Jakes (1995Quad4SE) '95 Grand Am (56K beware)

[1995Quad4SE]

Here are some pics I took a couple weeks ago. The car is two toned Factory Purpleish/burgundy and toasted marshmellow by the MN & ND DOT (if you can tell my the paint code I will worship you, since there are 2 colors almost identicle and i can't decifer which is which).

That snow pile didn't get there by hand. Part DD, racecar, and snowplow

These are from the summer 2010.

My J-body HVAC knobs. Cavalier are black and Sunfire are grey like the rest of the dash so i though black lookd better and all the grey ones I got were dirty past the point of cleaning so I cleared some and will be snading the edges to smooth them out then installing in place of the black ones.

I have aquired a number of G5/6 arrow heads (what other cars do these come on im still researching but I think any new model after about '04 had this style arrow). However I can't find a location to put them on 4th gen GAs (they fit perfectly on the bumper of 5th gens). I've also picked up some vinyl that I am starting to work with and since the black one in the pic had pink lines mixed with the red I covered it with vinyl by hand. I think i have 5 of these emblems currently.

My motor is insanely dirty as I'm too chicken to pressure wash clean it for fear of destroying electronics. Though I hope to give it a go this summer and after a good 10 washes it should look like new again I painted and polished my IDI cover and there is an Air Hog drop in filter in the stock airbox. I know its not K&N but when you look at the price of $45 for the K&N and I only paid $5.12 for the Air Hog (coincidently $5 cheaper than a factory replacement and mine was rotting through) it was well worth not getting the .1257498372HP that the K&N would give me over this. I noticed it made the intake fairly louder however once I remove the silencer and the ripple tube for some 3" pipe connecting to the stock airbox it should be alot better. I have taken some brash brushes with some dishsoap water and cleaned up the timing cover, intake manifold, as well as the cam covers so those aren't black anymore for the most part.

I was bored one day as I was attempting to black out my chrome molding strip right above the "ribs" in the side panels with vinyl electrical tape (which is a PITA BTW due to the tape being 3/4" and the chrome molding being 1/2"). Anyways I looked at my headlights and decided to go to town. I've always liked eyebrows but I was woried about loosing light with them so I took the cheap way out to see if I liked it instead of the hours of removing, taping, & painting I just mocked it up with the electrical tape. I loved it and I think it actually helped direct my light more on the road because alot of light was lost through the top of the housing. So I will be keeping it there untill spring when I can remove my housings or buy some new ones (im looking into a retrofit so to keep my car a DD i need a spare set of housings to build on) I will be painting it black in the same place as the tape is now.

I found a place locally selling universal replacement antenna so I found a shorty rubber one for $5. I also have one from the CB radio I had in my old '93 SE 3300, its got the chrome base but the reception is horrible so I rarely use it.

One day while searching craigslist I found a guy selling a set of pontiac 14' wheels for $20 but the tires were shot so I made the call to my uncle who lived about 15 blocks from him in Brainerd and he wen't to pick them up for me. My plan was to strip them fully then paint all black with a chrome lip but I think I've scraped the idea and depending on my ability to get more than the $35 total i've invested into them including the purchase price and the supplies to strip them from a scrap yard they will be gone in hopes of finding a cleaner set of wheels from a Z24 or a crazy deal on CL for some black 5-6 spokes. I need tires by next fall so hopefully I can find some by then. Anything is better than steelies and hubcaps but i'l stick wth them for now. My dad and I were having difficulties taking the rubber off the bead so we got a little creative as you can see in the video below. It works the best with air in the tire but if you let it sit for a min or two it slowly falls off the bead and pops right off. The one I didn't get on camera had air in it and as soon as the truck got half way up the board it poped off like nothing.

This first picture is from about 2 years ago of the girlfriends '03 Monte Carlo LS. Then the second is of this summer.

I think thats all for now. I'll update in due time with more and more pictures as the time comes along.

[[ChaosweaveR]]

HELLASTOCK

Looks good for it's age. Don't be like the other 4th gen ricers and try and ram Civic headlights in the front. An actual retrofit with projectors will work so much better, since HIDs are worth the trouble.

Doesn't Eibach make drop springs for the 4th gen? The 4x4 status needs to go.

So much potential with the older Quad4 motors. And I always lol at LD9 owners that call it a Quad4.

[1995Quad4SE]

' date='Jan 20 2011, 03:56 PM' post='46893']

HELLASTOCK

Looks good for it's age. Don't be like the other 4th gen ricers and try and ram Civic headlights in the front. An actual retrofit with projectors will work so much better, since HIDs are worth the trouble.

Doesn't Eibach make drop springs for the 4th gen? The 4x4 status needs to go.

So much potential with the older Quad4 motors. And I always lol at LD9 owners that call it a Quad4.

It looked great untill late into the summer the fender under the gas fill started bubbling and is now weeks from poping through the paint. Its solid metal under so minor work needed to fix that. Then the other fender just decided to chip about a 1x2" peice of paint off but only the bottom sliver is surface rust the rest is showing bare metal. It will hopefully be fixed this summer.

There are 2-3 different spring kits made for the car but my first priority is finding something for a rear sway bar and a 30mm front, then well see about a drop. MN winters can be rough on a droped car.

I at LD9ers like that too. Take pride in what you have don't pretend to have something better. I'm hoping to someday either trade for a 92-94 GT HO or else swap in a 94 or older HO and a 5 speed since the 95s have balance shafts. Everything can be done the same but you loose like 15hp just from those. Bare minimum is a HO exhaust manifold with 2.25" exhaust and a 086 head with HO cams and a custom tune. Should raise me from the 150CHP to something that will get the tires spinning on a take off.

[[ChaosweaveR]]

Ah, nice to see you having actual mods in store, not just the usual "OMG I WANT SUBZ, LIGHTZ AND RIMZ LOL"

Gawd...I hate other GA owners sometimes. I'm on GAGT.com, most of them have taste and common sense, but GAOC just makes me shake my head. You'll have fun over here.

[Ringo64]

Agreed, it looks VERY good for its age!

[Jedi3]

Good looking car

[1995Quad4SE]

I did forget to mention that every panel on the car is potentially considered totaled by the insurance because there is an average of about 2 quarter size hail dents. Can't tell unless your looking for them but i continue to find more after owning the car since June 8th '08

[Ringo64]

Wow that's crazy

[markpetersonii]

Looks pretty dang good for being "totaled" lol

[1995Quad4SE]

Looks pretty dang good for being "totaled" lol

Thanks. Glad to hear everyone thinks it looks great for its year. I'll try to get some closeups of some dings and count how many I can find. However its double digit bellow zero with -30 to -40 wind chills so it might take a day or two.

[nix912001]

I did forget to mention that every panel on the car is potentially considered totaled by the insurance because there is an average of about 2 quarter size hail dents. Can't tell unless your looking for them but i continue to find more after owning the car since June 8th '08

Being that im an autobody major i noticed some of the dents in the pics. and if i had the car in front of me i could tell you what the paint code is. have you tried looking for the paint code on the car? it should be in the glove box or on the tag on the inside of the drivers door most likely. if all else fails any respectable body shop should be able to tell you

[[ChaosweaveR]]

With the GA, I believe it's in the glovebox or under the spare tire cover.

[1995Quad4SE]

i've ran my vin in the compnine vin decoder but all i get is the 3 letter paint code and it was the same code for different colors for all different years. I'll see if i can get numbers for you.

[valid]

She looks great! Has she always been a MN car? I'm delightfully surprised by her conditions especially since you have only had her a couple years. My roommate's car has hail damage on the roof but you really can't tell unless you get up close and personal. It's ultimately only cosmetic and as long as you love the car it doesn't matter! (Though if my car managed to get any hail damage I think I would die.)

[Mariachi]

not bad man. keep away from the rice. it definitely is good looking for its age.

[Jean-Seb]

Looks pretty good. Reminds me of simpler times, when mine was a SE.

(well it will always be a SE, but just sayin' lol).