The AMC Javelin build thread!

Javelin wrote: New wheels!!! This weekend was the giant swap meet at Portland International Raceway and the Portland Expo Center (it’s seriously huge, and is a 4-day event). My #1 goal this year was to get wheels and tires for the Javelin. Although the P71’s old steelies technically it, the center bores are a little too small, the backspacing is wrong, and the tires are all shot. So I solved all of the issues (plus the heavy weight!) with this cherry set of genuine Weld Rodlite wheels! They are only 14’s (with 185 and 215 tires), but they will look really cool, they are super light, and they’ll make a great drag racing setup. Not to mention they had a nice set of BFG tires and came with all of the lug nuts and cebter caps. My cost? $400. Nice.

awesome!

Osterkraut wrote: If curiosity is getting the best of you, I recently made a "learn me" about it. Get to it, Watson.

Surely not a FIAT 124 Spider? Speaking of, there was a "barn find" 124 Sport Coupe at the Portland Swap Meet (for $800, natch) that I had to spend an hour talking myself out of. Goooood looking car!

Big update weekend!

Grill header finished

The grill header panel is finished and reinstalled. The driver’s fender needed a little tweaking (it’s the damaged one) so it could go on how it’s supposed to. It feels good to put stuff back ON the car instead of taking it off!

Coolant system rebuild time

I also managed to start the coolant system rebuild. The old coolant actually looked really good! Drained this out, removed the heater hoses, crossover hose, and the radiator hoses. All of that will be replaced with new stuff (Goodyear, natch) as well as the thermostat and radiator cap.

While you're in there...

I have a seriously bad habit of going “while I’m in here” with this car… I also took out the fan and shroud for a little clean-up. I might even replace the fan. The radiator works great and is all copper, so I’m not going to mess with that, but the v-belts are getting changed.

Keep taking stuff apart!

Now I’ve got some good access to the front of the motor. Obviously I need to do some cleaning and painting in here! I might also change the water pump, we’ll see. I’d really like a new harmonic balancer, too (I’ve seen a stock one fail, and it was not pretty!). All of this was pretty necessary to get to the fuel pump and hard lines, which are all getting changed as well.

Problem found

Since I was already there I decided to pull the original 55 amp alternator out. Turns out it has a broken wire on it! Luckily I happen to have a spare GM-style 1-wire 100 amp alternator from a Wagoneer that will bolt right on…

Weight savings

The front plate mount was large, steel, mangled, rusty, and heavy, none of which are desirable qualities. Since my state only requires a rear plate on classics, off it comes! Much cleaner and lighter.

Roof primer is holding up

The roof primer is holding up well. There’s no bare spots or rust besides a little trickle where the quarter panel lead seam is. Good! My protection plan is working. You know, I can’t stand the cheap roof rails modern cars have. I love the older cars 1-piece rooflines like this, it’s just so much better looking. Can’t wait to paint it!

the new alternator should let you run more accessories. Any plans?

JoeyM wrote: the new alternator should let you run more accessories. Any plans?

Tach and other gauges.

Also, the water pump is getting changed, the fan is not. Radiator is staying in as well.

Also, I did a ton of stupid little stuff. All of the vinyl top trim is now removed, the dipstick bracket is reinstalled, I soaked the brake fittings and started unbolting the master, and I think I've finally solved the starting issue with the key.

Fan & Cooling

Got the fan and pulley cleaned, sanded, primed, and painted. Cleaned the spacer bracket as well. Not shown is the plastic fan shroud that was cleaned and redyed.

New suspension - Part II

All the suspension parts (sort-of) came in! I’ll explain; I wanted to get a spare set of control arms to have the bushings pressed in so I could swap everything at once. Unfortunately, one of the lower control arms I spent so much time welding up was damaged in shipping. So I am waiting on a replacement set of stockers now.

More new stuff...

I also ordered up a new aluminum water pump, thermostat, some gaskets, and that K&N finally.

Shock mounts

I took the front shocks out to replace them and cleaned and painted the mounts and hardware.

Brakeless

The master cylinder, brake booster, and some of the lines are removed. Threading in the new lines will be fun (not).

Wheeless, too

I sold the old P71 steelies off the car, and I need to do the rear brakes, so the Javelin is up on 4 jackstands now.

Organized!

I finally cleaned out the shed and got all of the Javelin’s parts in one spot. I didn’t realize how much stuff I had or how much of the house and garage it all took up. I even have spares!

(Edit: this originally said "WTF??" at a non-sequitur post above mine, but it has since been deleted.)

hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. She's made five posts and several comments about how she was treated. Looks like she joined the site just to dish out a public shaming.

She sounds clingy and needy. I'd have dipped out on her too.

I love this build thread. More AMC content is needed on GRM.

What did I miss, and how the heck was my poor AMC involved??!?

In other news, I've done a ton of work to ye old Javelin and haven't gotten around to updates yet.

Mid June:

Stuck axle solved

When I had the Javelin delivered the right rear axle was frozen solid and the car dragged across the ground. It took days of soaking in penetrating oil and the biggest hammer I own to get the drum off. (Yes, the parking brake was unlocked) Turns out the shoes actually rusted to the drum! Funnily enough, the other side popped right off and the drum is even reusable. Everything here has to be replaced.

Blacked out the back

Since the rear was up on jackstands and everything was apart, I blacked out the wheelwells in the rear to match. Once again I scrubbed all the dirt out and found surprisingly good metal. The only rust in the quarters is at the very bottom where the mud collects, and it looks patchable. No rust on the inside structures at all!

Scrape, scrape, scrape

There was a ton of oil and sludge buildup on top of the oil pump, which is par for the course in a 39 year old car. More scrubbing and scraping…

New drums

Since the right rear drum was shot I had to buy new drums. The ones that came in are finned! Woohoo for unintentional upgrades! I’ll keep the good old drum around as an emergency spare.

Shock mounts in

The shock tower hats/mounts are re-installed all cleaned up. The old Monroe shock is on the fender. The new shocks bolt to this mount first, then the whole assembly goes into the car. It’s a slick way of doing it once you figure it out.

KYB's

The new shocks are KYB’s. Not anything fancy, but since the suspension is stock right now anyways, they’ll do just fine.

Yet more blue

Since the alternator is out it was time for more blue! I know it’s not the greatest job, but once all the brackets are back in it will look pretty good. At least it’s clean so I can spot fresh leaks.

Power steering pump

I cleaned and painted the power steering pump off of the bracket and reinstalled it. Came out nice!

Wrong parts!

And then I hit a snag! The rear wheel cylinders didn’t fit. The bolt pattern and the way the lines entered were both different. Back they went! Luckily the right ones were the same price and in stock. Never did figure out what these were actually for as they weren’t listed under Javelin in the computer at the parts store…

I've been working on the car so much that I'm a month behind on build thread updates!

I know I’ve made impolite comments re AMC styling on several occasions to you (sorry, they’re just not my thing), but damn it Javelin I love this thread. It’s a real world resurrection / restoration thread. Not an artificial low priced challenge build, not a gazillion $$”s shop restoration, but an honest to goodness guy working on a car he loves dearly bit by bit as time and funds allow. Keep it up, I love it.

In reply to Adrian_Thompson:

Thanks man, those comments really mean a lot to me!

I'm debating on whether or not to sign up for the biggest local show and cruise. It's August 25th and they close off most of downtown for a cruise. It's really cool and sells out fast. It would give me a concrete end goal though...

Do it! How much is really left to do to get it roadworthy?

Well I just dropped the rotors off to get turned. I'll need to install those, the calipers, the brake booster and master cylinder, the radiator and fan, pulleys, belts, coolant, and front wheels. Then hope like hell the trans works...

I can't decide if it's worth dropping the tank to have it cleaned or not. It's been stored dry (empty)...

Rear drums completed

With the correct wheel cylinders in hand it was a snap to get the drums together. I also figured out that my axles are good, but the differential is an open one. But, no brake drag, no seized bearings, and everything seems to work well. Great!

New wheels fit well on the back

With the drums completed on both sides, I polished up the new Welds and mounted them up. They fit really nicely, albeit with small tires. The 215’s on here have many, many inches of clearance all the way around. When I burn these off I’ll likely replace them with a 235, or better yet, an appropriately large Drag Radial…

Mocking up the front disc conversion...

Time to start attacking the front brakes now. I cleaned, sanded, and painted the various brackets. Test fit looks good, so I went ahead and dropped of the discs to get turned…

New fuel pump is in!

Next up was the fuel system. I took the old fuel pump off. It had a good wear pattern on it, so I installed the new one in the same spot. It’s just a stock replacement, but for now it will do fine. Fuel lines were cleaned out, all new rubber fuel hoses installed, a new metal fuel filter installed, and then I topped it all off with brand new clamps. No more fuel can!

And new water pump, too! Jul 15, 2012

I removed the original water pump while I was doing the fuel pump for better access, and because I was replacing it. This replacement is an aluminum one, saving me about 4-5 pounds right on the nose of the motor. No we’re making serious progress with the new parts!

I can't wait to see it moving.

And with this update we are at real-time again...

Rotors turned

The used rotors I have were able to be turned and I got those back from the machine shop this week. I also had them remove the old bleeder screws in the calipers, bought new bleeders, and the neutral safety switch arrived.

Because I can, that's why

Yes, I painted my calipers bright red. It’s my car and I’ll do whatever cliche’s I want! I actually think it will look pretty good once the car is painted, because it’s supposed to be bright red, too. So this is more of a color-matching thing then a stand-out thing. Still, they turned out nice.

More work on the engine

I kept going on the engine today. The thermostat has been replaced, and I’m glad I did it because the one in the car was a very incorrect 195 degree one! The correct factory 180 degree one is in there now. I cleaned all the paint off of the aluminum housing, installed the new crossover hose with new clamps, and did some other cleaning and painting such as to the oil fill tube. I also added in my new wire looms and started fitting the lower radiator hose.

I'm only seeing red 'X's for all pics after 7/8/12

In reply to Adrian_Thompson:

That's odd. The pictures are hotlinked from my own GRM Garage, so it's not like they're going far.

the image "http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/media/img/readerrides/updates*/Javelin_July_12_015.JPG" cannot be displayed because it has errors

Can you guys see the pictures in the actual garage link?

I posted in the feedback/help section, too.