My daily driver project 81 ElCamino

[HAFROD]

There were a few things bothering me I finished/fixed. The two facing screws below the radio and the two on the dash cluster surround are visible. I used a brass brush and cleaned off the light rust and painted them with Krylon flat black. The long dash panel with the three vents had scuffs and the vents just flopped around. I scuffed the dash trim with a gray scotch brite and wiped it down. I then shot it with SEM landau black. I removed the vents before painting the trim panel and cleaned them. The remaining silver outlines which were mostly gone got polished away. Mothers mag and aluminum polish makes the plastic vents look gleaming new again. I use a micro fiber towel for applicator and polishing off. I used small round felt pads on the tops of the vents to make them stay in place. I had quarters lodged between the vent and dash trim panel before. Lol. Also my Super Sport dash plaque was hazy so I used Mothers mag polish on it too. It now looks new. The coolest fix was my tachometer. It was reading about 1000 rpm too high. As suggested by a member, I simply pulled off the needle and started the engine. I pushed it back on at 900 rpm. Now its a lot closer. I have an Autometer tach here somewhere that I was going to loosely hook up to set my tach needle correctly but I can't find it. I may have thrown it out by accident. Oh well.

 

[HAFROD]

Here's the rear panels that were sun damaged. After bed liner and SEM paint over the top. It would look better to sand with 400 before putting on the interior color. It would make the graining look more factory.

 

[HAFROD]

Here is the dash. I ordered some new defroster hose for the under column vent. That's why it's not installed.

 

[1evilregal]

that thing is lookin sweet! never heard of using the bedliner spray to redo the panel graining, but a way cool way to re-use original panels!

and yes, these thing do snowball badly, don't they? mine started out as just trying to get the body ready for a spray job 16 years ago

 

[EME_Mack]

Im gonna have to steal that bedliner trick for some crumbly interior bits I can't replace. That interior is looking mint I really like that colour.

 

[HAFROD]

So I have been driving my El Camino pretty hard on the interstate for about a week to go see my dad in the hospital. I've been smelling gas intermittently. I could not see any leaks. Today I removed the air cleaner and noticed the rear secondaries vent tube (Holley) had some dried fuel gunk around it. I checked the float level and it was too high. I set it so hopefully that cures the smell. I've also been noticing a very slight miss at idle. Pulled a couple spark plugs and noticed one side of the ceramic is black. I swapped out another coil and it runs smooth now

 

[MrSony]

After losing a stop light race a little bit ago, I came home. I had put on a 600 Holley when I first bought this truck and had it tuned perfectly for this engine. When I was doing my performance 350 swap I broke the ear off the 600 Holley. I also had issues with the new engine so I swapped back to the Goodwrench 350. Anyway, I have been using a 670 Holley street Avenger and it has killed the power. I have heard by others a smaller carb is great on a stock 350. I bought a used 600 at a swap meet a few weeks ago and just swapped out the broke base plate and swapped out the 670. I started it up and gas was spraying out the disk on the side of the rear float bowl. I can't catch a break this weekend. So I put the 670 back on.

Chevy 350s are very often over carbed. They never really need more than 600cfm. Unless you are 450+hp and spin it to over 5,000 all the time, it really doesn't need it.

 

[ssn696]

Here's the rear panels that were sun damaged. After bed liner and SEM paint over the top. It would look better to sand with 400 before putting on the interior color. It would make the graining look more factory.

View attachment 53747

Wow. That looks like a decent solution to this common problem. "Reproduction companies HATE it when you use this simple trick..."

What brand of bedliner did you use, and how did you apply it?

 

[HAFROD]

Got tired of listening to the radio with just two 3 1/2s in the dash. I used some 1/4" plywood, spray glue, and some cheap universal carpet from Pep Boys. I will build a box and glue it underneath the face I made to help with bass. This will get me by for now. I never use the rear floor boards so this was a quick and easy solution. I just pressed firmly down into the floor area and it tension set itself.

 

[Blake442]

Interior turned out awesome!
Great progress!