Sorry for the long read. Its hard to sum up 2 years of work in a short paragraph.
I’ve been working on this one off and on for the past 2 years and thought it was time to share the progress. I was looking for something I didn’t see at every car cruise but was within my budget (read near free). I looked around for awhile and found this on ebay. The engine, a 287ci AMC, was torn down to the block already and was in need of alot of machine work.
The cowl, firewall, and floor on the passenger side were rotted but it came with new used parts. The fuel tank had been cleaned and repaired. All the brakes and suspension had already been rebuilt and it came with alot of new parts for the engine. I added up the parts receipts and came up with about $1300 in parts. I got it for $500. A pretty good deal in my book. After a trip to Roanoke, VA it was in my garage.
I got off to a good start taking the car apart. I got the cowl, firewall, and floor welded in and then winter came. I spent that time working on my firebird so not much got done. Over the next summer I did some small stuff but not much. I did find a 327 AMC engine complete with the trans and rearend for $100 near philly and couldn’t pass it up. I tore the engine down and it looked great inside so i just had it cleaned and honed. I put new bearings in it and sent the cam out to be reground with a mild performance grind. I already had the decals for the 287 so i put them on. No need to advertise the extra cubes. Meanwhile I stripped the engine compartment and painted it. I was just going to leave the outside as it was other than buffing it out. When it became obvious it wouldn’t be done for spring I decided to paint the firebird and it got put on the back burner again.
I recently started working on it again and decided to strip the whole car and repaint it. Thats where it sits now. Hopefully it will be road worthy by spring.
Here are a few pics along the way. More can be found at http://s214.photobucket.com/albums/cc172/hotrod16105/amc/
Thanks. I’ve always liked AMC’s but I had never seen one of these until I bought it. It’s not the coolest car but its different. It does suck trying to find parts for it but its worth it.
Thanks for the compliments. It is a low budget project. I’m hoping to keep it around $4000. I’m doing everything other than the machine work myself. That saves alot of cash. I’ve avoided looking at the total so far but maybe i’ll add it up tonight.
lookin’ good. AMC’s rule. I had a 401 in a Wagoneer that ran pretty decent. Once the Wagoneer rotted away to nothing, I sold it to a guy who put it in a Javelin. He ran 13.40s in the Javelin with the motor exactly as it was pulled from the Jeep. AMC motors are light weight & pretty much bulletproof. I’d love to build a 401 Javelin some day.
Total spent so far including the purchase price, renting a trailer, tolls, parts, supplies, etc $2300. Less than I expected so far.
Unfortunately the 304/401’s wont bolt to the trans in my car. And I’d have to fab a new rear suspension to change the trans because they use a torque tube setup. Someday that may happen but the budget isn’t there.
I love the garage, but it’s my bosses. I live in an apartment in the garage and he lets me use it, which is nice. All the crap in the background is his. There would be room for 3 or 4 more cars in the heated side if that stuff was gone.
AMC offered TH400 in the Qtrac Jeeps behind the 304/360/401. A tranny guy can change the main shaft & tailshaft hsg to make it a normal RWD TH400. Then you get a 9" ford the width that you need & have a driveshaft made to connect the two. This could be done for not alot of $$, just a lil bit of fabbing. The ambassador has leaf springs in the rear, doesn’t it? You could prolly get away with an 8.8" ford from and explorer or something similar. As long as you aint got mega HP, it should hold up well. Maybe even find one with rear discs.
They actually used a coil spring rear suspension similar to the F-body cars. Instead of a torqe arm they used the torque tube. It wouldn’t be too costly to fab everything to make another drive train work, and i do have a 9" sitting in my dads garage, but we know it never ends there. An AMC drivetrain would be cool, and a 401 wouldn’t be expected, but if i’m going that far I would love to get the v10/auto from a srt-10 ram and put in it. Based off the measurements i could find i only need to take about 2-3 inches out of the firewall and a mild rework of the strut towers and of course the trans tunnel and a custom cross member. It would be hidden under the hood and if you looked inside it would still work from the stock column shift. I found the eng/trans/wiring/ecm from one with around 15-20k miles for $8500 last year. If only i had the cash. Someday maybe. I’ll keep dreaming.
Thanks. I do have a 9" laying around too. Its just the rest of the missing pieces and the time that I need. I had planned to be driving the car this past summer and it didn’t happen so I really want to have it on the road this spring. I can drive it for awhile and start gathering the parts for a rebuild in the future. At least i’ll be able to enjoy it in the mean time.
The V10 & trans would definately blow the budget. A 401/TH400 could keep you within your budget, especially if you could sell the 327, 287, original trans & rearend/torque tube.
I had not seen that. Thats f***in awesome. The only thing that would make it better is if it was AMC power instead of chevy. I guess that should give me something to shoot for in about 10 years. haha
