[BDH79TA]

A member thought it might be beneficial to me and others to post my build here. I've never posted a build and do more reading in forums than posting. However, after some thought and consideration I thought I'd give it a try. Here's the set up.

I already had a plain Jane, no options 79 TA. Decent body. Not great but certainly needs work. I bought it with a locked up 400 and a TH350. I was in the middle of a 428 build when I found it and figured that would be a nice match up. So I started buying parts. Bare minimum I wanted it to hit the road with WS6 suspension and upgrades.

In 2019 I dropped in the 428 and TH350 and fired it up. It broke in fine. After a cooling cycle though, I had a head gasket that didn't seal and was pumping those wonderful little bubbles into the radiator. If you've worked on one of these cars you know how difficult it is to try to torque head bolts with the brake booster and AC evaporator in place. It was at this point I had to make a decision as to which direction to go. In the end I decided to pull the engine/trans. This is where things went off the rails.

If I was going to pull it out again it was going back in with a 4 speed. Being an automatic that meant the conversion kit, bellhousing, flywheel, clutch, and of course the 4 speed and shifter. The conversion kit for the clutch linkage and pedals was easy to find. Decent quality kit too. I found a Suoer T-10 with a low mileage rebuild out of what I believe was a late 70s Vette. The original shifter and linkage took a little more time to find. I won't be running headers so I wanted one with the reverse linkage so that the steering wheel lock and back up lights would work like they're supposed to. I finally found the complete setup on eBay. The guy didn't know for sure what it was and I grabbed it for $150. I ordered a Hurst brand rebuild and went through it.

At the same time I continued to acquire parts for the build. Complete Pypes exhaust. RA manifolds. Brake lines, suspension and brake parts and so on. The gauges on the car worked but had seen better days. I really liked the RTX gauges Dakota Digital now offers and ordered one of those. They did a really nice job on the retro of those. With the 428 and direction change of the car I hadn't started installing these parts except for the clutch conversion.

At this point, summer of 2021 things changed dramatically once again. My mom passed in June that year and left me a little money. Not a lot, but enough to make me start thinking bigger. It took me quite a while to come to grips and to spend a single dime of that money. Mom had grown up in the 60s. She always loved muscle cars and while I was a teen was my biggest supporter when it came to my car obsession. I finally decided that she, of anyone in my life, would understand if I used some of that money on "upgrades". Away we go.

[BDH79TA]

I had been second guessing putting all that equipment into such a low optioned, poor man's Trans Am. I had a Solar Gold 78 back in the 90s with delay wipers, tilt and PW. I didn't need every option available but I wanted a few luxuries. Now that I had some disposable income, and the extra from mom I started looking for an upgrade to the car itself. At one point I even considered the 1980 Pace car. You can still find them fairly reasonably priced...even in running condition. But then there's that freakin' 301. I already have a drivetrain so I focused more on non running cars.

If you're looking for half finished, hacked up projects that are wildly over priced you can find them about anywhere. Rust buckets with a $3500 price tag. No title Bill of Sale nightmares. I looked at "restored" cars and everything in between. I finally remembered seeing a TATA years ago on a "lot" while checking out a 67 LeMans. I found the guy's info and contacted him. He still had the car and it fit most of what I was looking for.

It was missing the engine, transmission, the wheel spoilers and most every piece of interior plastic. Dash and gauges are immaculate. It's still got the original leather seats and front door panels. The console and all switches are missing as well as the buckle side of the front passenger side seat belt. This is actually beneficial in my case. Stay tuned for those plans.

After a couple weeks of consideration and self debate I pulled the trigger and purchased the car. I did something I never do and don't typically recommend. I bought the car without going to see it in person. While I had glanced it over a few years ago, I hadn't spent a lot of time on it as it wasn't what I was after at the time. I didn't get it for a steal, but I didn't get hurt on the deal either. I think it was a fair transaction for both of us. The guy even delivered it to the house. So December 18, 2021 there's a TATA sitting in the driveway.

The car has no major dents. No significant rust I could see at the time. To be totally honest, as far as body condition goes, it's in the best shape of any TA I've owned to this point. The doors shut like the thing is new. After cleaning out the junk in the seal channels, the T-Tops don't even leak. Looking in the glove box I found the original window sticker, some original paperwork from the sale to the original owner, the original shifter knob and a small maintenance notebook. The build sheet is long gone it would seem Unfortunate.

The notebook states 7/20/88 with 98,000 miles "exhaust, water pump, brakes, head gaskets and front wheel bearings". on 8/24/88 at 00003 and 6/10 miles they changed the oil, new tires and a radiator. Current mileage shows 00335. My assumption is they were chasing an over heating problem and that the car has been parked since 1988 considering there's only 332 miles difference.

After being able to really tear into it and inspect it I found a very small rust hole in the passenger side quarter and some rust through in the toe boards and the first 10 inches or so of the front floors. Everything else is rock solid and still has most of the original factory grey paint on the under side. There's surface rust where the sun finally baked through the paint but that's expected after 34 years sitting outside.

Considering I had already purchased all the parts for the other car I decided to strip this one completely down. Luckily I had not started installing these on the other car. I'm not doing a show car restoration. Just a quality driver restomod. Other than the doors, if it can be unbolted and removed the car is completely disassembled now. I hadn't planned on removing the subframe but I am glad that I did. The original bushings are completely shot and need to be replaced. This also makes it easier to repair the toe board, floor and the driver side body mount brace.

This is the current condition and state of the car.

[BDH79TA]

So how about the drivetrain? That's gone off the deep end now also. The engine is/was a 1969 428' bored .030, .010/.010, with milled 6X-4 heads, Ferrea 2.11/1.77 valves, VooDoo 703 cam and roller rockers with a factory 1972 intake and a 1978 Q-jet from a Buick turbo car that I built and modified using Cliff's parts and guidance. I was never planning on going much over the 400-450 HP mark or running high RPM so when I built the engine I just reconditioned the rods. That was a mistake given the current direction.

The short block essentially remains the same with the factory 428 crank. That's about all that's remained the same. There's now a set of Butler prepped E-heads, a Butler HR cam and lifter upgrade, full roller rockers and an Edelbrock ProFlo 4 for air/fuel management. I've wanted multiport injection on a Pontiac since it first came out. We'll see how that goes. I went with the complete kit with a new fuel tank designed for the in tank pump. Thanks to Butler again for that kit. As for the rods, there's a set of forged rods waiting to go in. That means a complete tear down and rebalance.

Exhaust is handled by 2,5 inch RA manifolds and a complete Pypes SGF70 system. I've added Flowmaster high flow cats to that system. It appears to be a high quality kit but I have yet to get to the point of installation. Suspension will be high quality factory spec replacements. Rear springs, coil springs, KYB shocks, and Moog ball joints and bushings. I've used poly bushings in the past. While performance is great, I can't stand the squeak that seems to be impossible to permanently get rid of. I know some have had good success. I did not and will not be dealing with that again. Brakes are also high quality OEM replacements with a complete brake line replacement from Inline. Steering is mostly Moog parts with the exception of an aftermarket, larger than stock rear anti sway bar. The rear end will retain the factory 3.23 gears but an updated Eaton TrueTrac unit.

So how about that 4 speed I went to so much trouble to find and piece together? Most of that is tossed aside now also. Sitting in the storage building is a complete SST supplied TKX 5 speed. It's a quality kit. I know there are cheaper ways to go about it and several companies to choose from. This is the one I settled on and the complete kit means I'm not looking for and sourcing parts to piece it all together.

As this project goes together in the future I'll post the pitfalls and any solutions I find that work or don't work. I'm just a typical guy wrenching in the back yard. No lifts or high dollar equipment. Currently don't even have the garage. Doing this on a concrete driveway and a 10x12 storage building.

[BDH79TA]

So for the plan for the body and interior. If you're a purist, now is the time you'll want to stop reading. As stated before, the car is missing the drivetrain and most of the interior. It'll never be numbers matching so I'm doing exactly what I want to the car. If this were a numbers matching car I'd never go this direction.

While I like the TATA, I've always thought it was just too much silver. The original console is MIA but the dash is absolutely flawless. The end goal is a blend of the original greys with black showing up to help with some much needed contrast. IMHO. I've always preferred the 70-77 front door panels over the 78 and up. I've got brand new lowers now as well as a set of 72 custom uppers. I've ordered all the interior plastics in black.

As for the body. The current plan is pretty dramatic for a TATA. The original 1969 TA did not come with a shaker. It was the dual scooped hood. I've always liked the Formula hood about as much as the shaker. With the original shaker missing I would not have to piece that together. I also wouldn't have to mess with height adjustment. Been down that road before. Plus I've got a nearly flawless Formula hood here. The car will retain all the spoilers. Instead of all that silver exterior I'm leaning more towards a blue and white tribute to the originals. Macho had a scheme on a 78 that I thought I could borrow from with some adjustments. This is the one I'm considering.

[BDH79TA]

Here's some of the floor replacement I've managed to get done. I've still got a lot of cleanup to do to finalize installation but it's on the way to being rust free. A couple of observations so far. First off, if you want "perfect" do the complete firewall and floor pan This is just a quality driver so for now this will do. I wanted a more factory look so I went with the individual toe board and floor pan instead of the one piece. I did this for the factory overlap.

First off, my experience is that the Sherman partials are junk. Not even close. Due to price and availability I went with Golden Star. They seem to be stamped very well and match factory pretty darn nicely. Both the toe board and floor pans have been easy to work with. What I have noticed on these and other brands is the lack of sufficient overlap material. The floor pan and toe board both are a good half inch short in this area. It makes for a very small amount of overlap and it also does not line up with the factory panels at the end.

Perhaps another company comes closer. No idea. It's more work but to resolve the issue it's possible to cut a piece of same gauge steel and weld it to the end of both panels to provide a factory look. This is time intensive but possible if you're shooting for perfection. Other than this issue I definitely recommend them in all but a show car restoration. Like most everything, it's made overseas and a slightly thinner gauge material than back in 79. Prime it well. Paint it well. Keep it clean. We've got far superior coatings than they had 40+ years ago.

[BDH79TA]

Before and after of the original leather interior. This is just one cushion so far. No idea how well all of it will clean up yet.

[Hoodshaker]

Good stuff! I love a good factory original car, but one that's been left for dead and without a powertrain is liberating in that your no longer constrained by originality. You're free to paint your own picture.

You've got a really cool build going. I like these builds with a guy doing the research and planning and working with whatever space he's got, in order to build the car he wants, much more that the big dollar shop builds you see on tv.

The best part of all is the connection to your mom. Things like that are why we don't look at cars as "just" cars. Looking forward to following the progress.

Are you keeping the original seats? The theme on my '79 is mostly stock {appearing), and I love the Hobnail/Lombardy cloth seats so I got the Legendary upholstery kit when they first started offering it but I don't like the fact that they don't recline. So I had considered swapping some other OE reclining seats in and reupholstering them in the correct fabric, but the person I spoke to at Legendary at the time refused to sell me the material by the yard. I explored some other options but have ultimately landed on modifying my factory seats to accept the recline mechanism from a Chevy Blazer.

[Hoodshaker]

Just saw you latest post with the seat bottoms-those look great. If they're salvageable they're superior to any of the repops imo and you're way ahead of the game on cost too.

[BDH79TA]

You just touched on one of the more difficult decisions I'm facing. I would love a more comfortable seat that reclines. However, like you, I prefer the factory look. My original plan was to do the 80 Pace Car oyster interior. Love the oyster hobnail cloth.

I'm not crazy about all the silver, especially the leather seats. They are original to the car though and I figure if they clean up I'll use them a while until I decide one way or the other. I hadn't heard about being able to convert these to reclining seats. That would be a nice upgrade and still be able to maintain the factory upholstery.

[TAKerry]

Im restoring my TATA to factory. I would be willing to take those seat covers from you and the money from them will offset a new set of reclining seats!

[BDH79TA]

So for anyone needing to know, the 70-73 body mount braces offered do fit our later cars. There are differences as far as holes stamped but the dimensions and stamping appears to otherwise be the same. I haven't compared the passenger side yet as the driver side is my priority right now. There are 2 holes missing in the new stamping. On later bodies one of these is threaded for mounting the fuel/brake line clamp. There are some extra holes in the new stamping that is not present in ours. While it wouldn't be completely correct, it would be functionally fine. Here are pics of the driver side.

[BDH79TA]

TAKerry...you're the first one on my list if I decide to let the seats go. I have not cleaned them all up yet and have no idea what you'd be getting. As soon as I do I'll email you.

[BDH79TA]

Links for the body mount braces. First is a Golden Star number

https://www.jegs.com/i/Golden-Star/1...-70FE/10002/-1

This is a Dynacorn part. I found this set on eBay for $118 delivered.

https://www.topflightautomotive.com/...wall-brackets/

[bankbook]

Any updates on how the body mount braces installed? pictures if you can.

Thanks

[BDH79TA]

I ended up moving in the middle of everything. However, I did get the driver side initially fitted. Just like the original.

[bankbook]

Boy, I know that feeling. Just now getting back to the cars.

Reason I ask is that I will be doing the passenger side this year and you are the first I have seen attempt it.

Thanks for the info.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

It looked like your car was an Automatic brake pedal -
so it was a 403 Auto car and had a 3.23 rear gear ?

I've never been involved with a 403 TaTa , but many local folks back when had 403 TA's and all were 2.73 - except one had 2.41

Did the 403 TaTa all get 3.23 in them ?

Its going to be an awesome car
Good luck on your build

[BDH79TA]

Not sure which pic looks that way, but no. It's a Z code car. Original 400 4 speed.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

ooo my mistake then .

I'm not a huge fan of the exterior appearance on the TaTa
But I do like their interiors above all others.
Can see how that won't go very well with your exterior color plans though

Would like to see what one would look like painted Black and everything else stay the same as designed.

[BDH79TA]

I know doing a color change as well as an updated drive train isn't the popular choice when it comes to a fairly rare, special edition car. If the car still had its original components I'd never go this direction. But it's a heck of a lot of silver!