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[FW28z]

Day two of the baseplate installation and I put in another 7 hours, but still not done. To be fair, part of the time was taken up for 4 trips to the auto/hardware store for nuts/bolts/chisels, etc. so it was not all install time.

I am now at the point of installing the safety cables. I decided I was too tired to continue any further so will finish up tomorrow. Should only take an our or two.

One issue though is when I have the front fascia/grill on, there appears to be a 1/8 difference in the left to the right brackets... the brackets that connect to the tow bar. The left side sticks out just a bit more.

However, there is basically nothing straight on the car to make a measurement. I measured the front of the baseplate to the mounting bolt on the frame, and from left/right, it is exact. But one side of the frame is about 1/8" longer than the other in front of the mounting bolt, so that might be what is making the grill stick out one side more than the other, I don't know.

But hopefully the mounting bolts are true to the chassis alignment, not the front grill.

At worst case, I am not sure if there are any straight tracking issues or not if I am 1/8" off. We shall see...

This project has been much more of a challenge than I first thought. Not so much on the difficulty side, but the fact that the instructions for the baseplate is for a Chevy Malibu (a sister car to the Grand Am), so much of my time was taken up in figuring out how to disassemble the front end.

Next, the frame itself is not perfectly flat top-to-bottom, so I ended up shimming a bit with a few Grade 5 washers.

And I had to modify both the horn bracket - it's mounting location, and the windshield water mount. For example, I drilled a hole and tapped for a 1/4-20 thread for bolting the horn bracket in a new location. If I took it to a dealer to install, they might have just cable-tied the horn in place - who knows.

And I took some time to paint the frame members wherever necessary with Rustoleum which also would not have been done by a dealer.

And I think I have figured out a couple of solutions on the tabs being too low. The connector tabs are small enough that I was able to bend them up an inch for the electrical connector to be centered in the grill opening, so that problem is solved.

And for the safety chain tabs, I think I can use those "S" hooks with the rubber band thingie on the bottom to secure them, and I can simply attach them to both the tabs and grill cross member. Not the best solution, but it will suffice.

Will post more photos later - I am too tired to do it now.