The Admin's Yac

[admin]

Since I've spent so much time away from the garage to make this site I'm making my car a little tribute. This page is going to be dedicated to the progression of my Restomod 1971 Pontiac LeMans.

Disclaimer: No power tool was used during the making of this post

Well, here it is. Every spare penny I have goes into this. I know it's the wrong color but that'll change eventually.

1971 Pontiac LeMans
Purchased originally on 3/30/71 from Kerley Pontiac Co. Lakeland, FL 33802 for $3,672.18. Must have been a bit of a haggler since the SRP was $4,472.68.

Factory Options:

• Quezal Gold exterior with Sandalwood interior
• 350ci 2 Barrel V8
• 14 inch wheels with G78 x 14 White-wall tires
• Power Steering
• Option code 531 (Glass-5/R-AL) which my best guess means the back windows roll down. I can't find any reference to this code on Google nor the Pontiac Historic Society documents for my car
• Electric clock
• Turbo Hydromatic transmission
• Radio-P/8 (8 track?)
• w/Cov-Custom (no idea what this is? :Option code 472)
• Power disc brakes
• Air conditioning

When Purchased:
Exterior

• Plum crazy purple paint
• Weld Racing Drag lite 15" wheels
• M/T Drag tube tires in rear. 195/70 x 15 standard radials in front (17 years old)
• Lowered stance

Interior

• B&M slap shifter
• Tach w/ shift light

Performance

• 400ci YX block
• Edelbrock intake manifold
• 750cfm Holley carb
• 40 series flowmaster mufflers dumping straight to the ground under driver. (Death sentence)
• 12bolt rear from 1968 Chevelle
• 4.10 gear ratio (soon to be changed to 3.55)
• 3500 RPM stall converter

Current Specs:
Exterior

• Plum crazy purple paint
• 17" Cragar wheels
• 255/45 17 rear / 225/50 17 front tires
• Lowered stance

Interior

• B&M slap shifter
• Tach w/ shift light

Performance

• 400ci YX block
• Edelbrock intake manifold
• Edelbrock Performer RPM cylinder heads
• Rhoads Hydraulic Super Lube Flat Tappet Lifters
• R.A.R.E Oversized Ram Air IV exhaust manifolds
• Custom 2.5" exhaust w/ 40 series Flowmasters
• 750cfm Holley carb
• 12bolt rear from 1968 Chevelle
• TCI Saturday Night Special torque converter (should be around 1900rpm stall)
• 4.10 gear ratio (soon to be changed to 3.55)

[admin]

Changing those fugly gunrack toting drag lite's

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I know it's really lame to first change the wheels when you have no parking brake or windshield wipers but damn it I hate these wheels.

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I wasn't even planning on buying wheels first honestly but while at A&A auto I caught a glimpse of the Cragar SS Black cast aluminum wheels. Decision made. First mod was the wheels...

Of course since weld racing draglite wheels are just plain gay on a street car there was no more need for the 4 miles of threads and added support of a mag shank style lug nut so this would require new studs on the rear. After a trip to Napa in State College, and 2 AutoZone's in Altoona and Duncansville I finally had all 10 studs. I pounded the old one's out with my grandpa's trusty old hand made sledge and in the mean time decided to install a rebuild kit on the rear drums.

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[admin]

The feckin rotor is fecked

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Now that I had exposed the rotors in the front I noticed that something had gouged a 1/4in wide 1/4 in deep groove in the left front rotor. I have a feeling that is bad so I ordered a very nice kit from Stainless Steels Brakes Corporation. The kit inluded new rotors, pads, and caliper hardware. Installation was easy as pie since everything fit so nicely.

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[admin]

A 3500 RPM stall is bust for the street in a car that has 400+ ft./lbs of torque

Now it is time to get down to business and into an area I've never been. With the help of my good friend and roommate I began to tackle the transmission. No major work. I didn't crack the case or anything but for me this was new territory. The plan was to remove the transmission and replace the racing torque converter with a more reasonable street oriented 1900RPM stall TCI Saturday Night Special. While I was at it I figured I might as well just replace the vacuum modular valve since they are only $20. There is exactly 1 bitch bolt on the bell housing where the dip stick tube is attached and 1 bitch cross member to remove during the process. On with the pics...

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[admin]

The long awaited cylinder heads come next

Updates to follow

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[admin]

I sent out my air cleaner and exhaust manifolds to Mountain Top Powder Coating for a satin black treatment. Just got the air cleaner back and it looks awesome.

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[admin]

I removed the old cylinder heads. They are 4X-8 date stamp of 1971 if anyone is interested in them.

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I purchased a set of reproduction Ram Air IV exhaust manifolds from R.A.R.E along with all new hardware and mandrel down tubes. I tried to get them powder coated but that didn't work out. I found out that high temp powder requires an additional coating gun. You can't mix the different types of powder in the same gun because it contaminates the powder. I ended up painting them with some extreme temp VHT black paint. They look good but I'm concerned about the durability. We'll see.

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These heads are a work of art

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I looked into getting transparent valve covers and only found one company that makes them. Roland Racing. I also found out that they leak so that is out of the question. I settled on the suggested aluminum Edelbrock ones. I'll post those up after they get installed.

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While I had everything apart I put in new Rhoads Super Lube lifters. Hopefully they will help the idle with such a massive unknown cam.

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