Thought I would drop in and say hi. I've been into the wagon scene for a while, but took just this long to meander in here. I've got a 78 Catalina with a '96 SS suspension/brake conversion running a pontiac 455.
so?....have you run it down the 1/4 mile yet?? i know me....if i big blocked mine.. ..1st place i'd take it...would be the track nice looking wag!! Rufus
. I have to agree. It is not every day you see a 455 in such a car, so I would like to know what it does as well. O, and don't feel pressured, but we wnat more pictures now!
It ran a 13.9x in the quarter a few years ago, I can not remember the MPH. The car would just squat and run, to traction issues with that fat back end. I had sold the car and just recently bought it back. The guy who had bought it made it more "streetable" removing my drag shocks, and the carb that it had (no choke provision and it was really a gas hog). When I drove it home for the first time (I don't think the guy ever got into the gas all that hard), we cleaned out the carbon deposits Still handles and drives fantastic. More pic's soon, I work shift work and I am a bit far from home. It's a 73 455 (out of a wagon of course!) bored .030, ross pistons, H-beam rods, ARP everything, mildly ported heads, Perf RPM intake, Perf RPM cam, 2.5" Ram Air manifolds, Billet Dist. The suspension all came out of my Impala SS (springs, sways, wheels) and I fished around for a good combo of shocks. I went with all rubber bushings to keep it on the softer side of life. We put PST poly stuff in, and it was too harsh for what I was going for, so the rubber went in. The rear diff is a low mile rebuilt SS unit (disc brake) with new GM gears 3.08 ratio. I used billet spacers to kick the wheels out in the rear (the sedan rear is of course narrower). The front sway bar is an aftermarket unit and the rear is stock. I was going to fiddle with the rear springs again (a bit soft for me), but I don't now if the car is going to stay in house all that long... I might just keep the motor and let the rest of the car go.
Rufus, To bad I already bought my 78 Impala, that 78 Safari would have fit my driveway and wallet alot better!!!! LOL!!!! And I have a stock 76 400 4bbl & a 77 350 2bbl pontaic engines I could have put in her. I would definatly like to see more pic's!!! Welcome aboard!!!
shoot, you are the kind of guy that needs to get a hold of this car... I can't enter my garage from the inside and the garage door barley closes... the wife and I chuckle aobut it now, but it will not last. When we saw it for sale, we could not help but buy her back...we went out on our second date in it! (long since married now). I went through lots of trying different parts to get her right on the road and have the stance just right. I must have tried a half dozen different springs out of the box and trimmed, as well as a couple different sway bar combo's. I finally found a good neutral, no understeer and not too much over steer when you goose it out of a corner. The biggest challenge was keeping the nose from diving around with being lowered over all that weight up front. The 4WDisc breaks made a hudge difference too. Like I said, if I had the time and I knew I was keepning it, I would put in ZQ8 bump stops and find a stiffer rear spring option that keeps her on the down low.
Hey guys, thanks for all the welcome. It looks like we might part with the car after all, get a boxy four or two door, it just does not fit. I will pull the 455 and sell it with a GM Goodwrench 350 I have. I will post to the classifieds when it happens, but until then, I will enjoy hanging out here with ya'll! Long live the Long Roofs!!
Here are the pictures. This car needs to go. It now sports the SS wheels with black painted center spokes, no guages and no radio thanks to an over night parts aquisition from mr. stealsalot. We drove it again yesterday for grins, and it handles very well, drives great!
Gorgeous looking car. Too bad we don't know how to build a holographic dash. You could leave the car at night looking like it was already ripped open, and get in the next day with everything intact.
