911rsq

So I am at work the other night (dispatcher for the sheriff's office) and the call comes in. The caller says a kid just put his red Camaro in the ditch. It peaks my interest, but not too much. My deputy gets on scene and runs the plates and it comes back on a '92 Chevrolet Coupe.....aka '92 Camaro. The deputy know's I'm into Camaro's so I send him a message on the computer in his squad that he ought to tell this kid that I want to buy his car... . So he does.... . The kid's dad is on scene at this point and the deputy tells the dad too. The dad says it is the kids 5th wreck in his 3 years of driving and the car's gotta go. I send my number to the squad car and I forget about it.
That weekend was Super Chevy in Indy. I was out of town all weekend and when I get home, sure enough, there's a message on my answering machine. The ol' man wants to sell me this car. I go and look at it. It's not too bad and the guy wants nearly nothing for it......SOLD !!!!!!

And now I have 5.....

911rsq

The front end is a little high because of the jack stand holding up the passenger side. When he went thru the ditch, the castle nut broke and slid off of the spindle, allowing the wheel to fall off. The car landed in dirt, so nothing was really torn up too bad.

911rsq

Or so I though......

911rsq

New front ground effect is all that you can tell that needs to be replaced in this pic . Check out the next one tho....

911rsq

Last but not least....
From here you can see that I am gonna need a new fender and passenger side ground effects. The door has a dent in it and it broke the spoiler piece on the quarter panel which fell down and cracked the tail light. All pretty easy fixes...
Oh yeah The wheel fell off too, so I am gonna put a new a-arm and spindle from a parts car on her just in case anything got bent.

Whaddaya think ????

Difflock

5??
You greedy bugger! At least it's gone to a good home

I'm just coping with one ThirdGen over here (sniff...sob...)

Mark.

911rsq

This one looks like it needed saved from the previous owner. He's 19 and had 5 major wrecks . The car is really clean, so I think he took car of it, but he just didnt have the driving skills needed to drive this car.....
Thankfully I do.....

srdynamics1

iTrader: (10)

The Nitto sticker tells me all I need to know about the previous owner.

911rsq

Did you know him..... I see you are from Illinois....possibly central Illinois ?????

srdynamics1

iTrader: (10)

Most definitely not. I don't associate with that crowd.

911rsq

If it helps at all, there was a huge Chevy Bowtie sticker on the back window.....
It has since been peeled off......

VroomVroom87Z28

You'll definetly be rescuing this car from the otherwise certain doom it was facing. So far I've done this with two camaros, one is yet to be revived though, some people just have a passion for the lost. We see through the dents and scratches and think of only one word, "potential"



But really, 5! You are greedy, never mind the money, who's got the space?!

CrazyHawaiian

I dunno how you can do 5 at one time. I've had that many at once, it was a nightmare. Run out of funds real fast. Parting them out is fun though ...

firebirdjosh

iTrader: (1)

Yeah I know, right. Anyone with a window banner is a scumbag... </sarcasm>

911rsq

Hahahahahhaa..... I cried a little

omnipotentgoku

iTrader: (1)

Keep us posted over time with your updates, I will put them in the tragedy to success gallery.

I should note though, you know that gluttony and greed are sins right ? (Good snag though)

@ZZKKER

iTrader: (1)

i live in decatur. where are you located?
i picked up my 89 formie beater up like that. i work ata body shop and the guy didnt want the car anymore so i payed the $200 storage bill he owed the shop. iv driven this car for 2 years now without a hitch while I work on my t/a and iroc's. t/a is about done so i will have something to drive while i fix the formie's rear damge and then sell it. a 2000 ws6 ta just came in sat and i think it is totaled. if it is im gona try to pick it up from the insurance company cheap. lets hope so.


thanks

DanTheMan_smlk

you rich sob...lol

how big is your garage...or driveway?

911rsq

I am just north of Springfield.....
Good luck on the WS6, that could do wonders in swap parts !!!!

Well..... I am doing this all out of a 1 car garage. The driveway can hold 2 cars, but we store them down at my dad's shop.... 2 of them are outside down there....

911rsq

I was really trying to get a lot done today, but it rained from sun up to sun down. I am gonna try to get the garage set up to really hammer on it in the morning. Hopefully, if all goes well I will have the fenders sanded down and "maybe...just maybe..." painted tomorrow night....

It is scheduled to rain in the morning tho

DanTheMan_smlk

rattle can job?

911rsq

Nope..... I really paint my cars....
I've painted cars for a long time now, just haven't done it a lot here recently. The fenders just need a good sanding and the ground effects as well. With it raining, the humidity is gonna be really high with the temps we've been having. Hopefully the rain will blow some of it off and I can get them ready to go.

DanTheMan_smlk

cool, make sure u post pix when ur done

any rust on the floorpans?

ES87iroc

Good riddance. Few things are more tacky on an fbody than a big fugly bowtie in the back window.

911rsq

I think the bowtie on the hatch is a major cliche that this dude just felt the need to fulfill. I, being a hard core 3rdgenner have peeled it off and lit it on fire for good riddance...

I again had a lot of plans for today to get the parts painted and maybe ready to go onto the car. No dice. Rain rain, go away....... I have most of the parts together and have been sanding on them a little, but the rain is gonna keep the paint gun away...

911rsq

I haven't pulled the carpet in the front, but the rear looks good and clean. There is 1 small spot of rust on the pass side quarter where the previous owner had put some of that chrome wheel well trim on.......(barf). It is where the screw hole was at. I have since removed that garbage and am gonna fix the spot of rust. From the looks of things, I may just do a "quickie" paint job on the whole car.....

DanTheMan_smlk

paint it white with black heritage stripes

911rsq

Although I do love white Camaros, I am probably gonna stick with red on this one. I may go for the herritage stripes tho.....

DanTheMan_smlk

damn......

911rsq

OK...Update time.
I went out in the rain today and did a little deconstruction. I took apart nearly everything in the rear to get the rear bumper cover off. The rear hatch panel, the spare tire (which by the way was covered with some old blanket that had sat down in the water in the bottom for what had seemed like years and it STUNK!!!!!!!!) Thankfully no rust down there....
The previous owner had a "custom" stereo consisting of an amp rack mounted on the rear deck area and he removed the T-top mounting brackets, so I replaced them. He also pulled the carped all up and out of the way trying to remove his stuff, so I started to fix that too. Tail lights came out and the drivers side back interior panel came out as well. the rear bumper is loose and will come off in the morning. I also took off the rear spoiler, as it was cracked. Anyone got an extra deck spoiler and pass side quarter piece for sale... 91-92 style......

911rsq

So, I think I have "most" of what I am gonna need to get this ol girl back on the road. Last night I went and picked up a new rotor, bearings, and pads for the front to be put back together. $87 is all it's gonna take to get this girl rolling again.

I also came up with 2 fenders, nose cone, and a front bumper bar that are already the right color

I got the passenger side door opened finally and the damage is not gonna be fun to fix. The rocker is pretty much smashed in and it has bent up a little in the middle of the door opening. It just touches the bottom of the door and makes it rub. I have access to a good rocker panel and a welder, so not too big of a problem.

What gets me most is that most of this damage was avoidable!!!! I finally pulled the rotor off of the wheel that came off and the "castle nut" that was installed was 1/8" thick nut, with a "castle cover" on it to keep it from spinning. The accident occurrecd and ALL of the threads stripped out of this thing . I am sure that if there was a good (correct) castle nut in there, this thing would still have 4 wheels, and much less bottom side damage.

It's been raining for several days, but the forecast looks good for the days off, so hopefully more progress on this ol' girl very very soon.

DanTheMan_smlk

do you have pics of the rocker panel damage?

please....

911rsq

I do have a few pic of it at the tow yard where they took it to that night after the wreck. I will have some much better ones on my days off, but here are a few.

911rsq

and that picture....

911rsq

The ground effect was torn off and was in pieces and the bracket that is spot welded to the rocker has rolled up pinching the door shut. I beat that down with a hammer. As you can see, the middle of the rocker is smashed up pretty good.

P.S. I have since removed that silly plastic chrome trim on the rear of the door....some people

DanTheMan_smlk

thx for the pic, now i know what ur talking about

that looks bad though

911rsq

Good news,
I got the fender off and the damage isn't really that bad. The subframe and structure underneath the car are all in really good shape. The A-arm is good and the plastic pieces under the car were mostly all there too. The rocker panel is pretty banged up, but I have plans that will relieve that problem. I will have good pics posted up tomorrow.

I got most all of the interior out of it tonight too. The seats and the dash are pretty much all that is left in her.

@ZZKKER

iTrader: (1)

are you going to ruff it out so the rocker molding will fit? that gfx should cover most of the damage.

thanks

911rsq

Well, I got to work on the car again today, but the news isn't quite as joyful as yesterday. I am having some issues with the passenger side door not closing properly. When it is almost closed it looks like it is dropped down nearly an inch. The door striker has fresh nicks in it from closing the door. I think the car is tweaked a little.

I do have good news tho.... There is a body shop here locally that does wonders at straigtening cars...even unibody cars. I plan on getting in touch with them in the morning. What I would like to do is to have them pull the car back to square and then have them install the complete rocker to replace my damaged one. I have access to a parts car with very clean rockers on it. I will cut off tons of extra sheet metal around the rocker to give them plenty to work with.

Now for the good news!!!!!
Some of you may have read some of my other posts and have seen that I am really into building a convertible Camaro. The good news is.....this is now gonna be my donor car for the convertible conversion. After stripping the interior out of her I realized that this body is in great shape. It has 137,000 miles on it and not a spot of rust......VERY VERY clean car. I have had a '90 vert "shell" for a while that I was some day going to fix up into a full car. I have since found out that it is gonna be WAY easier to convert a T-top car to vert than to cut 2 cars in half and make 1 good one out of the 2. Well, here's my T-top car that I have been looking for!!!! I will soon have the car the rest of the way stripped out, and I even got that front right suspension replaced today. SHE'S A ROLLER NOW!!!!!!

What do you guys think????? The funny thing about it all is that when I do go thru with this conversion, that this new ride will make "4" as the 5th car is gonna be a donor car and then scrapped as the damage is just too great on it.

@ZZKKER

iTrader: (1)

form that pic of the door, i would say the door is tweaked, not the body. try installing a good door on there and i bet that will solve the problem. if the body is tweaked, there will be dents or ripples on the roof and the b pillar where the top rear of the door glass is.

so i would not worry about it untill you can fit a good dorr on there.

thanks

911rsq

The door is probably tweaked a little, there is a decent sized dent in the bottom of it from the accident. The rocker panel is tweaked a little too. It has some high spots. The door gaps look good when I can get the door shut all the way. I'm gonna have it checked either way cause I want it to be perfectly straight when I convert it....

Hexane

....I have a big red Chevy Bowtie on my hatch... Any special ways to peel it off? Or just like a normal sticker?

911rsq

The best way to remove the bowtie sticker is with a hammer. Several nice smooth clean blows will assure that the sticker is no longer affixed to your car !!

Hexane

Hahaha.. Picked up my windshield today and it had two bowties and "Camaro" across the top.. Razored it all away and since it's been there the whole time, the bowties and camaro are blue in the now orangish tint. I never win.

82knightrider

iTrader: (1)

cool

DanTheMan_smlk

btw, does it have heritage stripes?

911rsq

Survey Says.........................

911rsq

Nope.....But it will when I am done with it....


I hate long weekends. I really need to get this car on a frame rack to make sure all is ok, but this stoopid weekend being 3 days long is gonna hinder me for 1 more day. I hope to have it in there in the next couple of days and then the fun really will begin!!!

911rsq

I've been workin on this darn car for a couple of days trying to figure out why she won't run.... I was just kind of playing with it as I went thru everything else, but it was bothering me none the less. Obviously she was running when he wrecked her, so it had to be something that broke, or something simple if not broken. At first the battery only let her crank over really really slowly, but that got better. I pulled the breather cover off and I could smell the fuel when it cranked. 3rd and final thing to check was spark.....

I think this kid must have been an electrical engineer.....er....an electrical retard He installed an MSD ignition and cut the CRAP out of every wire in sight. I pulled the box off the firewall and tracked down thru all the wires. The ones that needed cut were cut and he crimp spliced into the rest. Not my favorite type of connection, but good enough to get her running I guess. Then it hits me. When I went and got the car, the kid was pulling his stereo out. He pulled every last wire, but I remembered seeing a red 12ga or 10ga wire up by the A/C box. I just blew it off as his power wire, but when I pulled the interior, there was no power wire . I pulled it down to the battery and hooked it up and guess what......Fired Right Up

What an A$$. He pulled that wire half way back to the MSD box. I took her for a little ride, but not too far cause of the cracked brake caliper, I.E. I backed it out into the street and turned it around, then pulled it back into the drive . It sounds AWESOME, even for a 305 (sorry 305 lovers.....) cause the exhaust was destroyed in the accident, so I cut it off just behind the cheapo glass pack he had hidin where the cats should go. LOUDDDDDDD is more like it!!!! I was all ready for some pics tonight, but rain has hampered me again. I hope it is dried up in the morn and maybe I will have some....

V6camaroman

where can you get those nitto sticker like he had on that camaros windshield? does anyone sell just the sticker? i have a set of the 555r on the back of my car and thought that adding the windshield banner would be cool.