'67 Valiant: Rebirth

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jtolbert

jtolbert

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So, I have a '67 Valiant Signet 2dr that has led a rough life before coming to me. The short version is the car was bubba'd up by previous owners and then got vandalized while I had it in cheap storage before moving into my house.

This thread will serve as a log of sorts for what's going on.

From last night:

So I had one of those "duh" moments the other day. I'd been sand-bagging on doing anything else with the Valiant until I got a window trim removal tool...Cheap, but right now I'm broke. The top dash bolts are located below the windshield gasket. To take the gasket out, you have to remove the chrome trim, take the windshield out and then pull the gasket out. At least, that's how it should work.

I'd never really stopped to think about how things were arranged until last night. It came to me that I could just go pull the gasket out from underneath the window trim since there was no windshield holding it in place any more. Thanks, vandals! Yes, it was kind of a "duh" moment. So I pulled the windshield gasket out. I'm very happy to see absolutely no rust anywhere in the windshield channels. This is a relief, cuse I don't really want to find any more problems with the car.

Pulled the gauge cluster out. The housing itself is in surprisingly good shape, but the finish is shot. The speedo is broken; the needle broke off. I'm surprised that a car this old, with a factory manual, didn't have a tach. I know they're not necessary for driving a manual---I never look at the tach in my Jeep---but it seems odd to not have one.

cluster-20100422-01.jpg


Yes, the needles are blue. It's odd. I think that might be the factory color. I'm not sure yet.

I think I'm going to go with aftermarket gauges when everything goes back together. There's really no use in sticking with the factory gauges, since all worth in the car from a collectible standpoint was killed long ago. I had originally thought about building my own gauge housing, but then I stumbled upon these guys: http://www.redlinegaugeworks.com/products.asp. The second item is an ABS plastic drop-in instrument panel that will fit my dash's opening. This is awesome and takes care of my biggest worry about going with aftermarket gauges.

There's a tear where the firewall meets the transmission tunnel. It's odd.
 
Does anyone know how to remove the temp control cable from either the dash/control end or the heater box end? :( That's the only thing holding the dash in the car.
 
Dash is out. :)

The temp control cable is retained by a disposable ring that just slides over the post on the bellcrank. Then you remove the bracket that holds the cable in place...Requires a Phillips screwdriver. Pretty easy. 7071DartGTReg cleared this up for me. :)

heater-cable-end-20100426-01.jpg


That's the offending cable/clip.

Now I get to remove everything under the dash, as well as probably pull all the wiring going to the rear of the car.

I think the car may be tweaked. The body panel gaps on the left side are bigger than on the right side. There's a tear where the firewall meets the transmission tunnel on the left side. The right-side package tray brace is bowed out (toward the front of the car) a bit (but is still attached to both the package tray and the floorpan) and is folded a bit where it gets close to the wheelwell. I'm not sure what would cause these conditions besides the car being bent. It was apparently drag-raced at one point, so maybe that would explain things.

I'm hoping it can be straightened, if it needs to be, but I won't know till I crawl under the car and start measuring things.
 
So...Moving on, I removed the dash a long while ago but have been busy with other stuff. Decided to start removing other things that would keep me from measuring corner to corner in order to find out if the car is straight or not.

Exhaust is out. My non-mechnically-inclined girlfriend, Amy, was actually very helpful while removing the exhaust...She was able to see what the pipes were hitting on better than I could while looking from the rear while I moved things around from below.

Engine and transmission are unhooked and will probably be coming out within the next few days.

The car has subframe connectors! They're home-made and welded in---the welds don't look great but they're probably solid enough---and so far seem to be about the only "good" thing done to this car before I obtained it.
 
Okay guys, I need your help.

We got the engine out tonight. Not hard; it wasn't even really bolted in and nothing was hooked up.

josh-sean-valiant.JPG


I took some pics of the damage that leads me to believe the car is bent. First, the tear in the firewall.

firewall-tear.JPG


Second, the package tray brace being bent.

bent-rear-brace.JPG


These two things, plus the panel gaps being larger on the left side of the car, make me think something bad happened. Thoughts?

I found some pretty egregious hacking on the k-member once we got the engine out.

hacked-k-member.JPG


Not such a huge deal since I'm going to be swapping to a later k-member anyway, but it's exemplary of the butchery that seems to have taken place on this car.

So...What do you all think? I could use some advice here. The car is amazingly rust free; there's a bit of rust behind the right-side rear wheel---not even into the trunk extension---and the front floorpans are shot, but otherwise...That's it. But, the potentially-bent car worries me. Is this realistically something I should worry about? What can I measure to figure out whether or not the car is in trouble?
 
measure X patterns across the frame rails where it is easy to reach. like rear k frame mount to front spring mount, and check the differences. should be within a 1/4 inch.
 
In the FSM there should be a page that gives all of the dimensions and measuring points of the frame. If you bring it to a fram shop they can measure these distances very accurately and may even be able to pull it straight if the unibody is bent.
 
that firewall damage looks man-made. wondering if somebody took a shortcut to get to the bellhousing bolts.
 
jtolbert said:
Okay guys, I need your help.

We got the engine out tonight. Not hard; it wasn't even really bolted in and nothing was hooked up.

josh-sean-valiant.JPG


I took some pics of the damage that leads me to believe the car is bent. First, the tear in the firewall.

firewall-tear.JPG


Second, the package tray brace being bent.

bent-rear-brace.JPG


These two things, plus the panel gaps being larger on the left side of the car, make me think something bad happened. Thoughts?

I found some pretty egregious hacking on the k-member once we got the engine out.

hacked-k-member.JPG


Not such a huge deal since I'm going to be swapping to a later k-member anyway, but it's exemplary of the butchery that seems to have taken place on this car.

So...What do you all think? I could use some advice here. The car is amazingly rust free; there's a bit of rust behind the right-side rear wheel---not even into the trunk extension---and the front floorpans are shot, but otherwise...That's it. But, the potentially-bent car worries me. Is this realistically something I should worry about? What can I measure to figure out whether or not the car is in trouble?
Click to expand...
Second picture possible tranny explosion....third picture something in the truck might have slid into it.....fourth looks like hacking for front sump oil pan clearance...JMT
 
What I originally thought was a tear in the firewall looks to be a cut, now that I go look at it again, and it's bent out towards the engine side of the firewall. Maybe someone did cut this for access to the bellhousing bolts...But those bolts aren't hard to get to in the first place.

The k-member is definitely hacked for a front-sump pan.

Not sure about the package tray brace damage. That wouldn't explain the outer side of the brace being folded where it's close to the wheelwell. Any ideas about that one?

Since the car's subframe connectors appear to be welded in with welds that appear to be on the quality of bird crap, would it be advisable to cut the SFCs out before taking the car to a frame shop? Get the unibody straightened if it's off, then put new SFCs in...

What sort of cost is one looking at to have something adjusted at a frame shop? Is it worth it?
 
That brace looks like mabby some one hit the brakes hard and some thing in the trunk slid up and hit it? Hard to say. Like has been said I would just take some mesurments and see if it is strate or not. No reason to take it to a frame shop if it is not bent.
 
Well, we did some tape-measure measuring tonight. The numbers are a lot closer than I expected.

Left-side front-to-rear: 56 1/2"
Right-side front-to-rear: 56 7/8"
front side-to-side: 31 11/16"
Rear side-to-side: 35 1/8"
Right front to left rear: 65 9/16"
Left front to right rear: 66"

Our measurement methodology probably wasn't the best...We just clipped the tape measure in one hole and ran it over to the other hole, measuring to the edge of the hole. The holes we used were the closest ones we could spot in the subframes to the wheels. Estimating center to center would have added even more human error. Is there a better way to do this? How do the numbers look so far?
 
In my FSM it says to measure with plum-bobs at certain locations and discrepancies more than 1/4" are bad.
 
You wouldn't be able to tell me what locations or scan in those sections of the FSM, would you?
 
Thanks. I found a set of the frame dimensions on eBay for $7. Ordered them, and hopefully I'll be able to measure this stuff properly and figure out if anything is wrong with the car.

I will be selling the unwanted 318 that came in the Valiant for $25 tomorrow. This means I don't have to haul it off to the junkyard. The guy doesn't want the transmission, so I'll probably try to sell that separately.
 
G'morn J. Just wondering how the fenders line up and if the doors close with no "issues" ? Looks like you're making a bunch of progress.
 
Good morning!

The right-side door looks pretty good, but sags a bit. I figure the hinges are in need of a rebuild. The left-side door has bigger gaps on both sides. It also needs some work in the hinge area, but the difference in gap sizes bothers me.
 
frame/body dimensions diagram showed up. Now I just have to find time/space...
 
So in another thread I posted a while ago I mentioned that I had the Valiant taken to a local body guy. He said the car is straight, solid and in much better shape than most of the other stuff from that era he sees...So I continued on.

Haven't done much with the car itself, but have started rounding up more parts...I obtained a rebuildable 8-3/4" housing. I'm going to go the Grand Cherokee rear disc brake route, so I'm starting to scout around for those parts. I'm also on the lookout for a '73-'76 v8 k-member and a big-bolt-pattern disc setup.
 
'73-'76 v8 k-member is on the way.

Pulled the left front wheel off and the car appears to have the big-bolt-pattern '73+ disc-brake setup. Can anyone confirm this from a few pics?

brakes-20101115-01.jpg


brakes-20101115-02.jpg


Thanks for taking a look.
 
It doesnt look like SBP KH brakes but to be sure you should measure from the center of one stud to the outside of the 3rd stud. Plus SBP would have used 7/16" wheel studs where I do believe the LBP used 1/2" wheel studs.
 
I'll try to measure stuff tonight. The front of the car has Outlaw II wheels and I'm not sure those were ever made in five-on-four.
 
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