I thought I would share some pics & info of my HB Torana restoration/modification. Its a 1968 series 2 HB 2 door SL with 1159cc engine and 4 speed. I am the fourth owner and it had original 50000 miles on the clock when I picked it up.
The body is relatively rust free except for the back edge of both front guards and some surface rust where the underbody tar has fallen off. There is a dent in the right hand rear quarter and the paint is extremely weathered.
The interior is close to immaculate except for the crash pad and top of the rear seat. The car came with all the original books and tools, the only missing part is the original rubber spare tyre holder and block of wood for jacking (may have been in Brabhams only).
I have begun buying up bits for it as required when ever I come across them. I have so far been able to find a nos steering coupling, nos rear quarter panel, nos front number plate panel, nos rear indicator lenses, nos clutch cable and an almost complete set of bushes/ball-joints from rare spares. I have also bought a Brabham carby setup minus air-cleaners, GTR dash and a black GTR steering wheel (minus horn button).
The car is currently off the road as I get ready to put a rebuild a 70 series motor from a LC. I will also take the opportunity to rebuild the front suspension, convert to disc brakes and re-tar the floor pan & wheel arches.
The only alterations I have made so far is the addition of some eyelids. I am keen to try and find some of the original nasco options and maybe a rear venitian.
The Brabham carby setup came without air cleaners and I was keen to try out an idea I had to put small ram tubes inside a slightly higher than standard a/c assembly. I have made tooling to spin the lids and ram tubes from aluminium and they have come up quite nice using the repro dotloc wingnuts. In hind sight I'm not sure if my ram tube idea will work that well but it is easy to run them without so I will try both setups when I get it running.
The 70 series motor is supposedly rebuilt so I will strip it down and check it over and get the head sent off for some mods. From my research, the main place to get extra power from these motors is the heads. I will be running the standard cast iron sports headers untill find a set of extractors (unlikely).
Why spend time & money on a HB you might ask. I just love the styling of the car and after reading an old wheels "Hot Up Guide" I was inspired to carry out some period performance mods with the hope that I may some day have the power to overtake slow moving tractors.
See below for pics. I will post more as the work progresses.
HB1200
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