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This is the story of my second American Sports Car project.  A 1986 third generation Chevrolet Camaro Sport Coupe, with a 5-Litre Small Block Chevy V8 (a 305ci mouse motor).  It was bought exactly 6 weeks after the sale of my first American sports car project (a 1977 Trans Am) The Camaro was bought from Doncaster in the UK on the 7th of May 1994.

The major rebuild took place over 2 phases.

Phase 1: 1994 to 1997 Stripdown, repaint in red and enjoy driving it!

Phase 2: 1999 to 2009 Complete media blasted shell, custom paint and air suspension!

Click on a picture to see the adventure begin!!!!!!!!

PHASE 1

   old camaro                                    phase 1 work                             phase 1 complete

PHASE 2

           Phase 2 intro                          Phase 2 paint at home                     Phase 2 bodyshop

Phase 2 airbrush                      Phase 2 paint back home                   Details Details

              Air suspension                                Phase 2 complete              Professionals who helped me

As you can see from the photo it was originally white and had a brown velour interior.

This is the original engine bay

	The first owner lived in Stockton in California.
	He (and his wife, who was the main driver) had the car delivered on 14/6/86 with 6,296 miles on it.  The dealer was Frank Hurling Chevrolet in Sacramento, California.
	Unfortunately, on the day they went to pick it up, a truck reversed into it on the forecourt and caused some damage to the bumper and rear panels!  It was expertly repaired and today it is completely undetectable even when stripping it down.
	In 1994 the family moved to Withernsea in Humberside to start a new life there.  The car proved to be too wide for the "lanes" there, so it was sold to us by a garage in Doncaster.  This is where we saw it and my Wife gave me permission to buy it!

THE FIRST FEW WEEKS!

During the summer of 1994 (as we were preparing for our wedding!), we drove the car around as it was.  Eventually certain faults became apparent; The paint was peeling in places (A-posts especially), Idling too fast, Exhaust in poor condition, Centre caps on wheels cracked, Poor driveability and excessive emissions.  In fact the ECU detected a fault and sent the car into "limp home" mode.  This set the timing to a set number of degrees (BTDC).

I spent many hours trying to find the fault using the fault codes, but none were forthcoming.  We then limped the car back to the garage in Doncaster where it remained for 3 weeks.  They couldn't find anything wrong at all so we returned to Doncaster to "attempt" to get the car home!  I say attempt because the drive home was a nightmare. The clouds of smoke behind the car was amazing and black!  We eventually made 30 mph on the M18!  When I finally left the motorway, the car suddenly went back to normal, almost went airborne over some hefty bumps in the road, nearly gave me a heart attack and then promptly cut out and refused to run ever again when I pulled up at home.  A few swear words later and I promised that the next time the car went out under it's own power things would be very different!

The car stood there for a whole winter under a waterproof sheet while the engine was pulled and stripped down.  While the engine was away being overhauled, my wife and myself stripped the interior and bodywork down to almost nothing!  This left just the rolling shell.

Amazingly enough, when the dashboard was dismantled, we found a Californian Driving License along with a photo of the previous driver on, and a certificate of insurance!  Luckily I found out this families address and mailed them back to them, after a phone call.  The gentleman on the other end of the phone said this was a mystery solved because these documents were lost around 1991!

Unfortunately I never received confirmation that they actually made it to their rightful owners.

In the ashtray, and under the centre console we found a total of $3.57! (which we still have to this day)!

The following page is a list of the things done to the car to get it back on the road in fine show condition.  We never did find the actual fault with the car, but at this point that wasn't the purpose of the exercise.  The car was going to be made into a pre-smog motor!

Hopefully this story will encourage someone to have a go at their own car and make it into something special!  Please contact me at my e-mail address if you feel you need to!  (See "Present" page).