Scotty's 1965 Chevy SportVan Deluxe Travel Cruiser

So, I decided to experiment with a 2 barrel carb upgrade. I decided to try out the weber 32/36. Since it is a progressive carb it would still function well on a stock motor, possibly give me improved gas mileage and power when needed.

Had a bit of a hard time getting it to idle initially, but after some deep cleaning and tuning, I've been able to get it pretty dialed in. At this point it's a matter of fine tuning to try to improve my results. Very happy with it so far. Pulls strong, and gives some extra power at high speeds. Once I get my 2004R transmission installed, this will be one hell of a setup!

While I was at it I put together a cold air intake and routed a remote airfilter down underneath the van. Here's some photos of the setup. So incase any of you were wondering, the weber WILL fit in our vans...it will even fit rotated 90º with the needed adapter plate if you wanted to.

Very nice work... Love the rims too. Ken

Went out and camped at the Barona Drag Strip again this year for their vintage drag race event. Pretty fun time! Van ran great aside from a couple grades it struggled on mostly because of gearing. It's the kick in the but I need to finally finish my tranny mount and get my 2004R installed!

Way to go Scotty! Gettin lots done and making use of the van! Great camping setup. I see that matching card table! That fresh air intake sure seems like a good idea for our vans. And let us know when you get some MPG numbers with that new carb. What rear end ratio do you have, again? 3.36:1?

Good, affordable solution for the headliner. That's useful stuff. I might use that for a quicky interior in the back of my van. You know, if you had just drilled a few thousand little holes in that stuff it would look like the stock headliner!

Here's the custom TV cable bracket for my weber carb. Juuuuust fits width-wise. Think it's gonna work. Thanks to VanAgain for the help with getting all the angles correct.

VanAgain came over on Friday night and we worked late into the night getting the new 2004R transmission jacked into place so I could finish the tranny mount.



Instead of using lowering blocks on the motor, we decided to bend the crossmember up enough to let the tranny clear…it really didn't need much. We notched on each side of the hump, heated the center with a torch, then used my floor jack with a piece of steel like a hydraulic press to bend it up.







I then mocked up the two missing pieces of the mount. Brought the whole thing over to VanAgain's house today, finished welding it all together and gave it a coat of primer. Here's what it looks like when installed.



Next on the list is to connect up the cooling lines to my tranny cooler, get my shifter linkage adjusted to the new overdrive tranny, and adjust the TV cable. Almost there!!

We had to turn my 220V MIG all the way up to get good penetration on the thick metal at the top. Scott did a great job of welding the crap out if to make sure it's strong on the two vertical "straps".
 

 

At least no one has to stare at those ugly welds now that they're hidden up under the van! But hey, better safe than sorry.

Nice design for the mount, nice and tight up there

Nice work on the mount. Great teamwork guys!

I'd originally modified the stock throttle linkage to work with the 2bbl progressive weber carb, which worked ok. After adding the TV cable with my new transmission, the added tension of the cable made my linkage want to bind when I hit the gas. I decided to switch to a throttle cable for ease of adjustability and just reading how well they make the pedal feel.

I went with a 5' lokar cable. It's really nice quality and smooth as glass when you pull on it. I would have just ran a 180 bend in the cable at the pedal, but the cable I got was too short. So I used some ideas on here as reference to mock up my reversing linkage. I was able to use some of the removed linkage pieces to make this. I think it looks pretty trick!

Damn Scott this is an awesome thread you got going... I gotta crawl under your van again and check out all the work you've done...

Hey Miki! Welcome to VV...can't wait to check out that Econoline! You should start a thread on yours in the E Van section.

That linkage looks pretty slick but does it clear the belly pan?

The cable will definitely remove a lot of the usual slop we all have in ours.

Took the van on a nice long trek today with a friend and his father in-law. We went up to a motorcycle swap in Temecula, CA and made a couple pit stops along the way. Drove 138 miles total and ended up getting Close to 19 MPG! The weber and overdrive trans combo are paying off!

Good for you, Scott! For getting the van out for a road trip and for reporting the results of your upgrades. Your rear end is a 3.36:1, right?

Yep!

Don, what ever would we do without you?! Thanks for looking out for us!

Thanks Don! I will have to grab them from you sometime. Really appreciate it!

I was looking for this same info myself. I was wondering if poly bushings were better other than duration as I have read that some feel poly bushings will make for a harsher ride.

Hope to see you there Moose.

I'll crawl under there and check sometime this week. So, if I did have the larger size bushing, they would only be on the from springs? I plan on going to the Big 3, that would be a perfect time to pick them up.