The Stickman's Custom Cruiser Build thread

Ok this will be where everyone will be able to see all the is and will be done to my 1984 Custom Cruiser. Let's start with what it looked like when I first bought it and what it had.



It has a matt black paint job and dark tinted windows all around. The wheels are Wheel Vintiques that are powdercoated red with baby moon hubcaps. The interior was stock with the exception of a pillar mounted tach. It had a generic radio/Cd player. It had the stock 307 and 200R4 trans. It ran ok but smelled bad. I knew sooner or later I would get rid of the computer controled carb, airpump and all other garbage cluttering the engine bay. The first modification was to add a toch screen radio/cd/dvd player.





The backup cam was a fairly simple mod. Had to run one cable to an AV in and then a power wire which I put through a toggle switch. When I bought the radio I was hoping to leave the cam on screen while listening to the radio but it doesn't work that way. I also wanted to add one to the side mirror but have yet to get to that. Then I had to add a remote antenna. The stock fender one was broken off so I needed an antenma. But I liked the uncluttered look and a hidden one would be better. I bought a powered one for better reception.

I put it on the far back side window behine the tint. You can't even tell it's there.

I then bought a 1972 Olds 350 off of Ebay for $400. The auction stated it was a 350 with Edelbrock intake and possible cam. The guy paid more for it and was hoping it would get bid up but no one but me bid. After I got it home I pulled a valve cover only to find Competition Cams roller tipped rockers. So I am guessing it also has a cam. I think what happened was the guy bought the engine for his truck thinking a 350 is a 350, not knowing Olds engines have different bellhousing bolt patterns.











It would be a very long time till this engine would see the inside of my car. I wanted to wait till closer to the end of the car show/cruisenight season.
The next addition was a simple one. A Batwing aircleaner. I always loved the look of these. And the black color and theme fit my car.

Then I was at a u-pull-it junkyard and found a Caprice LT-1 dual fan aluminum radiator. So I picked it up.

I hate scraping my knuckles on that clutchfan. And I hate the way it looks. So the swap was made and it looks so much cleaner. I still have to made a better looking hold down for it though.





Because I was adding this I decided to add an external transmission cooler. I like the finned cylinder ones so I bought a 24 inch one and mounted it in place of the plastic thing that mounts under the radiator. I know it's there to direct air in and around the radiator and engine bay. I figure the cooler is about the same size so it should work in both capacities. I did notice my transmisssion worked better afterwards. Before it had some issues and will get a rebuild and shift kit in the future.



I also added a controller for the fans as I didn't want it on at all times and wasn't going to rely on me flipping a switch.

I also lowered the car using Edlebrock/Eibach springs. I always thought the nose looked kinda high and thought this would fix it. It didn't really. The car is level if you measure the rocker panel height. I may take an inch out of the springs in the spring.

I then started looking at installing the 350. I knew I needed a carb and found one on Craigslist. A Holley 4 barrel. It was cheap. I had my wife rebuild it as I trust her more than i do myself at such things.



I started to get things ready for the swap.





I had wanted true duals on the car but was in no hurry to spend that cash. But when I yanked the 307 I had to cut off the crossover tube to get it out. So duals would come sooner than later. Therefore I needed a dual hump crossmember. Thank God my wife is a welder.







It worked rather nice.
The engine was in and I was boltng up all the brackets and realized my wire braided hose and AN fittings wouldn't really fit with the mechanical Holley fuel pump and the A/C brackets. So to took it off and my wife made me this.

So then I needed an electric fuel pump. Ug what a problem this would be. But not for any reason you might think. The problems came from disturbing the old rusted fuel lines. I put the electic Holley fuel pump on ahead of the passenger side rear wheel and replace all the fuel lines foward of that. Now keep in mind that it took me like 10 weeks to get to this point. Why? Well I suffer from severe Migraines. I get them everyday. Just depends on when I get them. And how bad. In the past I would have had the swap done a whole lot quicker. Anyway I tried to get the engine running only to find for some reason the fuel bowls would not fill. I tried to figure it out and decided it would simply be easier to run a Quadrajet. With the Holley I had to run a 1inch spacer. I also had an Edelbrock carb and that wouldn't work even with a 1inch spacer. And I wasn't going higher and having to cut a hole in the hood. So I ordered the carb and had to wait a few weeks. But I got it and installed it. And imediately had to reroute all my properly planned hose and regulator layout.

Well now I had to figure out how to do all my nice wire braided hose, AN fittings and regulator. The inlet of the carb is in a different location and had a different thread. Well I had to move the regulator to the passenger side fender well. I bought a union and an Elbow fitting to mount to the carb. Well that didn't work at it was up against the radiator neck. So I took the fuel filter hosing off the carb and bought another fitting. I got all of this mounted cycled the fuel pump only to find it leaking at the new fitting on the carb. I take it off to find the cause is casting marks on the carb not allowing a good seal. The car was already on the car so I simply found a big file and went to work. The casting marks were kinda deep so I was at it for awhile. But it all worked out well. Then it was time to see if all my work was worth it. I turn the key and this is what I got.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocZ8_tTMbr0
Can you tell how happy i was?
Haha baby was now alive. Now that she was running I finished putting her back together. I would take her to the muffler shop the next day for the duals. Now I needed to cap the place where the crossover pipe went. Now I could have had them do it. But I trusted my wife more so I had her make this.







We had it towed to the shop as I couldn't drive it that loud. He wasn't that thrilled though. We told them to bring a rollback but he said it would have been just as hard. He towed it from the rear. He had to as the bumper nad spare tire well would drag. The spare tire well will be eliminated over the winter. I will still carry a spare in the same spot. I will just raise it up and make a new cover to go over the tire. I drove it home with difficulty. It was out of tune and the battery was bad. A new battery solved many ills. As did a proper tuning. Here is how she now sounds.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2fmZ68ADVI
You can hear in the backround a slight squeel of the belts. They were much worse at startup. Turns out I needed to put the A/C belt on to balance things out. Here are pcs of the exhaust system.















The mufflers are bigger than I would have wanted but to be truthful they turn out to be perfect. It is not loud inside. But just right at the back. Now all I have to do is fix my intake vacuum leak and she should run much better.

These are the new valve covers I just bought. I like them must better than the chrome or finned aluminum ones I have seen. They are more distinct and rare. they are also 4 inches tall.

Cool Indeed! You sound like you got a keeper for a wife there buddy! She likes cars, can rebuild a carb AND she can weld... WOW!


She have a sister?

Great pictures, thanks for sharing. I those Olds valve covers too!

Great writeup!!

I second the notion of the sister


Robert

Here is a mild update. I just received my new wheels. They are Boss 18X9's. I will probably be going with 275/40-18's on them. There will be many more updates in the next 2 weeks or so. This car will be very diferent by spring.

Well I finally got some steering wheels for us and installed them today. I took off the old goofy looking plastic one and put on a leather one from a Fiero. It has the nice contoured grips and is so comfy. Yes I know It hasd the Fiero horn cap. I will be trying to fix that in the future. It's also a little dirty. I will need to take some cleaner to it.



Now if I am going to run a floor shifter I have to replace the bench seat with a set of bucket seats. And I had a few options. I could have found some comfy buckets so it would be similar to what the bench feels like. Or I have a bunch of Fiero seats I could have had recovered. But since this car handles great as is and will only get better to the point I may want to do some track days with it I felt that something closer to a competition seat should be in order. So I found these off of Ebay and it so happens they were fairly local so it saved me some cash. I really like the look. Wait till you see what I do with them.

Well parts have been arriving pretty often lately. I now have a TransGo 200-4R HD2 shift kit for my 200-4R transmission. It will give me either full manual control up or down thru the gears for 1st,2nd, and 3rd gears. Or I can stick in in OD and let it do all the work.

Today I recieved my new shifter. It is made by Brian Kilduff and is one sweet piece. His shifters are made to order so you can't go wrong here.

I am loving your build up, I have a sweet spot for box wagons. That ratchet shifter is SICK!

Wow! I first thought "Who is this Stickman and why have I not heard of him before????" But now I know! Cool Olds. Cooler wife. Nice 304's.

Diggin' this threads.

I want your old WV's if you still hav them.

toomanytoyz wrote:

Wow! I first thought "Who is this Stickman and why have I not heard of him before????" But now I know! Cool Olds. Cooler wife. Nice 304's.

Diggin' this threads.

I want your old WV's if you still hav them.

Ah the Wheel Vintiques will be my winter wheels and tires. Sorry. If you want a set of cheap wheels that look good try the Cragar Soft8's they look great and can even be had in 17X9's

Well more parts have been recieved for my build(s). I found two distributors off of Craigslist. The first one was a Mallory Uni-Lite vacuum advance distributor. It is used but looks ok. I paid $100 and the guy threw in the MSD wires and Blaster 2 coil.

The second distributor was a brand new in the box MSD Pro Billet unit. This I got for $175 which I thought was a steal. So much so I didn't even try to haggle.

Now why 2 distributors? Well the MSD distributor must be used with an MSD box. Now I have a used 7AL-2 unit. BUT it happens to be a 4 cylinder only part. So I am trying to find out what I need to do to send it back along with this coil to have rebuild at a fraction of the cost of new.

Note the coil has an aluminum heat sink around it. This will not only look cool but I have yet to see one on another car. So I can't use the MSD distributor until I have a box and coil to use with it. So I can use the Mallory until all that get's figured out. I hope to have the Mallory in this weekend depending on the weather. It should improve my spark and timing. The Mallory has to be a vast improvement over the tired old HEI unit. And once I have all the parts I need to use the MSD distributor the Mallory can go in the wife's car providing we find an Olds engine for her's soon.

Ok bucket seats day 2. My car is becoming more and more like my vision of a high performance touring car like i want. We worked on getting the drivers seat perfect and making brackets for the passenger seat. It took most of the day(well started at 1pm) but now I have both front seats mounted, and I can work on the backs. Here are the newest piccs of both installed. BTW there should be alot of updates this week as I plan on lowering the front end and will be getting my wheel spacers and poly bushings for the front end.

She is turning out to be a beast man. Lovin the inspiration you are givin me. Once I get $400 together, Im buyin a 86 Caprice Wagon and hope to do a few things to it as well, like yank out that 307 Olds and drop in a real motor. I plan to keep the 92 Roadie Wagon mostly stock for the family and the 86 for work and fun.

Very cool wagon man....love it all! So when do we get to see some video of this beast in action!!

Chris

Well I have been slacking off with the updates so I will try to get up to date in the next few days as I will have more after that with a new radiator and intake, as well as a rebuilt trans with shift kit after it's rebuilt.



So here's what you have missed. I rebuilt the front suspension with Energy Suspension bushings and I took the Eibach springs out of the front and put the F41 RPO code springs back in. First I took a half coil off and it brought it down to the level of the Eibachs and I wanted more of a drop. SO I hacked off a whole nother coil. That might have been more extreme then I had originally wanted. But the looks and ride are perfect. So I got way lucky. Here's some picks.















Here's how I want the rear to be with some help from a friend.



Here are some coilover brackets that my wife made. Problem is I have 2 pair of Coilovers that are too long so we have to figure a way to find the extra space for them.

Very cool....I am loving this wagon more and more! The stance/wheels/paint are so nice

Chris

Well I promised more updates and here they are. Here are some body mods I did with the bumpers. First the front bumpers are tucked in. The one bumper shock was partially collapsed so I collapsed it all the way. Now to collapse the other one I had to drill a hole in it. Then I stripped the bumper down and painted it black.











Then onto the rear bumper. I stripped it down and painted it black like the front. I took it off the mounts and put it against the body and it looks great. But I have to figure out the mounts to get it right but here is how I want it to like

Here is the rear suspension mods I have done. These are my Metco Billet Aluminum LCA's. I really like these arms. They are very nice quality pieces.



They allowed me to mount a sedan swaybar on may wagon until I can get a set of much bigger wagon bars.

Here are the arms mounted without the swaybar mounted.



Here it is with the swaybar mounted.





ANd here is a pic showing the twist in it.

Ok I bought a new Edebrock High rise Performer intake part #7111. I bought it cause the old Performer is warped to hell and I need to fix the leak problem. ALthough I think it might be a problem with the head because the cast iron intake leaked at the EGR crossover too. But then again I didn't read the turkey try gasket directions either time i did it until after the last one that said to use gasket sealer around the ports. Never had to do this on any other car. So hopefully this will seal right and I can get all the performance outa my engine that I should. Here are so some pics comapring the 2 Performer intakes.





You can clearly see the new intake is about 2 inches taller than the old one.
Here is it mounted and with the carb on it.





Now it did represent a big problem. The base plate for the batwing aircleaner is flat so it sits up off the carb. Thankfully I had an old HUGE aircleaner that had a drop down base that is the same size. So I swapped one for the other(will need some trimming) and low and behold I can close my hood.

Coming together nicely! Are we going to get to see this ride in person at WagonFest?

I love that batwing aircleaner!!

DBeaSSt wrote:

Coming together nicely! Are we going to get to see this ride in person at WagonFest?

Yup providing no more problems creap up like the trans seal blowing out and I don't get a migraine attack. but both our wagons should be there. I am so missing driving my wagon right now. Hope to have the trans back in by next weekend.

Well I got my transmission back from the rebuilder after the front seal went. I figured I might as well get the shiftkit put in and have the whole trans rebuilt. I also figured while the trans was out to replace the LT-1 radiator with an all aluminum one and to replace the Edelbrock Intake that was warped with another better one. The Intake was easy and I covered that in a previous post. The radiator was a bit more involved. I could not use the LT-1 radiators fans and since I had to shell out big dough for the trans rebuild I couldn't get new fans which can cost a good penny. So I bought 2 junkyard fans and made my own mounts. I think it came out very well.

Very short update. I got the trans cooler on. I will actually be running two The cylinder heatsink one plus this Perma Cool one with the fan on it. I think this one wll not only help keep the trans temp down. Not sure it was high to begin with but now that the trans is built up I don't want to take any chances. But it should also help with keeping the engine temps down due to the extra fan. I also got some work done to the fan shroud for on top of the radiator. But it's not quite finished.

Lookin good! I was able to go check on that tailgate for you yesterday. All 3 of them are metal...

93wgn wrote:

Lookin good! I was able to go check on that tailgate for you yesterday. All 3 of them are metal...

Damn, but thanx anyways.

Ok here is the top shroud I made for the new radiator. It needs to be polished but it looks pretty good I think. I may need to move the fans a bit closer to the rad but I'm not sure at this point.

Looks good man! WIll you need to made a bracket or something to cradel the upper rad hose? Or will it be fine (or you can put a spring inside it too I guess)

You do good work!

FINALLY!!!!! I have all 4 seats in and mounted. Finally. And I have to say it makes the interior look great. I still need to put new carpet in and fix the headliner as well as other things but the seats and the way they are in the car really look cool. It has a theater style arrangement.

Ok time for a tiny update as I haven't done much. But I did a very simple cheap mod that I thought I should pass on. I thought the rear sat a touch higher than I liked and someone from another forum let me in on a secret. Seems G-Body rear springs work in a B-Body and lower it quite nicely. It gave me anoth inch drop over my Eibachs. Not only that but it slightly softened up the ride on the front suspension. I thought they would be too weak to hold the rear up and not bounce. But it worked quite nicely. Still have to see how it corners but the ride seems great.

Hey Stickman
how are you doing.

Keep it coming man. I love your car and wish I'd never sold my box wagon.

love the stance! not a fan of cut springs but damn, that just looks sick! might have to look into something for my caprice.