Bigbore500r
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This past weekend, I finally got my ass in gear and trailered my 72 Chevelle home. The car has been sitting (rotting) outside since 2006 without a drivetrain, a casualty of shifting priorities - buying a house, getting married and making babies.
It was my first car - bought with help from my Father from a neighbor for the paltry sum of $1500.
It was a fairly original Malibu with a 350/350 drivetrain, an Edelbrock intake, and the finest 600 AFB Carb that pep boys had to offer. It's job was to transport me to school and work - and it did that, along with becoming a lifestyle that consumed my entire being. My entire $4.75 per hour paycheck went to gasoline, del taco, and trips to PAW. Along the way, I made some stupid "kid" decisions - like ripping out the working factory AC, installing a fiberglass hood, cutting a hole for a radio, screwing a monster tach to the dash, removing the fenderwells, removing the swaybar, and swapping the chevy rally wheels for drag stars - 90's street race de rigueur.
Friday nights consisted of hitting Cruisers on Tampa, driving around looking for 5.0's and trouble, and then Kevin Burgers on DeSoto after 10pm to watch the street race crowd negotiate the night's racing schedule. Eventually we'd end up behind the Van Nuys airport around 1am with some buddies, to finish the night off with some burnouts and 1/8 mile passes against any car a kid could get their hands on.
The 350 finally died, and my friends dad taught me how to build my first motor - a .40 over 350, with a steel crank and all the budget-friendly backyard tricks. We found a set of 186 casting 1970 LT-1 heads, comparable to camel hump heads with accessory holes, and went to work with the die grinder pocket porting them and fully polishing the exhausts. We deburred and polished the connecting rods, an old trick that may or may not have added strength by removing potential stress risers and saved some weight. The block was deburred, oil drain-back passages were opened up, the lifter valley was coated with rustoleum, and it went back together with a off-brand SSI 268 cam and roller rockers. The intake was changed to a performer RPM and it went back in with a set of headers and a curved HEI. It was probably a high 14 second combo, but it felt like serious business to a 19 year old.
A neighbor the next street over was a hotrodder that stayed up for days at a time building motors and tearing up the streets at night. If you saw his garage door cracked and the light was on, you stopped in and learned some cool shit. I ended up hanging out over there alot, way later than I should. He taught me a ton., but luckily - he didn't teach me how to do coke, cause that's what he was REALLY good at
. It was all Van Halen, tall cans and bumps in the back room. He would come out sniffing and get right to work with his torque wrench, building drag boat motors.
I ignored the drugs and focused on learning how to build motors, and marveled at how he built stuff that ran so damn good. How I didn't get into drugs over there, I have no idea. He knew I was a kid, and never offered me any or talked about it. I knew what it was, but i just didn't do it.
Anyways....the neighbor mentioned above helped me put together a 4 speed setup, and we tore the TH350 out and hung a clutch pedal in the car, converting it to a 4 speed. The car was waaaaaay more fun this way! The saginaw 4 speed lasted about 6 months before I broke the input shaft side-stepping the clutch everywhere I went. We found a M20 muncie, and we re-built it on his workbench, hand filing synchros and doing all the tricks to make it shift like butter. If you've never rebuilt a muncie - its a feat of patience. There's a million needle bearings that go in, held in place by grease as you gently slide the gear cluster into the case. He knew how to do all that, and I learned some cool stuff. The rear end was swapped for a 4.56 he had laying around - at this point the car was no longer my daily driver, and thank god because that gear was gnarly!
Fast forward a few years - I was making more money, and wanted to go alot faster. The editor of Chevy High Performance was a friend of my buddies father, and he had a 408 small block come up for sale. (This motor was the "Rat vs Mouse" motor, if you read CHP back in the early 2000's). It was just a shortblock, I topped it off with a set of Edelbrock performer RPM heads that had some work done to them, and a victor JR with a Holley HP series 750. The 4 speed setup was torn out and a built TH350 went back in, with a continental 3600 stall. The car ran real well, and that combo was in the car for quite a while.
Fat forward a few more years - got the itch to go faster. Pulled the 408 out, and tore it down. Kept the .40 over block and fit it with @RaceTec pistons yielding 11.5:1, and 6" rods. Re-used the crank, which was still in great shape. Replaced the flat tappet camshaft with a 260 @.050 solid roller, and fed it with a old set of heavily worked Canfield aluminum heads that came off a friends sprint car - old stuff, but they hauled ass and were available. The heads came with a full stud girdle setup and rockers.
This motor ripped! It was buttery smooth all the way to 7200rpm - despite being solid mounted, it was incredibly smooth and balanced.
2006 - decided I needed to go MUCH faster, and at the time I had gotten into LS motors doing engine builds and wiring harnesses as a side business. I tore the drivetrain out and sold it, with the intent of putting a turbo LS / 4L80 setup in the car to run sub 10's with good street manners. Sold the 4.56 posi rearend and bought a 3.31 12 bolt off a buddy, which I tossed under the car temporarily so it would roll. Built a 6.0 turbo motor, but sold it to a customer. Built another motor for it.....sold it to a customer. And another....and another.....
The car just sat as I did side jobs. Bought my first house and moved, and that was that - the car would never go back together again. It was pushed from one end of the backyard to the other. Pulled into the garage, then pushed back out 3-4 times. Eventually, it went to my moms house in 2020 when I sold my house and looked for another. It sat there until this past Sunday....and now it's home in my garage.
The car needs work - has no drivetrain, needs the interior stripped, needs rust repair around the rear window and bottom of the rear 1/4 panels. But its straight, complete, and everything fits nicely. And its my 1st car, which is priceless.
So now the question is - what do I do with it? Do i keep it "drag style" and do that turbo motor I envisioned in 2006? What color do I paint it? Do I keep it 90's style and keep it on drag stars with skinnies? Or do I bring it back to stock and restore it with a few tasteful upgrades? Does it get an LS, or do I build a Big Block for it? Auto or Manual? My son is 11, and I need to get this thing going. It will be our next father-son project.
To be continued.....
90's . . .
August 1999 - Chevy High Performance
A much skinnier 19 year old Bigbore......
2008 . . .car is now red, and ready for that turbo motor......
2012 Now I have a kid. Best intentions on working on it......
2014 . . . still not working on it.....
2023.......finally got it back home
It was my first car - bought with help from my Father from a neighbor for the paltry sum of $1500.
It was a fairly original Malibu with a 350/350 drivetrain, an Edelbrock intake, and the finest 600 AFB Carb that pep boys had to offer. It's job was to transport me to school and work - and it did that, along with becoming a lifestyle that consumed my entire being. My entire $4.75 per hour paycheck went to gasoline, del taco, and trips to PAW. Along the way, I made some stupid "kid" decisions - like ripping out the working factory AC, installing a fiberglass hood, cutting a hole for a radio, screwing a monster tach to the dash, removing the fenderwells, removing the swaybar, and swapping the chevy rally wheels for drag stars - 90's street race de rigueur.
Friday nights consisted of hitting Cruisers on Tampa, driving around looking for 5.0's and trouble, and then Kevin Burgers on DeSoto after 10pm to watch the street race crowd negotiate the night's racing schedule. Eventually we'd end up behind the Van Nuys airport around 1am with some buddies, to finish the night off with some burnouts and 1/8 mile passes against any car a kid could get their hands on.
The 350 finally died, and my friends dad taught me how to build my first motor - a .40 over 350, with a steel crank and all the budget-friendly backyard tricks. We found a set of 186 casting 1970 LT-1 heads, comparable to camel hump heads with accessory holes, and went to work with the die grinder pocket porting them and fully polishing the exhausts. We deburred and polished the connecting rods, an old trick that may or may not have added strength by removing potential stress risers and saved some weight. The block was deburred, oil drain-back passages were opened up, the lifter valley was coated with rustoleum, and it went back together with a off-brand SSI 268 cam and roller rockers. The intake was changed to a performer RPM and it went back in with a set of headers and a curved HEI. It was probably a high 14 second combo, but it felt like serious business to a 19 year old.
A neighbor the next street over was a hotrodder that stayed up for days at a time building motors and tearing up the streets at night. If you saw his garage door cracked and the light was on, you stopped in and learned some cool shit. I ended up hanging out over there alot, way later than I should. He taught me a ton., but luckily - he didn't teach me how to do coke, cause that's what he was REALLY good at
. It was all Van Halen, tall cans and bumps in the back room. He would come out sniffing and get right to work with his torque wrench, building drag boat motors.I ignored the drugs and focused on learning how to build motors, and marveled at how he built stuff that ran so damn good. How I didn't get into drugs over there, I have no idea. He knew I was a kid, and never offered me any or talked about it. I knew what it was, but i just didn't do it.
Anyways....the neighbor mentioned above helped me put together a 4 speed setup, and we tore the TH350 out and hung a clutch pedal in the car, converting it to a 4 speed. The car was waaaaaay more fun this way! The saginaw 4 speed lasted about 6 months before I broke the input shaft side-stepping the clutch everywhere I went. We found a M20 muncie, and we re-built it on his workbench, hand filing synchros and doing all the tricks to make it shift like butter. If you've never rebuilt a muncie - its a feat of patience. There's a million needle bearings that go in, held in place by grease as you gently slide the gear cluster into the case. He knew how to do all that, and I learned some cool stuff. The rear end was swapped for a 4.56 he had laying around - at this point the car was no longer my daily driver, and thank god because that gear was gnarly!
Fast forward a few years - I was making more money, and wanted to go alot faster. The editor of Chevy High Performance was a friend of my buddies father, and he had a 408 small block come up for sale. (This motor was the "Rat vs Mouse" motor, if you read CHP back in the early 2000's). It was just a shortblock, I topped it off with a set of Edelbrock performer RPM heads that had some work done to them, and a victor JR with a Holley HP series 750. The 4 speed setup was torn out and a built TH350 went back in, with a continental 3600 stall. The car ran real well, and that combo was in the car for quite a while.
Fat forward a few more years - got the itch to go faster. Pulled the 408 out, and tore it down. Kept the .40 over block and fit it with @RaceTec pistons yielding 11.5:1, and 6" rods. Re-used the crank, which was still in great shape. Replaced the flat tappet camshaft with a 260 @.050 solid roller, and fed it with a old set of heavily worked Canfield aluminum heads that came off a friends sprint car - old stuff, but they hauled ass and were available. The heads came with a full stud girdle setup and rockers.
This motor ripped! It was buttery smooth all the way to 7200rpm - despite being solid mounted, it was incredibly smooth and balanced.
2006 - decided I needed to go MUCH faster, and at the time I had gotten into LS motors doing engine builds and wiring harnesses as a side business. I tore the drivetrain out and sold it, with the intent of putting a turbo LS / 4L80 setup in the car to run sub 10's with good street manners. Sold the 4.56 posi rearend and bought a 3.31 12 bolt off a buddy, which I tossed under the car temporarily so it would roll. Built a 6.0 turbo motor, but sold it to a customer. Built another motor for it.....sold it to a customer. And another....and another.....
The car just sat as I did side jobs. Bought my first house and moved, and that was that - the car would never go back together again. It was pushed from one end of the backyard to the other. Pulled into the garage, then pushed back out 3-4 times. Eventually, it went to my moms house in 2020 when I sold my house and looked for another. It sat there until this past Sunday....and now it's home in my garage.
The car needs work - has no drivetrain, needs the interior stripped, needs rust repair around the rear window and bottom of the rear 1/4 panels. But its straight, complete, and everything fits nicely. And its my 1st car, which is priceless.
So now the question is - what do I do with it? Do i keep it "drag style" and do that turbo motor I envisioned in 2006? What color do I paint it? Do I keep it 90's style and keep it on drag stars with skinnies? Or do I bring it back to stock and restore it with a few tasteful upgrades? Does it get an LS, or do I build a Big Block for it? Auto or Manual? My son is 11, and I need to get this thing going. It will be our next father-son project.
To be continued.....
90's . . .
August 1999 - Chevy High Performance
A much skinnier 19 year old Bigbore......
2008 . . .car is now red, and ready for that turbo motor......
2012 Now I have a kid. Best intentions on working on it......
2014 . . . still not working on it.....
2023.......finally got it back home
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