Been lurking here for a couple weeks and have started my first project. I've wrenched on our family cars and my toys and motorcycles most of my life because I'm too cheap to pay someone else to do most of it. But I've never dealt with a car that needs this amount of love before and I figured a cheap mass produced seventies land barge would be a good place to cut my teeth on rust repair, body work and the like. The subject has been immobile for 10 years. and hasn't been licensed in 17. The guy I purchased it from bought it from a friend who was going through a divorce with the intention of restoring it, as he has a nice collection of very desirable 60's and 70's Ponchos. Just never got around to it and the old girl got kicked out of her barn storage a couple years ago and was slowly becoming one with a pasture. We pulled her out and took her home and today I pulled the plugs on the 350 and they all looked pretty good. Put a mixture of JB knocks her loose and oil in to soak for a few days. Before I try and start her on a remote gas tank I'll pop the valve covers and pop some oil on the rockers to soak. Looking forward to documenting the process.
'70 catalina clean up on aisle 3
- Thread starter svt4cam
- Start date
Kevlar
New member
Sounds like a challenging project! Good luck with it, have fun and above all, be safe!
Thanks, Managed to get her running today off a remote snow blower tank. Ran pretty well although there is an leak somewhere around the right manifold, have to scope it out when I start pulling the front body work to do engine, chassis, fire wall clean up and detailing.
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92 Sunbird LE
Well-known member
455 Swap in the Future? Whats that car Weigh?
Doug in P.R.
Doug in P.R.
92 Sunbird LE
Well-known member
I found out the weight, heres some info for you...............
http://www.oldride.com/library/1970_pontiac_catalina.html
Doug in P.R.
http://www.oldride.com/library/1970_pontiac_catalina.html
Doug in P.R.
Just south of 2 tons, I'm going to stick with the 350 if it will cooperate for a while. Got it started the other day running off a remote tank, ran pretty well. Has a leak somewhere around the right exhaust manifold, TH350 was a quart or two low it moved forward after 10 or 15 second reverse was a little more slippy but got a bit better as I screwed around. Going to do a compression test next to see how healthy it is but wasn't smoking (if you don't count burning off 10 years of crap on the motor) or making evil noises I have the interior and dash out of my wife's Spitfire doing some cosmetic and wiring renewal so that's my first concern as soon as it gets above freezing in Siberia NJ. Once I get the Spit roadworth for springtime I'm going to start taking the front clip off the Ratalina to clean up the motor, Take the radiator to a shop to get it cleaned and tested, and tidy up the engine bay. I hope with a fluid and filter change maybe the TH350 is resiliant enough to give me a summer of ugly car cruising.
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