PROJECT - Restoration of 1972 Opel GT Download

[opelspyder]

I recently aquired an Opel GT to restore at my shop. It belongs to one of this sites members Matthew Newman. We are going to be doing a rotisserie restoration on this car, and build him a quality driver that he can go anywhere in, but still stand tall up against other Opels if he chooses to show it. Our goal isn't to make it 100% original, and some things to the restoration may not be liked by some viewers, like parts we kept, and parts we replaced. Colors we went with, and colors we didn't choose. I will download updates on this site every week of progress. This may give people ideas on how to tackle a restoration, or it may persuade others to not even attempt to restore one. Please keep in mind the following isn't for suggestions, but for everyones viewing plesure. The owner has made his decisions and we must accept that. Thats why we are here, to give the customer what he wants, not what everyone else (including myself wants). Our shop is Mid-Southern Restorations out of Cookeville, TN. You can visit our website at Mid-Southern Restoration . Here are the first pictures begining when I picked up the car. Later this week I will begin disassembly. I will also let everyone know where I purchased parts, and found deals for items. Where the chroming took place and how the job turned out.
Keith

[opelspyder]

Well Matt,
I guess its just a sign that the car is needing help. Tried to start the car and something is not making contact and will not crank over. I'm not going to fix it, due to I will be disassembling the car shortly (so please don't give me ideas of where to look, I can figure it out, but not worth spending the time to fix, when I am going to be removing it anyways). I will take some pics of the projects we got going on in the shop and you all will see how covered up we are. I thought about the video and all, but what you do not relize is that I will be working on other cars as well, sometimes the Opel will not get touched for 4 days. So it is hard to do that kind of thing, unless you have someone that doesn't want to make any money, and come in day in and day out to film. Thats why video is out of the question
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here are some pics of the Opel awaiting its turn in the shop. Notice in the background the rotissorie we will be using-more on that later
Keith

[opelspyder]

Well no project forum has been built, so I will go ahead tonight and put on the last two weeks progress. Disassembly has begun-found rust in some different areas. Headlight buckets got it hard, mainly driver's side, drivers inner rocker has some, and rear tail pan down low. Interior is pretty good shape, working on getting parts I need.

I will be posting several posts to this thread, so wait before posting
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here we have it on the lift for all the heavy dissassembly. Engine will come out as well as rear end and suspension. Found several things here during inspection. Exhaust was shot, no real fluid to the rear brakes. Trailering arms rusted completely on-had to be cut off, saved the rear pan-hard rod though. Fortunetly I have these used in good shape. The wiring harness was really butchered up, and for the most part the steering column has never been removed!!!! Here are pictures of that

[opelspyder]

The next thing we did was hook up the rotissorie. I have had a GT on this prior, and already built the brackets. If not this would have taken days to configure. This is the best setup I could figure that would not only support the body, but allow to work around. The front bracket will be modified to be partly removable to work on the belly pan. This tool is really utilized just for underneathe detail work and metal replacement, We will paint underneath this while hooked up, but the main body being painted will be without. The company I purchased this rotisserie is Whirly-Jig out of Paris, TN. I feel this is the best engineered product on the market and has lots of extras built into it. The have a great product.
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here are a couple more. It makes taking off the rest of the smaller stuff easy too. I can stand on one side and remove parts and then turn it around and pull parts from the other side.
Keith

[opelspyder]

Well, no point looking and trying to figure out where the rust is-lets send it to the blaster!!! A 20ft trailer came in handy for this. The unit measures 18ft long!!
Keith

[opelspyder]

The exhaust manifold is cracked on the top, the dipstick tube does not go all the way in, the thermostat housing should be a 3 bolt style. The brakes were rebuilt and it is hard to tell they have been touched-the fluid low as well. Two right hand calipers, rear end is in desparate need of seals and bushings, the front suspension is pretty ugly. And there are a few other small things of concern. Picture of the exhaust.
Keith

[opelspyder]

After sandblasting a laboring over several parts to get them cleaned, we have made progress. We desided during this project to cut cost as much as possible, but retain a maintenance free car. We are powdercoating anything that will be underneath and in the engine bay that can be coated and not be destroyed by the heat of the oven temps, so no vacuum booster and stuff like that. I started with some brake components. The caliper I tried intact, I have now desided to separate the halves of two other calipers and retain their seals and recoat them. I just could not be sure if I melted a seal when doing this one, so why chance it, I will do it right. The master cylinder hwas completely disassembled and an NOS kit used with new check vave, I wire buffed the banjo fittings and cleared those. I will be using a lot of this "almost Chrome powder coat" on a lot of these parts from Eastwood. I have now switched to a different product from Columbia Coatings here in TN, that offers even better products. I used there super mirror black on the black parts later
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here are several parts that I could easily sandblast and coat for later assembly. I try to do these cars as parts and not one big project, it makes it easier and alot less headache.
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here are a couple more pics
Keith

[opelspyder]

Well after another master cylinder rebuild and booster painted here is the finished product. Also NOS Master Cylinder cap
Keith

[opelspyder]

Matt's engine was rebuilt about 10k ago and we decided to retain this how it was, but do a good cleanup on the block and regasket everything. The dipstick tube in the block was installed incorrectly and that is why the dipstick tube did not go all the way in. I had the head remachined witha 3 angle valve job. No porting or anything like that was performed as this was not desired, we just want a stocker. The head was resurfaced the bare minimum, and all new seals installed. The head never was machined. The pistons and cylinder walls looked to be in really good shape, nice crosshatches in cyl walls and flat tops were used for the pistons. The people that put the new waterpump on burred the front crankshaft and It literally took a puller to get the pulley off that usually slides off. I filed that smooth as well. I tend to use Hylomar here as oil tends to seep between the crank and the pulley through the keyway. I then reassembled the engine after some cleaning and checking of parts. Oil pump looked really good-for once!!!
Keith

[opelspyder]

I am currently waiting for a puller to remove the front spring of the suspension of the front. I will show off my welding table / Opel work station- I ordered quite a bit of parts from my good friends at Opel GT Source. Always the best service and parts. I ordered about everything I need from bushings to interior and exterior seals and such. Quite a large order. Most I have ever helped someone spend on an Opel. I have begun cleaning the rear end and getting ready for powdercoating of the backing plates and such. I will be painting the rear though, I do not intend to totally strip down the rear end mechanicals due to anyones lack of knowledge in our area of properly setting them up. I will be replacing the bearings which I got a great deal from Lyndon (Ciara1970) on---thank you again! I will be looking into new hardware for rear brakes and making new brake lines. I will post on this at a later point. Thanks for being patient to let me post all this update
Keith

[opelspyder]

Got a chance to sneak the engine to the paint booth and have painted. Looks sweet. A little different color choice, but we went with 2004 Arrival Blue for Chevy Truck. Here are some pics
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here are a few pictures of some parts going on the engine. Valve cover is just in place to give the effect. NOS oil sender was used and that is why it is the high temp orange rubber. I began taking off the front suspension parts today, and tomorrow will update with dissassembly of the front spring and such. Here are the engine pictures, had to reload them do to quality-there is also some weird reflections due to the pearl in the blue and the almost chrome brackets
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here are some pictures of the work table I built to work with and can convert over to Opel Tools - this is J Tool J-KLTBL -ha

The table was built for welding. 1/2 plate steel for top, 8 inch channel for under support of table, and 3 inch pipe machined square to set level. A little overkill, but it works great. I've made it where I can pull out attachments for other things like a bead roller and this Opel Front Suspension tool. More pictures on disassembly later
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here is the continued progress of the front spring removal
Hope everyone understands what I am doing now at this point. I used the universal pitman arm puller from astro pneumatic as Soybean suggested to me over a year ago. Thanks Soybean!
Keith

[opelspyder]

I did this a couple days ago but forgot to post it. Here is the tranny parts after coating. I found when I removed the pan that the spring detent for revese was gone, and the selector shaft was scratched up. I have about 10 of these trannys so I robbed the parts for it. I kind of forgot that in order to change out the seals (especially the rear housing gasket) I had to completely dissassemble the unit. Ahhh. Anyways I guess I am glad I bought that J Tool for removing the reverse idler. I've rebuilt one of these trans before, but this one really went together well. I installed the selector shaft with the modification for the end to be removed for future seal replacement as noted in the flyer GT Source always sends out. I will get assembled pics when I get the seals back. I had the rear gasket so I went ahead and assembled for now until I get the rest.
Keith

[opelspyder]

Oh here are the differences in the oil sending units. This orange one is the high temp replacement (NOS) These are available through GT source. I had a couple stashed away.
Keith

[opelspyder]

Here is the requested picture of the front spring removed. Yes there is a lot of recoil there, so be sure you are being safe when removing
Keith

[opelspyder]

Well it took me a while to get all this stuff done, but it looks sweet. I have to do bolts individually due to taping up. It does make the heads thicker, but I manage to still install them without problems. The super mirror black it excellent stuff for chassis parts.

[opelspyder]

Well, after more sandblasting and coating, the drivetrain parts are narrowing towards the end. Then after parts arrive, things will really come together even before I get the car back from the blasters. They said about another week due to cold weather, which suits me due to how much space it requires. I removed the rear wheel bearings, and cleaned up the retaining plates. New bearings will be used, and I took apart the distributor. It is really hard to keep on track with one thing right now because it all has to be cleaned and coated/protected, dissassembled and what not. So I am jumping around quite a bit, but moving forward towards the ultimate goal. I redid the calipers and they came out good, I did separate the halves, and felt the seals that were there were in actually excellent shape. The cylinders were honed slightly and new seals and boots installed. The rear wheel cylinders were done as well. Added a few more pieces to the engine such as waterpump and misc bolts. Dissassembly of the steering rack was a challenge, broke a new allen head in the u-joint of the steering, will need to locate a better used one, which I have. I have noticed I've had to take the torch to more items on this car to work them loose that anything ever. Hopefully it won't have to be that way the next go around, due to the coatings. I also plan on using lots of assembly lube and antisieze to prevent these problems later on as well.
Keith

[opelspyder]

In above post I decided to coat the non mating surfaces of the calipers. I had the new rotors machined (they were supposedly new, but hard to tell) I will clean up the edges with a roloc disc. I hate when these rotors rust all up. I hit a light dusting on the mounting surface though, I didn't want to effect any wheel mounting surface were it might cause wheel shimmy.
Keith