My Inheritance

[fleming442]

I have a TrueTrac in a 9 with 3.70 gears. It works well, but can be a little noisy when it hits both wheels.

 

[airboatgreg]

Very cool

 

[Turbo Zach]

Nice car, my buddy has a red 69' Nova with a 632 BBC his was a race car turned into a street car.
I don't know how comfortable those race seats are but you might want to consider changing them for some nice adjustable bucket seats with some bolstering.
Less gear and full exhaust will definitely tame it down and make it more enjoyable to drive.

Thank you. I would be interested in hearing more about your buddies car and what he did. The seats are pretty comfortable, but would not be for long drives. I don't plan on taking this car too far from home. A speedometer, windshield wipers, power steering, and maybe heat would be more important than the seats right now.

I like the cheap valve covers and alternator bracket. If anything, I'd head in a more sleeper direction and hide the nitrous solenoids. By all appearances the car is a cruise-in queen. I'd never suspect legit 700hp racecar. I'm guessing it sounds pretty serious.

I agree with what you are thinking, but once you hear it run the cat would be out of the bag. The alternator is not lined up very good and the single v-belt at high RPM is not going to work very well. When this car idles in gear it lurches forward with the lopes of the cam. Solid body mounts and motor mounts. It gets my adrenaline going when it bounces off 10000 RPM.

Subscribed. I love that you still have your Dad's car and get to enjoy ownership of it and wrenching on it. It's a great looking car. Still the best part is that his car, something that he put a lot of himself into, is still around and in such great shape.

Thank you.

Converter slip won’t be a concern with a well built converter. If it doesn’t lock all the time below lockup rpm during steady state driving, then you need a better converter.
I used to be concerned about the same issue until I began using better converters.

My current converter will stall to 3800, but I cruise at 2500 and the rpms never waiver unless I increase throttle a noticeable amount. And if I stand on the throttle, it will flash to the low 4’s. But it doesn’t like trying to cruise much below 2000 rpms - pretty much related to HP and cam specs.

Regarding the gearing, pick an rpm where the motor will cruise at (hopefully you’ve driven it enough to know this), and then pick a gear that will keep the rpm in that range at highway speeds. My guess would be aim at 2400-2700 based on what you’ve told us about this motor - but that is a guess only.

Looking at those chips and hearing the pinion was loose - sounds like you made the right decision to pull it apart - something unfriendly was occurring in there.

Good luck and keep us posted - Jim

I look forward to your advice and comments. I find them to usually to be pretty sound advice and I know you have a lot of experience in this stuff. To answer your question would be no. This car does not even have a 100 miles on it since I put it together. Knowing my Dad I am betting on the converter being a cheaper one. Knowing what a good one cost I am sure he cheaped out on it. I am leaning more to 3:70 gears now to be more on the safe side.

 

[Turbo Zach]

I did get the pinion pressed apart Friday morning. No crush sleeve. Just shims and spacers between the bearings. The problem was there was nothing between the yoke and bearing. The yoke was bottomed out and let the bearing slide back and become loose. I am not completely sure as to how it should be yet, but it was not right.

 

[Supercharged111]

I have a TrueTrac in a 9 with 3.70 gears. It works well, but can be a little noisy when it hits both wheels.

Mine has never made a sound, maybe you need a louder exhaust? It's better around corners than a healthy Auburn.

 

[Turbo Zach]

Small update. I stopped by Quick Performance on Wednesday. As soon as I told them what the problem was and who owned the car they new all about it. They said my dad switched yokes from the original parts list to a different one. The yoke I have needs a spacer between the yoke and outer bearing. They give me the spacer. A check I had been waiting on showed up Friday so I had the money to buy the parts I needed to regear the rear end. So I have that stuff ordered and I even saved 60 bucks because of Black Friday sale. I never liked the way the drive shaft hoop sat so low and the way it looked.

So I modified to my liking. I got to play with my new welder in the process.

I fiddled with my exhaust pipes some. The problem I had way back when I bought the exhaust pipes was the passenger side header does not point straight out and points more to the center of the car.

I tried to bend it with a big six foot bar, but did not have any luck. I cut slits in the extension pipe and tried to aim it back, but that was a fale.

I will have to come up with a different plan. The headers are big tube Hookers. You would think they would have fit better. I have been busy with other projects and have not had much time for this one yet. My truck is broke and so is my daily beater. The truck has priority right now. I don't care if I fix my beater or not really. Stay tuned.

 

[81cutlass]

The 3800 W body broke! Is that even possible!?!?

Nice to see the car being given a new life 🙂

 

[565bbchevy]

I cut slits in the extension pipe and tried to aim it back, but that was a fail.

You could always weld in a stainless braided flex pipe to make the bend

Exhaust Flex Pipe Stainless Steel Double Braid 3.5" x 6" w/ Ends 11" OAL | eBay

 

[64nailhead]

I’d cut the header pipe and re-weld it. Looks like you need about 3-5 degrees of bend to resolve all issues.

 

[Turbo Zach]

The 3800 W body broke! Is that even possible!?!?

Nice to see the car being given a new life 🙂

The engine is not broke. It runs good. ABS module took a dump. Ignition switch seliniod lock not working right and I broke the tilt column lever.

You could always weld in a stainless braided flex pipe to make the bend
View attachment 163250
Exhaust Flex Pipe Stainless Steel Double Braid 3.5" x 6" w/ Ends 11" OAL | eBay

That is a option.

I’d cut the header pipe and re-weld it. Looks like you need about 3-5 degrees of bend to resolve all issues.

That is my plan as of now. A ball socket pipe in 3 inch would work too.