1962 Chevy Impala - The Great Swapster

There comes a time when everything was better back in your day. It usually coincides with reminiscing about the good times you had growing up on Super Pangaea, and having to take multiple potty breaks each night. Although Ron Parker is 65, something tells us he's not that kind of guy. He's obviously a man who appreciates the past while simultaneously embracing modern technology. For verification, look no further than his '62 Bel Air, which packs a fuel-injected LS2 small-block and a six-speed stick. Interestingly, this isn't Ron's first foray into the realm of late-model engine swaps. It's more like his tenth. As with his past project cars, Ron's refusal to be intimidated by electronics and techno gadgets has resulted in a car that's more modern and refined than g-Machines built by hot rodders young enough to be his kids.

Fearless by nature, Ron's been doing EFI engine swaps for over 20 years. Back in the late '80s, he pulled a TPI 350 out of a wrecked third-gen Camaro and dropped it into his Chevy truck. "Everyone said it couldn't be done because EFI motors are too complicated, and I told them to just watch and learn," he says. Since then, he's built a '69 Camaro with a supercharged LT1, and a '57 Chevy with an LS1 and a 4L60E overdrive trans. "If an engine has a carburetor, then I don't want it in my car. I don't do carb motors. I love fuel injection because it fires up every time, gets great fuel mileage, is maintenance free, looks better than a carb, and never gives you any problems. I've swapped more EFI motors into my own cars and my friends' cars over the years than I can count."

After finishing up his '57 Chevy and several custom pickups, Ron longed for a new challenge. He had the perfect candidate already in mind, and he didn't have to look very far to find it. "My buddy inherited a '62 Bel Air and never got around to building it," Ron says. "The car sat in his backyard for 25 years, and I tried off and on for 10 years to convince him to sell it to me. He finally gave in about two years ago, and I was very excited to bring it home. I've always wanted a bubbletop Bel Air, and I knew right away that I wanted to put an LS2 and a six-speed manual in it."

While the glass was broken and the interior had seen better days, the Bel Air's sheetmetal was very solid. The only areas that needed rust repairs were the rocker panels and a patch above the rear wheel arches. "I rolled the car into my garage and put it up on the rotisserie right away. With the help of my good friend Julius Hardy, we completely dismantled the car, fixed the rust, and block sanded the body until it was perfectly straight," Ron says. "The paint is a custom mix of different PPG colors that I came up with myself. People always ask me what kind of paint I put on my car, and I just tell them that it's Parker Red."

With the bodywork complete, Ron shifted his focus to the chassis. Granted that being 20 years older than the typical 40-something muscle car buff elicits cheap jokes, but with that age comes loads of hot rodding experience. Ron's old school, and only buys aftermarket parts when necessary. As such, he figured out a way to graft the front frame/suspension section off of an '80 Olds Cutlass beneath his '62 Chevy-whereby the front third of the chassis is effectively an '80 GM G-body and the rear two thirds is a '62 Chevy. "It was a piece of cake, and we knocked it out in about four hours," he says modestly. Ron says '78-84 Cutlasses have the same track width as a '62 Chevy, so the swap is rather straightforward. "Welding everything up isn't much different than installing an aftermarket front clip, and the great thing about the swap is that you get the modern suspension, big sway bar, disc brakes, and nice power steering box all at the same time. All you have to do is put the car in the air, mark where the wheelbase is on the ground, and then whack off the stock frame. Then you cut the frame horns and bumper brackets off of the original frame, weld them onto the Cutlass frame, and bolt everything back together. It drives and steers so much better than stock, just like a late-model car."

Now it was time for the fun stuff, since most of the grunt work was finished on the Bel Air project. As no surprise, for a man who can weld a new subframe beneath a car in half an afternoon, the powertrain swap wasn't much of a challenge. Ron picked up a totaled '06 GTO at an auto salvage auction, and then promptly picked it apart like a well-trained vulture. After fabbing up a custom crossmember and motor mounts, the GTO's LS2 small-block and Tremec six-speed trans dropped right in. "I had to reshape the trans tunnel a bit for some extra clearance, but the install was very easy," he says. Although he couldn't find a set of headers built specifically for an LS-powered '62 Chevy, he had a hunch that some fourth-gen Camaro Hooker shorties might fit, and he was right. The headers dump into custom dual 2.5-inch pipes and MagnaFlow mufflers. To feed the mill, Ron once again got a little creative. He built a custom aluminum gas tank himself, and heisted a fuel pump off of an '02 Camaro. Keeping things cool is a Ron Davis radiator and dual electric fans from the donor GTO. Just as he's experienced many times in the past,after finishing the wiring, the LS2 fired right up.

To make sure that the rest of the driveline could handle the LS2's grunt, Ron pulled a factory 10-bolt out of a 409 Impala. Before installing it, some tweaks to the rear suspension were in order. As is common with most fullsize GM cars of the era, the Bel Air uses coil springs and control arms to suspend its back end. Ron says, however, the rearend has a tendency to wrap up and unload when torqued. "The Bel Air uses two lower trailing arms coming off of the X-frame to locate the rearend, and a Panhard bar to keep everything square. There's also a third link that connects the top of the pumpkin to the frame, but it's too weak to prevent the rearend from wrapping up under hard acceleration," he says. "I fixed the problem by welding up another bracket to the rearend housing and installing a second link on top. Now the rear suspension has four links, two on the top and two on the bottom."

Upon putting the wraps on the project, Ron wasted no time throwing it into service. You can't really call the Bel Air a daily driver, but he enjoys long road trips in it and makes sure to take it out on cruise nights. Looking back at the finished product, Ron takes great pride in the fact that he built the entire car himself along with the help of his buddies. That makes the Bel Air's year-and-a-half gestation period, and parts total of $30,000, even more impressive. Being older and wiser than the typical muscle car enthusiast, Ron hails from a period in time before big name restoration shops existed, and when building hot rods meant you had to turn your own wrenches and make your own parts. So, cheap jokes aside, maybe things really were better back in his day. After all, what good is youth when older and wiser gentlemen like Ron have to show the young punks how things are supposed to get done?

Easy Factory EFI
Ron makes no bones about his disdain for carbs and adoration of EFI. In fact, he's currently working on a Nomad project and a '66 Chevy pickup, and both will be powered by fuel-injected LS-series small-blocks. Many people are willing to forego the benefits of EFI due to the intimidation factor, but Ron insists that there's nothing to fear. "People think that you have to be a programming expert to run fuel injection, but as long as you know the right people, that doesn't have to be the case. There are plenty of extremely knowledgeable tuners out there who can write you a program for whatever you want," he says. "For wiring everything up, I've had great luck with Superior Harness in Mena, Arkansas. All I did was tell them I was installing an LS2 in a '62 Chevy, and they built me a custom harness that fits perfectly. Next I sent my computer to my friend, Tony Duncan, who reprogrammed it by removing the vehicle antitheft system, speed limiter, and O2 sensor provisions, and also remapped the fuel and spark curves for more power. After plugging everything in, the motor fired up right away, and the car drives perfectly."