Restarting My '70 Nova Project

[hcallaway]

I have never shared this. My buddy said that one day he will give me this car. He told me to print the text so if anything happens I can show it to his family. 1969 Nova SS 396 375 HP Numbers Matching 4 Speed Red with Red interior. One of many in his collection.
I believe that he knows this is my son's favorite car.

 

[BravoXray]

That's a great looking car. The L78s are wicked fast if tuned properly.

 

[BravoXray]

Taking applications for a test driver?

Got lots of applications already.

 

[arrow]

I have never shared this. My buddy said that one day he will give me this car. He told me to print the text so if anything happens I can show it to his family. 1969 Nova SS 396 375 HP Numbers Matching 4 Speed Red with Red interior. One of many in his collection.
I believe that he knows this is my son's favorite car.
View attachment 747195View attachment 747196View attachment 747200View attachment 747201

The L78 is "thee" engine in the Nova and Camaro's in my mind. (these were really 402 cu in)
Most problem w these was w traction. At the time, the Cobra Jet Mustang was vaunted as the fastest production street car. I had one and ran 13.28 with just a set of 7" slicks. Tuned and some headers and traction bars, the car was a 12.8 machine. A cam change and you were low 12's. A terror on the street in those days.
The L78 was the same but didn't get the notoriety as the Cobra jet.
None the less, it was surely capable of sub 13 second quarter mile times with just a little bit of attention right out of the show room..
I wish it have had more attention it deserved in the car magazines back then

 

[arrow]

I have never shared this. My buddy said that one day he will give me this car. He told me to print the text so if anything happens I can show it to his family. 1969 Nova SS 396 375 HP Numbers Matching 4 Speed Red with Red interior. One of many in his collection.
I believe that he knows this is my son's favorite car.
View attachment 747195View attachment 747196View attachment 747200View attachment 747201

It is a beauty. I love the fact of no vinyl roof which completely took away the aesthetic of the car as a mean ombrey imo.
Vinyl roof always broke up and disturbed the nice lines of the car for me

 

[scaredychicken]

That's a spill guard I made a while back. I had the local steel fab shop cut me the top and sidepieces, I had the 1 1/2" square tube on the top. I put in little doors to run chains through to the hooks bolted to the bucket. Welded it all up, added a piece of expanded metal in the center and had it blasted and powder coated Kubota Orange.

great work, thanks for the details. had me scratching my head earlier. It looks like that could be useful.

 

[MossRoad]

Nova's did not get the respect they deserved. Quicker, faster, lighter. Better power to weight ratio. If you could get them to hook up, look out.

Favorite car is still the Yenko 427 Nova; a car that should never have been built, according to Yenko himself. He said it was a car “we probably should not have done. Almost lethal.”


Another of my favorite quotes from some article I read...

"If you have to ask why anyone would shove a 427 into a Nova, we can't be friends."

He only built 37 of them, and only about 10 are known to still exist.

If I ever had the chance, funds, etc... to do a tribute car, I'd do that.

 

[BravoXray]

The L78 is "thee" engine in the Nova and Camaro's in my mind. (these were really 402 cu in)
Most problem w these was w traction. At the time, the Cobra Jet Mustang was vaunted as the fastest production street car. I had one and ran 13.28 with just a set of 7" slicks. Tuned and some headers and traction bars, the car was a 12.8 machine. A cam change and you were low 12's. A terror on the street in those days.
The L78 was the same but didn't get the notoriety as the Cobra jet.
None the less, it was surely capable of sub 13 second quarter mile times with just a little bit of attention right out of the show room..
I wish it have had more attention it deserved in the car magazines back then

While I had the L78, a friend, who worked for a local speed shop, and I spent a few days doing a little massaging on the engine, port matching the heads, manifold and headers, 3 angle valve job, new crane valve springs, retainers and aluminum rocker arms, recurved the advance in the distributor, put Blue Streak points and condenser, solid core plug wires, Accel coil and distributor cap and rotor, Hooker headers and 2.5" exhaust with mufflers off a turbocharged IH Scout. A little later I built and added the traction bars, new shocks front and rear and put L60-14 MT rear tires and 4.56 gears in the rear end.
One Saturday we took it to the local drag strip at Osceola for a test and tune session. We opened the headers, lightened it up, took out the spare and jack and rear seats, which got it under 3400# if I remember correctly. I made 3 passes the best of which was 12.52 at 106 mph, turning ~5800rpm through the lights. Not bad for a daily driver.

Interesting thing about the L78 engine, was that in Novas, Camaros and Chevelles it was rated at 375hp, but in a Corvette was rated at 425hp. Same identical engine.

 

[BravoXray]

Nova's did not get the respect they deserved. Quicker, faster, lighter. Better power to weight ratio. If you could get them to hook up, look out.

Favorite car is still the Yenko 427 Nova; a car that should never have been built, according to Yenko himself. He said it was a car “we probably should not have done. Almost lethal.”


Another of my favorite quotes from some article I read...

"If you have to ask why anyone would shove a 427 into a Nova, we can't be friends."

He only built 37 of them, and only about 10 are known to still exist.

If I ever had the chance, funds, etc... to do a tribute car, I'd do that.

I've seen a couple 3rd gen Novas with the 572 big block in them. Can't imagine how fast those are.

As for getting them to hook, it just took the correct combination of tires, springs, shocks and traction bars. Grumpy Jenkins had gotten them pretty well dialed in when he raced them. TCI, I think, makes a independent rear suspension unit for Novas that bolts in with minor drilling and welding, but it's around $8000.

 

[MossRoad]

While I had the L78, a friend, who worked for a local speed shop, and I spent a few days doing a little massaging on the engine, port matching the heads, manifold and headers, 3 angle valve job, new crane valve springs, retainers and aluminum rocker arms, recurved the advance in the distributor, put Blue Streak points and condenser, solid core plug wires, Accel coil and distributor cap and rotor, Hooker headers and 2.5" exhaust with mufflers off a turbocharged IH Scout. A little later I built and added the traction bars, new shocks front and rear and put L60-14 MT rear tires and 4.56 gears in the rear end.
One Saturday we took it to the local drag strip at Osceola for a test and tune session. We opened the headers, lightened it up, took out the spare and jack and rear seats, which got it under 3400# if I remember correctly. I made 3 passes the best of which was 12.52 at 106 mph, turning ~5800rpm through the lights. Not bad for a daily driver.

Interesting thing about the L78 engine, was that in Novas, Camaros and Chevelles it was rated at 375hp, but in a Corvette was rated at 425hp. Same identical engine.

I stopped going to Osceola with my RD400 when we had kids. That was around 1992. Too bad they couldn't get that deal going with those folks that wanted to make a road race track there. Some farmer bought it for investment property. It'll never be a drag strip again.

Where's the closest now? Bunker Hill?

I had the little RD down to 11:92 pretty consistently. I frequently won $12 in prize money after doing $3-400 in damage in an afternoon.