The dash is all stock and intact; nothing has been modified or cut; tach is on the column so there are no holes drilled in the dash. The stock "Two Ten" steering wheel is still in pretty nice shape. The shifter is a B&M and there's a fire extinguished mounted on the floor.
There is an oil pressure gauge under the dash that gets pinned at 50 psi when the engine is running, so the oil pressure appears to be higher than 50 psi. The stock temp gauge still works fine.
The seat is the original '57 two door split seat with real 60's-era hand-stiched black tuck & roll upholstery, not pressed pleats.
Also seen in this picture is the clutch pedal, left in the car from when it ran a stick. There's still a hole in the floor (under the carpet) for the shifter. It would be simple to put a 4-speed back in the car.
It was manufactured as an automatic from the factory; the clutch was added with factory parts and looks like original OEM.
The engine is the original 301 the car was raced with, and it sounds great with the headers open. Even through the mufflers, it sounds intimidating. It has a solid-lifter roller cam.
To run it in D-class, they destroked the 327 with a 283 steel crank to bring it down to 301. As most people know, it's the same crank and block combination GM came out with for the '69 Z28, but they called it a 302. Anyway, it's basically a '69 Z28 engine.
The 60's-era Mickey Thompson valve covers have breathers because the 327 block originally had a breather tube in the intake, but the aftermarket manifold doesn't have a provision for the breather tube. The carburetor is a Holley 700 cfm double pumper with mechanical secondaries.
Heads are double-hump / angle plug style with roller rockers. Distributor is a Mallory, and it has a Mallory coil.
That's a cool can in the lower left, which is fully functional.
The roll bar was required, and there's a smooth panel in the back to replace the back seat. It still has the same helmet that has stayed with the car since its racing days. It just keeps moving along with the car.
Typical of most Chevy Tri-5 gassers, there's no front bumper. The steel hood is cut out the full dimension of the scoop to get outside air to the carburetor.
There is a slight amount of age-cracking around the corners of the hood scoop, and I can only find one tiny rust spot under the car on the passenger side rear floor pan...which is the only rust I could find anywhere on the whole car. It is only a few inches in diameter. Other than that, the sheet metal is very nice. The trunk and spare tire well are solid and the doors are mint.
The paint has been on it for 40 years or so, but the car looks real nice and you can tell it's the real deal. It's an honest 1/4 mile drag car; anybody driving it has no appologies to make. It loooks good and sounds tough. It has a very ratty idle at 1000-1200 rpm, but is very well-behaved on the street.
There's a Detroit Locker and a set of 5:13's with the car which are not in it right now. That's the rear it ran when it was raced, but it's a little too low for the street.
Pro Automotive was the name of the shop that worked on the car for the owner that raced the car in Oregon. There are receipts that show some of the work that was done there.
A-1 Welding built the roll bar and installed the I-beam front axle, which came from a '51 Chevy Pickup.
There are air shocks in the rear with separate valves inside the trunk.
Shifter with T-handle can be seen a little better in this photo.
The first thing I did was get the headers ceramic coated flat black. Coating is brand new. Notice the exit pipe that leads to the muffler.
Front tires are brand new, and so are the front wheels (American Torque Thrusts).
Traction bars are visible in the rear. It's basically all business; there isn't anything on this car that doesn't have a purpose.