['ol Pinion head]

Totally understand what you're stating as far as quick availabilty in the NE on a clean used '68 core support. Have pulled desirable sheetmetal in over a 1/3 of the country. Have shipped & hauled tons of nice sheet metal up North, many others have done so as well. Some, for decades, have hauled higher quality used & nos sheet metal back all the way across the country. While websites like Franks may prove helpful to some, it only spotlights a tiny tiny fraction of what's actually out there & Frank's price points dont necessarily align with prices from many other sources.

[dataway]

Test fitting the repop core support.


Looks pretty good to me. Everything appears to be the right place. But, as I've said, until the body is on the frame and I can test fit the fenders ...who knows. How anyone has used these on a 68 with no major modifications I'll never know.






Here is the bottom rail, mounted and tightened up ... rail is horizontal back to front as it should be, lip that bolts to the valance is level ... again, everything looks right to me so far.




Might be a while before I add to this thread, may or may not wait till spring to do some tack welding of rivet nuts and painting. Still gathering various seals, hood latch parts, horns etc.

[Scott Thelander]

nice work
looks great !

no sleeves eh ?
hmmm

[Greg Reid]

Excellent job on the support and the thread illustrating the work needed.

[dataway]

Scott, I have the sleeves but according to what I've seen here the sleeves go through the core support, but not into the frame hole ... so insulator below the core support, insulator above the core support, then frame, then the square nut/washer inside the frame.

This is the way I installed the frame mounts:

[Greg Reid]

Why isn't this thread a "sticky"?
This subject is going to continue to pop up from time to time with people asking for advice on the core supports. Be nice if it was right at the top of the forum.

[dataway]

To update ... the modifications worked fine. Although ... there are numerous other smaller problems with these supports too, bolt hole locations for instance, some missing weld nuts and I found that there are some tabs that need to be trimmed for an endura to fit snugly against the fenders ... I still haven't done that, will have to wait until the bumper comes off again which hopefully won't happen for a long time. There was some interference in the upper left and right corners where some of the hideaway hardware appeared to be dead heading against parts of the support. Bit of trimming would clear that up I think ... but I had already spent several days getting the bumper the best I could, so that will have to wait.

[rolling money pits]

Not enough blessings to give you for this.

I, too, have one of these clunkers for my 69 that i bought 15 years ago.

Found out how screwy it was playing around with it and the repop fan shroud. I sat in my basement dumbfounded wondering WTH was going on…then it hit me.

Too bad I have no welder, and don’t know how to weld

* sad *

[tom s]

Note to self!NEVER buy a 68 A body!Tom

[Greg Reid]

Curious, why not Tom?

[tom s]

I guess because I read this thread?Tom

[Greg Reid]

Well, there are a few reasons to avoid them for sure...mainly because of the number of one year only parts that aren't reproduced... but if l'm not mistaken this core support is '68, '69 and 70 isn't it?

[tom s]

By reading the thread we kind of know it’s not a 68!Tom

[Greg Reid]

I'm kinda slow. I guess l missed something here.

[dataway]

Same issue 68 and 69 for sure, not sure about 70 and later, but possibly same issue with the repop right through to 72. Which covers a LOT of cars.

Never thought to look into it, but I wonder if the same problem exists with the repop A body non-Pontiac models.

But yes, the 68 A body Pontiac can be a challenge, lot of one year parts, lot of subtle mid-year changes. But REAL Pontiac fans consider it a challenge

[Greg Reid]

'68s are the redheaded stepchildren of GTOs...they catch hell for everything...LOL

[grivera]

Originally Posted by dataway

Scott, I have the sleeves but according to what I've seen here the sleeves go through the core support, but not into the frame hole ... so insulator below the core support, insulator above the core support, then frame, then the square nut/washer inside the frame.

This is the way I installed the frame mounts:

By any chance do you know the size of the hole in the core support for the bushings?

[rasilverbird]

Originally Posted by Greg Reid

'68s are the redheaded stepchildren of GTOs...they catch hell for everything...LOL

Which is funny because there were like ~20k more 68's made than '69's.

I really wish I had seen this thread before i bought my core support! I'd have fixed my original