It has been a while since my last update here, so I thought I'd check in and show where things are at currently.
Some big news in my world is that I have a new personal shop space to store and work on my cars, so the GTO has been moved from its previous "country club" shop location which was shared with hundreds of other collector cars to a space that is just mine. I purchased a 2-post lift and have space for two cars along with plenty of workspace and storage area. It's great not having to work in shared space anymore. Although the previous location was a lot of fun in some ways and I met a lot of great people with cool cars and projects, the ultimate end game has always been to get my own space, so this was all according to plan.
Unfortunately, before I was able to find a suitable shop space for myself, the previous facility's staff damaged my GTO while parking it underneath a 4-post storage lift. This was in July of last year. Despite having one staff driving and another staff "spotting", they still managed to scrape the passenger side quarter panel on the post of the lift. So frustrating. It crunched the wheel arch a little bit and caused a very slight ripple in the flat portion of the quarter panel.
My painter was able to pull out the metal and no cutting or fresh metal was needed, but he did have to repaint the entire quarter panel. The repair came out good, but of course I will always be a bit salty about that incident. Accidents happen and I was kind to the staff about it, but yeah... Not ideal.
Alright, on to other things. I'm so glad that the '66 GTO doesn't have a ton of brightwork, because that stuff takes time to make right. Here is one of the wheel arch trim pieces that I removed some dents from and got looking pretty again.
Starting point
Dents removed and now ready for further sanding and polishing
All polished looking like new
I also took the opportunity to rethink how my tailpipe hangers were attached to the frame. The existing metal screws that I had holding them on were not super secure, so I decided to install some nut-serts and use bolts rather than screws. Nice and secure now.
When I was working under the car, I also noticed that one of my rear shocks from UMI Performance was leaking (see oil trail on shock tube), despite only having about 30-40 miles on the clock. I called them and they sent me two replacements for free despite being past the warranty period. They get a blue ribbon for customer service.
I installed a set of retractable 3-point seat belts from Morris Classic Concepts, which are outstanding. I really like them and am grateful the '66 came with threaded inserts in the roof structure from the factory despite never having been equipped with shoulder belts.
Eventually, I finally took the car back to the painter for final wet sanding, which even though the car was painted in 2022, the plan was always to have wet sanding performed once I was mostly done with the rest of the car. Here I am with it last month on the day I got it back from wet sanding. HUGE difference in the appearance of the car. Really can't be understated how much smoother and rich the paint looks after wet sanding. 99% of the orange peel was removed and it looks wet.
And now that wet sanding had been finished, I could then begin putting the remainder of the trim and badges on the car.
I also took the opportunity to repaint my steelies, since they got some overspray on them when the body was painted, and I never liked the quality of the Eastwood wheel paint that I sprayed them with the first time. It was too flat, too textured, and too grey. Not good. Here is after I repainted them with my favorite semi-gloss, Duplicolor engine enamel with ceramic DE1635. I didn't repaint the centers around the lugs since they just get covered with caps anyway.
The weather was really nice here over the weekend, so I decided to take the GTO out for a spin and see how things are working. I have just under 200mi on the clock now since getting it running under its own power. By most accounts, it runs fantastic. It does everything it's supposed to do and seems very healthy. Never had any hiccups, until this Saturday's outing...
I drove about 20min from my shop space to a park, and shut it down to take some photos. I was there for maybe 10 minutes, and when I attempted to restart the engine, it didn't want to fire up. So I pumped the gas pedal a few times and cranked but it still didn't want to go. At that point, I feared I had flooded it, so I held the gas pedal on the floor while cranking and eventually it sputtered to life. It backfired through the carb and I noticed that it seemed to be running a little bit rougher than normal. Thinking that it would probably clear up after a moment, I put it into gear and pulled away. After about 100 yards, the engine hadn't cleared up and I noticed that the brake pedal was really stiff. I had almost no brakes...
I put two and two together and realized that I must have a vacuum leak at the booster, causing both the engine to run rough and no brake assist. I opened the hood and sure enough, the backfire had blown the front of the booster check valve clear off.
I tried to MacGyver a roadside fix with electrical tape, which seemed to work momentarily, but the pedal got stiff again so I threw in the towel and called for a tow. Had to wait for 1.5hrs for the truck to arrive, and during that time I called a nearby O'Reilly to see if they had any check valves in stock. Nope. Hard to believe, since it's a super common part used in many GM applications. If they had one, I'd have taken a Lyft to grab it and been back on the road in 20min, but no such luck.
The tow went smoothly, and we arrived back at my shop without any issues. Glad that I had water with me while waiting for the tow truck to arrive. Now I just need to figure out what caused the backfire.
After I sort that out, the only things left to do on the car are install the remainder of the rocker trim and fender badges, A-pillar trim, headliner, windshield wiper assembly, and have the A/C system charged.