more work on the TA

**ls1ws6ben** · 10-06-2012, 06:56 AM

just had the rack and pinion and tie rod ends replaced in my car. been needing that for awhile now. got her all aligned and found out the differencial seal is shot and leaking.. i have had this car for aout 2 years now. she was in rough shape when i got her. had all these plans for her but due to a job change and drop in pay, its been slow going. and it didnt help that the stock 5.7 gave out due to a bad oil pump. luckily my boss was nice enough to help me out and found a 5.3 out of a 2004 chevy truck with only 60,000 miles. not what i wanted but i didnt have $2000 to rebuild and put in the old motor. ive spent over $5,000 on this car and have only bought a few things i "wanted" for it. it sucks man. i have all these plans for this car and just cant do it due to this crappy ass economy and money being so tight. but she does run and there is no damage to the body so she looks sexy..lol.. have to find some good in all of this..*sigh* suppose i should just be thankful i am lucky enough to own one of these beauties and can drive her around... even thought she does have the smaller motor, she still sounds great and runs great and i get lots of compliments and people always offering to buy her... sorry but i waited to long to get one of these.. she is not for sale.... so i guess its off to my next list of repairs.. new brakes and rotors, the crappy plastic cover on top of the dash cracked into a billion pieces but the dash mat doesnt let everyone see that, got to do something with my driver side seat. those things are horribly made... there is a ton of other things i have to do but didnt list.. just sort of ranting here.. gotta clear my mind is all...

**pajeff02** · 10-07-2012, 05:39 PM

Just a heads up -- a leaky pinion seal was a factory installed option on our cars. They all seem to do it and owners have had varying degrees of success getting the leak to stop even with replacement seals.

**jiveass** · 10-08-2012, 08:56 AM

hey man i got a 5.3 of a 2004 as well.....with headers and magnaflow, sounds real nice and still moves pretty good even on the factory tune. plus i can run regular gas

. throw bolt ons at it and youll be happy as long as youre not lookin for a race car.

**ls1ws6ben** · 10-08-2012, 09:35 AM

Oh you are right about that. I don't have headers but it does have a flomaster exhaust. I cant tell a difference in the sound and yea the regular gas is kinda nice. And no im not looking for a race car. Its my daily driver.

***SMWS6TA*** · 10-09-2012, 07:24 AM

Don't get to frustrated about the pace of things. Some of the best looking cars take years to build. Yeah you're in a rough patch for now but it should get better and when you have the time and money then go for it.

I've had mine for 3 1/2 yrs now and yes I've done a lot but I still have much more I want to do.

**ls1ws6ben** · 10-09-2012, 07:27 AM

You're right. And yeah im frustrated with the pace of things. Thanks for the encouragement

***SMWS6TA*** · 10-09-2012, 07:56 AM

From my experience and asking a lot of the guys here over time I've come to this belief when building a car:

Decide on what you want and then research, research, and research some more - You have many options - DD, street, strip, auto cross, show, and any combo of these. Now you can't just make it into all of them, some things will clash with each other. For example - DD/track car. Throw every top $$ part and huge cam/heads and gears now you lose the DD aspect; A good set of combos DD/street, DD/show, DD/auto cross. I chose those as examples because you stated it's your DD for now.

Have a major goal and then break it down into smaller goals - Now unless you have a serious bank account and have access to all the tools, this is a must. Say you pick a street/show car you'll want to do all the wrench turning and fabing prior to going into a paint booth. Show paint quality ain't cheap. A good path to follow is suspension, rear end, transmission, then engine work. Engine work in this case is internals, Bolt on's like headers and intake you can do at any time, but items like cam and heads greatly effect the power out put. The path I previous mention lets you build up the car and get it solid prior to having power mods thrown at it. High HP cars will always break the weakest link in the drive train. Build up the weak links you'll spend less time chasing repairs.

My current project is building a custom 8.8 rear for my car. I could have kicked out the $3600 for it to be done but this is something I wanted to try to do and also because it is kinda unique. I've been working on it off and on for the last 7 months. Some of the delays has been money, time, fab some parts, also I'm working with some one that has some build experience with rear ends so on top of everything else I'm at the mercy of his work schedule. I can see the finish line, I just need to be a little more patient.

Know you experience level - Some jobs are out of your skill level. I like to do my own work because I love to learn how to work on these cars. However I know enough that when it comes to internals of a transmission, it's best (for me) to let a professional do it. I can swap clutches all day long, break into a T56 or 460Le and it look like a voodoo contraption. Another example for me - paint. No way am I going to experiment on my baby, again I'll let a pro do it.

What I'm saying is know your limits. If you're doing it to learn how and don't mind mistakes then go for it.

Tools - Simple as it sounds, some jobs require special tools that aren't cheap.

Ask lots of questions that is what's this sites purpose is for (or maybe because of AAG

) but seriously have no fear in asking, someone here has done it or experience it.

**pajeff02** · 10-09-2012, 12:47 PM

You can never own too many tools.

**35th-ANV-SS** · 10-10-2012, 04:10 PM

You have to consider too that these cars are getting old. Things do not last forever. Don't feel like it's your car being cruel. Happens to everyone at some point.

**cpop98ws6** · 10-10-2012, 04:49 PM

Yea, Jon is right. Nothing lasts forever. Just noticed the other say when my car was up on the lift that my rack is starting to leak

**Redrokit8** · 03-12-2013, 05:50 PM

As long as you have the space and work place for it, I would say keep it forever ! It's not like you have a deadline where everything has to be done. Just picture what it would be like to not have it. You would't have something to tinker with or talk about when you're around a group of gear heads. It's also something to look forward to and sure can be rewarding when you complete a phase. You never know what's around the next corner. All of a sudden you have more funds available and what a bummer if you didn't hold on to that old girl.