1968 Florida 1600 Restoration Project

[ak-]

sending positive vibes and nudes your way. Also, I think Sunday is a good day to get this car started. Wanna get this car started with me?

Oh hey Ryan. Sunday? Yeah man I think I'm free Sunday to help you get this car started.


But really, I might be in the water in the morning, then I will come afterwards.

[Calypso Moor]

where on earth do you keep finding these?!!

[phreshkid]

where on earth do you keep finding these?!!

Have you ever been so deep in a specific genre of music, or industry that you know everything about everything, basically making you a super knowledgable dude on that topic?
That's kind of what happened to me with these cars. I don't really look for cars anymore. They sort of just show up at my house.






Not 2002 related, but I swapped out my entire front suspension, and the tie rods on the m3 today. I even did the rear shocks and RSMs. Every part replaced was OEM with all OEM stuff. Feels good.

Some of the new parts:







And a pile of the old parts:




I'm so pooped.








And blue-car related:

This car is getting torn apart soon. Time to assess what is still good and what is not. I intend to take the motor to Ken Blasko's shop and spin it on his engine stand. I should get a good idea if it's still any good.





But then I noticed this today. Not very happy about it at all. This was my favorite valve cover.

[phreshkid]

I was determined to to get the car started. I was scared that the pistons might be seized because the waterpump wasn't turning (belt was still on and tight), so I did what anyone would do: take a break and make some food and search the FAQ. I then wondered if the waterpump was seized. Seeing as how the radiator was out, I said "what the hell", let's get that out and inspect.

So first, the fan comes off. Here is a comparison of the stock 1600 fan (on bottom) next to a new 400mm tropical fan. So wild to see the difference!





And then off comes the water pump! My suspicions were confirmed. How does a waterpump get this bad? I'll never know. But luckily, I had a new waterpump ready to go sitting in the parts pile.






And with everything off, my good friend Jeff stopped by. He's really good with 02s and early 911s. Within 45 minutes, we had all new plugs gapped to .025, new wires, I happened to find a new cap and rotor, and we set the engine to TDC based on Cylinder 1. We had a 50% shot of getting it right since you can rotate it 180* and the car won't start.

Well, that's exactly what happened. So we pulled the valve cover, confirmed that the we were wrong and again reset it to TDC based on Cylinder 1, where the rockers had a bit more slack than the others, buttoned everything back up, and on first click, the car fired to life.


Here's a quick video. Disregard my commentary. I was so excited to see the car fire up that common sense completely escaped me in those moments. It wasn't until after the video was shot that I remembered that I didn't have a belt spinning the alternator because there was no waterpump installed.





I'll get the cooling system back in and call it a day. Pretty excited overall. Stoked.

[LJ851]

"L is oil? "


You need to brush up on your German....


Congrats on getting it fired.

[phreshkid]

"L is oil? "


You need to brush up on your German....


Congrats on getting it fired.

L is for "Letric". My brain didn't process this information from the archives quick enough. I hit my head really hard in the accident, ok?


But I got other parts of the engine cleaned up in prep for the fan and radiator. Notice the newish waterpump also installed.








And then I made another quick video after I got most things installed. The car is low on oil and the valves need adjusting. I think this is the chatter I hear. I will remedy these things tomorrow. Also, the cooling system doesn't want to pressurize. I threw the new three-core high-efficiency radiator and 400mm Tropical mechanical fan in. I ran the car for near 30 minutes but I can't get anything warmed up past 60ish degrees. The thermostat didn't open either. The two hoses to going through the firewall to the heater core were both warming up and the heater core was set to full heat. Still nothing.

I'll get some more oil in the car tomorrow and go from there. Also, I need to chase and clean all the grounds. None of the gauges work except for the "L" gauge. The yellow/orange light flickered a few times, stayed on, then shut off and never came back on, not with the car on, or just ACC power. I'm betting bad grounds.


Here is that video. Disregard the fact that I filmed this with the phone right side up like a noob :

[2mAn]

Nice work.

[CubbyChowder]

Just now seeing this, very stoked about it.

[obes]

You are a hero Ryan

[jeenyus]

Awesome build. Awesome color. Well done and thanks for sharing.

[e30onBBSs]

+1 for naval jelly. used it on my rotors and it's a hell of a difference

[csermonet47]

Glad to see you back into the swing of things. Looks like you got another gem. Love that color!

[IzzY_325is]

WoW.

[phreshkid]

Glad to see you back into the swing of things. Looks like you got another gem. Love that color!

Shabrah! Where is your C10 build thread? I'm balls deep into looking for either a '59 Fleetside Apache or a '63-66 shortbed fleetside C10. Do you follow "StonerSpeedShop" on IG? They do some interesting builds on these old trucks. Worth checking out.

WoW.

Thanks!

Car has been sitting. Waiting for the rust guy to finish his work. He cut out panels out of both the blue car and the florida car, then had an emergency and left the state, about 10 days ago. I don't want to raise an alarm yet. I'm hopeful he will come through. He has my donor metal. Hoping that have all that completed in the next week.

Waiting for a few parts to come in the mail as well. Things will be moving soon.

[Old city bimmer]

worst water pump I ever seen. pictures of it are unbelievable seen it seized like that.
however great work and glad to see it running.