I have posted about it in a few other places but after selling the car in 2019, I bought it back 2 weeks ago. It did not take me long to regret letting this car go, but it did allow me to straighten some things out in life and get a better perspective on how I want to enjoy the car hobby. I am fortunate enough to have space for a few projects now, so I plan on keeping this car for a long time. I gave the car a good cleaning and then decided to put the "original" carb back on. The rebuilt carb I have has a pretty serious fuel leak coming out of the primary well plugs. It has done this since I bought it and I'll have to do some research on how I want to go about fixing it. The carb I installed has a casting number for a 67 327 Camaro automatic. I think it is a dealership service replacement because it has the correct linkage and has been on the car since at least the 80s when it was parked. It is pretty dirty and due for a rebuild but the performance difference between the Camaro carb and the rebuilt "correct" Q-jet are night and day. Next I played around with ignition timing. I am having trouble getting rid of some part throttle pinging. I have tried running 93 octane and I am only at 32* total timing with 10* of vacuum advance. I could have a slipped balancer or maybe I just need to keep adjusting the vacuum advance diaphragm to get the advance plate to close sooner. I bought a correct 67 license plate bracket from GSfred, this is the 3rd one I have bought for the car and it is nice to have the right part on there. I have a couple more small items to track down like an AM/FM radio and a plastic antenna nut. After the timing is sorted, next up will be trying some paint correction, a TA Performance water pump and possibly rebuilding the 67 BOP 8.2. The auburn posi is pretty tired and develops some rumbling and vibration once the rear gets some heat in it. I have a few projects going on; an 85 Corvette at the tail end of a 6 speed swap, a 59 LeSabre I bought last year for my wife that needs total resto and an 85 Celica I bought as a beater car that is too cool to scrap but not valuable enough to sell. Right now the GS is last on the list, not because it is the lowest priority, but because it is the most sorted. I am really glad to have this car back and plan on driving it a bit this summer. A restoration is realistically a few years away so I want to keep the car running and driving and fix some minor things as I go.
Good for you, Jacob. Enjoy tinkering with it and driving it until you have the chance to go all out. It's a cool car.
Here was my twin to yours I bought running in the early 1980’s for $150. Kurt Peterson gave me $300 for the Star Wars, so bought my wife a ring enhancer and found another air cleaner with money to spare. Look close & can see my 1st GS up on the hill at Mom & Dads,brother bought it new and after letting it go down hill I bought it from him for $500. Had a 70 350/315 Hp in it by then (brother didn’t check oil or much of anything else lol) but was a beauty when I was done with the full resto seen in pic. Love your 67!
5 months later and I really haven't done much to this car other than drive it. I live about 25 minutes from work, so I drive it anytime the weather is clear and temperatures are mild. I've easily put over a thousand miles on the car since I bought it back. I randomly lost ignition in the run position about a month ago. I tried another set of points in case the condenser was bad, replaced the ignition switch (over 100ohms between the bat and run terminal when key returned from start) and I made sure the resistor wire was in good shape and measured 1.6ohms on it. I still couldn't get it to stay running after letting go of the key. I needed to move the car so I just ran a lead from the battery to the coil. When I went to pull it off the car kept running as if the issue was fixed. Drove it a few hundred miles and then the same thing happened to me at work. Decided to give the firewall connector a wiggle and that was enough to get it to work. The engine and dash harnes are fairly new M&H parts so I think I just need to clean out all that old dielectric grease and get some contact cleaner on the pins to keep it from happening again. I see why GM later used a bolt to hold these connectors together. Aside from a full resto, there are lots of little things I'd like to take care of on this car before the GS Nats. Life has been hectic for me lately but I hope to get back to somewhat normal within the next few months and get some work done on some of my projects. I still am blown away by how well this car drives every time I get in it. The beater 72 455 runs strong, the well used st400 shifts perfect, switch pitch included, the leaky service replacement q-jet that is probably 30 years overdue for a rebuild is well tuned and the 80s era suspension components are still holding together well enough to make this a nice riding and handling car. I didn't make it to the track this year but with decent tires in the rear it certainly feels like it could be a mid to high 13 second car. Not earth shattering but I'd be happy with that on a $400 motor with 2.93 gears.
Looks like a BSA car to me! Rules likely unchanged this year-Qjet, iton manifolds, stock appearing parts… Patrick
Aside from having a 455 instead of a 400, and possibly some sort of RV cam, this car is pretty darn close to stock. I'd love to run in the BSA class as long as my car won't upset anyone as far as the looks department goes. One of these days I'll have the 400 block back in it, I'd love to do a mild stock appearing build on that. This car is so enjoyable to drive as is that I really don't want to go crazy with the engine. Ported heads and a mild roller cam would probably be plenty of power for what I want out of the car.
My ‘68 is rough around the edges (and in between, too!) The 455 is fine for our class; put 400 valve covers on it, along with a stock air cleaner, and we’d be happy to have it. (Last year’s rules are in the GSCA events section; we’ll likely use the same rules this year. Check to see if you ‘fit’. I bet you do!) Patrick
I do have the stock aircleaner and 400 valve covers already so it sounds like I should be compliant as is, which is pretty cool! I bought this car not even 2 weeks after the 22 Nats and can't wait to bring it for 23. I see that in certain cases an open element air cleaner can be used for qualifying and racing, would a starwars aircleaner count for a special circumstance? If not, no big deal to me. I can't imagine it is too restrictive at my power level.
Looks great to me! If the factory air cleaner fits, you need to run it. It’d be much cooler with the Star Wars unit, too. The open element provision is a concession to a non factory build not fitting otherwise. Patrick
Totally makes sense. I normally don't run it at the track since it isn't the most efficient design but the whole premise of BSA is pretty cool and I'd love to be a part of it. I'm sure the star wars air cleaner really won't hurt the power of my stock motor much at all.
My gas gauge suddenly started reading about 1/4 tank too high. I was hoping it would be a corroded ground or loose connection but with a full tank I am reading 110ohms right at the sending unit. Any recommendations for a quality replacement? I really don't want to put junk back in there.
