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That is incorrect. Bucket seats and the console were an option, even on the SS. You'll see in later videos that I have the original sales receipt, build sheet, and protecto-plate for the car. There is absolutely zero doubt it is an original SS.

@@JamesSorenson match the vin exactly. It is a clone that was done 40 years ago.

No, it is not. It is without question an original SS with every available document to prove so. The bucket seats and console were an option that was not purchased on this vehicle.

chevellestuff.net/1970/70ss.htm -- pay close attention to the "interior" section

They are available now, if you want to go that route! burtzblock.com/

The castings certainly seem to be quite meaty around the valve bowl, which definitely helped the nerves while opening them up. I'm not sure what you mean with regard to the rectangular ports though. Do you mean that they used the same overall runner casting, just with different interior dimensions between the oval and rectangular port runners?

Haha, I'm all about them gains! 🤣

@@JamesSorenson we all are... I think, I have enuff... Not !

@@JamesSorenson I get it as I am too. BB Old's 425ci .30 over crap heads now but I got a redone set of big valve 'C' heads and better intake. PC period correct. '64 Cutlass/ F85 2dr post. sedan.

Haha, by the time I did the last port, I was probably about as ruthless as most dentists are when they wield the drill. I was definitely in a hurry trying to get these things wrapped up.

Thanks! Pretty "mild" in terms of the extremes many go to on the pocket porting, but I was pretty happy with the result. With winter in full swing out here, the small things are keeping me occupied and building anticipation for being able to drive the car some more. It felt like by the time I got most of the bugs ironed out and got it driving well, winter snuck up on me.

​. You have me hooked on watching you bring it together.

I bought the car because I already had an L78 engine that needed a home, so I was in the market for a roller and found this with the seized up motor. The fact that this 402 ran was just an added bonus. I'll be replacing it and have started the L78 build already.

This is an 800 cfm casting, so it'll give me a tiny bit more breath than the original. I'm not quite sure what the primary size is on the knockoff, so it'll be interesting to see how they will stack up to one another. I suspect once this is dialed in it will pair pretty well with the build and I'd rather err on the side of being undersized than oversized for where this car will spend most of its time.

@@JamesSorenson That is really good to know. I always thought there was the 750 & 850. I really miss my car. What is worse is I probably cant afford to buy it back.. I Impala project is coming along pretty well though I am having a sensor problem I believe. At times it will just shut off when the throttle is depressed. I dont know how to tune Holley so have no choice but to pay the piper. Did I see a 63 or 64 Impala in your shop? That ( along with that 30AA Ford) look pretty sweet. Happy Thanksgiving

That's certainly a trouble spot with going EFI -- there's a learning curve that can be costly if you don't have the time to invest in it yourself. Some of the first cars I started working on were old EFI systems that I would hack apart and build mods for, so it became pretty second nature to setup and diagnose. The carbs are more black magic to me, especially the Quadrajets and their metering rod systems. The market has become pretty crazy -- it takes a small fortune to buy these things and then an even bigger fortune for the parts lately. I've been able to land a few decent deals on most of the cars I've picked up, but they're hard to find. I have a '63 Impala in the smaller garage with the Chevelle at the moment. It is nearing completion, just going through final body work and getting the interior together for it. It has a 327/300 with a muncie 4 speed.

@@JamesSorenson I cant wait to see the 63 Impala finished I have always loved the 62 - 64. I still remember seeing them on the streets everywhere. About the Holley EFI. I originally got the 95 Impala running with the OBD1 but it was not able to get the engines full potential power out of it so I decided to go with the Holley. Some had suggested going with a carb and e-85. In a way I wish I had listened. With the holley I picked up over 150hp though.

I've noticed the 94-96 showing up quite a bit more frequently around here... perhaps the old 402 will find a home in one... 🤣

I'm getting excited just at the prospect of bolting parts onto this thing as I've never seen it in any other condition than just the bare block. It'll be a departure from the feel of an original L78, but I believe this setup will work much better for the car and should hopefully have some stout numbers.

It is some mixture to try to mimic the original 1931 Washington Blue. I believe it is mixed with a black base, where some of the other Washington Blue used in the later years were mixed with green and don't quite look the same. The prior owner was working on restoring the car and had it painted, but they ended up in a nursing home and someone attacked it with a buffer and left rubbing compound in the joints and swirl marks throughout. It looks good if you're more than 5 feet away, but gets pretty bad the closer you get.

You should be able to find my e-mail address in the "About Channel" section.

Haven't heard of that one before, but I'll check it out.

@JamesSorenson yup he's does that same stuff

It was pretty rough when I first picked it up, but over the course of a few months I was able to get quite a bit fixed up. Still a long way to go though!

@JamesSorenson Cool, can't wait to see it when you're done!

Haha -- good catch. Looking back on it, I probably left them on all the way from about 35:45 and didn't notice since the switch was shorting out at that time. A whole lot of that has been fixed up since.

None of which should affect the hood being too high, that could be due to hinge adjustment, sprung driver side hinge, or the spring is newer / non-OEM / tighter on that side, etc.

The "cowl induction" hood with the flapper and letterings were an option on all three years. The SS came standard with the plain "power bulge" hood that was essentially the same shape, but missing the flapper and lettering. That is what is currently installed on the car and is correct for how the vehicle is optioned, as they did not opt for the ZL2 RPO to get the cowl flapper.

Actually my favorite is a 58 Vette 283 dual quads with heater and defrost radio and the 3.55 rear. Basic school shop mechanics test light hammer screw driver and vacuum gauge and dwell meter. That build sounds really cool, I really never messed around with big blocks except if they were customers that had Caddy’s. Which were my favorite especially the big mid seventies eldorados. Take care and happy holidays to you and your family

I thought by that point they were marking the warranty blocks with a CE code on them, but I don't keep up with that stuff anywhere near well enough to know all of the nuances. The CTB block in my '70 now doesn't have a partial VIN on the pad either and I couldn't find one by the oil filter. I'll definitely be slowing this L78 down, especially with the longer stroke, but hopefully the few extra cubes will make up for not wanting to spin it to death. I had heard of the 4" stroke in a 396/402, but never came across it in person so I nearly forgot all about it until I stumbled across the pistons while looking for what was available. I think it'll suit the car very well.

@ the L78 is a fairly potent small big block. They only made 2144 of Chevelle’s, 500 Camaros and 500 Novas with it. With a good steel crank, h-beam rods and a retro roller cam I wouldn’t be afraid to spin it to 6500. The L78 was rated at 6200 in the Vette and 5600 in Chevelle, Camaro and Nova. Always liked the 396/402, they rpm very well. Can’t wait to see how yours turns out.

I am looking for my original block can you share that vin on your block?

@ yes, I’ll check. It’ll be a little bit.

@ looks like 1CL144085. The second to the last number isn’t stamped very well, but I’m fairly confident it’s an 8. I have a picture of it. The block is 40 over, if I remember right the worst cylinder has a tho taper, and the cylinders do have miner surface rust on them. I have the timing cover as well as the 8” balancer. There is an oil pan I believe is off of a Corvette. The drain plug is in the rear and has a gated baffle. Also have the 6223 crank, pretty sure it’s toast. It’s been turned I think it’s 30 under on the mains and rods.

Yeah, I plan on picking up the externally balanced flywheel / damper to go with the new crank, unless I splurge for one of the nicer internally balanced cranks.

It looks pretty good from what I've been able to eyeball, but I'll have them check it out when I bring it in to be cleaned. I had thought it was primarily the earlier blocks that would go out that far.

@@JamesSorenson The one I bored out was a 1971 Chevelle 402. If you are worried about cylinder wall thickness of your casting, you can always have the cylinders sonic checked.

I actually think the '70 L78 would have been a bit lower due to the switch to the low-rise intake (3963569) compared to the earlier 68-69 L78 that had the mid to high-rise (3933163). I'm not familiar with what came on the '65 in terms of intakes, but it is always interesting trying to figure out the games these manufactures played in marketing and listing these things.

some late production 69 396s were actually 402...The 402 including the 70 396.....WERE NOT .030 over 396s. They were built as a 402.

I'll be keeping the car automatic with the TH400. The only thing I had been on the fence about is going with the console shift to be able to use a slap shifter, as I'm pretty terrible at trying to manually shift the column.

My mentor back in the late 70’s and early 80’s was on of the first GM Master Techs. He actually owned his own shop for 25 years before that but sold it and kept the money and went to the local Chevy dealer. He said don’t shift an automatic transmission back then because it not only causes unnecessary wear but if the car is setup correctly just drop it in drive and hold on.

Yeah, at present it has a mind of its own and seems to shift at any random time. I'll have it rebuilt when the L78 goes in and try to get the governor dialed in so it's a bit more consistent.

This engine was the sole reason I picked up the Chevelle, so it was the plan from day one to stick with the big blocks. It won't be the most economical build for what it produces, as I could likely find a 454 core and build a 496 or something for about the same overall cost, but I tend to place a bit of value in the nostalgia and sentiment of getting my father's long abandoned engine up and going again.

They had two different gold colors if I recall, Autumn and Champaign, do you recall which it was? I think I've only ever seen one Autumn Gold -- they seem quite rare! I believe my father's was Fathom Blue, but way before my time! I only ever heard the stories of it and figured one day I would need to find a home for this block.

@@JamesSorenson His was Champaign. I've only seen pictures and heard all the fun stories but it made me love Chevelle's.

They're hydraulic so I went through and adjusted preload in an earlier video, as I had one cylinder bleeding off compression.

Primarily for the v8 clutch / pressure plate and then subsequently preference. I prefer the faster response time to the delay from the additional rotational mass.

It's a '38, not quite as nice as the later double synchro, but does the job.

It scoots pretty good with the downdraft. It also helps to have the much better 2nd gear ratio of the later transmissions.

Between Grand Rapids and Lansing. I'm a part of the Looking Glass A's MARC region, but I don't have much opportunity to make their events.

Thanks for the story! It's crazy how certain things can put you back into an exact moment... By the time I took the streets, cassettes were starting to be phased out, but I remember all of the old school cassette to CD adapters and burning mix CDs to listen to instead of swapping albums around. I didn't quite think I would take to the Forest Green as much as I have, but the more I see it, the more I'm liking it and plan to keep it on the car.

Thanks! I always hate tucking it away for the winter...

They really are something else and surprisingly fun to drive.

The car runs beautifully with that Burtz and the downdraft. Mechanically, all I need is to pick up an Ares muffler and it would be just about perfect.

It's become a pretty decent cruiser as of late, I think I"m at nearly 500 miles on the odometer since I did the cluster swap.

That damned corn syrup has found its way into everything... I try to buy only fuel without it, but even then, I believe the average power density of pure gasoline available has seen a steady decline in recent years.

The rigid units are pretty nice, especially with their large, "teardrop" shaped presses that fit the clamping rails really well. They still take a good bit of effort though, which is why I'll probably just pick up a hydraulic set one of these years.

I'm surprised myself at just how far the car has come in such a short period. I was fully convinced after the first few videos that it was going to take me all winter to get the car anywhere near where it is now, but I kept reminding myself that I didn't need to fix everything at once and just focused on tackling what I felt like were the most significant issues as they came up. In addition, I think the very simple interior overhaul played a massive role in elevating the overall state of the car. It went from being absolutely miserable to drive to being fun to cruise around in.

I've been trying to plot the path forward a bit here, as I have an idea of how I want to build out the engine, but I hadn't considered much beyond that. I would really like a console with a slapper, so I can be a bit more deterministic with the shifting and I'm pretty sure an overdrive unit will find its way in the car as well.

I may pick up the tuning kits they produce to be able to play around and dial them in, as I imagine it'll become even more of an issue once I swap the engines out.

Thanks!

I was using a magnetic mount hanging from the roof, as the car does not have a headliner presently.

Thank you for getting back brother. It’s a GREAT angle!

That must have been turning some serious RPM! This car will likely spend most of its time on the street, so the 3.55 ratio will stick around for a bit.

They're essentially the same block with the 360 having a smaller stroke. In this particular case, as I'm planning to build a 445, the starting displacement wasn't a critical concern.

Probably about the same, as unfortunately, the engine in the car currently is a '72 LS-3 402, so it's down on compression from the '70 L34 that should have been in here.

@@JamesSorensonyou did say that in video, yea, probably would not make much of a difference but, Dam, I’m lovin that Chevelle, I binge watched yesterday and today all your Chevelle videos, I look forward to future videos.