1977 Trans Am Restoration, page 2.
After selling the T/A in 1996, only because I was relatively poor and couldn't afford the upkeep on it any longer, I thought I had seen the last of it and it would be gone forever. It is a sad, depressing feeling when you get rid of a car like this - especially when you really didn't want to in the first place.
I loved that car more than any other I had ever had. I thought it was the most beautiful piece of machinery in the world, and it also had a lot of sentimental value...
See, I met my wife and we went on our first date in this car. In fact, these days she tells me that she would never have gone out with me if it hadn't been for that car. (I was a really clean cut police officer at the time - not really "her type")
At any rate, many years went by until one day in early 2001 I was watching "Gone in 60 Seconds" with my son who was 10 years old at the time. After we watched it, my son had been impressed with the Shelby GT500. Impressed is an understatement I think. He was a little obsessed. Not only with the Shelby, but with American muscle cars in general, and he began asking about the '77 Trans Am that I used to have. His obsession helped re-spark my love for the old muscle cars, and I decided to go out and find another Trans Am...
4 or 5 months went by, and I was constantly looking at the papers, on the Internet, and on the street for another '77 or '78 Trans Am to buy - but no luck. I found a few but they were all pretty well trashed. All were too far gone to really restore, at least for my budget which was $2000. I was pretty frustrated. But they say everything happens for a reason...
One day in the June of 2001, I was out taking a computer back to a guy who I had done some repairs for. I was driving down a residential street in a part of town where I rarely go, and drove past a house with a gray primered 1977 Tran Am parked in the driveway.
I was immediately taken with this car because it looked strikingly similar to my old T/A that I had sold 6 years ago. The first bells when off in my head when I realized that this car had the same deep dish chrome nugget wheels that my T/A had. Another bell went off when I saw that this T/A had NO spoilers missing (it's rare to find old T/A's that have all the spoilers intact). It even had the front air dam!
OK at this point I just had to stop, get out and go have a closer look. There would only be one way to tell for sure if this was my old baby - if it was still on the car. So, I walked around to the back of the car, and there it was!!!
WHAT A BEAUTIFUL SIGHT!
I have to admit, I nearly broke out in tears at this point.
I had found, by pure luck, my old Trans Am. I was in disbelief. Not only at the fact that I had found it, but also by the horrible condition that it was in. It had a spare tire on an old rusty rim on the front passenger side, the passenger window was broken out, and the interior was a wreck because of it being exposed to the weather.
No matter. I knew I had to have it back. So, I went up to the door of the house and rang the doorbell, but nobody was home. I came back the next day, and the owner was home. It was the same woman who I had sold it to.
It took a bit of begging, but luckily she was getting ready to move to another state and didn't have a way to tow the car all that way, so she agreed to sell it for $2000. Things DO happen for a reason!!!
I was so happy, but at the same time very aggrivated that she had let the car go to hell as she did. The interior was trashed, the paint job was gone, and the motor hadn't run in at least three years she said.
I spent most of the afternoon cleaning the carb, replacing fuel line, and hoping the motor wasn't locked up.
The battery was gone, so I went and bought a new one and cranked it over. It didn't sound too good. But, after some coaxing and spark plug replacement, it actually fired up! It was smoking like hell on the drivers side, but the people who had just sold it to me could not believe that they had let it sit outside for 3 years, and I had it running in 3 hours.
Well, after all that work, it turned out that the transmission was out. No forward gears at all. Crap...
I called a flatbed tow truck and towed it home. I didn't care. I just knew that I had my old T/A back, and that's all that mattered. She was HOME!!!
Here is what it looked like when I got it home in my garage. It still had the hood, but I removed it before this picture was taken.
I didn't waste any time tearing the engine down. I knew it would have to be rebuilt as well as the transmission.
Here is the empty engine bay. It really needs a good cleaning and paint wouldn't hurt either.
The chrome deep dish wheels still on it, and in surprisingly good condition, despite the rest of the car.
Unfortunately during the next 2 years, I couldn't afford to do a whole lot to it, so I just did little things like replace the broken passenger side window, get the missing pieces of the dash and put them back together, and I went ahead and gutted the interior, cleaned it to the metal and put in new black carpet.
My son Tanner vacuuming the new carpet.
The interior after restoring most of the dash and replacing the carpet.
It used to be... and will be again soon!
Still vacuuming... I'm not sure who loves this car more, me or him.
Next, a little about the motor...
Go to page 3