Bound For Glory...with a New Posi...and Gears

[Blue_69_malibu]

Well, the time has finally come to upgrade the last piece of my drivetrain that I haven't yet "improved"....my 8.2" open 10 bolt with 3.08 gears.

Dave and I pulled the rear-end out late Friday night....under the cover of darkness....with shockingly little difficulty or time consumed. Who knew it was possible?

I'm dropping it off at J&D Race on Monday a.m. where Jim will add a Posi, upgrade to 3.36 gears, redo the rear drums, and all the bearings etc. that go with the job.

I've also picked up a rear sway bar, fully boxed uppper and lower control arms and triangulation braces from PMT. (Pure Muscle Fabrication) They were kind enough to throw in a free shirt...in XXL.

Much thanks to TireSmoker for the use of his tool shed and big, blue lift.

[ttamrettus]

very nice. let's see if it goes back as easy it came out. : )

[Fred32v]

If this were facebook, I'd give it a "LIKE". 3.36, hmmm, that'll help.

[Blue_69_malibu]

very nice. let's see if it goes back as easy it came out. : )

C'mon Matt - What could possibly go wrong? Or take more time and money to finish than expected?

It looks so easy on T.V.

[Blue_69_malibu]

If this were facebook, I'd give it a "LIKE". 3.36, hmmm, that'll help.

Yeah....I know it's not the steepest gear in the world but the car is such a nice cruiser that I really didn't want bump up the RPMs too much and ruin it. I never really liked the 3.55s that I put in my first Chevelle....although 14 x 6 inch tires didn't help the cause too much, either.

On a different note, it wasn't until the car was up on Dave's lift that I got a very good look at my 2 1/4" exhaust system. It's clean and solid....but not helping me in the HP department. It's definitely not "ideal". So...we'll just see what happens and when I decide to buy a bigger one.

Who knew there's always something else to do/improve?

[TireSmoker]

Yeah, it came apart really easy. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky and it'll go together just as nice. However, with aftermarket parts involved, I'm sure something will need adjusting. It's like working on my own car, except I don't pay for parts.

-Dave

[Blue_69_malibu]

Well, every so often, things go almost as smoothly as you planned or hoped for. Having Basement Paul and TireSmoker along for the ride (or should I say "driving"?) certainly had a LOT to do with it....and I thank them both tremendously.

On Saturday evening, we got the newly refurbished rear-end and suspension pieces completely installed....with very little drama or fan fare. (Turns out we removed a set of original 45 year-old rear shocks....that were fully depreciated.)

I've only taken the car out twice but the initial results seem very promising and positive. The gears seem smooth and quiet. The new rear suspension and KYB shocks are a very nice step up. The car rides as nicely as I had hoped for...if not more so.

I have not yet "tested" the newly installed posi....but there is a holiday weekend coming up.

Thanks again to Dave for the use of TireSmoke Central and the Atlas 9000. Additional thanks to BP for some quality garage time on Saturday night.

[TireSmoker]

This was probably one of the easiest jobs I've ever been involved with. Everything came apart exactly like it was supposed to. No heat, breaker bars, broken bolts, heck we barely used any WD40. The guy that rebuilt the rearend delivered on time without any issues. Everything went back together pretty much how it was supposed, save for a couple extra washers needed in a couple spots.

The car drives really nice. Since Tony is more a cruiser than a racer, the gear change is spot-on. Can't wait to see it do a proper burnout!

-Dave

[Basement Paul]

It was work, but we had a really good time and I liked the fact that we could drive it and know that all the effort was worth while. It does ride really well and is really pretty quiet inside the car. The right rear tailpipe is getting lonely being the only pipe with rubber on it. Hopefully that will be remedied soon.

-BP