Been having fun driving the Toad around. Took it to a small local show on the Main Street of Somerville a couple Friday nights ago. And the other picture is my son helping me wire the gauges up a little nicer.

I’ve put some miles on the car at this point. I love how it looks with the 14x8 rear tires and H50-14’s. But man if I don’t worry a bit driving around on them lol.

The little guy seems to like the AMC!!!

Awesome project!!!

Ryan W31

Looks like the front end needs a camber adjustment.

Yes. Even in the picture from the80’s it looks way out of wack. I need to adjust it at some point.

Small update on the Hornet.
I’ve driven the car a bunch. It let me down one time when the factory tach shit the bed and I had to bypass it on the side of the road. I’ve since bypassed it correctly but otherwise the car is awesome. I’ve put probably 3-400 miles on these ancient Mickey Thompson H50-14’s and they still look perfect. One has a small slow leak but we don’t worry about that little guy.

Otherwise I look like Joe Dirt driving the thing around and it’s awesome.

I still need to do a camber adjustment on the front end. I’ll get to it at some point.

Edited to add: Can’t wait for MCACN and being able to show this car. It’s an oddball and I hope people appreciate it in the barn finds and hidden gems section. Which I believe they will. And I’m truly grateful that this car is included in the show this year. I’m also in talks to do a Hemmings photo shoot and article to be released before MCACN.

So MCACN is over. And I had a blast. Thank you to everyone who came up and talked to me about posting this car on the forum and who recognized me from it. I really had a blast and though I never had a chance to properly thank Bob Ashton for both his work and having me in the show, I really appreciate it. As well as all the work by Ryan Brutt to put together the barn finds area every year. It’s not easy and it’s incredible what they all go through putting together 1 weekend a year.
Here’s a few pictures of the car at the show. Originally I had the car sold after the show, but a few days before the buyer backed out and honestly I’m having a ton of fun driving the little car.
I need to fix a few things. The gauges that were redone by Williamsons instruments are the biggest pieces of shit I’ve ever used and other than looking cool do nothing to actually tell me what’s going on with the car. I’m incredibly disappointed with them as they were very expensive to have redone and all 3 sun gauges have issues.
I need traction bar snubbers, and somehow I need to try and find a nice used or NOS set of H50-14 tires I can sort of trust. Because I like them on the car. And I like a little danger in my life.
Thank you for reading.

Hey it was great to see you and talk to you at the show. I looked for you after that but could never find you. The car is cool! I would drive that like I stole it.:3gears:
I also have a ugly Golden Lime SC360 that I may just do what you did and make it a beater. Mine is one of the 19 cars originally built with the 360 2bbl and 3 speed stick. It will be a 397 stroker and 5 speed when I am done with it.
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...8c47731bd8.jpgIMG_6151 by Rick Jones, on Flickr

Small planned update on the Hornet.
I really like this car and plan to keep it for now and drive it a bunch next summer. The big Kenosha show is next summer and to be different I’m going to install my a few different parts.
I picked up a nice set of headers at MCACN I’m going to install, and I have my UR18 tunnel ram that came with a set of 500 cfm Edelbrock carbs(though I’m a Holley guy)
I’ll also need to put tires on the slot mags that originally came with this car. Should complete the 70’s look with a two lane blacktop style scoop over the carbs.

Had a beautiful 55 degree afternoon to play with the Hornet a bit.

First job was to remove the old R4B and 3 barrel. It took longer to drain some coolant out of it than to pull that intake. Also pulled the valve covers to make life a little easier.

Cleaned everything and installed a NOS intake valley gasket. I have 7 or 8 of these left. AMC says to put sealant around all of the intake ports, but they didn’t from the factory with these gaskets and the book instructions are for reusing the old tray.

Installed and torqued down the UR18 base. Doing this was a little nerve racking because the new valley tray had to crush down and all I could think of was this manifold cracking. But everything lined up and bolted down nice.

Installed the new valve covers and dropped the distributor back in. This is where I ended for the day. I need bolts for a couple of adapters and things. And then I’ll drop the carbs on and see how much more I have to cut the hood for the grump lump.

Not much of an update. And still on the lookout for a plexiglass grump lump. But I did end up buying a 1968 Camaro hood that the guy remembered putting this grump lump on in the 70’s at some point. The hole looks like it was cut with an ax.
But the scoop is in good shape other than 2 small cracks at the very front. It just adds to the character.