1966 Chevrolet Corvair homecoming – missed deadlines
Prepositioning script and body trim with blue painter tape. It’s got to fit before it is attached. Photos by author.
Originally, this was supposed to be an optimistic update of a project well along. But as things have worked out, I’m now fairly discouraged. Not yet depressed, and certainly not defeated, but the original timeline to get this car into the Forest Grove Concours on July 16 might not be possible. It’s just feeling as though time is running out two weeks too soon.
Sometimes new trim pieces overlap, which requires some careful refitting.
For my part, I’ve done pretty much everything that would be required. I have assembled a whole bunch of parts, NOS and replacements. At considerable cost, I have either sourced or upgraded a bunch of components, from trim to engine bits. I’ve had the working alternator rebuilt to factory specs, and had the starter rebuilt because it had gotten weak. The cylinder heads have been redone properly, and the cylinders rebored to .030 over, with new pistons, wrist pins and rods.
On a fifty year-old convertible, what happens underneath the chrome and stainless steel trim can be pretty ugly. Happily, no one will likely ever see that part of it.
All the components required to reassemble the drivetrain, get it back into the car so it can be powered up before everything else is properly assembled have been done.
All except one critical bit, and that one’s got me flummoxed.
The flywheel.
New (R) and old (l) e-bar wheel cover spinners. 1964-1966 only. The difference is subtle, but important.
I gave it to a local Corvair specialist for rebuilding back in early January along with the pressure plate. It needed a new clutch disc too, and I prepaid everything, which in hindsight was probably a mistake. Still, these shops tend to function on a shoestring, and I’d like to support local folks who do this sort of work.
There are 42 feet (!) of stainless steel trim on this car. All of it has been polished to a mirror finish. The trim that goes around the back of the convertible top requires new snap buttons to be installed. The kit comes with the tool to do that. The directions say it should take two people. I probably will have it done professionally.
The pressure plate and clutch disc showed up just fine. No problem there. But they aren’t much use without a flywheel, and the builder went into hospital in February. I am certainly understanding about that, but since getting out, repeated phone calls to the guy have had him telling me it was due just any day now and he’d get right to it. The last call was on Wednesday, May 31. He solemnly promised that it would be done Thursday, June 1, and that it would be delivered to my drivetrain builder the very next day. Got a text from the builder that Friday – still no flywheel. I can’t contact the shop owner over the weekend, so am frustrated. Maybe next week – maybe not.
The manual top frame is complete, but has a very long way to come back. I won’t have time to do it this year.
This one single component has stalled the whole project so much that I am now skeptical of having it done in time. It’s not that it will break my heart or cause much depression. It’s just that I’d hoped so very hard to bring it out next month, at the Forest Grove Concours d’Elegance.
(I wish some days that I could get one of those teams that do television shows rebuilding a special car for someone to help me with mine. But if it doesn’t have a SBC motor in it, they don’t generally do that. The backstory of my car is every bit as good as any I’ve seen on a Saturday morning. I know it’s too much to hope for, but still….there are those days.)
The newly rechromed dipstick handle. Note the little orange plastic insert. Original, easy to lose or overlook, but to those who know it should be there, it should be there.
Ah well, patience is no easy thing. It’s not so much that life is too short — it’s that sometimes it feels as though the remaining part of it is.
Meanwhile….
Smallish details still get attended to in due course, against the day when the bits and pieces can be reassembled.
- The radio is now back, upgraded to AM/FM but with a perfectly stock look the car came with originally.
- Smallish bits, fasteners and trim pieces, have either been sourced or re-furbished locally. Mostly I’m pleased with that.
- My local chrome shop has now committed to expediting the few small jobs left to do. Like the chroming required on the dipstick handle – the originally was quite corroded. They did a nice job in only three days, and charged me only $20 for it. A bargain, as such things go.
- Odd pieces, like the little 1/4 inch orange plastic button that fits into the end of the newly-chromed dipstick required of this model. Those got lost most often, and are hard to find. I found one. Just have to figure out how to reinsert it without scratching the handle. Not easy!
- Discussions with Corvair experts indicate that the air cleaner lid I had so carefully powder-coated in satin black really should have been chrome for this model. (I recall mine as I got it originally – the lid was satin black, not chromed.) OK – ordered one of those and it should show up sometime this week. Cost $100, but sometimes that’s the price of authenticity. I just paid it. At the moment, I’m more buying time than buying parts. That’s the only way I can continue to make sense of this at all.
- I clicked the wrong part number ordering some seat covers for the rear seat from Clark’s, and got a set for a coupe. Four inches too long. Sent those back and the proper ones came Friday. They are now at the upholsterers. The seat frames were redone inside and out, padding and burlap replaced where needed, and all of the covers should now match as a set. No point installing them until things like the manifold pressure gauge line has been run from the motor to the dashboard.
- Speaking of the dashboard, have that back from Bob’s Speedometer. I am assured it has been tested and works properly. Installing it will require hooking up to a working motor, so the installation can be checked. The newly refinished dash is back in the appropriate black crinkle finish, and it looks great!
- Trim drives me nuts! Various sorts of fasteners fit in different places, and getting the proper ones to the proper places is time-consuming. Learned how to install the script trim. I’d been doing it wrong earlier. Wrong fasteners. My bad, but not critical. Got several NOS trim bits still in the original boxes, so that’ll work just fine.
- Picked up a manual top complete frame, but it will need to be disassembled, blasted and repainted before it can be installed. So for now, I’ll just leave the power top on it. It didn’t have a power top originally, and the build plate will be wrong. Eventually I’ll put that right too. Next spring or summer most likely.
- A little issue dealing with the stainless steel trim piece around the back where the top attaches to the rear of the passenger compartment. The buttons that attach the top boot need to be properly attached to that piece. Got the buttons and the tool with which to do it, but one mistake and some very expensive stainless steel gets damaged. Probably going to get some professional help with that.
- Got all four of the 3-bar spinners for the “wire wheel” covers, to replace some that pass the 10 ft test but aren’t concours quality. Will disassemble all four wheels, repaint the inner portion in the proper black, polish everything off and reassemble with the new spinnners.
- Took some doing, but now have four proper tail/backup/turn light inner housings. Found two that were NOS, and two that were really good used. The issue was the yellow/gold cadmium coating on the external surface. The originals I had were pretty much corroded and rusted. No one makes a replacement part for those, and finding four good ones was a challenge. But they are here, along with four brand new properly marked lenses, so they can be installed after the motor goes in too. Won’t take much time.
- The proper one-piece stainless wheel well trim awaits installation, still in its shipping box. NOS parts again – the ones I had were dented here and there. Need to go on when the wheels are off.
- The new wiring harness is in. Can’t connect it to anything till the drivetrain goes in. But so far, seems OK.
(Starting to get the idea about how critical that whole drivetrain thing is?)
Front of the glove box door. Crinkle finish paint flawless and trim properly installed.
Back of the glove box door, with new decals as they were originally.
Once the weather broke so I could work in the shop, things now progress faster than before. But the same weather change that allows for that also allows grass and weeds to grow, and keeping up with all of that is also time consuming. Just one damned thing after another!
Dashboard completely redone, all instruments functional and odometer reset to zero.
Looking back, I probably shouldn’t have tried to set a schedule at all. But at the time, it seemed like more than enough time to put a car together once all the correct components were in hand.
The brake/backup/taillight housings were cadmium coated. Over fifty years most have corroded. In this case, the one on the lower right was also oversprayed red. Just wrong.
An application of some Goof-Off with a paper towel and the red overspray is gone. There is no useful way to clean and re-coat the housings, and no one makes reproductions. These are the best four I could find. Just have to live with them.
I am re-learning one of the pieces of Murphy’s Law. It reads:
Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.
Corollary 1: It will not remain hidden forever. Or even for long.
Corollary 2: It will reveal itself at the least convenient time.
Corollary 3: Fixing the flaw will cost more than was in the budget.
Corollary 4: It will take longer, sometimes much longer than expected.
So – that’s where things are today. Might or might not make it to Forest Grove. But the car will be done correctly, and if it doesn’t get in this year, it will next year. I’ll get it there one way or another.
I recall clearly that when I got this car, the air cleaner lid was black. It was supposed to be chrome. Now I have two – both perfectly redone.
Sidebar story: There’s a fellow here in Salem has a lifetime achievement Oscar from the film industry for his work on cameras and sound for major motion pictures. About 6 weeks ago, he asked me to help him find an early model Corvair convertible for his collection. I did find him one – a 1964 Spyder convertible. He flew down to Santa Monica last week, bought it and…Drove It Home to Salem!. I approve completely. That story is here:
On arrival, it was clear that the wheelwell trim is missing. I got him the information for how to source it, and he’ll have it installed. I showed him how to enter his car into Forest Grove, and he plans to do that.
If I can’t get mine there, I can at least help him get his. The car hobby should work like that.