Funny you should mention that. I am as giddy as a school girl since the last parts I was waiting for on my rebuild came in yesterday.

Original 396 but not original tranny (auto) or rear end, story goes a slight mishap in 71 sent those to the graveyard, judging from the frame rail I removed, I beleive them.

The 396 will get the pistons installed this weekend. I have done the following:
Blasted and magnafluxed everything, then acid diped for cleaning
liquid dye checked for cracks (none found)
bored .030 (hence the new pistons)
had block heads checked for straight/true (they were)
had to resurface the heads (they were on the very edge of acceptance so we cleaned them up)
new valves, relap vavle seats, new springs, guides, etc.

I'm missing a bunch, and I've done everything myself so far (at a engine shop that I've know and done business with for 15 years.) I'll let them internally balance everything.

It was originally at 350 hp version, should be 425-450 HP when I'm thru. I'll throw some pics up after assembly, hopefully this weekend.

 

Very nice.

 

Engine, a few years away from firing.


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My big accomplishment this weekend was actually removing and replacing the left rear framerail. In and out and welded up, went in pretty smooth after being a pain to get out. Next is finish patching some sheetmetal and welding and rolling the fender to fit the tires. Then POR15 and undercoat.


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Looks like you are in to it. Keep the pic's coming.

 

It's been awhile, out for a week for a convention in Vegas, but I did get the rear end put back together. Bolted up the new 1.5" lowered rear leafs and put on the disc brake rotor and tires. Rolled it under the car and everything bolted up with no tugging, pulling, or hammering, I was very happy! Here are some pice. FYI, the rear tires are BFG KDW's 275 x 40 x 17. Rims are Torq Thrust II's 9.5 inch with 5.5 inch backspacing. One of the pics shows the inside clearance, between tire and inner wheelwell is about 1/2 inch. Without touching the fender, there is less than 1/16th clearance, but I will roll the fenders about 1/2 inch to give some clearance.


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Here are some pics of the inside floors, spent last weekend stripping down all paint and grinding and cleaning up the welds. Then down went 2 coats of POR 15 to stop the rust. Probably could've waiting a few weeks and donw the entire interior at once, but I was getting impatient after a winter's worth of work.



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After a birthday, wedding, and a few weeks of scraping and grindng crud off the underside, I got the underside painted with POR-15, undercoated with an epoxy based spray on liner. Then I got the rear end bolted back underneath, and since it was raining all day Sunday and I couldn't do anything else, I welded in new subframe supports and put the subframe back on as well. Here are a few pics, new disc brakes and a few of the car back on all for wheels for the first time in 8 months!



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