[chevyrestoguy]

Thanks for the comments, guys. I wasn't in the typing mood yesterday, so I'll tell a little bit about what I've done so far and what I've got planned. To date, I've done:

Chassis: I grafted a '71 Camaro clip and boxed the entire frame from front to back with 3/16" plate. I built an 8" step-notch in the rear,so there's plenty of room for the rearend to travel. The rear is a Ford 9" out of a 1978 Lincoln Versailles, which I had narrowed by Currie Enterprises. The center section is a 3.70 Trac-Loc with 31 spline axles. The rear housing brace was built by me. The gas tank is a '55 Chevy car unit and is located behind the rearend. The wheels are 15x6 in the front and 15x10 in the rear. The rear wheels have an interesting history. They are magnesium (1963 vintage) and were one of the original sets on the Greer, Black, and Prudhomme Top Fueler. They later went to a different rear axle, which made the bolt pattern on my set useless for their set-up. I bought them in 1993, before the big Torq-Thrust craze.

Body: I bought it from my neighbor in 1993. It was originally an Alta Dena, California School District work truck. It has zero rust. It was hot-rodded when I bought it. The previous owner swapped the front sheetmetal to the '55 style. Before I got it, it had a 396 (gone), 4-speed (gone) and an early '60s Old rearend. I was told the previous owner street raced it, and looking at how he butchered the floor and the bedsides, I believe it. I had the hood louvered (68 louvers), and welded all the trim holes shut. I shaved the front marker lights and now have a '57 Chevy grille bar as the center grille. I have modified the headlight rings to resemble a '57s, but I still need to do some work on them. The front bumper is a 3-piece bumper from a '55 Nomad I bought off of ebay. I still need to build bumper mounts and a front valence to fill the void between the bumper and the front sheetmetal.

Engine: I'm in the mock-up stages now, but it's a 454/TH400. The picture with the tunnel ram is only a mock-up to see if I have hood clearance (I do!), and if you notice, it's one of my small block manifolds. The headers are Hedmans (2" primaries/3.5" collectors) from a 67-69 Camaro.

Firewall: I got tired of welding holes in the stock firewall (I counted 68(!) holes), so I decided to build my own. Plus, with the stock firewall, the passenger side valve cover is real close to hitting it. So I cut out the stock firewall, but I left 1.5" all the way around to give the new panel some rigidity. The firewall is made from .063 sheet metal. The setback is 3.5" deep for adequate distributor clearance. The entire panel was glued in place with a badass aerospace adhesive designed for bonding wing skins together. For added insurance, I spot welded the backside every 3". Due to the subframe being installed high in relation to the stock chassis, the transmission actually sat higher than the stock floor, so I had to build a cover. I like the idea of having a removeable cover, so I utilized the factory hole and built a new panel with .080 for the base and .063 for the sides. I utilized Nut-Serts and button head Allen fasteners for the attach fasteners.

Whats next:

1: Mount the column
2: Fix a hole in the floor done by the previous owner
3: Smooth the dash
4: Mount the seat
5: Figure out a shifter (probably Lokar)
6: Pull the cab off and detail bottom and final paint/reinstall
7: Respray the chassis

and the list just keeps going...........................