So I'm walking through the pits with a buddy one day. It was a big show weekend and the new Pro Stocks were there all lined up. I heard something coming behind us and I turned around and it was a blue Vega wagon. It was Jungle Jim Liberman in his Pro Stock Vega wagon. When he drove by I looked at the back and all I could see was tire. It looked amazing. I looked at my buddy and he said Forget it man. That car would cost a fortune to build. 6 weeks later I called him up and said I have to pick up some parts. Do you wanna come? 1 hour later we are pulling into the back lot of Belmont Chev Olds. Davey wanted to wait in the car but I told him I needed a hand. We checking were out all the new cars. There was a midnight green Vega Panel Wagon sitting all by itself at the end of the aisle with nothing else close to it. It was late November and we had our first snow fall. The color was very dark and it had tinted glass. The snow had covered the drivers side window and we were standing on the passenger side. It looked like the car had dark tinted glass. You could barely see inside the car. Kind of dark and mysterious. Davey came up and said what are you looking at? I nodded towards the Vega. He looked and stopped instantly. Are you f**king kidding me!!! Are you going to buy it? I said I already did. We checked the car out. It was a 73 Vega Panel Wagon. Dark Midnight Green with black interior and tinted glass. It had one cheap beige seat in it and not many options. Tinted glass, HD battery, front disc brakes and HD cooling. No carpet.
It was listed as a truck with a truck ownership. Most buyers would be using them as a parts delivery truck. It came with a 3 spd manual trans and a 4 cylinder aluminum block motor. It was $2352 out the door! After driving it a few months on the street it was time to get started.
I called around looking for a chassis shop. Don't forget. This was 1972. There were not a lot of performance chassis shops around. After searching for a couple of weeks and getting ready to take it over the border I called Beatty & Woods. At first they didn't know anyone in Toronto that did that kind of work. Someone called me back the next day and gave me a number of a guy who worked on Hot Rods. His name was Dave Jackson and he was a good fabricator but he had never done a full back half or any job this big. It took a lot of talking and finally he decided to give it a try. He started on the car a couple of weeks later. On my third visit to his shop I met Wally Clark. He was a well know racer. He was a great guy and knew his shit. I figured if Wally was getting work done on his Vega here then I was in the right place.
I picked up a Dana 60 rear from the Courtesy Chev drag car that had crashed at Georgetown. We checked the rear end for straightness and one axle was bent. Luckily the rear came with a second set of Quarter Master axles so all was good. Dana axles are like baseball bats compared to a 12 bolt. The rear came with a 5:87 gear. Perfect for the street. lol. When I got the car all together I realized I could get a fairly wide tire in but the stock rear quarters could not take more then a 26" tall tire. Perfect. lol. I wanted to get the car all sorted out before I had the quarters opened up and the car painted. I remember sitting in Harvey 's behind the building and driving to the road. I could easily get the car into high gear before reaching the road. Talk about an eighth mile car. It didn't have much top end but not many could take me at a light.Emoji
Dave cut the floor from the back of the front seat to the rear bumper. The Dana fell right in as it was made for a Vega. Except for front end limiters the front end was all stock. I even kept the 4 bolt spindles and original coil springs.
I used the Hooker Swap Kit as there wasn't many available and it was well designed and came with 3 piece headers, motor mount plate and a trans crossmember.
At this point the car had a ladder bar suspension, mini tubs, 6 point cage, SBC, Muncie 4SPD and a Dana 60 with original paint. All tin work was steel. Even the stock hood and bumpers. I had picked up 2 bucket seats from a 1970 Celica, 3 gauges and a tach. This combo was Stage 1.
When I first started on the car I found my 1st shop at Sheppard & Meadowvale. That area was a well known street race spot and only about a couple of miles from Altona RD which was one of Toronto's most famous street race areas.
The shop was a stand alone building that was all brick with a cement floor, house size furnace, a huge loft and washroom. I still remember the first time I checked it out. It was a cold winter day and I expected to find a shop with a lot of junk stored. It was wide open and clean! Even the washroom. I stood in the middle of the main floor and it was warm enough for a T shirt! It was big enough for 4 cars. No drafts, leaks or cracks. I brought my stereo from home and I still remember the first song I played. lol. And no I wasn't dancing. Well. Maybe just a little .
Play That Funky Music
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It was an amazing shop compared to my dad's wooden garage with no insulation. I remember putting a set of 90/10 shocks in the Chevelle. It was winter time and below zero. I'm under the car and I pick up a nut and it actually stuck to my fingers! That's how cold it once.
So come Sat. morning and starting bright and early and the first job is remove the hood. The hinge assembly is welded on. Not bolted. Basically the hinge is welded on both ends. There is a solid pin that slips through both hinges with a C clip holding it together. I remove the C clips and the hood will still not come off. I look at it for 20 minutes and I just don't get it. I want the motor out on the floor today. I make some calls and no won has a clue. All my buddies are working on Chevelles and Camaros. I sure hate to start cutting things on a new car, but there is no other way. So we cut the hinges with a hack saw. Ouch!1 month later we weld the hinges back together. A year later I'm talking to a buddy at at GM dealer and he is working on a Vega. He's pulling the hood and asks me to hold it. So he goes to his tool box and I'm waiting to see him bring out some Hi Tech tool to do the job. He walks over with a large flat screw driver. Oh come on!!! He takes the screw driver and prys the one hinge apart. He then looks at me and says. What are you waiting for? An invitation? I snap out of my trance and look at the hing that is still hooked up. I move the hood side ways and the pin slips right out. DOH! I just couldn't believe that GM would design a hinge that you pry apart with a screw driver. Geez.
I got the 327 from the Chevelle on an engine stand and fixed a few leaks and painted it Chevy orange. It dropped in fairly easy with only a few mods. The headers were the most work but still went in fairly easy. This swap kit required you to cut a hole in the front wheel well for one of the header pipes to go through for more clearance. The inner stock wheel wells in a Vega are reinforced steel to help the unibody. I decided to keep the front end stock. The only mods I did were front end limiters and tow bar mounts. I also was running the original 4 bolt front spindles.
You don't see many people flat towing race cars any more but back then that was quite common. One problem that I ran into with the stock front end was the front crossmember was bolted in!!! So every time the car pulled the wheels and came down(which was a lot)it would try and spread the front wheels. I was getting a front end alignment every couple of weeks. When the front end was out of alignment the car would not straighten out coming out of a right hand turn while flat towing. The front tires would then scrub across the pavement and I would have to stop the tow vehicle, jump out, straighten the front wheels through the side window and then run back and get in the tow vehicle before somebody behind me would start honking his horn. Ya sure. It kept me in good shape but it was embarrassing. The only good thing about the whole deal was that when it started doing that I knew it was time to get the bear claw out and adjust the front end . For the first year before I got it fixed I would actually take a longer route to the track that had less right hand turns. LOL
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