Es Carne de Burro V

[Alan F]

This thread is going to be a serialization of my current El Camino build. I have a 1970 Custom El Camino. It started life with a 3502bbl, automatic, air, power steering and manual brakes. It was Cortez silver with a Blue interior. I have no build sheet and could care less about it. My goal is to build a respectable driver.

I was well connected in the area Chevelle community. My best buddy, who will be introduced later, sent me an email that there was a guy trying to sell an El Camino that was complete but with a blown motor. The pictures looked good. I didn’t need another car but I’m sometimes a sucker for another build. I’ll buy them for the fun not knowing what I’m going to do with it.

So, I purchased the car, sight unseen. The seller was firm on his price but it was already low enough that I was feeling like I couldn’t get hurt. So we made a deal and he included delivery to my shop.

Here it is the day it arrived. I will add more photos and more of the journey later. I will also add the back story about the name.

 

[kmakar]

From what I see of the body, she looks like she's got good bones to start with.

 

[Chevelle_Nut]

Very Nice! I would just try to shine it up and not even do bodywork to it.

 

[Alan F]

In this installment, I want to get back to my roots and fill in a bit of the backstory that is directly related to why I’m here.

As a child, you could say I was mildly fascinated by what I called car-trucks. I had noticed them and since I liked cars and pickups were not cool, loved them.

Growing up, my father considered himself a “Mercury man” (men created their identity by the brand of car they drove & family arguments would erupt sometimes over those discussions). We had a succession of Mercury vehicles such as Comet, Meteor, Montego, Marquis, etc. I was given a 66 FoMoCo that my parents had bought new for my mother when I was 16. I never looked outside of that marque. Then I started working in gas stations and was fortunate to serve an informal apprenticeship as a mechanic and became quite successful. I almost took that route in life. At any rate, I was a senior in high school working at a service station that had a mechanic on duty, which was me, from noon until 7pm daily and all day Saturday.

My family’s veterinarian had a 1971 SS454 El Camino. The shop’s owner had diagnosed that it had a flattened camshaft and I changed the cam. In the process I fell in love with that car. When it came up for sale later, I was barely affording a new Camaro I had ordered with a 4 speed. I didn’t get it.

Fast forward 20 years and my oldest son fancied an El Camino as a car project. The nerve was struck, hook was set. During that period, which looking back now is 25 years later, I accumulated 11 El Caminos, three in my first purchase. This spawned three completed projects by me and another for a friend. Several were scrapped, others were sold. My oldest son still has the El Camino which I gave him. It’s a 1971 SS 454.

 

[JohnC]

I look forward to your build. I love the build threads on the OCS.
At some point I’m going to put up some pics of my 67. I haven’t done it to this point because it’s pretty slow progress. I also look at some of the other builds and it’s all coil over suspensions and blown LS motors. I just want a really nice stockish build. Might not be interesting to some.

 

[Alan F]

So the El Camino came to me as a total unknown. Based upon the pictures I received, I expected to have to put an engine in it, clean it up and go. Things never work out like you expect.

I had some gear heads working for me at the time and I paid them on their time off if they wanted to help. The first thing I wanted to know was if the engine was locked up, as was represented. I had my boy Jeremy do the diagnosis. I gave him an absolute script of the actions that I wanted him to undertake. I had him pull all the plugs and put a few ounces of Marvel Mystery Oil in each cylinder. I had him drain the oil to see if it had any moisture in it.

Next I inspected the plugs and they weren’t damaged or odd appearing. I made him wait a couple of days before trying to turn it over by hand. He put a socket and break over bar on it and easily rotated it a few times. After that I had him pressurize the cooling system to see if we had a head gasket leaking by. It blew out some old hoses and the radiator but no hiss in the cylinders. We disconnected the ignition, put a battery in it and cranked it over. I had him watch the oil pressure light to see if it made pressure when cranking and it did. So far so good. I had him check the compression and it ranged between 150 and 135 on all cylinders, certainly enough to run.

Next it was on to spark. It had been converted to a factory HEI at some point along the way and had a Edelbrock Performer and Holley vac sec carb. I had him hook up the distributor, still without plugs and check the spark when cranking. Got spark. Reinstalled fresh plugs and oil. Knowing it was going to be changed again, I didn’t change the filter.

I know Holley’s leak like a sieve after their gaskets dry out and had an Edelbrock on the shelf if it would run. But I didn’t want to change it yet. So, I had him fill the front fuel bowl with fresh gasoline. He cranked it over and it started right up. I have no idea why they thought it was locked up. However there were other problems to be dealt with.

The first engine you hear is my Gator running. It was misting and I wanted to catch a quick video and get back to the office from out in the yard.

 

[kmakar]

Jackpot! Pretty lucky on that one.

 

[Leadhead]

Nice! That's a great project you got there. It looks to be in good shape. I'm glad the motor wasn't locked up!

 

[Alan F]

I was waylaid for a few days. Continuing on…


Here’s the pictures I received from the seller.



The best part of the car is the interior, if you like red.

 

[kmakar]

I was waylaid for a few days. Continuing on…


Here’s the pictures I received from the seller.
View attachment 1055
View attachment 1056View attachment 1057View attachment 1058View attachment 1059View attachment 1060

The best part of the car is the interior, if you like red.

Factory A/C, nice. The body is in nice shape and the interior looks pretty sweet. Don't know what you paid, but I'm sure you got a great deal.

 

[Alan F]

And some more words.

So my oldest and only, at that time, son wanted an El Camino. I knew EXACTLY what I wanted. A ‘70-71 SS with a big block. Back in 1994 I subscribed to Hemmings at that time so started scouring titled. I found a guy who in 1995 had a large stash of Chevrolet cars. He had a used car lot, a junk yard and a paint and body shop but the best stuff was in a field behind his house about 10 miles out in the country. Here's a pic of my, at that time 15 YO with HIS project.


I made a date to go visit him about 225 miles from where I lived. So with my family in tow, we go looking for an SS El Camino. He had 3 GM A body pickups.
- 1970 SS 396 4 speed El Camino which was my favorite. Forrest green with black bucket seat interior.
- 1971 SS 454 auto El Camino placer hold, sandalwood bench seat interior with air. This is the one we built for my son. Only took 11 years but that’s an entirely different story (pic below);

and
- 1972 GMC Sprint original U Code that had been in a front end collision. Guy also had a complete front clip for it which I bought too.

After that, El Caminos just started showing up like lost dogs. In the span of 5 years, I bought

another 71 non SS with the numbers matching 402.
a rusty 70 custom El Camino that I guy had been saving sheet metal for. It had NOS front fenders and quarters.
another 70 Custom El Camino from a guy who used to be in the old Chevelle email list. This was before Team Chevelle.
a 69 EL Camino at a swap meet for $250 with a camper shell. It was the end of the day and the guy didn’t want to take it home.
even another 1970 El Camino for parts.
an 80 El Camino as a learning project for my older son.
a ‘70 Chevelle Coupe that was an L48 4 speed car that was optioned like an SS.
another 70 Chevelle Malibu that was complete with a solid body and needed full restoration.
my coup de grace was a survivor 1970 SS 396 Convertible.
another 1970 Malibu that was highly optioned with power windows, seats and door locks.

I lost sight of where I was going with this which was to relay the story of the name. The rusty El Camino that had the extra sheet metal I parked behind my fence beside my garage. My son’s friend bought the complete Malibu that needed resto. He asked me for some parts of the car and they were having a ball taking things apart. I found one day that he and his friends named the El Camino and had spray painted the words “ES CARNE DE BURRO” on the drivers side quarter panel. Thereafter all the El Caminos we finished were named Burro with a Roman numeral sequence. So this is the 5th one we are rescuing.

I gave away one of the El Caminos to my buddy who helps me so much and shall be revealed later. It was Burro iV.

[Edited to add pics]

 

[KwikSS]

Well this might keep you busy for a while. Nice collection.

 

[Alan F]

Well this might keep you busy for a while. Nice collection.

Thanks, but they're all gone now except for this one. My son still has the '71 SS 454 that started it all. There were a couple of 1969 coupes that came and went too - one a frame off L34 SS and the other a nice COPO clone that I built my way. As Ralphie as narrator said in A Christmas Story after the Bumpuses dogs scarved their turkeys: "Gone, gone, all gone!"

 

[Alan F]

I knew I had a picture I wanted to post of burro number 1.

 

[SSuperDave]

Gotta love a build thread, with anectdotes no less! Keep 'em coming!

 

[Alan F]

OK, got some history out of the way and guess what? My best bud showed up just in time to participate in the thread.
This guy. Burro V is in his garage, 200 miles away from where I live. He has been doing the majority of the work on the car.
\/


In an earlier post, I said things don't always work out like you think. Something unknown happened under the hood of the car. I SUSPECT the battery blew up and covered everything in sulfuric acid, and it wasn't cleaned up. It started out with visible holes in the valve covers. Then the left front brake steel line was corroded into two pieces. Then it was a vacuum leak because of a hole in the aluminum manifold. More mild steel corrosion. Here's some pictures of the carnage.



Then there was the lower cowl. Thank god the car was under cover because the cowl was a straight shot into the interior. It was particularly nasty on the drivers side.
What to do?

 

[Chevelle_Nut]

What a mess!

 

[kmakar]

You've got your work cut out for you.

 

[SSuperDave]

Ah, but that work has already been "cut out" and addressed. From the windshield forward the car has been updated, improved and detailed, and has been around the block under it own power, sans front clip.
The cowl was rougher than a night in jail, I didn't think it could be saved myself.

 

[Alan F]

Dave’s right. I had a good welder and fabricator working for me earlier this year. In about 3 installments he cut the top off the cowl, cut and welded patch pieces. He went way beyond what I expected. All sealed up now. Voilà!