I've been on here a while and thought I would post a thread on my 85 over here. I've been primarily on Another since I bought this car around 2008.
History: I got divorced and decided I needed another hot rod. My brother and I had previously had a pretty hard core back half 83 Regal with a methanol injected 455 Buick in it that ran 10's. I knew I didn't have money to do that all over again, PLUS I wanted something to his the cruise ins and just drive.
I found this 85 over in Knoxville (7 hr drive) and drove it home. It already had a bunch of good parts like 5 lug conversion, 86 up dual exhaust, BBK equal length shorties, Weiand Stealth, alum. driveshaft, clean interior, SVO sail panels and 97 Cobra wheels. I quickly ditched the quirky Holley and put an Edelbrock 650 on it and an Innovate LC-1 to tune it. With a purchase of a tune up kit and some metering rods that weren't in the kit, I had it running pretty good. I drove it 2 years like that.
But, like most other hot rodders, I couldn't leave well enough alone. I pulled the shortblock and reringed it and got rid of the ported E7's for some ProComp heads and BBK long tubes. The 89 shortblock already had had the pistons notched for the healthy cam already in it, but I bumped up a hair to a TFS Stage 2 cam. As I got it, it dyno'd 275/275ish at the tires and ran 9.21 in the 8th and best of 14.40 in the 1/4. After all the upgrades, I never dyno'd it, but it ran an 8.51 in the 8th. I put Maximum Motorsports full length subframe connectors on it and put upper torque box reinforcements in when I saw a crack. I got rid of the Cobra wheels and put the Bullits on it. Along the way I picked up a PURPLE fiberglass hood.
Then for some reason, I decided I wanted EFI. I swapped out the tank for an EFI tank. I swapped the guts of an early gas gauge sender to a 87-93 sender so my gauges, which are Nordskog digital, would read correctly. I found a open but never used Holley Commander 950 TBI setup cheap on EBAY. I wired it all in, not bad, but with the thought that if that thing actually worked, I would go back and redo the wiring and do a wire tuck while cleaning a ton of unused stuff up. Funny how that worked out. I had fun messing with the efi for a while, and then found a great deal on a used Avenger setup, which is bascially the same TBI with a Holley HP ECU. I'll get to installing that someday.
In the interim, life got in the way. Slow times at work led to pay cuts. When I recovered from that, shoulder surgery. It seemed life was getting in the way. I had ended up with a 2600 sq ft house in 2005 when I got divorced. I never could sell it. I almost walked away. If I would have, I probably would have recovered my credit by now and HAD A TON more money to throw at this thing. But I didn't. I've gotten remarried and then all the things a single guy doesn't worry so much about, like wall colors, stained carpets, lack of tile, etc, came to the forefront. I've recently started a new job and think it is going to be very rewarding. I've still got the majority of the downstairs floors to redo, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.
I've been hoarding parts as I find them and I have started work on it again after a 2 year patch of just using it as a shelf.
Once I figure out why my NAS is offline, I'll post up some pics of this POS.
History: I got divorced and decided I needed another hot rod. My brother and I had previously had a pretty hard core back half 83 Regal with a methanol injected 455 Buick in it that ran 10's. I knew I didn't have money to do that all over again, PLUS I wanted something to his the cruise ins and just drive.
I found this 85 over in Knoxville (7 hr drive) and drove it home. It already had a bunch of good parts like 5 lug conversion, 86 up dual exhaust, BBK equal length shorties, Weiand Stealth, alum. driveshaft, clean interior, SVO sail panels and 97 Cobra wheels. I quickly ditched the quirky Holley and put an Edelbrock 650 on it and an Innovate LC-1 to tune it. With a purchase of a tune up kit and some metering rods that weren't in the kit, I had it running pretty good. I drove it 2 years like that.
But, like most other hot rodders, I couldn't leave well enough alone. I pulled the shortblock and reringed it and got rid of the ported E7's for some ProComp heads and BBK long tubes. The 89 shortblock already had had the pistons notched for the healthy cam already in it, but I bumped up a hair to a TFS Stage 2 cam. As I got it, it dyno'd 275/275ish at the tires and ran 9.21 in the 8th and best of 14.40 in the 1/4. After all the upgrades, I never dyno'd it, but it ran an 8.51 in the 8th. I put Maximum Motorsports full length subframe connectors on it and put upper torque box reinforcements in when I saw a crack. I got rid of the Cobra wheels and put the Bullits on it. Along the way I picked up a PURPLE fiberglass hood.
Then for some reason, I decided I wanted EFI. I swapped out the tank for an EFI tank. I swapped the guts of an early gas gauge sender to a 87-93 sender so my gauges, which are Nordskog digital, would read correctly. I found a open but never used Holley Commander 950 TBI setup cheap on EBAY. I wired it all in, not bad, but with the thought that if that thing actually worked, I would go back and redo the wiring and do a wire tuck while cleaning a ton of unused stuff up. Funny how that worked out. I had fun messing with the efi for a while, and then found a great deal on a used Avenger setup, which is bascially the same TBI with a Holley HP ECU. I'll get to installing that someday.
In the interim, life got in the way. Slow times at work led to pay cuts. When I recovered from that, shoulder surgery. It seemed life was getting in the way. I had ended up with a 2600 sq ft house in 2005 when I got divorced. I never could sell it. I almost walked away. If I would have, I probably would have recovered my credit by now and HAD A TON more money to throw at this thing. But I didn't. I've gotten remarried and then all the things a single guy doesn't worry so much about, like wall colors, stained carpets, lack of tile, etc, came to the forefront. I've recently started a new job and think it is going to be very rewarding. I've still got the majority of the downstairs floors to redo, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.
I've been hoarding parts as I find them and I have started work on it again after a 2 year patch of just using it as a shelf.
Once I figure out why my NAS is offline, I'll post up some pics of this POS.
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