So, I didn't drop a transmission on myself today, which was nice.


Here it is in the air, in my slightly messy garage.


This is a nice shot of the diff cover. Cleaned off, degreased, and painted gloss black. Much like polishing a turd, but oh well. Waiting for the RTV to dry overnight and then we'll fill it up with fresh gear oil.

I had to remove the fan and shroud to get to the crank pulley bolt, so I snapped a picture of the nifty new aluminium radiator. Apparently, Autozone won't even sell you a copper/brass radiator anymore. They're all Chinese aluminium cores with plastic tanks. It gets the job done. We'll see how long it lasts.

And lastly, I cleaned up the 200-4R crossmember. I almost managed to get the pan off the TH350 and drain it, got the kickdown cable undone, and got three of the five bolts holding the crossmember in off. Two more of those, undo the shifter linkage, undo the bellhousing bolts, and I should have the TH350 out. 

More underside stuff this morning. First, you can see the catalytic convertor. It looks a bit rough. The A.I.R. tube going from the A.I.R. pump to the cat was completely rusted away. The car smells funny while it's running, and I'm afraid the cat is bad. The horrible time the car has pulling past 2000 rpm is also a hint. It's coming out with the exhaust manifolds.


Here you can see the transmission pan. It's a THM350, basically the metric version of the hot-rodder favorite Turbo 350 from GM. Unlike the versions the hot rodders use, this mid-80s metric passenger car transmission has mushy shifts, shift points that are way too low, and a 1:1 3rd gear. I'm sure a good transmission guy could pull it and make it into a world beater, but I'm not spending any money on this one.














And here's why. This is a THM200-R4 four speed overdrive out of a 1986 Grand Prix. This transmission was made famous by the Buick Grand National. This example is not quite that fancy. The GN's, Monte Carlo SS's, and Olds 442s had a special valvebody with much better shift points. This one doesn't have that. However, it still has deeper 1st and 2nd gears, as well as a 0.69:1 overdrive fourth. This will get the car up to speed faster, and I'll get better gas milage once I'm up there. Readily available kits will also allow me to get the torque convertor to lock/unlock automatically, allowing me to dispense with my tacky in-car switch.














Everything is soaking in PB Blaster right now. Tomorrow, I drop the drive shaft, drain the transmission and try to pull it without crushing myself. Wish me luck.

So it begins...

So, here's the start of the first major set of "repairs." My goal for this week is to swap the exhaust manifolds for a set of headers I have laying around, as well as swap the stock TH350 three speed with a 200-4R four speed overdrive, and a few other odds and ends while the car is in the air.

Here you can see I've popped the diff cover off. It had never been off. The fluid inside was 22 years old. Nasty.












Here you can see the driver side exhaust manifold. It's been on there 22 years, but only 58.000 miles. Hopefully it'll come off without any of the exhaust bolts breaking.

These two, the first is the passenger side manifold. I think this one's going to be the tough one. second is the driver side manifold again, but through the wheelwell.

So, here it is

So here it is, my 1985 Pontiac Grand Prix. It's an eBay buy. 58,000 miles on the clock. Previous owner bought it from an estate sale. Apparently the old woman parked it seven years ago when she couldn't drive anymore. Sitting stillin Columbus, Ohio, isn't really good for a car. The previous owner was a car guy, and replaced a bunch of crap. The thing has fresh front brakes, all new hard brake lines, new rear brakes and drums, and it had a decent set of 15x7" American Racing wheels.

The rest, however, is a little off. The doors are shot. The steel ends at the chrome strip along the bottom. The suspension bushings are shot, and there's a little rot in a few places I've found, along with plenty of surface rust.

When I got it home and started driving it, it ran like crap. No power at all. I soon found the secondaries on the carb were rusted shut. I pulled it and attempted a rebuild. The top and base were worthless, so I swapped them with another Quadrajet I had laying around. It helped, but wasn't the greatest. I gave in and slapped a 500CFM Edelbrock four barrel onto it to get me by. I also had to rig up a switch to lock the torque convertor, since without a TPS signal from the carb, the computer won't lock it.

Next to come were new shocks. The original dampers were still on the car. It handled like a big fat ass. All waving and bouncing around. New $13 apiece cheapy shocks from O'Reilly's and a rear swaybar from a junked Monte Carlo SS helped a ton.

Chronic overheating was fixed with a new radiator, though I think the water pump is going to need replacement soon. I had the A/C converted to R134a by the Local Roppel's (on Dixie, good guys, go there), and got the non-functional A/C controls fixed by cleaning the vacuum switch in the dash as well as plugging a gigantic vacuum leak under the hood.

Future plans for this thing? I'm going to build a monster. You see, I also have a 1970 Datsun 240Z. I have spent the last three years getting it restored from sitting in a barn. I have determined that for what I've spent to get that Datsun up from 111 horsepower to a stout 175, I can get this Pontiac well over 500. It will also have A/C and a radio, which the Z will probably never have while I own it. I know what parts to get to deal with the suspension, and building a 500hp small block is cake these days. You can do it for $4000 using a junkyard core 350 and a mini-blower.

No, the hard part is going to be doing the rust repair, body work, and paint, all while trying to drive the thing to work each day. Stay tuned for more...

So here I am...

Amazing that somebody who had an email address in 1994 and wrote the first web page for a secondary U.S. Public school in 1995 would not have blog... until now.

So here it is. This thing is to keep track of my newest little project, my 1985 Pontiac Grand Prix.

Why this car? Because I like them. No other reason. Yes, I know they're worthless. Yes, I know they aren't fast. Yes, I know I will never recoupe my investment. I don't care, that's not why I'm doing this. If you get in the comments and address any of the whys, I'll delete them. I don't want to hear it, I already know.