My 1979 L-82 Corvette Coupe Is Going Drag Racing
Well, some more news about the blue racer (the old stuff is below). It turns out that all (and I do mean all) of the emissions equipment on this car has been yanked off at one time or another. The catalytic converter is gone, and the original exhaust has been replaced with a dual exhaust, which isn't street legal for a '79.
The plan is still for this to be a street legal car, so one of the first things I'm going to do is make sure I have the emissions equipment replaced. It's not gonna be great for the performance, but the car will be street legal before I drive it. And I do intend to drive it to the track.
I've also got a line on another engine for it. It isn't settled yet, but it looks like I may be putting a 383 in the car. I'm still going to go through the engine that's on the car. That way, if I blow up one of the engines on the track, I'll still have another one to keep running.
The saga will continue...
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I saw this corvette for sale in a tiny lot in Lincoln City Oregon while my wife and I were driving to the Chinook Winds Casino. A couple of days later I went back and bought it.
Practically nothing about this car is original. That's OK though. My '77 is nearly all original with a few minor cosmetic modifications. It has a chance one day of getting restored to NCRS standards. This one though hasn't got the proverbial snowball's chance of having that happen.
The spoiler's all wrong for one thing. Chevrolet offered spoilers in 1979, but they didn't look like that wing. As far as I can tell it came from Vanacors. I've seen ads for wings that look exactly like it in Corvette Fever and Vette. The paint's not original either, and it's not too hard to tell. It's flaking away in some places, and pretty thin in others. Also, it looks like a little fiberglass work was done when they put the wing on, and they didn't bother to sand it properly. Not to mention the fact that the paint code on the trim panel indicates that it's supposed to be metallic silver.
Another thing, that's definitely NOT the original engine. The RPO code on the date stamp doesn't match anything I've ever heard of General Motors putting into a car or truck, not that I'm much of an expert. I'm told by one person around here who has quite a few corvettes in his garage that it was probably purchased as a bare block and built up into an engine, but I don't know. All I know for sure is it isn't the original engine.
That being the case, my plans for the car have changed a bit. I bought the car to have fun with and to fix up. My wife and I talked about it, and now this car is going drag racing.
John Itofe and I are going to pull the engine out of the car sometime in mid to late April and start dismantling it. Once we know what we've got, we're going to start modifying it a bit.
I plan to put a multi-point fuel injection conversion onto it, and maybe force a bit more air into it as well, as long as I can keep it street legal. I'm also going to be putting a performance exhaust system on.The transmission's getting yanked too. As far as I know there's nothing wrong with it. It's a TH 350 though, and I want a TH 400, so out it comes. I'll keep it, recondition it and use it as a spare for the '77.
The rear end is going to have to be beefed up as well. I want it to be ready once we start building power with our engine modifications. I've read about more than a few corvette rear ends breaking when too much torque was applied, so we're upgrading. While I'm at it I'll probably have the gear ratio changed too. I'll need some stiffer springs and shocks too.
I want this car to be fast on the dragstrip and still be able to drive it on the street. I'm going to have to drive it to and from the track after all. I don't have a trailer for it anyway.