Back to......VANagains NEWest 65 Chevy SportVan Deluxe

Nice looking van! Has he listed it yet and if so, what is he asking for it?

He carries all his tools in it,,,,,,,,,,,it has a 350 engine and trans in it,,,,,,,,however,,,,,,,,it has a lot of rust,,,,,,,,

In San. Diego? Ocean air rust?

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Massachusetts rust,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Yours starts from the top down and ours starts from the bottom up!

the 5 amigos !!

A 1965 Full House!

,,,,a full cul-de-sac,,,,,,,,and there are still more 65's in San Diego,,,,,,,

I would have some copies framed for each VAN that is there.That is a AWESOME line up and defiantly something you don't see very often Good Job Guy's. ..

donivan65 wrote:,,,,a full cul-de-sac,,,,,,,,and there are still  more 65's in San Diego,,,,,,,

Here are a few more of our 1965 family,,,,,,and there are a few more sitting along the road,,,,,,,


Scotty





Meno







Sean




Chris





Steve




Tom






,,,and Ted

I hope Sean's drivers seat goes wayyyyy back or he must have to drive with his knees in his chest! LOL Looks like your area isn't going to run out of 65 Chevy's any time soon! But you can never have enough, can you?

WOW.!!!! Thats AWESOME to see so many Earleys in your area on the road they all look really good.

Thanks, Don, for straightening my steering wheel and posting some pictures!

It's been a while since I've posted here about my van. It seems like I've been so busy working on it that I haven't had time to post.

Great thanks to Leftcoast65 for coming over every weekend to help out! We work together real well. He has seen firsthand how I operate and now knows why my van project has taken so many years! He's able to put up with my perfectionism but more importantly he keeps me from getting distracted and going off on tangents. Together we've made a lot of progress.

Let's see if I can remember all the things we've put back on the van:

Pop-out windows (gluing in new rubber), including adding them to the rear cargo doors.
New rubber (from S-10) on doghouse
Wired up new front running lights.
Headlights and trim.
Rewired rear lights (that the body shop had cut!)
Right-hand mirror
Wing windows (redid a sloppy hinge rivet on one)
New fuzzies on front doors
New glass for front doors (transferred bottom rails from old glass)
Adapted a passenger-side window regulator to work on the driver's side. (It can be done!)

Meyer, did I miss anything?!

I'll post some pictures later.

Nice teamwork. You guys have got a great support system out there! Congrats and keep it up, with pics of course!

Checkerboard stripes!! Why didn't I think of that?! And that is one heck of a roof rack!

Well, he's someone new to us. Another rare Sportvan Deluxe. Hopefully he'll chime in on our forum.

Yup, we are really cranking to get ready for this week's van get-together on Wednesday in El Cajon. Leftcoast65 and I worked on it both Saturday and Sunday. I decided it was a priority to get some new rubber on these old rims. We did a lot of checking around and found that white walls are hard to find these days! As Scotty found out, BFGoodrich no longer makes them. (They sold the molds to Coker, where I could get a set of four for $1000!) Discount Tire is going to order a set Coopers on Monday, hopefully to arrive on Tuesday. Saturday I had them remove the 10-year-old junkyard tires off the 15" rims I got from the junkyard. I thought about sandblasting them or bringing them somewhere to get dipped but in the end, Leftcoast did a lot of scrubbing to get the years of road grunge off the rims. I ground down the scrapes from old hubcaps and sanded down the rusty areas... on one rim and primed it as it was getting dark! 3 to go to get them ready to bring to the tire store.
 
We adapted a passenger-side inner door handle "remote" to work on the driver's side. (That can be done too!) The splines were shot, as usual, on the driver's side. I had a spare passenger side. Turns out only the backing plate and the actual shaft are universal. So you unbend the 5 tabs to open up the assembly. Then you can press the shaft down through the arm. This shaft can then be pressed into the drivers side arm.
 

 
Here are a few photos of work done in the last few weeks.
 
NOS Chevrolet emblem installed!

 
Re-chromed headline trim finally going on after reinstalling headlight buckets and adjusting headlight beams:

 
All pop-outs installed, including the rear doors, which required drilling and tapping holes in the right place for the hinges and latches:

 
One wing window "hinge" was very sloppy and the window frame didn't line up well in the rubber. Ended up removing this little bracket, welding up the hole and redrilling it to be a snug fit on the new rivet. Also added washers under the bracket to try to move the window a bit forward to fit better against the new rubber. Helped a little:


More photos to come.

Wow looks great

Rich unveiled his Sportvan and won "Best Work in Progress" at the van show last night. Here's a few pics I snapped.