BUILD THREAD “The Juggernaut”
- Thread starter Rktpwrd
- Start date
That's what she said. Very cool work Donovan. I assume these will give you turning room at ride height, but still be tight laid out?
2 questions though, you're adding lip to the front in an unsuprisingly tasteful manner. What's the situation out back? Or am I jumping ahead? Also, those front brakes are
I assume somewhere in this chronicle they were brought up, but I do not recall where if so.
Oh man, this just keeps getting better.
This latest body mod is very cool Donovan. Neat idea using the Malibu flares. Excellent work as always. I think you're pretty lucky to have your friend Mike. Looks like the 2 of you work well together. Looking forward to seeing upcoming updates.
Bro I swear after your last hood update I said to myself, you'd be doing some widebody type wheel well/fender mods. Bad *ss integration of different model G parts. Props
Yessir, that’s precisely what this’ll do for me. Just after we got the passenger’s side to the point where it was a full flare again and sitting flush with the rest of the fender, we quickly threw the wheel on and cycled the suspension through its travel to check clearance to see how much it gained us.
I’m happy to report that even with the bit of remaining flange still on the bottom of the flare, this mod gained me a solid quarter inch of clearance, and will be closer to a full half inch by the time I’m done.
That alone will make all this worthwhile. Clearance at ride height isn’t really an issue as the top of the tire will still be below the bottom of the opening.
Yeah, you’re kind of jumping ahead a little, but that’s ok, it’s a natural thought progression. Mods to the front beg the question of what’s going to happen with the rear.
I’m going to remain tight lipped on the plans for the rear openings for now. I have something special planned for back there, but I’m not sure how it’s going to turn out just yet. Regardless of what happens back there, I have two more flares left that are earmarked for the rear openings.
The front brakes are Wilwood 14”, six piston, slotted and cross drilled bad boys mounted on F body Camaro spindles (which are taller than G body ones). The taller spindles required the use of Global West short upper control arms, but will be a substantial handling improvement over stock. They are extremely nice, but also carried the price tag to match.
Thanks for the compliments.
Thank you Chris!
Glad you’re enjoying the build! Thanks for following along.
Jeff, the shape of the Malibu fender openings is uncannily similar to the Cutlass ones. I mean, like scary close. Once we had the parts of the Cutlass fender trimmed out of the way and were able to move the flare halves fore and aft, the damn curvatures lined up! Like perfectly. I assure you, no one was more shocked than I. I mean, I knew it would be close, but perfectly? I felt like I had just won the lottery at that point.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I’d rather be lucky than good, and I was very VERY lucky here.
I’ve known Mike for almost 20 years now, and we’ve always worked well together. He likes to say we’re two people with the same brain. We’re constantly on the same wavelength, I’m usually already thinking what he’s suggesting, and vice versa. I’m very lucky indeed.
Thank you, and it looks like you were spot on the money, good call. The original plan was actually to yank the body off the frame and support it with big 6x6 timbers on jack stands so we could tackle the firewall next, but this mod and the upcoming inner fender well mods may at least partially dictate what happens with it. So I figured we’d better go after this first.
I’m very pleased to be able to still keep it all factory GM sheetmetal in the fenders this way, and use cues from the Malibu to serve the purpose. I appreciate the kind words.
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Not really. These are stock Malibu flares on stock Cutlass fenders, so there’s not really anything widebody about it. Just simple factory flares on a car that never came with them.
