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I bought a Bricklin. Specifically a 1974 Bricklin SV-1. Well, I'm picking it up later this week, but the deposit has been placed so I'm calling it mine. I wasn't really actively looking to buy one, but this popped up on my Craigslist notifier app for a good price and I emailed immediately. Most of the Bricklins I've seen for sale are in the $10-$12,000 range for a running example in need of restoration. This SV-1 is not currently running, but it costs less than half the price and is surprisingly in decent condition otherwise. It's also been a California car all its life, so there is no rust other than small bits on the rear diff that can be sanded away. It shows pretty well! (from 10 feet away)   This is VIN 0578, which means it was the 578th SV-1 to roll off the assembly line in 1974. With only   There are some pretty cool things to mention about this particular car. For starters, those tires are original. This car has 30,758 miles on the odometer. It's been sitting for 20 years untouched in a garage under a car cover, and somehow the original OEM 1974 tires still hold air. The rest of the car is equally all original too. The seats, the steering wheel, gauges, engine, smog pump, suspension, you name it. Of course this is good and bad. Good because there's been no fuckery with it in its 38 years. All stock, matching numbers, etc. And all real genuine parts from the doomed factory in New Brunswick, Canada. Bad because everything is 38 years old and most likely doesn't work anymore. This particular car, as I'm told, was originally bought by a CA senator in 1974. The demand for Bricklins when they were first announced was huge, and you needed to be rich or have connections to actually get one. (Mostly because of production problems due to financing issues at the factory). So this senator picked one up, but apparently got a lot of flack from the public for driving around in a sports car when the nation was in the midst of a terrible oil crisis. Since he depended on people liking him to continue his political career, he ended up selling it to the person I'm buying it from some short time later. A very popular (and necessary) modification that nearly all surviving Bricklins have is an air pump system to replace the hydraulic setup that came from the factory to control the automatic gull-wing doors. The hydraulic system would break and cause people to be locked inside their cars with no way to escape. This feature of course added to the charm of the SV-1, as well as securing it's place in Time Magazine's top 50 worst cars of all time. This car will need that mod done. Along with some other things... Like new carpet. The owner's cats got in and shredded the carpet. Fortunately NOS carpet exists and is fairly cheap. Though I'd want to replace the carpet anyway after all those years, so this isn't that big of a deal. Fortunately since it was stored inside all of these years, the dash, door panels, and other interior bits are all straight and without cracks.  It's going to need some fairly major restoration work to the body. The exterior of the SV-1 is fiberglass with acrylic bonded to it. Malcolm Bricklin's idea was to bond a layer of colored acrylic to fiberglass rather than using steel or painted fiberglass like the Corvettes of the era. This way, if you get a scratch on your car, you just sand down the acrylic layer and polish the scratch right out. The problem is that the plastics industry was still in its infancy in the early 70's, so the process for bonding acrylic to fiberglass wasn't really perfected yet. Many of the body panels were cracking in the their molds at the factory, and if they didn't do it then, it only took a couple years of warm summers and cold winters to cause issues like this:  When the previous owner tried to open the door a few years ago, they didn't feel like hooking up the battery and opening the automated door the right way, so they just pulled it open manually. This caused the door to crack, shattering the window. This is a problem at the moment because I can't seem to find a replacement window yet. I'll be digging into that problem later. The rear window also popped out and is laying on the floor of the hatch. The good thing though is that glass is in perfect shape and just needs a new seal to be put back in place.   Other bad and unknown issues: The engine might be seized. When I went to check it out, the owners said the engine hasn't turned over since the early 90's and will need to be rebuilt. This is ok though, as I plan on modifying this car to have some decent power and I don't want to irreversibly break the stock original engine anyway. It will be coming out and I have yet to decide what's going in. Whatever it ends up being (most likely a turbo 4G63), it will be done in such a way that the original engine can go back in to stock specifications. Or maybe if I pull the stock engine apart and find that it's in ok shape, I might freshen it up a bit and drive it for a while. We'll see... It's automatic, as almost all Bricklins are. I'm planning on somehow swapping to a manual transmission. I say somehow because there just aren't exactly Bricklins sitting in junkyards or being parted out on Craigslist for the parts, so I'm going to have to get clever. Fortunately for me, pretty much all of the mechanical parts came from AMC's parts bin, so I might be able to find a clutch pedal and other required items from other AMC vehicles of the era to match the factory SV-1 parts. So that's good for an introduction I think. Once I get it to my garage this week I'll take about a billion more pictures, and this time not with a cell phone, and update the thread. This will be a slow process most likely, especially since I don't know how the body panels work yet or how to rebond acrylic to fiberglass, but it'll be fun at least. BoostCreep fucked around with this message at 01:10 on Oct 10, 2012 |
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Jul 16, 2012 20:35
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I love AI for threads like this.
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Jul 16, 2012 20:43
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You are insane, but this is tremendous. Why a 4G63 and not a V8 of some variety?
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Jul 16, 2012 20:44
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That isn't cat damage, that is mouse damage, but this is pretty awesome.
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Jul 16, 2012 20:46
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Tremek posted:You are insane, but this is tremendous. Why a 4G63 and not a V8 of some variety? I'm not opposed to a V8. I just know the 4G63 extremely well and if I'm already restoring and modifying a weird car, I might as well go with a weird drivetrain too. I guess people would expect a V8, especially an LS of some variety, and I'd like to do something a bit less conventional. I'm not locked to any engine/tranny combo yet, but I'd be interested in hearing suggestions. I've already thought about doing a turbo'd AMC 4.0 from a Jeep to keep it in the family, but I don't know if there's enough room for the longer block. As soon as I can get this to my garage and start taking measurements I'll have a better idea of what I have room for. Also I'm a boost junkie and think it'd be really fun having (probably) the only turbocharged Bricklin ever. The nice thing is when you're working on a car as rare as this, pretty much anything you do to it will be a "world first". Originally I was going to put a 4G63 into a '72-'75 Dodge Colt as it was just a rebadged Mitsubishi Galant. The idea was to be able to modify a street car that wasn't required to pass SMOG every other year. In California, that means pre-1975. Then I thought "why should I stick to a Colt/Galant just because it's in the same family? There were plenty of cool/weird/strange cars from the early 70's that I could work on instead." Plus I already have a spare turbo capable of 500+ horsepower, spare ECUs, BOVs, injectors, and all sorts of stuff laying around that could use a home. Belldandy posted:That isn't cat damage, that is mouse damage, but this is pretty awesome. Well that is slightly less than good news, but since I'm replacing all of that stuff anyway it shouldn't be too bad. Hopefully the wiring wasn't touched. I'll probably be replacing the seats with more modern ones along with the carpet and whatever else is ruined in there. I just wasn't looking to replace all the wiring for stuff like lights.
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Jul 16, 2012 22:43
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Belldandy posted:That isn't cat damage, that is mouse damage, but this is pretty awesome. It could be cat damage, when the cat was trying to get the mice that were in the car.
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Jul 16, 2012 22:50
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This is awesome, you are awesome for doing it, and I really hope we get to see this thing through to a turbo Bricklin of all things.
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Jul 16, 2012 22:58
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Good luck with that thing, I think I'd rather restore an 80's XJS over a Bricklin if I wanted to die of a stroke, but that thing isn't far behind! I always kind of like the whole "no paint/colored plastic" idea of that car. Seizure Meat fucked around with this message at 23:23 on Jul 16, 2012 |
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Jul 16, 2012 22:59
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Wow, thread of the year if you follow through with this.
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Jul 16, 2012 23:06
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Does anyone make/sell a RWD trans that will bolt up to the 4G63? I sure as poo poo hope so because I want to see this thing come to life.
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Jul 16, 2012 23:09
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Would going with some other type of material for the back and side windows be beneficial? If that material could expand and contract with the bodywork I imagine that could be cheaper and potentially safer than sourcing glass. Also this is awesome and I'm really glad to see a goon give one of these a home.
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Jul 16, 2012 23:18
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I can already tell that this is going to be one of those AI stories that get passed down over the years. I'm amazed tires from 1974 haven't dry rotted away to dust by now. What's going on at the right rear quarter / rear bumper? Is it just missing a piece of trim or is there overspray/"corrosion" from an accident?
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Jul 16, 2012 23:20
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I also love that the tires advertise what they are. RADIAL T/A Back when radials where new and old timers didn't trust them.
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Jul 16, 2012 23:24
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Das Volk posted:Does anyone make/sell a RWD trans that will bolt up to the 4G63? I sure as poo poo hope so because I want to see this thing come to life. I think you would probably have to use an adapter plate, but I think a bunch of those have been made at least. Might be easier to go with an SR, F20/22, or BP though.
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Jul 16, 2012 23:30
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Das Volk posted:Does anyone make/sell a RWD trans that will bolt up to the 4G63? I sure as poo poo hope so because I want to see this thing come to life. Well, Buschur sells RWD conversion kits for 1st gen DSMs. He had to make these parts for his own RWD converted Talon years ago and decided to sell the parts since he already put in the R&D. https://secure.buschurracing.com/catalog/index.php?cPath=22_98&osCsid=0f4d67c828acb77979cc68963c808846 More importantly, there is an entire community devoted to RWD conversions for 4G63s. They deal specifically with putting them into Starions and Conquests, but I am sure a lot of that information will work for me as well. With some _slight_ modifications. http://projectzerog.com/ Seat Safety Switch posted:What's going on at the right rear quarter / rear bumper? Is it just missing a piece of trim or is there overspray/"corrosion" from an accident? The trim has come off that part of the bumper. It just needs to be glued back down again. Or, I guess, I need to find a trim piece for it and glue it back down. The same thing is happening on the front and back part of the driver side door. Click the picture to get the full size to see. And the tires are completely cracked and crumbling. I'm shocked they can hold air at all. I'm afraid to even roll the thing onto a trailer with them in that condition. BoostCreep fucked around with this message at 23:51 on Jul 16, 2012 |
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Jul 16, 2012 23:40
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Here are the rest of the pictures I took, just to have them archived.   The plastic isn't that faded, it just came out weird due to my camera phone:     
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Jul 16, 2012 23:50
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That car is the automotive pride of Canada  Do the doors work ok?
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Jul 16, 2012 23:52
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neckbeard posted:That car is the automotive pride of Canada Nope! This has the original hydraulic doors, which means they are held shut by hydraulic fluid in some mystery gearbox that I need to rip out eventually. It's the same system that caused people to get locked in these cars when they were new. I'll be converting the doors to air like the rest of the modernized SV-1s eventually. Also most modernized Bricklins have had the metal frames of the doors reinforced to prevent them from cracking like has happened with the driver door on this one. I'll be looking into ways of duplicating that as well.
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Jul 16, 2012 23:59
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When the first pic loaded I literally said "NOOO WAYYYY" out loud by myself.
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Jul 17, 2012 00:19
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That is pretty awesome. I hope the project goes well for you
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Jul 17, 2012 00:22
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Das Volk posted:Does anyone make/sell a RWD trans that will bolt up to the 4G63? I sure as poo poo hope so because I want to see this thing come to life.
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Jul 17, 2012 00:35
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I snickered when i got to the rear window missing but just said "WHAT" when you got to the cracked door image. Is it the body panel that cracked or the actual whole metal part of the door that cracked? That door looks like an absolute nightmare to fix.
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Jul 17, 2012 00:42
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coolskillrex remix posted:I snickered when i got to the rear window missing but just said "WHAT" when you got to the cracked door image. Is it the body panel that cracked or the actual whole metal part of the door that cracked? From the sound of it, there IS no metal part; it's high-quality early-70's plastic all the way through.
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Jul 17, 2012 00:47
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As someone who lives in the city where these gems were built - I anxiously await the fruits of your labour.
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Jul 17, 2012 00:48
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InitialDave posted:Starion (but maybe not in the US). Possibly the Dodge Ram 50. I remember reading that one out of an old Mazda truck, maybe a B2600, or something, would work on the 4G63. Other than that, what about one of the old Mightu Max trucks?
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Jul 17, 2012 00:55
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Fucknag posted:From the sound of it, there IS no metal part; it's high-quality early-70's plastic all the way through. So basically if you slam it closed to hard you get a face full of shattered glass and a completely useless door.
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Jul 17, 2012 01:03
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coolskillrex remix posted:I snickered when i got to the rear window missing but just said "WHAT" when you got to the cracked door image. Is it the body panel that cracked or the actual whole metal part of the door that cracked? There is indeed a metal frame to the door. Make this pic full res to see:  Look closely at the left most corner of the door where the acrylic is bending up and you can see where the metal door frame is. I really just need to reattach the fiberglass/acrylic to that metal. However, I'm probably just going to replace the doors entirely with fiberglass versions depending on how bad the damage is. coolskillrex remix posted:So basically if you slam it closed to hard you get a face full of shattered glass and a completely useless door. Well, you don't slam the doors at all. They are automated. There is a switch behind each door on the rear fender that raises and lowers the doors for you. Like so: (click for terrible quality video)  Also here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dKelFiHNtg BoostCreep fucked around with this message at 01:14 on Jul 17, 2012 |
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Jul 17, 2012 01:05
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coolskillrex remix posted:So basically if you slam it closed to hard you get a face full of shattered glass and a completely useless door. Well that's why you use the hydraulic actuators. You don't want to have to operate your doors manually like some dirty prole do you???
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Jul 17, 2012 01:06
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You're in the Los Angeles area, right? Can I volunteer to help and take pictures of this? Because this is awesome.
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Jul 17, 2012 01:13
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Krakkles posted:You're in the Los Angeles area, right? Can I volunteer to help and take pictures of this? Because this is awesome. Absolutely! The more the merrier! The car will be located in Glendale as soon as I figure out how to get it there from North Hollywood where it is now.
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Jul 17, 2012 01:17
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BoostCreep posted:Absolutely! The more the merrier! The car will be located in Glendale as soon as I figure out how to get it there from North Hollywood where it is now. PM'ing you my contact info.
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Jul 17, 2012 01:19
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This is amazing. I very briefly looked into picking one of these up years ago, but totally pussied out when I started reading about them and realized I'd have to replace just about everything - and, figure out how to do so on my own without relying on the massive knowledge base of an active forum. Plus, the 220hp 360 was kind of  Will be watching this with great interest!
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Jul 17, 2012 01:32
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AI difficulty on a scale of 1 to 10 is 11. Shine on you crazy rolling bathtub you.
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Jul 17, 2012 01:41
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Detroit Q. Spider posted:Well that's why you use the hydraulic actuators. You don't want to have to operate your doors manually like some dirty prole do you??? Must take some balls to get out of this thing. I imagine you have to feel pretty good about yourself to get in and out of a modern SLS... but then i imagine just sitting there as this door raises and closes itself.
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Jul 17, 2012 01:54
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VikingSkull posted:I also love that the tires advertise what they are. RADIAL T/A BFG actually still makes them, they've been the de facto tire of choice for a lot of muscle cars for a long time now.
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Jul 17, 2012 06:48
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When its finished you need to do a L.A. canal photoshoot, Deadline Auto Theft style. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJUm0SKDOgc Always loved the pure 70's-ness of these cars since I saw a lime green one at a car show.
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Jul 17, 2012 07:17
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I'd imagine you could hot up the 360 some. Even take a later one out of a junkyard Grand Cherokee or something so you can preserve your original motor. Edelbrock makes aluminum heads and an RV cam for them, and I'd be surprised if someone like Crane or Comp couldn't make you something more radical than that. Edelbrock also makes a MPFI kit for the AMC motors, but it's kind of spendy. If you keep it AMC, you will want to look into the oil system mods. Trouser Chili did it to his 401, and you can find some info about it on the 'net.
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Jul 17, 2012 07:49
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How is there not any camber loss on the front wheels?
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Jul 17, 2012 07:51
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kimbo305 posted:How is there not any camber loss on the front wheels? Gullwing doors defy the laws of suspension physics, duh and or hello
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Jul 17, 2012 11:50
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kimbo305 posted:How is there not any camber loss on the front wheels? They look like they have a slight positive rake, i think they're in the process of dropping.
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Jul 17, 2012 13:31
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