68 pontiac lemans convertible

i'm bored so thought i'll post some pics of what i've done to the ponty over the last few years i've owned it and what stage it is now!
i bought it off japanese e-bay through a jap used car importer in nz. it had one jap owner and one owner in florida and also had a japanese equivelent of our w.o.f which mean't it had to be fairly good condition as they are very strict.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...k/P1010151.jpg

it had a little bit of surface rust underneath so i had the complete bottom sandblasted and sprayed with chassis rubberised paint and then stored the original ponty wheels hubcaps and fitted some torgue thrust d's.
drove it around like this for a year until on one of the earlier beachhops with my wife(sober) driving and me an another couple drinking our way around the corromandel coast-we lost brakes (original drums alround)coming down a particulary knarly hill and scared the heck out of her enough that she refused to drive it again.
so i ordered a complete disc front and rear system from classic performance products in usa and fitted that.great kit and included 2"drop spindles which made it look great(got rid of nose high look) but the disc/caliper combo mean't the torque thrust's wouldn't fit back on so went back to original wheel/hubcap combo with new cooper tyres.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/P1020438.jpg

Nice!!! :-)

after another year decided to remove the vintique air con unit that the jap owner had fitted (why???? in a convert??) and put an original heater/blower back in.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC01683.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC01681.jpg
you can see the extra holes drilled in to the firewall unit to let the aircon hoses go thru!

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC01682.jpg
new 2ndhand unit fitted along with associated inside unit.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC01680.jpg

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC01679.jpg
also around the same time fitted a new performer manifold instead of the old one with a 2-4 barrel adapter

after another few years driving it most days ,where the only things i did was replace balljoints and then had too do front a-arm bushes where i found a broken front coil spring so got a local spring maker too make up new set and fitted them.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02266.jpg
you can see broken coil between my fingers.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02264.jpg

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02261.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02259.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02257.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02258.jpg

more driving until while on a family trip to tauranga coming down onto a bridge at speed, the lowered front caught up with us and it bottomed out and split the sump next to the sump plug dumping oil on the road and neccessitating a couple of hours in a local garage using a borrowed hoist and some knead it to get it good enough for us to drive it home.
this was a blessing in disguise as it had been leaking over the garage floor from a rearmain seal for ages and i had been putting it off for years so decided out with mtr to fix sump and replace rear rope seal.i also had a set of headers i had bought awhile ago to fit as well.this shouldn't take long!!!!!!!!!!!!
took the motor out in june last year ready to have it back on road for summer(dec onwards)----yeah na

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02493-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02494-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02490-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02491-Copy.jpg
the new manifold was looking real old so sent it off for acid washing

Nice car My oldest boy had one we put a 396 Chevy in it What a ride

pulled the sump and welded it up and dropped the crank out to do the rear rope seal as we couldn't force it around in place.spot of luck here!!! the bearings were just worn thru into the copper on a couple of mains and one rod so decided to replace all them.left the heads and pistons alone as they looked fine from the bottom and i had enough on my plate without worrying about a full rebuild.time will tell wether that was agood decision!!!
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02518-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02517-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02516-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02520.jpg
this rubber grommet for the pcv in the valley cover was heat-hardened an i couldnt find another one so welded a washer in there to fit a smaller more common chev one

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...02489-Copy.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC01678.jpg

also painted in the engine bay with some black rattle cans and found some 15"ralleys/ caps and new tyres and fitted them.
painted the mtr pontiac blue an refitted it.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02723.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02796.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02797.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02798.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02799.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02807.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02722.jpg

and now we are up to date!!!!!!!
missed summer altogether!!!!!!
i rebuilt the distributor-points worn out and vacuum advance was seized,bought some alloy valve covers and am picking up the 600 holley this afternoon after having it cleaned and rekitted.
hopefully back on the road soon!

Looking good! While you were right there, did you replace the timing chain? Or had it already been done? Pontiacs were notorious for tossin' timing chains.

Nice car and it's cool to see them clear down there! You're doing some great work to it. It looks like you have a nice little collection. I think I saw a Model A, and a 67-72 chevy truck, and then there's the car with stripes. :LOL:

timing chain was replaced along with oil pump etc-water pump was fine.

i do have abit of a collection of vehicles but some of those photos were taken at work where i had a qualified mechanic help me-i'm only a bush mechanic!!!
an the striped one is a hilux wellside-not mine!!

Nice car! Pontiac has always been one of my favorites and the drop tops are at the top of the list!

Those rally wheels definitely look nice on there as well!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by cffisher

Nice car My oldest boy had one we put a 396 Chevy in it What a ride

---

HMMMM that car is it dark green and is it a 396 /375hp. from bay city Mi

well-i'm officially an idiot
put the carb on and found tdc and went thru the static timing process with a test light.all good
made up some leads and followed the firing order 18436572
went to start it -some backfires thru the carb and in the exhaust manifold-hmmmmm-played with the dizzy advancing and retarding it a little bit
no joy.
called on the wife to blip the starter while i had my thumb ova the no1 sparkplug hole and rechecked i was on firing cycle not exhaust-yip 180" out
thats cool-reset the rotor ,still nothing but misfirng and backfiring. damn
ok lets check everything. tdc-yip,rotor in right place for no1-yip, sparkplug out and spark-yip, firing order-18436572-----------and this is where i realized-idiot!!!
pontiac is reverse to sbc and i had automatically put the firing order clockwise not anticlockwise
fixed that and it burst straight into life and i got a timing lite on it and its running well now
BUT------heres where murphy kicked my buttt
frost plug under powrstrg/alt bracket started leaking-bugga!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Murphy must be a female cause that's a b_ _ch!! But at least you got it to fire up and run. And that always brings a smile doesn't it?

Wow! way to bring back memories, My father had a 71 lemans post with the awesome color combo of, turd brown with white vinyl top and dark green interior. I filled the factory 8-track with pennies, good thing he loved me.

Great car, she's a beauty
Godspeed
MrC.

Freeze plugs - brings back the memory of my old '60 Chevy. Noticed a small puddle in the parking lot at NAS Corpus Christi at the end of my shift. None of the "normal" places and seemed to be coming from behind the driver's side motor mount?? Slipped my fingers in the gap, feeling the block surface with a finger tip and badda-bing, the finger slips through the crusty surface, the water goes glug-glug-glug and the system's empty. I learned about copper expandable freeze plugs that afternoon....

Sorry for the hijack, Mark....

As soon as you said 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2, I knew what happened. :) (I had a '68 GTO for many, many years.)

And you can guarantee,,that the plug that leaks,is the most in accessible one on the engine.. It's looking good,Mark.. Hey,,that's another one of your toys,I haven't seen.. ;) Hows the Chevy pickup coming??

hi robin-the chevys been on the road for awhile now-its my daily driver and gets used for all sorts of things.
drove it up to kerikeri, up north to buy a 27 dodge chassis

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...p/DSC02612.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...p/DSC02611.jpg

.

I cant tell you the times, I thought If I had just had a pallet and a mattress, I could haul that on my truck.

Good thinking.
Godspeed
MrC.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sharpmark

hi robin-the chevys been on the road for awhile now-its my daily driver and gets used for all sorts of things.
drove it up to kerikeri, up north to buy a 27 dodge chassis

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...p/DSC02612.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...p/DSC02611.jpg

.

---

Okay,,kool..Looks good..Hey,,I hope ya took a left turn at that intersection... hehe..Might have been an even longer trip home the other way... :) :)
ANOTHER project in the making??

yes-another project for the future-early dodge cowl and doors,chev tourer rear panel,283 or 305 an 3 spd manual, 9" diff----- a little modified but still deciding on single seat or two seater?

well-should have known better.i fixed the leaking frostplug-put it back together and went for a drive.excellant -everything working as it should.so off for a w.o.f next day and then rego and hey presto another one finished
BUT next morning -puddle of water under the car and sure enough - two more frostplugs leaking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
so ---- i'll have too pull the motor again and replace all of them----stupid cars!



parked it in the naughty car corner again and started working on the 28 roadster -more fun on this one

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sharpmark

well-should have known better.i fixed the leaking frostplug-put it back together and went for a drive.excellant -everything working as it should.so off for a w.o.f next day and then rego and hey presto another one finished
BUT next morning -puddle of water under the car and sure enough - two more frostplugs leaking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
so ---- i'll have too pull the motor again and replace all of them----stupid cars!



parked it in the naughty car corner again and started working on the 28 roadster -more fun on this one

---

What?? more leaks?? I suppose you upset things while replacing the other plug.. Hmmm,, Who says they don't have personalities?? Yup,,best place,,in the naughty corner.. :(

Sorry to hear about the freeze plugs starting to leak on ya. That can really kill a mood on a project. :LOL:

well- been awhile but car finally back on the road.
all the frost plugs were toast and were replaced after pulling the motor again.
after driving it around , the only problems left to sort out are front wheels rubbing on bottom corner of guards when halfway thru a turn and the exhaust flanges are abit low.

http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02972.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02957.jpg
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/l...s/DSC02964.jpg

So.....you replaced them with brass ones,Mark?? Or can ya not get brass any more?? ;)
Good to see it back on the street..

used brass ones--crikey ,they are pricey tho. repco wanted $14 each for them but I got them at bnt for $4.95 each. if I hadn't been in a hurry- I should have probably bought a proper kit.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sharpmark

used brass ones--crikey ,they are pricey tho. repco wanted $14 each for them but I got them at bnt for $4.95 each. if I hadn't been in a hurry- I should have probably bought a proper kit.

---

Thieving pricks... Must be why my ol' friend Karl has always called them ''RIPCO'' ;) Sheesh,,just thought,,wonder what we got in the stroker engine that we just picked up from the engine guy... better look,,too late now.. hehehee..

Mark, those old ones look like they're from the days when we used to run pure water in the summer, then dump in a gallon of Prestone anti-freeze to bring it down to around 0F freezing point and call it good, then flush the system in the Spring leaving crystal clear water in the system for seven or eight months. Of course that was before the "expansion tanks" to keep the radiators purged of air, too, so rusting internals was rampant.

the rusty one in the bottom middle was actually sitting in the block and must have been just punched in by a previous owner an left there!!!
hooked it out with a bit of wire along with a heap of lumpy rusty gunk so I'm quite happy that I had to do it as it will surely improve cooling.
we tend to run anti-freeze all year round now as its very helpful for the anticorrosive side of things.