Made a trip to California to visit friends and attend the annual Super Chevy Suspension Challenge with Church Boys Racing. Had a great time saw friends from NorCal, Joe, Jose, Brian, Duane and from SoCal John aka Shifty4 and Bill aka Klean63. Dave from Texas and met Charley from Canada and Dean from Ohio. This year Chuck Sr entered his 63 sedan with CBR suspension front and rear. Senio has owned this 63 for nearly 40 years and it is beautiful.
I can say it did nery well but you will have to wait until the issue is published to see how it stacked up to the competition.
While there I picked up the project car from John. 1964 Nova 400 series 4 door.
Here it is on the trailer ready for the ride home and all the stuff it came with
The trunk floor is the only bad rust, it will be replaced
After arriving home the truck, trailer and the car were unloaded. The garage a disaster needing to be organized
The actual car ready to begin
and some work on the firewall before getting it inside
Worked on organizing the garage, there is a 72 Chevelle frame in there and a bunch of wagon parts. Trying to add the Nova stuff was a challenge.
Mission accomplished
Work began to get parts on the car and out of the way. Front end first, the CBR suspension and steering is great. really easy to install no modifications are needed to the car, everything bolts on and looks good. I have seen first hand how it improves the ride and handling.
So first the firewall was painted, actually 4 times before I got the color to maych the powder coated inner fender structures.
Next assembly. Bill, a friend from Green Valley, came over and helped with the assembly. I was the young one of the two of us
Brakes will be next, 4 wheel disc from an 98 - 02 F body. CBR mounting bracket installed on front spindle. Conversion uses the stock 5 lug spindles and drum hubs from 64 - 67 Nova, 12" rotors front and rear, 2 piston calipers in front, single in rear all from the F body. Waiting on new wheel bearings, will post the brake install later this week.
The trunk didn't look that bad to me That is exactly what it has to look like if you were going to back half the car. Since you are running CBR front end you might think of a S&W back half kit or one from Chris Alston since he has a shop on the wrong coast closer to you.
Keep in mind a four link is an excellent suspension system for street or track (Chevy used them on their more powerful cars with bigger motors like the Impala and Chevelle).
A more door could be made into a real sleeper with a 406 or bigger SBC under a flat hood.
Church Boys Racing sells a triangulated 4 link for the rear that is nicer than any of the ones i have seen for sale. The 63 had another brand under it for years, with the CBR set up it rode much better and handled great. There will be photos of the underside in the Super Chevy Suspension Challenge article. For our intended usage of the car the leaf springs will work fine. A 62 wagon with the same front end as I have and leaf springs in back pulled 1g on the skid pad. I won't be driving that hard :devil:
These brakes are an over kill for this car. They are the same as used on my 77 and on the Chevelle wagon. This time a power booster will not be needed.
They have a rebuildable Howe tall ball joint too. I took them apart to repaint before installation. The coating had been nicked and scraped from being moved around the shop for years.
Sway bar arrived and is installed. Fell right in place with no issues.
Next the engine/trans will be set in (temporarily) the springs installed and then it is a roller that can be moved out of the shop when other work needs done.
More progress but just throwing parts at it to get them out of the shop and make the car weatherproof.
All the exterior sheet metal, doors and glass installed. The wagon goes back to the shop for paint this weekend and hopefully I can resume work on the Nova. I have decided to be a little different with the drivetrain. Instead of a small block or LS I am going to remove the 3.8L from my 98 Camaro and use it. I have both a 4L60 and a WCT5, not sure which will be used. Mary wants the manual, so that may be settled.
I purchased and in the process of learning to use HP Tuners software for the wagon. Might as well drop a fuel injected engine in the Nova as well. The 3.8L will be modified some, but stock it has 205 hp, like to use a little more aggressive cam. Move the coils out of sight and powder coat or polish the intake plenum. Headers are available that will fit the Nova frame. With cam, headers and tune may be able to get another 50 - 75 horsepower out of it. Like the wagon engine it looks different from mainstream conversions...and I like to be different
This has actually been abandoned. All the CBR stuff and 5 lug rear will go on the 63 wagon that Art, 62 NovaWagon, sold me in July. The wagon will get some sort of late model fuel injected engine not sure what yet. For less than the cost of rebuilding the 3.8L in the Camaro a running 5.3L/4l60E can be purchased from one of the local wrecking yards.
The 4 door will receive all of the stock running gear that is currently in the wagon and then be sold. It is a nice car, solid with zero rust issues, I just prefer wagons.
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