'55 Chevy Bel Air Build Thread

2.5" lower in the front, 2" out back.


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What I'm calling "round 2" is almost done, should be back on the road by the weekend.

Lowered 2.5" via coils in the front and beltech drop shocks
Lowered 2" rear
Hoosier 26.5" x 8" hoosier slicks on Rallys
New Headlights
Front turn signal sockets and harness - new amber lens covers
Relocated radiator to behind the core support for hood clearance
New fan
Electric Choke replaced and rewired
Removed excess wiring, and replaced much of the front harness
Replaced rear emblem
Trunk lock
Glove Box Lock
Replaced GT steering wheel with original '55 wheel
Remove the primer from the hood, emblems cleaned up and reinstalled

Last things I will probably do this winter are:
Replace front and drivers side floor
Replace drivers rocker
Remove primer from drivers side
Mount trim
Carpet
Exhaust



Otherwise, not much more I will soak into this. Just going to drive the hell out of it.
 
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I've started stripping the drivers side. There's patina, and then there's destroyed paint and well I put this in the category of the latter. It was primer over patina/destroyed paint basically. Still looks rough, because it is, but I got 90% of the heavy crap off.

It needs new floors, new inner and outer rockers, and the rear drivers quarter has some mud. Outside of that its fairly solid. I figured I should start stripping the metal so once that is done I can paint it. It will never be a show car, that's outside of my skill level and budget. But I feel like with enough time and elbow grease I can put a decent hot rod paint job on it.


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Probably one of the last times it will be out this year. I've got an electrical gremlin thats causing me ignition issues.

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What kind of ignition gremlins?

Spun the motor up pretty good a few weeks ago and blew up the distributor cap and rotor. Now it has a back fire / misfire like 1500-3k RPM's. Probably broke something in the points? I might swap to an HEI distributor and see if that fixes it.
 
Spun the motor up pretty good a few weeks ago and blew up the distributor cap and rotor. Now it has a back fire / misfire like 1500-3k RPM's. Probably broke something in the points? I might swap to an HEI distributor and see if that fixes it.

That's an intersting one. Points are simple but the HEI dist. is a pretty solid upgrade.
 
Ignition shit is sorted. Little piece of metal floating around in the points screwing everything up. Put a new HEI in it and away we go.

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Broke a rear trans mount, replaced both yesterday. The motor has slowly been shifting down and rear word to the point the distributor was leaning on the firewall. I should have done this months ago, really happy with how the motor and trans sits in the chassis now.

My headers are shot. They're next on the list.

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Bought some metal from CARS.

Short rear brace - Left Hand 1037
Short rear brace - Right Hand 1038
Outer Rocker Panel, left hand - 1045
Inner Rocker Panel, Left Hand - 1043
1955 Lower Front Quarter Panel Section Left Hand
 
That car is looking cooler and cooler!

Thanks OJ! Really torn on what to do when I get the new metal in it. Considering a quick and dirty paint job, but honestly I might just linseed oil it and let it patina again. I feel like it will lose its history if I paint it, if that makes any sense.

I do want to take the body off the chassis to clean and paint the chassis and paint the engine bay.
 
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