She's Alive!

[Noggin]

First attempt at starting this car in nearly a decade:
http://www.projectfirebird.com/files/combustion.mpg

Actually, not the first attempt, the first attempt resulted in having to reconnect a wire to the coil so I guess that was actually the second. If you listen carefully you'll hear a tapping/popping sound, thats a broken exhaust pipe. That engine sounds sooooo good to me, and its only running on 7 cylinders there, but that problem was fixed the next day as well as the fuel problem.

Next stop... Brakes! Or transmission, not sure yet....

Quick Stats:

• 1968 Pontiac Firebird Convertible
• 455 Engine
• Tri-Power intake off of a 389 GTO
• 4 Speed transmission
• Heads shaved 15 thousandths
• Cams... don't know what kind though

[wolfdogs]

seeing you pour the fuel down the venturi of the center carb reminds me of an old true story....

you see...thats not always a good thing to do.

back in 69, after me and an old friend of mine had just installed an Isky RPM 300 racing cam in my 68 SS 396 Chevelle, we connected everything back up...and i sat in the drivers seat with the keys in the ignition ready to go... Gary poured a slight amount of gas into the throat of the Holley 780 with secondary gear drive squirters... and i turned the key... well.......the distributor was 180 off..... she backfired and the flames that came out of the Holley caught Gary's hair on fire.... we got it out...he had second degree burns..and my hood paint was fried only on the bottom of the hood..........

[redws6]

so when is she gonna be done?

[Noggin]

Bah! I screwed up my site last night, my whole page wasn't being displayed so no one could browse the site properly.

Anyway, to answer the question on when she'll be done.... (cliff notes at the end)

Technically the car is my dad's, though he did use the words, "I'll give you the car, I just don't want you to sell it." In a few months the car will be drivable and will require insurance. Its at that time I'll find out if he'll really give me the car then. I just don't have time to work on it except for every other weekend (note the days of the updates).

By the end of the month I want to have the car moving and stopping under its own power. This will require a brake job and at least minimal transmissin work. After that, a new top will be put on the car. Once the top is in place, I'll put in new carpeting. The seats are ratty, but usable and will be recovered eventually... perhaps not long after the carpeting goes in.

The engine, exhaust, and engine bay is dirty and ugly, but the engine runs beautifully under no load. If I assume that the engine is fine and will be strong under a load, then I only have to replace whatever is f.... sorry, messed up in the exhaust.

So, either next weekend or the weekend after (probably the latter) we're going to work on the brakes. When the car was parked, it pulled hard to the right under braking, so it needs some work. Soon after getting the drum brakes working, we'll convert to disc brakes. Transmission shifts, but its rough. We have a bushing kit that need to go in it. IIRC, the transmission used to get stuck in 2nd gear a lot.

Steering pump is leaking, so we've got to pull it out and either reseal it or pay someone local $200 to reseal it. Or get one that is already rebuilt for about $250.

Then comes the long and tedious work of removing rust, cutting out old metal, welding in new metal, making it look like there have been no welds, etc... When completed, we'll paint it probably black or silver.

At this point, the car will be "temporarily finished". What this means is I expect to run out of 'fun money' and will have to begin saving again. I also expect to be almost out of debt and be close to buying a house. Once I own a house, if my father is true to his word and gives me the car I'll have a garage to keep it in. THEN I'll begin working on beautifying the car and working towards a pristine condition.

Cliff notes:
So... brake job, transmission work (hopefully minor), steering gear box, exhaust, new top, new carpet, body work, paint, recover seats. About a year from now (hopefully no more than 1.5 years) I'll buy a house and have a garage where I can tear down the car and do all of the hidden and/or finishing touch stuff like cleaning and painting the frame, painting engine bay, clean carb exteriors, paint engine....

Its going to take a while..

[redws6]

yeh it will take a good amount of time, but do it nice not twice