Corvette Club of Northern Delaware

1980 Corvette Frame Replacement Project

During the April or May 2007 monthly club meeting one of the CCND club members, Brian Falla, brought up that he knew someone that was trying to sell a 1980 Corvette as a parts car. As Brian related the story it turns out that a young man, Mike Motarulo, only 17 years old, had saved up his money to purchase his dream car, a Corvette. He found a 1980 Corvette thart ran good but needed cosmetic work on the body/paint and interior. Mike figured he could drive and enjoy the car and continue to save money to eventually improve the paint and interior slowly as he could afford it.

After purchasing the car he realized that something wasn't quite right with the handling and took it to a few shops to look at and was told that the frame was cracked. In fact, when it was up on a lift one of the bodyshops told him the frame actually had 22 cracks in it!
Mike and his parents went back and spoke to the seller of the car who basically told them "tough luck" and he wasn't going to take the car back.
Since a frame replacement was well beyond what Mike planned on fixing on the car not to mention well beyond his budget contraints it was decided that he would sell the car as a parts car to try to recoup what he could of his money out of it. Since his parents knew Brian Falla it was mentioned to him to please ask around the club to see if anyone was interested in a parts car.

After hearing this story as it was related to us at by Brian at the monthly meeting a few of us felt that Mike did not get the "proper introduction" into the Corvette hobby and that something should be done to help this young man out. We have members that work on their own cars and have the tools and knowledge to do the frame replacement so it was agreed that we would take on this project to help out this new Corvette owner and show him a more positive side of the Corvette community.

We had a number of club members that volunteered their time to do the work on the car. Next issue was the budget which was VERY limited and in no way near enough to cover what the job would require.
After a lot of searching we were able to find a good condition replacement frame at a very reasonable cost.

During the search for a replacement frame this project topic was brought up on many of the online corvette discussion groups such as Corvetteforum.com, CorvetteActionCenter.com, Vetteheads.com, and even the Corvette Club of Delaware Valley's online website and discussion forum.
The interest in the project generated online was spectacular and many forum members espressed their interet in helping Mike out as they also felt bad for his introduction into the Corvette world. Since most were too far away to help out with the physical working on the car many offered to assist financially with cash donations that could be used towards the parts and supplies required for the project. A special PayPal account and bank account was set up for this purpose and donations came in.

In June, A few of us involved in the project ran into Lance Miller at a local car show and after discussing the project with him Lance offered to speak to a few of his contacts and see what he could do to get us additional help. The first reply from Lances assistance was from Andy Bolig, the editor of Corvette Enthusiasts Magazine. Andy loved the story and how our club has taken on this project to help another Corvette owner in need and has promised to run the story about it when the project is completed. Andy also offered to assist with the magazines contacts to help us find parts vendors that will offer us significant discounts or outright donations of parts we will need to complete the project.

What is truly amazing about this project is not that the Corvette club of Northern Delaware decided to help a local corvette owner repair his car, but the support that others in the Corvette Community have shown to this project. From posts made about this on the above mentioned online forums we have gotten offers from people to help work on the car, monetary donations for needed parts, etc,. These are people that just didn't feel this young man had been treated properly for his introduction to the Corvette world and wanted to help him as best they could same as we did. 

It's this "Coming Together" of  a large and varied sample of the Corvette Community to help a new member that is most impressive to us and what we feel is the real driving force and real interest as a story and really shows what this hobby is and should be about - enjoying the cars and helping others.

Please keep in mind that when you look at the progress pictures that the project Corvette is not overly "pretty" in it's current condition and from most visual looks will not be "pretty' when we are finished with it. We are not getting involved with body and paint work nor interior work on the car. We are simply doing a frame replacement and our goal is to make the car roadworthy and safe for Mike to be able to drive it and enjoy it until he can take on the cosmetic restoration work himself.
Besides the actual frame itself, any safety related items will be handled while we are working on it so many of the suspension and brake parts will be replaced while they are being reinstalled on the replacement frame - there is no point in reinstalling worn out, unsafe parts. New bushings, new idler arm, new brake lines and master cylinder will be installed, and other parts as we come across them during the disassembly will be identified as needing replacement and will be done.

Update: 11/25/07

We have now completed this project. Mike has taken the car back home and will be working on it over this winter (Winter of '07/'08) to make other repairs and cosmetic improvements and is planning on having the car ready to drive by Spring of '08. It will not be completely finished by Spring and will still need body/paint work, a new interior, etc but it will at least be drivable and safe for him to enjoy.

Update: Spring 2008

Mike spent the winter working on the car doing interior improvements and engine bay cosmetic work and has now gotten the car registered and tagged in New Jersey. The car runs great and he is enjoying driving it. His plans are to drive and enjoy the car all summer as much as possible before he leaves for college at the end of the summer at which time he will need to leave the car at home since as a freshman at college is is not allowed to have a car there. He will come back home on school breaks and enjoy the car during those times while at school.

After all the work he did himself and what he learned while working on the car during this project he had no problems doing the interior and engine bay work over the winter and he reports he thoroughly enjoyed being able to do the work himself based on his learning experience.

This was a project that was well worth all of the time and effort put into it.