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David's Story: I bought my Verdoro Green/Black vinyl top 1969 GTO in Dec 2001. Fairly quickly I realized that I needed to learn to work on it if I wanted a long relationship with it and also wanted to stay happily married. My mechanical skills to that time had been limited to changing plugs/brakes/oil on my daily drivers. Since that time (random order....) I have rebuilt the steering and front and rear suspension while adding a 1.25" front sway bar, 7/8" rear bar, WS6 Trans Am steering box. I have replaced/rebuilt the entire braking system. Added aluminum rear drums to the rear. Ken Keefer rebuilt the #48 heads with a mild port job and spec'd out a 220/224 hydraulic roller cam all of which I installed. I had the Turbo 400 rebuilt and removed/reinstalled it myself. 11" PTC converter. The quadrajet is from a 1979 Toronado and I built it from a "Pull-a-Part" core using Cliff's book and other info gleaned from Doug Roe's book and the Internet. Building the carb and having it work with my set up has been one of the most satisfying things I have done! I put in an Auburn Pro series posi in what turned out to be a nodular iron 10 bolt from a 69 Judge. 3.55 gears. Detailed the trunk. Installed Doug's headers and a new exhaust system. Replaced the vacuum actuators/switch/check valves and bushings to get the hideaway headlights to work. Installed new carpet/seat covers/sound deadening/package shelf. Separated the water crossover and removed the exhaust crossover from a stock 69 cast iron intake. Port aligned and gasket matched it. Replaced all of the weather stripping. Added some Cragar S/S mags (always wanted a set). New body mounts. Polished up a junkyard set of Cal Custom valve covers. Painted and installed a pair of sport mirrors from a "Pull-a-Part" 78 firebird. RobbMc ministarter. Millions of other little details and fixes along the way. 99% of this work was done after asking questions on the various Pontiac web forums and simply diving into it.
And the wife still likes the car....and me.
David Jones
Pleasant Grove, Alabama |
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