First...some background info:
I bought this 57 Nomad in mid 2008 shortly after completing a frame-on restomod build of my first wagon (9 Passenger wagon called "Harriet"). The previous owner of this Nomad approached me at a local car show, after looking for what seemed like a half hour at the detail of the 9 passenger build. Turns out after talking with him for a while, he was in the middle of this Nomad build and was losing interest (and his eyesight). I was not looking for another Tri5...but a 57 Nomad was one of my dream cars since childhood, so when he told me about his build and I found out we lived less than 10 miles apart...curiosity got the best of me. Turns out, he had done a nice job of doing a frameoff LS1/T56 conversion, using the stock frame with a stock front A arm/CPP500 steering setup and a Ford 9"/rear leaf spring setup. The LS1/T56 combo came out of a 2002 Camaro. It was lust at first sight, so we finagled a deal and I bought it.

It looked good nearly NO rust or bondo, and my initial plans were to just finish it up and drive it. Here's a pic of it in his garage the day I went over to load it up on my trailer and bring it home.

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Fast forward a couple of years to 2010, and with 3 kids in high school and all their activities and booster club stuff, I hadn't really done much on it. Mostly because I had started to see better builds...like custom frames and suspension setups, better mods, etc. All that waiting time allowed a better build plan to galvanize in my head, and in 2010 I had Laszlo (aka ChevyNut) build me a custom frame set up with a C4 suspension in mind, and also some AME center bracing to stiffen it up. I decided I wanted a Tri5 that drove MUCH tigheter and better, and was growing tired of the stock lumbering feel of my 9 passenger wagon. I placed my order with the Fabricator of Frames (that's you Laszlo) and then made a road trip from Los Angeles to Ft. Collins Colorado (on what had to be the coldest weekend in January that year...it minus 10 degrees driving back thru Utah that morning!) and picked up the frame. Here's some pics...

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Over that next year, I managed to buy some C4 components pretty reasonably, including a Dana 44 rear end setup, and got them bolted into the frame...along with a set of C5 Corvette wheels/tires that I bought from a guy off Craigslist for $300!

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Then kid's # 1 and 2 hit college in 2010,2011 and low and behold...there went a boatload of money OUT of my car fund and into the states of Calif and Ariz college systems. Good grief...

Now it's 2012, and the boatload of cash transfering to the 2 states continues (with 1 more on the way next year), but I managed to pull the body off the existing frame and swap in the new C4 frame setup, and now I'm right in the middle of finishing up a new firewall (fabbed from scratch out of 16 gauge sheetmetal) and will then move around the back end and fab up the rear floor, rear seatback-bulkhead, fuel tank, etc. The stock frame with the previous owners placement of the LS1/T56 allowed the body to be bolted on with no firewall mods, but with this new C4 setup...the firewall needed to be changed. (Secretly admitting here that I hated the look of the stock firewall anyways....so it was a good reason to break out the Lincoln 110V MiG welder and start at it...)

go to the next post...more pics there...