Is it possible to revive a 4+ year old thread? I'll try, but may have to start another post.

Long story short, the car never came back out of storage (6 years!)... that is until last week. It's currently at a shop getting the carburetor rebuilt, lines bled, etc. to get 'er back up and running. I've got the funds to get this project going, so I'm excited to not only have my car back, but start doing the things I wanted to when I bought it almost 10 years ago.

Update on Plan:

The Borg Warner T10 is nearly toast, so I purchased a Tremek TKX 5-speed, that will be here in a few weeks with hydraulic clutch (currently mechanical). What should I do w/ the T10 - any thoughts on how I might recoup some money for it?

Also, planning on having the 10-bolt rear end rebuilt to add posi and gears... deciding between 3:55 and 3:73. My expectation is these two mods should make the car substantially more enjoyable than it is today.

While I'm going through all this, are there any other (smaller $) changes i should consider? I'm almost certain it won't be long before I want to squeeze more power out of this motor. I want a bigger cam in there, but might be too much to bite off on right now.

More updates to come!

 

So, I bought my '68 in '78, drove it for five or six years every day, loved every minute of the drive, and parked it until this time last year. That's a long time. Check out the thread in here called "Ricky Camaro Rebirth" for the story. Settle down for a long read, but I think you'll find it relevant to your quest. Thread is a mix of status shots, status reports, and some weird level of philosophy about loving cars, collecting cars, restoring cars, and making decisions. Have a good read, and also read "Active First Gen Projects" thread for a similar journey for similar reasons, but in the end, this is about deciding how much that grin is going to cost, and whether you're willing to pay that much. For Ricky, the price tag will be around $60K. That's a gulp, but that's roughly the price of a new car, and that new car is not going to bring the grin that a 1st gen Camaro brings, especially on the back roads. Your choice. You and your family are who you do this for, if you decide to, not us. Not the gawkers at the car shows, although they're fun in their own way. Don't do it for resale. It will be YEARS before Ricky Camaro will command a $60K price tag. But remember, that new modern whatever-brand car is worth less every day, until finally it's worth nothing. At least, Ricky is going to go in the right direction. I had a neighbor who had an amazing fleet of 'brass' cars (older than 1916) and I used to ask him how much one of them was worth, and he would say, "son, whatever some damn fool is willing to pay." But I noticed he NEVER sold any of his fleet.

 

If you're wanting to cam it and make more power I'd consider swapping in a 12 bolt rather than doing anything with that 10 bolt.

 

Amen to that!!! 12 bolts rock, and every big block deserves one. I think I also remember you mentioning converting to a limited slip differential. I chose that route, and after a lot of research, went with Eaton's "Detroit Truetrac' unit. Spendy, but if you research how limited slips work, you will find that unlike most, this unit does NOT use clutches, or require special oil and maintenance. According to Eaton, it is also more effective in transferring torque to the wheel with the MOST traction. Be prepared to spend some money here. The result will look something like this:



Also, here is a link to a fairly good discussion about 12-bolts. https://www.chevydiy.com/camaro-diff...-step-by-step/

Good luck in any event. Regarding ratios, I chose to go the apparently less-than-popular route of 3.42 rather than more wheel-spinning ratios. With the rear tires I'll be using, this ratio results in around 3K RPMs at 70, and my 396 rebuild will give me substantial torque to overcome this rear-end ratio at an acceleration rate adequate to my tastes. I'm retired on a fixed income and can't afford to be replacing rear tires all the time... If my future years are similar to my past, a lot of miles will be spent on relatively straight roads at speed, while moments of back-road exhilaration will likely no longer be spent daring death to claim me...

 

It's a pretty car on the outside. If any of us REALLY want this done right it's gonna cost us.
I watch the Motortrend Channel all the time and no matter the shop, this car....to do it right 100%, is going to cost $30,000 minimum to $50,000 maximum. But it depends on what we want. Ivwould go Restomod since it isn't numbers matching. Also, I would do an LS conversion and modern A/C, power windows, Nice POP-UP USB screen, but only the minimum needed for Hands free calling and stereo settings. Preferably one that looks like a 1968 AM/FM Stereo. I can see the rust under the paint. Now if I had a friend with a garage that would go through that 396 and get it and just the driveline fixed. Then drive it! Make sure to upgrade to modern stopping distance brakes. I just have a feeling that the car pictured here is salvageable. But they all LOOK salvageable!
If you can't commit $30k on a survivor muscle car and it's drawbacks then don't do it. Not a judgment on anyone's character, just the truth.

 

Thanks guys, appreciate the advice. Making my way through the Ricky resto, what a journey!

Appreciate the 12-bolt recommendation. That was the way I was planning to go originally, but my shop is telling me the 10 bolt should be more than suffice for my current power needs. I may be being short sighted, but I don’t plan to be too hard on it. It will see 0 track time, I’ve got small tires, and motor tweaks may be years away. Car can’t be putting down more than 350/375hp and maybe 400lbs torque. I’m hopeful the news trans and gears will keep my thrills going for a good while.

 

I hear you and know you're right. I may very well put that kind of money into it over time, but I'm not sure I love it enough or could get away with putting in $30-50K to get it done in one shot. My wife definitely doesn't love it that much YET. She's only been in it a couple times, early on into us dating - so she only knows it as that PITA car I've had to move around a bunch a pay storage for. Funny story, I picked her up in it on our 3rd or 4th date. First thing she said when she got in was said, "oh wow, this reminds me of my grandma's car!". When I tell the story, she insists she just meant that it had roll-up windows... No matter, she understood the difference when we ripped through the Broadway tunnel in S.F. w/ the windows down. Quite the cathedral effect!

Anyways, back to plan... in short I feel comfortable putting in $10-12K, regardless if I recoup 50% or less of that investment, as long as it buys me a few years worth of fun romping around town... with some nice gear pulls and the occasional lighting of the tires.

The TKX 5-speed has been purchased through SST and will be here early Feb. It will ship on the 25th, so in the meantime, I need to decide what gearing will go in the rear. I'm still wavering on exactly what to do w/ the rear end. The 12-bolt was what I was planning on, but both rear end shops I've talked to told me it's not necessary until I get into quite a bit more power. They want $1900 (assuming axels don't need to be replaced) to put in new gears and the posi unit on the 8.2in 10-bolt ... I have to believe i'm looking at double or more to swap in a ready to go 12-bolt right? Let me know if I'm missing something, but right now I'm thinking I'm ok paying the $1900 to blast around with the motor as is a bit, before I decide to take the next step w/ the car, which in all reality is likely a couple years or more out, if ever.

My apologies if this is all over the place. I'm just getting back into the car and reading like crazy to educate myself on all this stuff - some new info and much I have forgotten.

My latest conundrum... I need new tires, which it's recently occurred to me I may want to revisit the sizing... which will impact whether or not I go w/ 3:55 or 3:73 gears. I believe I'm currently running P215/60R15's in the front and P225/60R15's in the back. Any suggestions on how wide I should go, assuming I want to stick with the stock rally wheels and if I stick w/ the 10-bolt?

Thank you for the help!

 

There are tools you can use to determine RPM's at the crankshaft for a given speed in mph. In order to use these tools, you will need to know some things. Specifically, you will need to know the gear ratio of each gear (or at least the final gear) of your transmission, the gear ratio of ring & pinion, and the diameter of your tires. Then, you can visit a site like this: https://purperformance.com/p-29669-rpm-calculator.html and plug in the numbers to determine velocity for any given gear and RPM. I used this and built a spreadsheet in MS Excel that looked like this for my 4-speed Muncie M20 wide-ratio:

If you don't know tire diameter, here's a good site to help: https://robrobinette.com/tire_diameter.htm
So, I used this to provide me with RPM's and made a choice between the two extremes of "burn rubber easily" and "reasonable RPM's at freeway speeds", and decided on 3.42 but also, my 396 makes good torque so I'm not as worried about acceleration from the line, plus, as I said above, I'm past the point in my life where I put myself in need of new rear tires on a regular basis, just to watch smoke happen.

 

thank you, this was very helpful! My rear tires are 255/60R15, so 27.1in Diameter. Playing around with your calculator has me 2nd guessing a few things…

I ordered the TKX 5speed with the following gear ratios 1st: 2.89, 2nd: 1.89, 3rd: 1.28, 4th: 1, 5th: .68.

They also have a version with a slightly more aggressive 1st and 2nd gear… 1st: 3.27, 2nd: 1.98, 3rd: 1.34, 4th: 1, 5th: .72.

If I go with 3.55 or 3.73 in the rear, the overdrive RPMs are pretty comparable, however, 1st and 2nd look like they could be a different animal. Is it going to be annoying redlining at 37 to 40mph out of 1st, 60 to 65mph in 2nd?

With the .68 overdrive version and 3.55 or 3.73 gears, calculator has me redlining 1st 40-45mph, and 2nd 65-67mph.

Given I’m only putting down 350-375hp, wondering if I go for the .72 overdrive version (assuming I can make the change since it doesn’t ship for a couple weeks).

Thanks for the input!

 

I have to confess I'm stumped. I have no insight into your driving style, but when I built my chart, my focus was NOT on redline RPM related to speed. I was more focused on shift points that I would use while driving normally, and also focused on freeway RPM's when going 70. I stayed with the Muncie so no overdrive, and I didn't want to be winding the revs for hours on end when driving a long distance, which does happen here on the left coast. Our states are BIG, as you well know. The alternative is to stop being in a hurry and just drive slower, but then you become a traffic impediment. I have been guilty of slowing down to check out some really cool old hotrod that was just chugging along on the freeway, and don't want that guy to be me. Of course, the other alternative is to stay off the freeways...
I charted both your rear-gear ratios, and found the exercise interesting. I don't tend to think about redlines that much because I am spending around $8500.00 on this engine, and while much of that money was to make it very stable at RPM (internally balanced, magnafluxed parts that were re-used, much is new, roller-rockers, etc), I have no desire to spend it again, and redliners tend to do that. Things happen really fast when you're blasting through the gears. While I personally consider 5500 RPM's to be a good rule for a 396, you can shoot right on by that when high on our favorite drug, adrenaline. Still, that's just me, and having scattered an engine once when I was young, I don't want to do that any more. Anyway, this is really your call, as only you know how you are likely to be driving. I predict I will be very happy at 3.42 with my healthy big block and wide-ratio M20.

I know I could build Ricky to go faster, but choose not to. I was visiting a friend down in San Ramon/Dublin, and he let me drive his very new very strong Corvette out on I-680, and when the way became clear, he suddenly told me "Floor it". It was an awesome moment in my life, because 100mph came and went while I was still trying to make sure we didn't hit the Jersey Barriers between north and south, and the sound... oh Lordy, the sound. At some point I remember thinking "how will I afford this ticket" but the interval from 'stomp' to 'let up' was incredibly short, and I came away from the experience realizing there IS such a thing as too much power. I guess that means I should not go into politics... Or make Ricky too strong. But have a good time with your restoration!!!