Shifter

Bad arse bro! Very cool.

 

Murray and Chris at VC are good guys and know there shit! Used Chris as a sounding board for a bit of stuff on the 64 dude knows his stuff!

Yeah man, good people. Can honestly say that without them this car would have been an unfinished project on trademe.

Your 64 is awesome by the way. Cheers.

hey man!

good to see you got your car up on here.

im sure i speak for all of us when i say keep updating your thread. im keen to see it in new paint.

Hey man. Yeah, only took me a year or so. 

Hope all your projects are going swimmingly.

Fuck yes, nice car man. Glad you stuck at it, I'm sure you are not the first to screwed by Cowboys who promise the world.

Cheers man. It's my fault really for not having the skills to do the work myself, opens the door to that kind of stuff.

Was pretty dark on the car for a while but a couple of years of driving fixed that.

Anyway, hope this isn't getting too boring but the next problem was this:

I don't mind patina and this car had the good version in places, but the variations between panels just annoyed me - so this happened.

It is actually a real solid old beast so it was a case of tidying it up rather than back to bare metal.

Unfortunately the rear guard didn't get that message...sigh. Was a rather poor mud job done previously, but hidden by chrome.

Better to catch it sooner rather than later though. And fortunately the rest of the car was good.

Ebay find:

Took about 2 years to finally track these down via the HAMB: 

They're now gray with black lettering. Staggered SBC pattern. I mount them to the centre bolt crate motor with adapters.

Recent find - rear overriders and bar, needs chrome.

Right, so we got it legal and drove it round for a couple years. Kept losing the full wheel covers so changed them out to Chev dog dish and most recently baby moons with beauty rings. Stuck a visor on and started collecting more bits and trim.

SBC is sweet and a fucktonne cheaper than rebuilding a BOP motor. Who did the work? I recognise Lee's 51 Vicky up on the hoist in the second bunch of photos?

From memory the work done on his car was a bit fucked up too (like the master cylinder was installed under the floor but no way to fill the master cylinder without taking it off)

Those pics are at Valley Custom. So that was where it was getting made better!

My master cylinder is under the car too as a side note, but yeah, remote reservoirs. 

My excuse with the SBC is that all the Canadian versions ran them OE. I'm so CDM.

Here's where any discussion relating to my 51 Chieftain build goes...fire away. At least mock me for putting an SBC in it.

Here's the build thread...

//oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/53946-shifters-51-pontiac-chieftain/

Bit of a lurker but always enjoy following the build threads on OS. Came across a few pics of my car so figured I'd post a few up to now, and then update going forward.

Got the car off a friend in stock form. It was "restored" in the UK at some point but from what I understand the guy emigrated to NZ but had health issues and passed away once here. I think the car sat for quite some time after.

Anyway, I got the car and promptly broke it. The OG six needed a rebuild which priced out pretty high and as I had always planned to make it more of a daily driver I figured there was little reason to throw $ at the six.

Isn't hindsight a wonderful thing. That's exactly what I should have done. Oh well...

So, the short version...

Jag IFS, 350 SBC crate motor, TH375 trans (yes 375!), HQ diff, rewired. Some other stuff.

Would like to point out rather quickly that I'm pretty hopeless with the tools and although they entertained my efforts knocking round their shop, all the real heavy lifting was done at Valley Custom in Cambridge.

However, Valley Custom wasn't the first lot to have a crack at it and I'm picking this up from when I dragged it to their shop. Long story short, none of the first lot of work was up to cert standard inc engine mounts (had even bent on trailer ride over), gearbox crossmember, rear Jag IRS mounts, and steering rack mounts. But the firewall was painted so totally worth it. 

Well, it's making a much bigger thing out of it than it really was but for those who weren't there to witness firsthand...

No, my strong impression is that the approach certainly wasn't in line with what the organisers and associated parties hoped for.

And as an example...on thursday morning there was a checkpoint style setup next to a bridge on way to Tairua. They were waving over any car with a "noisy" exhaust or missing a front plate and ticketing. Was a well oiled production line. Cars were back on their way quickly with a fine in the glovebox.

I have no issues with police at all. Happy to face consequences if I'm at fault. All I'm getting at is this wasn't a "poor me, I got a ticket for doing a burnout in the middle of Whanga" situation. Was a lot more calculated.

This was a response issued by a party with a long association with the Beach Hop:

Okay as most know I support the NZ Police 99.99% of the time. They have a bloody difficult job to do at the best of times and one that gets harder by the day. 

Having said that I was completely gobsmaked (as were most) at their "overtly agressive response" to a situation that didn't exist in the first place at this years Beach Hop festival. Their behaviour was nothing short of a calculated attack on the event and its participants.

Rattled the pontiac round as a camera car over the week. Making a one hour special for TV3 and the Beach Hop DVD.

Good to catch up briefly Mr Gasser.

The cops thing was interesting. Yep, not attracting attention is a good start but they were operating with a directive of ticketing missing front plates, noisy exhausts, and people riding round in pickup trays. So bit of intent there.

Made it much more exciting as I discovered I was minus a warrant. Got waved through two checkpoints while they were busy so must have been crossing fingers the right way.

Timing is amazing. Everything else is dumb.

Will also be released on themotorhood.com the week following the TV screening.

The pontiac looks better from 20m - or at night!

It's solid but plenty of chips, cracks, and yellowing.

That Galaxie looks awesome. Gotta hold onto that! 

Gidday Cal.

Hi mate, didn't realise you were on here. Keeping out of trouble?

Thanks guys.

welcome along shifter.

hope to see you at the hamilton monthly meets. (last thursday of the month at speights ale house)

very nice pontiac man! 

Cool, yeah will have to come along sometime.

Seen your bug and Valiant at the Classics Museum before. Must have been the Petrolhead breakfast or one of those cruise in nights. Very cool.

Weird, I already have an avatar somehow?