Part VII

1989 RS Camaro

Well, another week has gone by and we really got with it this time. We had the chance and good weather to put a couple of evenings in plus a good part of the weekend. It really paid off as you can see from the photos. I believe Phil and I both are now getting to that "itchy" part where we want to see this thing go! As we finished up our work on Saturday evening and we were taking a minute to review what we had completed, we both agreed, "it's starting to look like a racecar". Good stuff.

Here we have the infamous Vega steering box installed and long with the new centerlink we mentioned the last time. Everything is hooked up except the idler arm to the frame. We have a bracket that needs to be finished and that will complete the steering gear. Next up is installation of the steering coupler, column and wheel. You can also see in this photo that we got started on the brake lines, but didn't make it too far. No problems, just started working on other areas of the car.

Another look again at the brake cylinder, roll control and start of the brake plumbing. A brake proportioning valve will be installed in the line running to the rear discs. Given that we have closed up so many holes in the interior, I am almost loath to drill any holes in it now, but putting it close to the driver to make minute adjustments certainly makes the most sense.

This shot shows the crossbar, support bars and sidebars that we got installed. The 8-point cage is complete at this point, but what really doesn't show up is that we cut the frame connector back out and re-did it. If you have been following along, we were not too happy with the way the driver's side connector went in the first time, so we fixed it. Looks much better, plus installing the crossmembers for the torque arm and transmission should be a bit easier now.

Just another shot from the other direction (and no, the photo is not just reversed!). You might notice that the support bars running up to the main hoop cross bar are not connected to the transmission tunnel. Most of the time you see people install them that way, but plates are never provided for them and the transmission tunnel is not going to provide that much support if the car happens to be hit from the side. To us it makes a lot of sense to connect the bars as shown, creating a much stronger trianglation effect that could help take that type of hit.

more photos......