Day 1 Thrash: Getting Malibu Ready for the Cage

[Tom@StreetlegalTV]

Today marked the first day toward the chassis fabrication of Project Grandma. We all have been longing to see our old gal come together, but there were a few things holding us back.

Now the stars have aligned granting us permission move forward. This will be the first of many Project Updates that we will be doing to bring all of you daily work as the build progresses. Now, before we dive right into the first day, a quick recap on where we are so far.



We are the stage where we are fully ready for our Chassis Engineering chrome moly roll cage, mini-tubs and chassis goodies. All of the Malibu's work is being done by Mike Ryan of Ryan Fabrication right here at powerTV's shop.

The front end on Grandma has been completely reworked thanks to the TRZ Suspension, QA1 Shocks, and Aerospace Brakes. The car has been stripped of almost everything not essential to the structural integrity of the body and frame and in between that body and frame we sandwiched Energy Suspension body bushings.

The 555ci Edelbrock Crate engine has been built by Pat Musi and put down 1050 hp on the engine dyno. All we have to do now is fit the roll cage, do a a 25.5 SFI conversion, as well as a mini tub kit, so we can move on to the rear suspension and rear end install.

Today all we did was yank out the rear end. You can see the photos below.


Mike says that he doesn't like to have his picture taken and will do almost anything to make to sure his face isn't photoed by our cameras.




















At first the wound appeared to only be a minor one....


..but the redness and swelling soon followed.