Oh what little you know Bill...what little you know!

 

Are you are planning on using a t56 tranny?

 

Sorry henry, yeah I was planning on it but Shannon told me the T-56 housing might be a little too big and I might be better with a 5 speed. What are you thinking?
I think once I get the car stripped and gutted I'll figure out where I wanna put the engine. I'd rather not move the firewall back in order to get the weight as far back as possible. Could be fun to stick it in the back and make it mid-engine.

 

No worries Julien. It won't matter much which tranny you go with, I figured the t56 because they are so available. Go with the one that gives you the least headache making it fit.
If you want a mid engine then get a C5 rear cradle and put the bellhousing right on the tranny. You will have the rear diff/trans/engine bolted together in one chunk, you might need to take the back window out to install it though.

 

Lol, or make it a convertible...
I'm have a million questions running around my head right now but first I'm gonna take it apart and strip it of everything, once that's done I'm gonna build the engine and go from there. I think you and rex are right that a stroker will be a little much for this light car. I'll just bore it out to a 5.7 and go from there. I like the mid mounted idea though, would make it real easy with running the exhaust, get rid of the DS and like you said that engine, tranny and Rear end will all be one Piece.
But before I get ahead of myself I'm gonna get the car here and then start with the disassembly.
I have a feeling that when I get stumped I'm gonna fly you and your dad down for a weekend.

 

I'd be happy to help. Make a solid plan before you start. It has taken me months to figure out what I finally want to do with my '64 truck.

 

theres so many variables right now with this build... first step was figuring out the goal of the car... now we have to decide how we will put the ower to the ground, and since we are planning on road racing we do have to look at the weight distribution... last thing we want is a front heavy car that smokes brakes, and plows through turns...

i have been running millions of ideas thru my head during my vacation....

i have made alot of mental notes, and i was actually thinking a possible t56 transaxle out of a vette.... because then if we do find that it will be too front heavy we will be able to displace some of the weight on the rear axle which should also help with the massive amount of wheelspin we will most likely enounter

im engineering it in my head.... you would not believe how many different versions of this car i have already created in my head

 

LOL, I was hoping that you were taking a break from all this while you were on your vacation but...guess not!! Lol
It was supposed to be a surprise that I picked up this car. I know I showed it to you before I won the auction but nobody outbid me so...
After I'm done with disassembly we'll sit down and figure out what direction to go with. Your gonna be the first one to drive it shannon so we have a little room for error... Once we get that out of the way I'll hop in!

 

I'm going out with a friend right now for coffee, I'll be starting a thread this week about this build but first I wanna get the car here and sell the snowmobiles and trailer so I have room for it. Then the brain storming can begin.

 

like i said julien... just dont get in too much of a rush bro... this is gonna take some time... were gonna do it right and its gonna be bitchen... I just wanna make sure we select all teh right components to do it right the first time... i want this to be as good as possible from teh get go...

i already know its gonna take some tweaking and asjusting once we get it going... but i wanna make sure we do it as easy as possible...


i was thinking once disassembled, since its already IRS we can measure the housing area, and see what size diff would fit, and measure up to see if we can fit a whole rear subframe from a vette in there.... taht would be ideal, because then the rear suspension would be golden.


as for me taking a break from this on my vacation.... good luck... you dont know how i am... if it can be modified, or if i have a project i am working on..... my mind is on it 24/7 which can be a problem because then we will start something then think of a better way when halfway done...


thats why we will brainstorm first come up with a semi-solid approach as to drivetrain and chassis, and go from there.... hopefully we wont deviate too far off course from there we probably will but hell with it


btw like we were discussing i said a stroker would be good for the torque, but being it is a car that zooms with a 4 banger.... i think a v8 that can rev well would be great... maybe up the displacement a lil... but no reason to take it too far if we can have a relatively square motor that will make plenty of useable power, and wont kill itself in the process


i like the mid engine idea, but we'll see how the other engine weighs to begin with

moving the trans to the rear may make it a pretty even distribution