Iowa Restoration Shop Recommendation/Help -- Engine, Drivetrain

[67L48]

All of the various reputable restoration shops I have spoken to are only interested in entire-car restoration -- turn a rusty frame into the car of your dreams sort of project.

I don't need that.  I need a reputable shop that can yank my original 350, rebuild it (and the Rochester QuadraJet), paint it, and put it back in.  I need a mini-restoration that is 80% focused on the engine.  Again, the only shops that come highly recommended just aren't into this kind of restoration and they're 3-4 years out on any sort of project.

I'm in the northeast corner of Iowa and can range from Madison, WI on the east, Minneapolis, MN on the north, and all of Iowa to the south and west (Des Moines ... though I could go as far as Omaha).

I'm out of my depth and don't even know how to find a shop that can do this work and do it right.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.

[Kelley W King]

Not from your area but look for a smalltown shop, (probably not on the internet). They may not do engine rebuilding so offer to send it to a machine shop and also send your Qjet to one of the carb guys and offer to pay them for removal and reinstalling the engine. If you want the engine pay painted like a restoration you may have to do that yourself. Finding anyone to do anything is difficult these days. The guy I have been using for years just retired so I need to find someone near me also.

[67L48]

Thanks.  I'm going down that path ... see if there's a local shop I feel comfortable with, cross my fingers, and hope for the best.  There are so many horror stories of shops machining off castings and other markings that destroy the parts' provenance and history.  It makes me nervous.

I may also send off the quadrajet to one of the restoration shops (many have been recommended here through a search).  That will do good to get my boy moving again, but the engine rebuild will eventually be necessary for my car to be fun again.

If anyone else has any Iowa shop recommendations, please feel free to post them here.  Thanks.

[bcmiller]

You can check with Jim up in Rochester, MN he kind of likes the 1967 L48s. I sold him a bare block a few years back. Let me find his information. I will send it to you. His username is jaybee

[David K]

What’s wrong with the engine?

[Stingr69]

Lars Grimsrud can mail order rebuild your Quadrajet so you just have to bolt it on and run it.  He has done a LOT of these for the enthusiast community.  I trust him 100%. 

v8fastcars@msn.com

[67L48]

What’s wrong with the engine?

I don't know that anything is wrong with it, per se.  It's just old.  Really, really old.  It has about 65,000 original miles on it.  Not a ton, but the miles + the years = skepticism from me.

I've owned the car since 1989.  When I drove it in the early 1990s, it had tons of pop.  Over time, it seemed to have lost it's pep.  It sat a lot between 1995 - 2004.  I had the carb worked on in ~2005, but it's never really been the same car I remember.  I drove it sparingly between 2005 - 2017 and it's pretty much sat in my garage for the pas 4-5 years (which has been very hard on the car).  At this point, the carb is really fouled up (stuck float, delaminated choke diaphragm).  There are a number of carb rebuilders/restorers that are recommended here on the forums.  So, I could always send that off to one of those good shops.

But, I'd really like to paint the engine.  So, if (1) the engine is already coming out of the car, (2) it's a really old engine, and (3) I'm not thrilled with the power it seems to be producing, then maybe it's a good idea for a tear-down, clean, and rebuild?  I really want it running like a factory-fresh engine.

I'm in contact with the shop recommended by bcmiller above:  https://besperformance.com/about.html.  I'll be talking with him next week to see what his thoughts are.

It still looks OK ... just don't get too close or you'll find the 25 years of rock chips and such.  So, I'm not in a huge hurry to repaint the car (though it needs it).  I just want to really enjoy driving it again.  Oh, and those tires in the pic were put on the car in 1991.  So, it's probably time to replace those, too.     I think I'll either go with original D70-14 redlines (in Firestone's new bias-looking radials) or maybe the F70-14 for a bit bigger tire.  I think it's wearing 215/70R14 today, which already seem like little bicycle tires to me.

[169INDY]

Looking Good, I can Second the Coker built Radial-Bias ply red lines you WILL enjoy that for sure Looks and performance BOTH.

Jim

[David K]

“I had the carb worked on in ~2005, but it's never really been the same car I remember.”

You just answered your question. Once that’s done, take it to the local self serve car wash and blast the crud off. You can spend time on the sidelines with an unnecessary project or you can drive it and enjoy it.

[MO]

Great looking car!

[adjudimo]

Whoever ends up doing the machine work on your engine, make sure they understand that it is of great importance that the factory numbers and broach marks are left untouched. It will ruin the originality if they do so and you will take a big hit on the cars value. Get it in writing if you can. It's that important.

[David K]

Elvis has left the building.

[67L48]

Whoever ends up doing the machine work on your engine, make sure they understand that it is of great importance that the factory numbers and broach marks are left untouched. It will ruin the originality if they do so and you will take a big hit on the cars value. Get it in writing if you can. It's that important.

That's my biggest fear.  It's currently a factory set up and, as you (and many others) say, it's super easy to destroy the provenance of these cars with careless machining.

[67L48]

OK, so Baier's Engine Service is going to get my business.  The owner has a 1967 Camaro and takes care to keep all markings and numbers correct.  He knows his way around a 350 SB and, specifically, a 350 SB from a 1967 Camaro.  That makes me feel good.  He said he'd likely do a complete rebuild with a very slight overbore, new pistons/rings, new hardened valve seats for unleaded fuel, something about a cam that I didn't understand, and maybe something about the valves themselves that I didn't understand.

What doesn't make me feel good is that he only takes the engine, not the car.  So, I have to figure out a way to get the engine out of the car.  Phase 1 will be to find a shop to yank the engine.  Phase 2 will be how to move my car around when it has no engine. 

I'm excited to get this going, though.

Question:  Other than the numbers and such, are there things that I should be careful to avoid in this rebuild?  Make sure that you don't swap out the ________.

[adjudimo]

Other than the engine internals that are being worked on there isn't anything else left other than the external bolt on's. Just try to keep the original bolts throughout the build along with the build, other than ones that might be of integral strength issues. (AMD is a good source for those) Label everything you take off, take notes and take pictures of how the were originally installed. Try to keep them together in specific groups while and after cleaning them. It will save you time when you get ready to put things back together. Now would also be a good time to look at your rubber hoses, mounting hardware (clips, brackets, etc.) and such to see if they are still useable and if not get the proper replacements with originality in mind. That's what comes off the top of my head. Others might have more suggestions that I haven't thought of as of yet.

Edit: If the carb needs any cleaning or work along with the tank, fuel lines, it would be a good time to address these while the engine is out of the way along with cleaning the engine bay and other areas that might need a refreshing. Just plan it smart and make it easy on yourself, in other words.