Back after a 33 Year Lay Off

apd628

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2015
Messages
6
I lived through that work for a living phase of my life, had too much time on my hands and got the bug again for a Corvette.

I am partial to C3's as the last one I had 33 years ago was a 1969 Big Block 390 horse, 4 speed, factory side pipe, air car.
My what getting married and starting a family will do to a guy, I sold the 69 and bought a Suburban to haul the family.

Fast forward a few decades and I bought a 1981 model that had been sitting for several years in a garage. The previous owner installed a 383 stroker motor, long tube headers, aluminum cross flow radiator, with an extra fan to supplement the clutch fan on the engine. The turbo 350 was beefed up with a shift kit, and a 2500 RPM stall speed. He had a buddy put on a nice driver quality silver pearl white paint job on the car.

I have spent few months getting the car to a point to where I can go for a drive and have a reasonable expectation of returning home while driving the car, instead of it being hauled home on a flat bed wrecker. Typical deal, drive it for an hour, work on it for two hours. Just like my old Pan Head Harleys.

I had forgotten how much heat is generated into the driver/passenger area of the car from the engine. That said and the temperature here in Texas just passing the century mark, I decided to get the AC system up and running. Fortunately the previous owner had the AC system converted to R134a. I was getting ready to charge the system when I noticed that the blower was not working. I ran the electrics out and found that the blower motor had power going to it, but no action from the blower motor. I made a trip to the parts store, and bought a blower motor, and my next step is to install that. Thank goodness I bought a factory shop manual for the car, it has made my life a lot easier.

Once I get all the systems up and running, I plan on installing a heat barrier and sound barrier to the passenger compartment.

Looking forward to picking up a few tips to get the old girl running and looking good. As soon as I figure out how to resize the pics of the car, I will post a few.

Thanks

Tim
 
Welcome to the motley crew.....

before spending $$ on the blower motor, you maybe want to consider two things, first put in a C4 blower motor/fan assy, make a 3/4 inch spacer from some plywood, this will increase the airflow a good bit, second is to make damn sure that black ~10 ga wire with the 3/8 loop on the end does not go to the battery post on the starter, it's a very common error, as it is really the ground point for the blower motor and the wiper motor....making the frames of both read +12 so of course neither works....on my car, I brought all that accessory grounding up top of the engine, except for the obvious frame/engine wire under the right side engine mount.....:shocking:
 
Welcome to the motley crew.....

before spending $$ on the blower motor, you maybe want to consider two things, first put in a C4 blower motor/fan assy, make a 3/4 inch spacer from some plywood, this will increase the airflow a good bit, second is to make damn sure that black ~10 ga wire with the 3/8 loop on the end does not go to the battery post on the starter, it's a very common error, as it is really the ground point for the blower motor and the wiper motor....making the frames of both read +12 so of course neither works....on my car, I brought all that accessory grounding up top of the engine, except for the obvious frame/engine wire under the right side engine mount.....:shocking:

I think there many who have adapted the C4 blower motor for extra AC performance. But another thing to look into. The cold air plenum in the engine compartment..actually an ambient air chamber before the air is passed through the evaporator.......for old cars it can be filled with junk. My 1970 cold air plenum was approximately filled with about 1/3 full of dry leaves/similar junk.
 
Welcome to the motley crew.....

before spending $$ on the blower motor, you maybe want to consider two things, first put in a C4 blower motor/fan assy, make a 3/4 inch spacer from some plywood, this will increase the airflow a good bit, second is to make damn sure that black ~10 ga wire with the 3/8 loop on the end does not go to the battery post on the starter, it's a very common error, as it is really the ground point for the blower motor and the wiper motor....making the frames of both read +12 so of course neither works....on my car, I brought all that accessory grounding up top of the engine, except for the obvious frame/engine wire under the right side engine mount.....:shocking:

I think there many who have adapted the C4 blower motor for extra AC performance. But another thing to look into. The cold air plenum in the engine compartment..actually an ambient air chamber before the air is passed through the evaporator.......for old cars it can be filled with junk. My 1970 cold air plenum was approximately filled with about 1/3 full of dry leaves/similar junk.

I had to vacuum mine out decades ago, but I sealed the fresh air intake under the fender, and removed the recirc flapper from inside/kick plate, so my car is on permanent recirc, no more crap in the evap now.....and being a convertible, I have plenty of air, especially with top down.....

:D
 
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