Parking Brake

The parking brake wasn't working when I bought the car, so I decided to tackle that next. Sorry, but there are no pictures - there was hardly enough room for me under the car, let alone a camera and enough distance to get a shot that was more than a blur of rust-colored haze. 
Anyway, I jacked the car up, got on my super cool Chinese-made creeper I got at Harbor Freight for like 80 cents, and rolled under the brake lever. If you've been under any old car, you know what the parking brake cables look like: "Y"


It was actually a super easy fix. The cables were in good shape, the springs were in place, and the brake lever itself worked fine. The cables just needed  to be tightened, so I could get more tension when I pulled the brake lever. This in turn would engage the brake. I tightened the pull cable using the nuts already in place. I turned them away from the spring, so there would be more tension on the cable, but it wasn't enough. I needed a way to increase tension on the cable going from the Y to the wheels.


A buddy of mine offered me a short length of 3/4" brass tubing. I disconnected the tension spring, took off the locknuts, and slid the tube over the threaded rod. I put the nuts and spring back on. Essentially, this made the my thread rod a few inches longer - perfect for getting the extra 3 inches of travel I needed to get the tension right. After some minor adjusting and testing, the tension is just right. Now I can park on on an incline without worrying about rolling into things!


Total cost for fixing parking brake: $4.28 for Slurpees and a Chico Stick for my buddy who gave me the brass tube

Images and steering couplings

So I drove the car over to my pops' house so I could take the wheels off and look at the parking brake, which isn't working correctly. I took some pictures while I was there, all of which can be found in the gallery. While I was taking pictures, my brother noticed something. The "flexible steering shaft coupling assembly" (rag joint) was all fubar.

It looks all bent and broken and broken, but it's supposed to be like that. The problem is that the bolts aren't the right kind, and the rubber part is all brittle and mangled. Someone bought a cheap overseas repair kit to fix it sometime over the last 42 years, and didn't do it right.


I went hunting all over the internets to find out what the part was called, how to get a new one, etc. Thanks to Jim Shea and the guys at the Corvette Forum, I was able to track down the GM part numbers for a 1968 Corvette Coupe. The coupling is part number 7806391. The pinch bolts (to mount the coupler to the steering shaft) are part number 7807271. I ordered them today, so hopefully they arrive in time to work on it Saturday.


New rag joint and pins: $102


I never did get around to fixing the parking brake. Turns out, whoever owned the thing before I did put on some wheel lock nuts (lug nuts that need a special tool to be taken off, so no one steals the rims). Of course, when I bought the car over 120 miles away, the guy didn't give me the special tool. We spent the majority of the day trying to figure out how to get the stupid lug nuts off without damaging anything important. In the end, a Dremel grind wheel and brute force got it done. The two rear wheels are done, but whenever I get around to taking off the front wheels, I'll have to Dremel and fight with it again.


New, non-pain-in-the-butt lug nuts: $5


Finally, I looked at the braking system and found out what was wrong, but that's another day (and paycheck).

The C3 Project

My name is Steven. This blag is going to be a record of the C3 Project. The C3 Project is a car project. A C3 is a particular generation of Chevrolet Corvette. It's the third generation of Corvette, thus, C3.

A few days ago (April 7, 2010) I bought a 1968 C3 Corvette. I bought it near San Diego, CA on a clear spring day. I got a good deal on it. It's a numbers matching, all original Corvette (numbers matching means the frame, transmission, and engine are all original, from the same car, no parts have been changed). The C3 Project will document the process of restoring this C3 to nice and shiny. I am going to do my best to take pictures of everything. I plan on taking pictures before I begin working on a particular piece, as I work on it, and after it's done.

Expect to see this blag get filled with updates, pictures, complaints about shoddy wiring, and all sorts of other restoration-relevant information. Hopefully, before too long, the C3 will be pretty and nice.