1970 amx

JoeP.

Club Member
O.K. so it's not exactly a "new" project since I bought it in late April, but I've had a few requests to post on it's progress.

With my work schedule this year, I just haven't been able to make it to the track much to play with the Mustang. But, that hasn't kept me out of the garage. I picked up this 1970 American Motors AMX this year and have been slowly getting it back on the road after sitting for 7+ years neglected. It's a 63k mile 325hp 390, close ratio Borg Warner super T10 4 speed, and the "go package" featuring the functional ram air hood, Kelsey Hays front disc brakes, factory rear axle "torque link" traction bars, and 3.54 twin grip differential. It had A/C, power steering, and the optional for 1970 Rebel "Machine" styled wheels. Overall a very complete and solid car, just in need of much TLC.

The previous owner is very active in the "pure stock musclecar drags" scene, and had plans to build this car for the event, but was just spread too thin with all his other project cars. He had taken out the interior to have the seats redone, but after the upholstery shop had taken the seat apart and found broken springs in the lower frames, they told him they couldn't fix them and he had to buy new frames. Of course they are not available, and an argument resulted in him picking up the disassembled seats and piling all of the parts back inside the car where they sat for the last several years.

I bought the car not running, with no interior installed other than the dash and door panels, and not sure if I had made a smart purchase or not lol... Here it is after I aired up a few flat tires and rinsed it off after dragging it out of it's barn. It is rust free with pretty decent paint. The mechanicals don't bother me, but I am NOT a paint/body work guy, so this project seemed perfect.

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I started with giving the exterior a good detail. It was covered in a light red overspray everywhere. A few stages of compound and chrome polish got it looking great again. I cleaned up the wheels with some fresh paint, and got to work on the interior. I found some Chevelle seat springs at NPD that were close enough to bend and fit the frames. The original seat foams were all there but "flat", so I added 1" foam to the backsides to restore some cushion. New seat covers from Legendary finished the job. The interior also got new carpet, headliner, seat belts, features a new old stock "rim blow horn" steering wheel, and factory Hurst shifter.

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I bought a new battery and added some gas and got it fired up, but it smoked pretty bad and ran poorly. I found the accelerator pump not working on the autolite 4300 carb, even though it had been restored years ago. It looked as though it sat with moisture inside and possibly froze and cracked the bore inside the main body for the pump. With a little help from my buddy Kevin, we machined a new bronze sleeve for the accelerator pump and machined the bore slightly bigger to fit. With a little N2O I got the sleeve cold enough to press into the main body, then honed to size. Works great!

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With the engine running, I finally put a few miles on it and worked out the steering/suspension with an alignment and new components where needed. The engine had great compression, but consumed a lot of oil through valve stem seals and worn valve guides. I was going to wait until winter, but it had to be done. The engine bay was pretty rough looking anyway, and needed a good detail.

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The heads got all new guides, valves, and springs. The shortblock looked pretty nice and only needed a hone/rings, bearings, and timing chain. I found another oil pan that hadn't had a floor jack rammed under it, sourced the correct 1970 nickel plated 390 valve covers, date code correct spark plug wires, and a few other detailing items. I removed the A/C and power steering, and added a manual steering box from a Gremlin in anticipation of a little pure stock drag action. The distributor now has a Petronix module. I am very happy with the results, and have been working on the tune lately while putting on some break in miles. The engine currently has the newer style high flow exhaust manifolds which won't be legal at the pure stock drags, but the exhaust system is made to fit them and I didn't have time this go-around to build a new system for the original "log" style manifolds. This will happen eventually, but maybe not until winter.

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A picture at it's first car show last month at Greenmead park in Livonia!

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A few more pics outside in the sun. I also plan to replace the 21 year old Comp T/A's soon with a new set of E60-15 Goodyear Polyglas tires.

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I picked up a new set of Polyglas tires at the Pure Stock Drags on Saturday, then re-sprayed the Machine wheels a more stock shade and mounted up the rubber. I like the results!

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