'73 Vega GT All Aluminum Wildcat 355 Project

Contents:
Page 1: Engine Block prep
Page 2: Head mods
Page 3: Induction/Exhaust
Page 4: Engine Assembly
Page 5: Front Suspension Mods
Page 6: Rear Suspension/Weight Transfer Mods
Page 7: Rust Repair and Undercarriage prep
Page 8: Frame Rail fabrication/Unibody support
Page 9: Body Mods
Page 10: Transmission Mods
Page 11: T5 Rebuild
Page 12: BMW Radiator Swap

Suspension Mods:

Front suspension: I wanted bigger brakes and 5-lug wheels so I converted the suspension to S10 componants.

Here's the LCA setup. I cut the ball joint sleeve off the S10 LCA I got at a local scrap yard.

Using an angle grinder I took it down to about 0.500 in wide. Then I welded on the sleeve from the S10 I just modified and used a hummer wheel on a die grinder to grind out the hole to match the S10 sleeve.

******************************************************************************************************
One thing I would have done differently was to mount the lower sleeves farther in board by about 1/4". That would go a long way to fixing the typical over camber problem with swapping these S10 spindles onto the Stock H-body suspension components. On the left is what I did. On the right is what I should have done:
******************************************************************************************************

Here's a couple pix of how it turned out after I pressed in the new S10 ball joints.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         Here's what the UCA setup looked like. This mod was A LOT easier than the LCA mod. I welded in the stock Vega UBJ holes. Then I made a template for the S10 UBJs out of tag board and worked out where they would end up at. I added some negetive camber as you can see before I learned the S10 spindle already has some built into it. I might have too much neg camber now... We will see.

Here's what the finished product looked like. This was my first time welding so there was a lot of time involved until I got the confidence to do it.

What I ended up with was a complete S10 setup. It was fun to work on too! I'll post pix of the final assembly when it is finished.

The last thing I did was cut the springs and flattened them down. This was really easy by-the-way. Just need a torch to heat up the spring locally, bend it, and let it cool slowly... Here's a pic of the cut. I'll post a pic of the completed springs shortly:

OK so I decided to go with an adjustable upper control arms to resolve the camber problems with the S10spindle. Here's a couple pix of them... One with me loving them a little. lOl.

I finished the rack mount fabrication this week. Pretty cool! I was fretting over this for a long time. As with everything I've done on this car, in the end it went off without near the problems I expected. The longest part was the planning. Just making sure it was level and straight, and mounted the rack in the right place. I think it's right where it should be. I still have to reassemble the front suspension now. If the steering arm from the spindle is the right distance from the pivots it should work out just right.

I finally got some time to fabricate the steering shaft and mock up the front suspension with the new componants. First the steering shaft. I took a fellow H-buddy's idea of using a 3/4" dowel to mock up the steerign shaft length. That worked great. It takes just a couple seconds to cut the dowel and allowed me to get the length worked out pretty quick. What's missing here is the bearing inside the steering column tube. I was able to order that and it should show up in a couple days. I'll post some pix of that when its finished.

Then I cut the shaft and mocked up the rest of the shaft. Here's a couple pix of the almost finished shaft assembly.

I finished the install this week. I started by trying to install the bearing I bought for the end of the steering tube. It turned out to have about 1/16" clearence so I tried to grind down the poly sleeve inside to take up the difference and press it into the tube that way. Then I tried to install the steering shaft and got it stuck on the bearing. When I tried to pull it out it pulled the bearing I just drove in! AHHH! Then I took the whole thing over to the vise and started tapping the bearing off by pounding on the end of the steering shaft and collapsed my steering shaft!!! SHIT! So I had to start over. Moral of the story is I just welded in the bearing. I doubt it will ever go bad.

Then I installed the front suspension to measure the distance from the rack to the spindle for the tie rods. Here's a pic of Chuck's adjustable UCAs. They worked out pretty good. I was a little pissed because one of the spacers didn't have the hole drilled all the way through. I had to finish the drilling. It was a little irritating. The second pic is of the wheel on. I'm hoping this is about where the wheel will end up.

I finally installed the tie rods out of the parts I ordered. IT looks great. I've got a coupleof bump steer studs you can see them on the spindles. Then I put the car on the floor for the first time in about 4 years. WOW!