The Intervention

1. In the April '04 issue we detailed the installation of Goodmark's new full quarter-panels. Proprietor Sal Perez at American Musclecars (now located in Ontario, California) seems to be one of the few California-based bodymen who isn't scared of extensive rust, and he and his techs dove in and had the quarters, the inner and outer wheelhouses, the trunk-floor extensions, the rear filler panel, and the right shock tower swapped in about three days. Miraculously, the original trunk floor was in perfect shape, as was the taillight panel.

2. The garbage 305 I was forced to install as a starving student was finally ditched in favor of a proper 350 that once lived in the Cheap Street Chevelle. With 355 cubes, iron World Products SR Torquer heads, and a Crane 230/236 hydraulic cam, it was good for 355 hp in '96. I topped it with a rebuilt Q-Jet and old Z/28 valve covers I bought at a swap meet 10 years ago.

3. Just for a laugh, here's what the engine bay looked like before the swap. Clearly I never took the 305 seriously, as it still wears a half-a-Q-Jet two-barrel and all its original accumulated grime. Dig those universal gas-tank straps holding in the Nova six-cylinder radiator that was left in place of the stolen three-row Modine. Yes, that is a broom handle supporting them. There's your affordable street performance.

4. The best money you can spend when installing new body panels is for the replacement bolt kit. Goodmark offers a kit from AMK, known not simply for providing fasteners that get the job done, but ones that duplicate the originals exactly. They're even bagged and tagged for each individual task.

5. Sal Perez at American Musclecars saw a glimpse of potential in the '69 when installing the new quarters, so he offered to help install new front sheetmetal if I could come up with the parts. Again, Goodmark came to the rescue with a pair of freshly tooled '69 fenders, produced with heavier-gauge steel than earlier replacements. One fender was original, while the other had been replaced in 1986 and was subsequently nailed by a drunk driver. The Goodmark fenders were complemented with new upper and lower valence panels, along with a reproduction steel cowl-induction hood to replace the GM piece that had once become airborne and still had the scars to prove it. The crew at American Musclecars took the time to get the new stuff to line up properly.

6. I hadn't been under the car for many years, and I was afraid. It was a mess under there, but at least the many leaking fluids slowed the rust. As a bonus there were broken brake lines, frozen drum-brake assemblies, rotten exhaust parts, and a set of coilover shocks--not the cool race car ones, but the trailer-towing kind. After hours of scraping and wire brushing, the crusty floorpan and framerails were metal-prepped and coated with POR-15, which looks much better and should ensure that the rust doesn't return. The axle was cleaned, drained, and filled with fresh lube and the drum brakes were rebuilt before the housing was sprayed with VHT epoxy paint in semi-flat black.

7. My old brake lines were in bad shape, with broken hard lines on the axletubes, a cracked flex hose, and rusty feed lines coming from the master cylinder. We ordered a complete set of replacement stainless hard lines from Classic Tube and upgraded to braided flex hoses from Classic's Stop Flex line. The new hard lines are an impressively good match for the originals, as illustrated here.

8. The front suspension and brakes were seriously neglected. The original-style two-piece rotors of the factory disc brakes were real thin, but since they aren't actually required with the new-for-'69 single-piston calipers, one-piece units can be substituted. We used Baer's DecelaRotors, a new line of drilled-and-slotted stock-dimension rotors that cost just a bit more than straight replacements and look a lot better. They should be available at Autozone by the time you read this. The stock calipers were simply cleaned, painted, and rebuilt then complemented with Classic Tube's Stop Flex braided lines.

9. The rest of the suspension was in moderate shape, but rather than skimp we opted to rebuild. Performance Suspension Components offers stock stuff as well as upgrades. The company even assembles G-Machine Packages with improved items in four levels of intensity. We went for the Level II, using polygraphite bushings, powdercoated front and rear sway bars, and KYB shocks in addition to the replacement ball-joints, tie-rods, and idler arm. We upgraded another notch to Edelbrock shocks.