The Camaro Club (UK)

Are you gonna weld the tubes to the diff ? Worth doing I'm told, especially if the axle if off the car.

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“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”

I don't have the kit to do that at home, cast iron to steel needs pre-heat and special rods, preferably MMA welding too.

Checked the alignments of the axle tonight. Got about 0.25 deg negative camber, which means it must have had more before I welded them on as it would have pulled more positive if anything. Also got about 0.25 deg toe in per side (0.5deg total). Which would have already been there anyway.

Checked across the axle flanges with an accurate straight edge

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.

Been gearing up to do the transmission and axle swap next weekend. Finished rebuilding the 700r4, hopefully it'll work properly after all that I think I will need a longer dipstick though, rather annoyingly!



Spent all day today making a new linkage for the throttle body as it had no provision for the TV cable whatsoever and then adding a suitable mount to the cable bracket. Went based on information here:

http://purplesagetradingpost.com/sumner ... 0R4p1.html

The post for the cable is 1.1" from the throttle shaft centre line and with the throttle 25% open it is vertically below the throttle shaft.

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.

Looks like a right fiddle to get it band on..... My hydraulic clutch has been the same with getting the adjustment right, part of the fun when fitting non stock modern upgrades I guess.

I hope it works out, and good idea doing the trans and axle in one go. Does the propshaft fit straight on length wise ?

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“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”

Yeah, was a bit of a pain. Despite measuring up more times than I can remember i still made 2 different lever set up's

Propshaft needs to be 3" shorter (45.5" joint centres) than for the TH350. Got a new one on the way, should be here tomorrow.

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.

The hole for the throttle return springs......has´nt got much meat around it.
I had a bracket for return springs made out of aluminium, not good, wears quickly.

That loop for the springs is steel it's the one that came with the spings, bit crap really, going to make a proper mount for it on the throttle arm at some point.

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.

Been working on the transmission and axle swap.

The axle swap went really well, only took about 4 hours in all. Left the brakes connected up and tied them up out of the way, saved bleeding them again.

Straightened the shock mount plates and welded on a reinforcement rib to stop it bending again. Bolted the axle up to the springs with no insulator pads and with new 1/2" U bolts.

The old 10 bolt out



12 bolt in



Spent all afternoon removing the old transmission, was hoping to work around the exhaust but had to take it off in the end, so that ate up a couple of extra hours. I've got a load of prep work to do before fitting the 700r4 next weekend. Got a huge stacked plate cooler to fit, and the wiring for the lockup converter.

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.

Finished installing the new transmission today, took a while as I had to do loads of other small jobs at the same time including fitting a new transmission cooler and resolving a shifter issue due to a bent cable end.

I moved the stock crossmember back 70mm, using the original rear holes in the sub frame as the new front holes and drilling new rear holes. To position those I stuck a long bolt through the original rear hole so I could measure the centres properly. Worked out well.

I was lucky, in that my car originally had a TH350C with a lock up converter, so I already had the brake switch and +12v wire ready to hook up to the trans, just had to solder on the correct connector.

The UJ is going to be very close to the reinforcement in the floor pan, it should have around 1/4" clearance, I could gain some more by elongating the holes in the rubber mount if needed. Reason is that the engine and trans sit offset by about 3/4" in the second gen, so it's always going to be rather close!

Still waiting for my driveshaft so I can actually test it properly (due weds), but I've filled it with fluid and run pressure tests in park, getting 110psi with the TV hooked up, and it spikes up to 200psi as soon as the cable is pulled. So far so good - and yes it sounds great on open headers

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.

Got my crossover pipe refitted today after some modifications to clear the crossmember. I've also made a few other small alterations to the exhaust to try and stop some annoying rattles and bangs.

Thinking of making myself a set of traction bars, I'm undecided whether to make some 'Caltrac' style ones or just good ol' traditional ones.

Ordered some tubular upper control arms today as well, should be here in a week, after those are fitted I can finally get my front alignment sorted properly.

Going to be interesting to see what difference the changes have made!

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My '80 progress thread - hugger orange! Now with LQ9 power - forged pistons, LS2 rods, 236/242, .621/.612, flowed and milled 317 heads. MS3X

4L80e, 12 bolt, 4.11, Moroso brute strength posi, steel shafts.

Subframe connectors, g-braces, solid body bushes, carbon hood and front bumper, custom door cards, Autometer gauges.