battery for this engine. Rick
  5. Hello, My desired angles on the front-to-back tilt of the LS engine are looking very achievable. I've got some easy plus / minus three degrees or so to accommodate the fit of the transmission into the tunnel and towards the differential. The AC compressor and bracket will also be no problem - good clearance. And though I've only eyeball estimated the fit of the power steering pump / alternator bracket assembly, their fit looks plenty good. I got the call from the machine shop about my rebuilt engine today - it will be finished tomorrow. The cylinders got bored .030 inch over. They polished the cam and reused it. The crankshaft, con rods, rocker arms and push rods all got reused and the crank still only needed standard main and rod bearings. The motor got new lifters, trays and a high-volume oil pump plus timing chain and gears. The motor got ARP racing head bolts and will get ARP exhaust manifold bolts. They want me to run Valvoline 10W-30 conventional oil for the break-in and no synthetics until 5000 miles so that the rings will seat properly. I am to disable the fuel pump for at least twenty seconds and pre-lube the engine through cranking it - they have no worries about wiping the assembly lube off of the internal spinning masses. My trouble with all of this?? It's raining cats and dogs here and I won't be able to drop the engine off into the space where the Catalina is getting worked on. The workspace is in a detached building and with the rain, the ground is soft. This is Louisiana and even when its not raining, you can walk across the yard wearing golf shoes and hit water . . . . almost. I have the very elusive and mysterious (and also very tasty) Louisiana Long-Tailed Water Dogs within a mile of my house. So my wife's car will get kicked out of its garage space until things dry out enough for me to move the engine. Rick
  6. Hello, Still no 4L60E transmission poked into the tunnel but I'm waiting on the arrival of an adjustable engine leveler for my hoist. But I've learned other things this weekend. 1 - the LS engine exhaust manifold will not fit the vehicle on the driver's side - it hits with the flange interfering at the steering box. I could make it fit by moving the entire engine to the rear a little but that will likely cause problems at the transmission tunnel. I'm banking on a tight fitting set of Chevy S10 truck LS engine swap headers to form the basis of the exhaust system. 2 - Likely no problems at all at the front of the motor. I've got plenty of room between the water pump and the radiator. The Cold Case company that built this radiator is backordered for the double fan / shroud kit that gets riveted to the upper and lower radiator frames. But the fan kit will not get close to the water pump. Though I am a little concerned with hood clearance at the upper pipe coming out of the water pump and this might trigger a move to the Camaro style of water pump and accessory drive. The fan and radiator kit in photo #2 is not the radiator that will be used. 3 - I've currently achieved 2.5 inches of clearance between the engine frame crossmember and the forward shallow portion of the oil pan but I will likely reduce that down to two inches or less - for better clearance with the hood at the top of the motor. I also have good clearance at the rear of the crossmember and the deep portion of the oil pan. And good clearance above the steering rod and front sway bar. The truck intake manifold is also tall and I might be looking at needing the much lower car intake manifold to clear the hood. 4 - Transmission tunnel clearance. It's going to be a very close fit. With the engine as far forward as it is, the bulk of the large bell portion of the transmission bellhousing will be out of the tunnel and narrowed down considerably. Hopefully, the tunnel sheet metal won't require any new sheet metal or much "persuasion" to let the transmission ride where it needs to be. It remains to be seen how much passenger side tunnel clearance I will have for the transmission cooler lines. And at this point, I don't care at all how long or short the driveshaft needs to be - it will be all new and custom made anyway. Would it have been easier to put in a Generation Two GM engine to replace the missing Pontiac 400 motor and also reuse the Pontiac TH400 transmission? Perhaps yes. But I'm up to the challenge here . . . its no different than the way I did it with my El Camino. Rick
  7. Hello Ron, The interior is absolutely GORGEOUS. I love the blue vs the black contrast. Very well done!! Rick
  8. Hello, I've got family in town over the next few days so I'm not sure how much serious time on the Cat I will get. But it doesn't stop me from thinking about my next steps. I have decided that I'm not gonna' cut up and shorten the dangling 1/4 inch steel mount plates provided in the mount kit right away. I've got some 1/4 inch by two inch bar stock steel that I'm gonna' cut up into temporary fitment pieces of various, two inch and three inch long trial lengths with holes drilled to experiment with - a plasma cutter would be VERY handy here. Once I'm happy with how these experimental pieces might work to lower the motor - and clear the oil pan from the steering gear and establish a good driveline angle to the differential - I will cut up the frame stands from the ICT Billet kit to the same length and weld those in. Rick
  9. Hello, This is my first attempt at putting the LS 5.3 motor down into the engine bay of the Cat. Plainly, the engine needs to be and can be lowered somewhat and the Holley 302-5 oil pan will still clear the steering track rod. This "Builders Mount Kit" from the ICT Billet company provides a lot of front to rear adjustability and the two dangling steel plates will be trimmed down by me to lower the engine. I will likely cut these plates down in quarter inch or maybe half inch increments to sneak up on a proper fit. And as you might notice, the rear plate on the passenger side of the engine appears to need some notching to clear a brake line. This engine is not the engine that will be used to propel the Catalina. This one is merely a testing and fitment mule. However, once I'm satisfied with the placement and driveline angle of the engine and transmission, these dangling steel plates get welded to the front frame crossmember and the large bolt in each stand gets removed to allow the engine / trans to be lifted out. I'm also now very curious if the original LS engine exhaust manifolds can fit between the frame rails and still bolt up to the heads. Setting a head onto each side of the motor will be my next activity to see if the manifolds will fit. Rick
  10. Hello, My dirtiest, unknown mileage, not running, junk yard 5.3 liter LS motor moves to the machine shop tomorrow for a rebuild. This rebuild will take about a month they say and maybe a little faster because I'm providing a set of 862 casting heads that this shop has already rebuilt - a few months ago. And perhaps about $420 less expensive from the standard $3000 price because these heads are rebuilt. The probably worn out heads on the dirty motor are a 706 casting that various references say are a higher compression head. I don't want to change the PCM operating system tune to support a 706 set of heads in the Catalina because the Cat is a cruiser, not a tire smokin' race car. The 862 heads will be fine and the 706 heads will simply get a good cleaning. I've got one more junk yard 5.3 liter motor that is magnitudes cleaner that I will use for engine mount test fitting while I wait for the dirty motor to be rebuilt. I will hang my almost certainly dead, sixty dollar, junk yard 4L60E transmission off the back of the motor before I lay the whole thing into the engine compartment. This will allow me to get into the bulk of the engine swap to work out proper drive line angles to the differential, floor pan sheet metal clearance, radiator fan clearance, exhaust manifold clearance, drive shaft creation and passenger side engine head clearance with the AC firewall plastic suitcase. As this is a full sized B-body vehicle, I think most of these things will be easier than what I found in my A-Body El Camino. My PSI Conversions LS swap engine harness also arrived today. For durability, I have abandoned the idea of depinning and repinning one of my junk yard harnesses. They were variously mangled, missing connectors, had the wrong connectors or had brittle insulation. I'm about 49 percent disappointed with myself here for not at least trying. The upside of the PSI Conversions harness is that it is built with extra wire length to move the PCM into the passenger compartment - maybe on top of the glove box under the dash cover. Rick
  11. No emergency brake for a while? Do you park in steeply inclined areas where an e-brake might be helpful? Rick
  12. The wiring diagram should reveal what the colors / stripes were for the radio - find those and reuse. The fuse panel may also have an "IGN" source that is easily accessible. Rick
  13. Hello, I finally figured out why my Lincoln MIG welder feeds wire some of the time and other times, not at all. If I push the cart far away from where I'm welding, it feeds wire. If the cart is up close, it does not feed. Apparently, having the welding gas hose with the wire in it coiled up in any way along the path to the work lead makes the wire not feed - the feed motor can't overcome the push resistance. If I weld with the cart moved farther away and the hose straight to where I'm welding, it works fine. This quarter panel job on the Catalina is finished though it could use another coat of high build primer. Rick
  14. Your car is getting there!! Rick
  15. Hello Again, I'm way too slow creating these small sheet metal patch panels to ever make a living at it but I think this one turned out very nicely. I must have made twenty five trips from the car to the electric grinder slowly making the patch smaller so that it would fit the hole and I still need to sand off the green paint around the edge with the Roll Lock disk. And then fight with my MIG welder for making the wire feed. Rick
  16. Hello, As promised . . . pictures from today. I will try to create the small patch panel in some 18 gauge cold rolled, ungalvanized sheet metal tomorrow - using tape as the template. I have already shot the inner fender sheet metal with a rust converting paint and I will remove the original metallic green paint from the edges of the hole tomorrow with a Roll Lock disk. The trouble I face is that my wire feed Lincoln MIG welder is a little bodgy on actually feeding the wire. I've got plenty of argon / CO2 but the wire stops. If the wire feeds, it'll be short burns of very hot welding to tack the new piece . . . makes for less warping of the old and new metal. This is a very uncomplicated patch panel to make and the weld beads will promptly get sanded down to a flat contour with the original quarter panel. And then get shot with some self etching primer. Pictures tomorrow if I can get it done. Rick
  17. Yea, the James Gang. Joe Walsh the guitarist was in that band. Rick
  18. Hello Frosty, I established a very good, temporary ground at the firewall sheet metal with great continuity but yes, all of the original engine compartment grounds are gone - there's no engine or transmission or battery or alternator. I've come to the conclusion that the portion of the fuse panel that is exposed to the engine compartment is my problem and as of late this morning, I have ordered an all new engine harness - that includes a new plastic fuse panel square block at the firewall. Plus all new wires, of course. The old harness was beat up with brittle insulation and the car needed this harness all new anyway. I have ordered it from Ames but they don't make them or stock these harness assemblies. They are contracted for production with M&H Electric and this company has a very good reputation but I won't see it until at least three months from now. I have plenty of other things to do on the Cat. I picked up the cutoff wheel earlier this afternoon and cut out the rusty metal behind the driver's rear wheel. The wheel arch stainless trim had to come off to make the cuts and I had to remove the rear wheel to do that. So then I picked up a big hammer and tapped the brake drum off - I think the wheel cylinder leaks -- will be replaced anyway. I will try to post a few pictures later tonight. Rick
  19. Hello, With a good bit of cheating, I have been able to apply 13.8 volts DC to an internal connection within the guts of the fuse panel. All of the rear vehicle lighting works - brake lights, tail lights, turn signals, flashers and the passenger compartment courtesy lights / glove box light also function. All of the wiring at the front of the vehicle AC / heat and wipers is disconnected by me. Oddly, the ignition key won't go to the Accessory notch. And the radio wiring was cut by a previous owner with the connector nowhere to be found. But I'm cheating. I still can't get power past a certain point along a main fat red wire and corrosion does not appear to be the problem. Still head scratchin' and staring at the wiring diagram a lot. But it appears that at least some of the 54 year old wiring is in good condition. Rick
  20. Are the original high impedance speakers in the car still operational? The people at Crutchfield can help you with your impedance mismatch but you might need to buy all new high impedance speakers. https://www.crutchfield.com/S-iPWbpWifxCk/ Rick
  21. The use of today's new, modern two ohm low impedance speakers will FRY / BROIL / KILL (!!!!) the output transistor in your old school Pontiac radio. The final amplifier in your old Pontiac radio expects to see a high impedance 8-10 ohm load. A two ohm speaker load "appears" as a near short and will flow too much current. And POOF!!! There goes your output transistor. Off for repairs your radio will then go. Also, don't be surprised that the dielectric paste in your electrolytic capacitors within the radio has dried out. It happens after this many years and usually results in poor receiver sensitivity even with an excellent antenna. Rick
  22. Hello, I have declared the main floor and the trunk floor complete for rust repairs and the application of sound deadening. Now I can lay under the driver's side dash in relative comfort and try to figure out my almost complete lack of 12 volts in the passenger compartment. Its some kind of problem at the fuse panel. The silver stuff is the aluminized adhesive rubber but the trunk floor and main floor both got a heavy coat of the "SprayMax 2K Glamour" high gloss and high film thickness clear coat before laying down the rubber. The floors got the spray last night on top of the Lizard Skin and the clear dried very nicely overnight. This is the rattle can stuff with an internal breakable ampule of hardener activator that makes the cured spray very hard and durable. This clear also makes for a surface that the adhesive on the rubber can really bond to. This same kind of aluminized rubber is in my 70 El Camino on the floor and the roof and hasn't moved a millimeter in five years or so. The trunk floor will also have some kind of cloth cover to protect it much like it originally had but that cover from the factory in 1970 was dirty, rust stained and destroyed. I might do the splatter paint in the trunk but its expensive and apparently there is a trick to applying it correctly. The idea here of applying the aluminized rubber is to give the sheet metal additional mass to force the metal into a lower resonant vibration frequency. If it still vibrates, it'll be at a less obnoxious frequency. A heavier sheet of metal also needs more energy to force it into vibrating. Covering every square inch of metal is not required and it is not the intention that this provides much protection against heat or cold in the passenger compartment. Its all about minimizing noise, vibration and harshness from the roadway. The new "mass backing" molded carpet with jute padding is what will do the insulating against cold and heat. Rick
  23. I get it. Its hard to be humble when you have the body of a Greek god such that I have . . . . . . . . . . . not. Rick
  24. Gimme a vector, Victor!! Hilarious movie. Rick
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