Just about done
 

Well, she's getting close to completion ... will probably pull it out for a photo session within a week.

Still some odds and ends to take care of, but soon she won't be seeing the light of day until spring, so I better get some outside photos now.

Need to do some more polishing, button up a few pieces of trim. Pull the back seat out and put the new upholstery on, and install the passenger front seat that is still out for easy access to the dash wiring. I'll probably pull it up the driveway ... and up the neighbors drive, back it out and pull it back into the garage .. no registration or anything so no driving down the road for now.

And ignore the bumper gap, most of it closes up when it's off the lift :)

https://i.imgur.com/TK8KWYs.jpg

Lookin good!

Looks great and my gap is always that big. Ugh

This has been a really fun project to watch- congratulations on seeing it through to the end.

Gorgeous- great job. Congrats

Looks fantastic. That gap appears just about right. Amazing how much flex there is when the engine is hanging out front like that.

Soon I will have to restage this old photo.

I think I need to move my "GTO" decal ... it's too high, luckily I still have a couple of NOS pieces.

https://forums.maxperformanceinc.com...0&d=1664556042

Your present decal looks to be located better than the one from your original pic to me. I get it though... original is original.

very nice !!
your original clips for the rear trim has been mailed

congratulations!!

Awesome! Nice work!!!

Thank you sir, that's all the encouragement I need to leave them right where they are :)

When I stripped the car down it was apparent some body work had been done to that right quarter .... so no idea if the original was in the right location .. and I never thought to compare it to the other side ... and I don't have any pics of the car with the original decal from the other side.

We've talked about decal placement before. Apparently the factory isn't the best source for verification with numerous examples showing the decals in different locations even on the publicity photos.

BTW, Beautiful work on your car Data.

Exactly right on the '68 decals. Kind of leaves you in a position where you can vary the location as you like, somewhere in the area of 2" or so in front of the marker light..

Awesome Dataway! Looking forward to more pictures and you getting out on the road with it.

I'm spending a lot of time standing in the shop and looking at it .. kind of hard to wrap your head around after 40 years ... and SO many years seeing it as a pile of parts under a tarp, or feeling like it's a piece of junk in the shop getting in my way and having it nag at my conscience for neglecting it.

I’ve been following your build for what feels like 10 years or so on this forum (feels like longer). I’m coming up on 27 years owning my Firebird and can totally relate. So great to see you in the home stretch and for the car to come out looking so so good.

Seems to me that you did not do a single, overall restoration thread did you dataway? Did you have to do anything to the drivetrain? Suspension?

Probably the closest I came to a full thread was correcting the repop core support.

I rebuilt the original engine, it's .040" over , 068 cam, typical Speed-Pro pistons (I dished the pistons 7cc), forged rods, OEM crank turned .010", SS valves, OEM spec springs, 1.5:1 rockers, NOS 704 Q-jet (1971), log manifolds (cleaned up, and outlet opened up a bit), exhaust is 2 1/4" I think, OEM syle exhaust.

I rebuilt the original TH400, basically stock Transgo kit, aftermarket converter, OEM diameter (good name, forget which), rear end is the untouched original, non-posi, 2.93.

Suspension has new TRW coils (bought about 35 years ago), all OEM style replacement parts (bushings, ball joints etc). Only deviation from stock was the addition of the manual trans style frame reinforcement struts at the rear end. 1972 front disks were returned to the original power drums.

Didn't do a built thread because it's a pretty run of the mill GTO, getting a pretty standard frame off. I did a deep dive in a few areas, like making up the tooling to press in the ball joint rivets, restoring the cut up lower control arms and you all have seen the questions about the minutiae of OEM parts I have asked.

My original intent for the car was a close to concours restoration, mostly for reasons of it's dollar value ... since the restoration began my financial situation changed and I no longer feel I'll need to sell the car someday, so I was able to loosen up my standards a bit. Plus I realized with this common model of GTO a lot of my efforts would add nothing to the value. My motivation increased greatly when I realized I'd be able to keep the car for the rest of my life. By the time I go I'll probably have owned the car for 60+ years.

You know those videos where people get together and have some kindly grandfather's car restored? Kind of like that ... except I don't have any kids or enough friends ... so I had to do it myself :)

Came out very nice!

Indeed it did!