Welcome to my '67 442 page. I bought this car in the fall of 2006 after seeing it listed on eBay. It was only about 20 miles from my home, so I took a ride to look at it and was impressed with what I saw. A very solid, complete, numbers matching, well documented original 442. All in all, a great start for an easy restoration project. The car didn't meet reserve in the auction, so I made the owner an offer. After thinking about it for a while, he decided he needed the money more than he needed a project car (haven't we all been there?) So, here's what I came home with:

You can see all the pictures of it taken the day it came home right here: http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2090098/3

This 442 was loaded up with power options: steering, brakes, seat, windows & trunk release. It also has factory A/C, AM/FM radio with rear speaker, tilt wheel, tinted glass, rear window defogger, SSI wheels, deluxe split bench seat with center armrest and and a black vinyl top. The car came with the original protect-o-plate, window sticker, sales invoice and tons of other documentation and receipts collected over the years. It shows only 49k miles on the odometer, but I haven't been able to determine if that's correct or not. Judging by the 20+ year-old Dunlop GT Qualifier F70-14 bias-ply tires it was wearing, it hasn't been driven much in a very long time. The tires looked like brand new! The previous owner had owned it 9 years and said he hadn't put more than a couple hundred miles on in that time. He had the engine rebuilt at a well-know local performance shop, but admitted he could never get it to run right since then. He also had it painted with black sealer (for the "suede" look) since he couldn't afford a proper paint job. I had it towed home and found a ground wire to the distributor was broken, causing the engine miss. Also, the Edelbrock carburetor was way too rich. I replaced it with a Holley spreadbore, fixed the ignition wire, then set the timing and voila - it purred like a kitten and spun the tires as long as I held the pedal down!

After 2 years of hard work (and lots of cash) here's what I ended up with:

That looks a little different, huh?

OK, the body & paint was a collaborative effort between me & a bunch of friends. It started with the car stripped to bare metal by me & Cort Knodel, owner of CK Metal Prep and Dura Plating. Part of the trunk pan and the LR body mount was replaced by fabricator extrordinaire Rick Vernon (RV Enterprises). Metal patching of small spots around the rear wheelwells was done by Ryan Knoche of West Collision & Competition, who also installed the front disc brake conversion (from The Right Stuff Detailing) and the reproduction fuel tank. Most of the rough bodywork was done by me under the instruction/supervision of Lee Baker, owner of Lee Baker Custom Finish. Lee did the finer bodywork, then applied multiple coats of primer with me doing the block sanding in between. Lee did the final prime & block then applied the 1968 Oldsmobile Peruvian Silver PPG base/clear finish. A VFN 4" cowl induction fiberglass hood was painted to match, with a black center stripe outlined by white pinstripe (by Mike Miller) added a'la '68 Hurst/Olds. The black vinyl top was applied by Perry Ross (Ace Upholstery), who also upholstered the seats with new covers from Legendary. I installed new carpet, armrests and rear package tray to complete the interior. Window glass installation was handled by Glass America. The rear bumper was beautifully rechromed by Keystone and the exterior stainless was polished by Dave's Metal Polishing. Reproduction emblems from The Parts Place, along with dozens of detail items from Fusick Automotive freshened up the exterior.

Here's some shots of the bodywork phase: 

Mechanically, there were some changes in order, too. The original 350 h.p. 400 c.i. "E-block" engine was pulled and stored away. A 1967 Olds 425 "D-block" was procured, along with a 455 crankshaft. They were delivered to Billy Leverentz, owner of the famed Oddy's Racing Engines in Elma, NY. After the machine work was finished, CAT H-beam rods, Wiseco pistons and a Pro-Race balancer completed the bottom end package, which was buttoned up with a 5-main halo girdle from Jim Lapikas of J & S Machine - home of the Olds halo main girdle. An Engle/Mondello cam, Crane solid roller lifters, Comp pushrods, Scorpion roller rockers and Isky springs work the valves in unported Edelbrock aluminum heads. The intake is an Edelbrock Victor, topped with a Jet Performance 750 Dominator carb. Exhaust is handled by coated 2" primary Kook's headers feeding a full-length Magnaflow 2 1/2" stainless exhaust with X-pipe. Ignition is controlled by a Pro-Comp box and MSD billet distributor. The engine made 481 h.p. and 513 lb/ft torque on the dyno at Oddy's, on a 90+ degree day with very high humidity. We were also forced to run the dyno pulls with a smaller set of headers (1 3/4" Dynomax) due to an interference issue. We missed the magic 500 hp mark, but the torque curve is very flat from 3000 to 5300+ rpm, and we all know how much fun that torque can be! Here's a tiny video clip of the dyno session: http://video.cardomain.com/copper128

The transmission is the original TH400, rebuilt by Atech with a switch-pitch converter from P.A.E. A floor-mounted Hurst Dual Gate shifter with a push-putton switch to control the converter was added. The driveshaft is 3" heavy-wall steel, made by Brookline Machine. Rear axle is also the original - an Olds 12-bolt, with new posi differential, 3.90 gears and Olds W-27 aluminum cover added during a complete rebuild by Brian Trick.

Wheels are real Halibrand 5-spokes, 15x6 front and 15x8 rear, mounted with Firestone Indy 500 radials. When heading for the strip, the rears are replaced with 15x8 Mickey Thompson wheels and 275/60-15 ET Street Radials.

Thank you to all the following for your help:

Lee Baker, Billy Leverentz, Mike Schultz, Rick Vernon, Ryan Knoche, Jack Wierzba, Perry Ross, Brian Trick, Cort Knodel, Lenny Iwanenko, Jim Lapikas, Atech Transmission, Brookline Machine, Fusick Automotive, Glass America of West Seneca, the members of www.RealOldsPower.com and especially my Dad and my wife Kathy.