Great story John. I believe that you will honor your friend & his dad by your treatment of the car. One thing about the Camaro steering box. I don't believe that it is the best choice for you. As I understand things, the internal stops of the camaro box will limit your turning radius. You will not be able to make a sharp turn, in or out of a parking space or tight corner. I know from experience :) .
>From what I've read at the suspension & brake forum at Chevelle Tech, a better choice >would be the box from either a 85-87 or so Monte Carlo SS (hard to find) or a 94-99 >(or so) Jeep Grand Cherokee. If you go here: >http://www.chevelles.com/techref/index.html and read Jim Sheas info (hes a GM chassis >engineer), he explains why a whole lot better than I can. As for the big rear brakes, 75-78 el caminos and some 76-77 Malibus/Monte Carlos seem to be a fairly reliable source. rick schaefer 72 El camino http://www.chevelles.com/showroom/rick/elcamino17.jpg ACES #00140 Team Chevelle #00038 -- "John Liao" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Sorry - no big secret, they are just off a 69 chevelle, which is good and bad. It is less of a hassle and they should be a direct bolt in since the spindles are the same size, they are an 11" rotor and a dual master cylinder, but I was originally hoping to do the tall spindle swap (and still may in the future depending on how the car handles). The car will be used for cruising and general week end enjoyment so I don't have high expectations of making a corner carver out of it. Now I just have to find out what GM cars came with 11x2 inch rear drums which will be a direct swap. The cool thing about the car is that it belonged to a buddy of mine. It is a very straight (in need of A LOT of love though) 64 Chevelle Malibu SS that was the first one sold off the show room floor from a local dealership. My buddy's dad bought it as the only nice / new thing he ever owned. My buddy really doesn't even like american cars, but it had so much sentimental value to him that when I offered years ago to start redoing it for him if I could borrow it occasionally and take it to Hot August Nights in Reno, he said that it would be like loaning me his wife... needless to say, I never asked again. I did talk to him years later about leaving it to me in his will because he would be done with it and I wanted to see it go to some one who would appreciate what it meant to him. Several months ago he said that things were changing in his life, he was planning on moving out of the house that his grandfather built, that he had not touched the chevelle for 4 years and that it had sat under a tarp in our little beach town and that he would never get to start working on it again due to time , finances and other things. He asked me if I still wanted it since he thought it would be better for me to get it while I had time to work on it and enjoy it. When I came to look at it, his wife said "Oh, you are willing to take the old car out of the back yard for us?". It pained me how little she understood or appreciated what the chevelle meant to my buddy. When I picked it up with my trailer, I had only driven for 5 minutes before I had an offer to buy it as is. Needless to say, it is never going up for sale. My buddy also thanked me repeatedly for taking his car from him. Needless to say I thanked him repeatedly for giving me his mostly original 64 chelle malibu ss. He rebuiltthe suspension and gace it better springsand shocks. He also converted it to a 68 350 and a super t-10. I am obviously changing the brakes. A norcal chevelle-camino club member turned me on to a camaro steering box to quicken the steering. The entire body has surface rust (and rust through on the leading edge of the hood) so I am going to strip it and change the color from dark green to black. I am going to put AR torq thrust d 15x7 in wheels. The inetrior could used some work and I just saw a white 65 with these really cool "SS" logo seats that I forgot to ask the owner where he got them. Other wise, I want it to be a clean straight car that my buddy would be proud of. I of course originally had some visions of 13 inch brakes a 6-71 blower.... but after finding out the complete history on the car, I just would not have the heart, and the car deserves more respect. Kinda a cool car and a wonderful place to start a resto. Thanksagain for all the help and advice. I am sure I will be asking for more. John(;-) -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2004 3:21 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: RE: [Chevelle-list] front discs again > From: "John Liao" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > As it turns out, for some reason he originally didn't want to tell me where > the brakes came from, but it will all be fine. Don't leave us hanging! Where'd the brakes come from and what was the big secret? Pete "inquiring minds want to know" Geurds