My 70 RS/SS 350

[John Wright]

Spent alot of time riding the roads looking for a 69 Camaro...someone that knew I was looking for a camaro said they knew where a 70 was, so it perked my interest. I rode out and gave the guy a cashier's check and brought it home. Here it sits at my father-in-law's the day I bought it.

[rgearhead]

how long ago did you buy it john,,,

[John Wright]

I'm thinking back....I believe it was in late 2000 or early 2001...I'll have to grab the title and see.

I joined NastyZ right after I purchased it, looked up all of the info I could find in Mad Mike's Archives. I forgot my login and password so I rejoined in 2002 and started participating in the forum.


I found that it was still a numbers matching car; motor, tranny, and rear axle were still all original to the car. The air cleaner had 350/300hp sticker on it, but I figured anybody could place a sticker on a lid. But it had the original CRE 350 that matched the VIN still in place.

First thing that I was able to do to the car was to order up all of the suspension and steering parts and replaced all of the worn out, 30+ year old stuff with new.


edit: I found on the 2007 personal property tax sheet that it was purchased in Aug of 2001.

[John Wright]

The following picture is the result of trying to replace the rear brake linings on my drum brakes. I found that the axle seals were weeping just a bit, so I may as well replace those while I have it apart......which leads into other things.



Well, I was in the process of pulling out the rear axles to replace the axle seals, but ran into a snag when trying to remove the bolt that holds the c-clips in the carrier. That bolt had been sheared off for some time and now I cannot get the c-clips out. With the guideance of Big Gear Head(a member here) I mananged to drill a hole into the carrier and was able to get the remaining portion of that bolt out. While I was into the rear, I ended up replacing the 3.07 ratio rear gear with a 3.73 and the single traction carrier with an Eaton posi unit. I decided to clean the housing up a bit while I had it out and welded up the axle tubes to the housing, plus cleaned up the factory plug welds and welded them closed. The factory did such a poor job welding these and they leaked rear diff grease. I also added stiffener plates at the front and rear of the spring perches while I had the welder out. And to top off the axle clean up, I added a DTS rear cover with the bearing cap girdle to help prevent the bearing caps from walking around.





Before I installed the rear back underneath the car, I took a minute to research the Herb Adams Modification. This mod relocates the mounting hole for the front eye of the leaf spring up into the spring perch approx. 3/4". I plated the sides of the spring perch with 1/8" flatbar.




and the end result.....

[John Wright]

Tommy(67lemanster) had just completed a C5 Corvette brake swap on his car and posted lots of pics. This idea seemed like a winner, I wanted rear disc brakes and Tommy made it seem really easy and inexpensive compared to buying a brake kit...so I leaped. Tommy found a set of C5 calipers listed in an auction on ebay...I bid and won. They were grey, so I bought a Duplicolor ceramic caliper paint kit and repainted the calipers red. Contacted Kore3 and purchased their brackets and mounted the C5 brakes on my rear axle.






I ordered a set of slip on C5 Corvette rotors from an ebay store, and found that I had to clarance my axle flanges just a little bit to clear this area inside the rotors.

[BTTB71SS]

John looks real good. Its amazing how one little project turns into another

[Robbo_BBC]

thats a serious looking axle youve got there! i like the gusstets youve put in from the spring perch to the axle.

sticking with a 350?

[John Wright]

Now that I had the rear back under the car, I jacked up the other end and started removing parts.



Had to place the car high enough off the ground to have room for the lower control arm to swing all the way down to remove the coil spring.

A pile of parts that were removed....


After cleaning up the front spindle, I had to cut all of the stock brake mounting points off to make way for the C5 brackets.



Now that the spindle has been cut and edges all ground down smooth(including all casting flash) I had to center punch and drill out the dust cover bolts. This is where the C5 brackets will mount. After drilling out the bolts, I open the holes up and tapped them 1/2" x 13. Now after painting, the spindle is ready to go back on the car.

Here are the brackets being layed out, drilled and painted for the C5 brakes.

[BlownBigBlock]

Nice lil documentary ya did on that. Came out looking great!!!

[John Wright]

To use the C5 Corvette slip on rotors, you need hubs. I took a pair of brand new 3rd gen rotors ($30/ea) and machined the rotor off of the hub.





.....purchased new bearings and seals for the front hubs and had them ready.

Next I drilled out all of the front hubs and rear axle flanges to accept ARP 1/2" x 3" long wheel studs.

Purchased SC&C upper control arms and Howe tall ball joints.....

The upper arms came with knurled adjusting sleeves, I welded a huge hex nut to make it so that I could use a wrench to turn the sleeves.






Turned my attention to the Lower control arms and cleaned them, painted and installed Delalum bushings....

[John Wright]

Reassembled everything except for the C5 Corvette Calipers...they would not fit inside the factory 15" five spoke wheel....








but....at least it was off the jack stands and back on all four feet...for now.

[John Wright]

I needed a set of 17" rims to clear these C5 calipers. So I sold the factory five spokes to a member here at NastyZ28. Used that money and some out of pocket to purchase a set of 17" rims and tires.



Got them mounted on the rims and put on the car.....now I can bolt on my C5 Calipers for good.

[kik_start]

John that is awsome write up!

[John Wright]

I talked with several vendors and ended up purchasing a 1" bore tandem master cylinder from Wilwood. While I had the master cylinder off, I also replaced the brake booster.



I still needed to plumb the brake lines to the rear. I decided to mount the proprtioning valve within reach of the driver's seat for on-the-fly adjusting.



I cut the rear line and plumbed it in here and used rubber grommets where the lines went through the floor.



At the rear I still had a problem with the drop axle line. So with the help of Keith(Blown Big Block) I was able to get the fittings and lines worked out to make up SS flex line.

[John Wright]

And now that the brakes are done, it sits here awaiting for me to save up enough dough to purchase a transmission....