In this post, we’ll show and demenstrate to you the process taken to install and repair our 1963 Corvette E-Brake and Rear Differential.

We have installed the e-brake on the Chassis and installed the rear differential mount.  We also did some testing and found the proper finish for the bare steel parts.  On top of that, we got the tumbler up and running; we ran the zinc plated part through it and they turned out fantastic!

Here is the e-brake assembly installed on the frame.

Here is the differential front mount.

When we went to install the front sway bar, we found that the sway bar bushings we got from Paragon were to small.  Turns out that Paragon only has 5/8″ and 7/8″ I.D. original style bushings.  Our original sway bar is 3/4″.  However, we were able to successfully bore out the bushings to the right size and get the sway bar installed.

Here is the sway bar installed.

As for bare steel finishes, here is the front coil springs.  This is right after bead blasting.

We tossed the springs into the tumbler and tumbled them for about 30 min.  That darkened up the finish and took away the bead blasted look.

Here is some refinishing that we did for the cast and forged items.  The part on the right is freshly bead blasted.  The part on the left is after our treatment.  Using a highly diluted solution of tooling black (very similar to the black oxide compound) we washed and misted the part with the diluted solution until we got the look we wanted.  We were really happy with the results.

Here is the differential housing and cover.  The cover is bead blast finish while the housing has been treated with the tooling black.  We also are coating the parts with a satin clear coat to prevent rusting.  You may notice that the housing is really shiny, this is because we had just coated it with the sating clear and it hadn’t dried yet.  Upon drying it will look like a normal steel finish.

Here are the front spindles.  The one on the left is bead blasted and the other has been treated with the tool black.

You may remember this photo from before.  This is one of the fuel injection components before re-plating.

Here is the same part after plating and tumbling.  The part on the right is after plating before tumbling.

Here is a batch of zinc parts before tumbling. They are sitting in the tumbling media.

Here are all those parts after tumbling.