Bluestreak 2010's IBM LS
 

Well after almost two years of ownership I have finally decided to start a member journal.:help: Unlike many on here I have not done anything performance related yet, so I can't really call this a "build" thread, but want to document the cosmetic changes I have made so far, any special events related to my car, and have a place to list future modifications whether they be cosmetic or eventually performance related.

Forgive the possible limitations on pictures until I get this thread up to date as I did not originally plan on making one of these threads.

So here we go. . .

Then:
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Now:
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Subscribed.:cool:

The beginning
 

I am ashamed to admit that I didn't grow up a huge fan of the Camaro, although I had always liked Chevy cars, especially the Corvette. All that changed when I first saw the concept Camaro in the first Transformers movie. The styling of this car instantly caught my attention!

However, I never pictured myself as one who would ever buy a brand new car. As I neared my graduation from college, my parents started asking me if I would get a new car after school. My daily driver at the time was a 1992 Plymouth Duster quickly closing in on 200,000 miles. After talking it over it became evident that I would soon need to look at getting a newer car at least, and not soon after I started to look at the Camaro (just out of curiosity) or the Cobalt. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the LS Camaro was listed for just over $24,000, which was more affordable than I had thought, and when I found out it would be cheaper to insure than the Cobalt that sealed the deal!

Not long after that I placed an order for my 2010 IBM Camaro LS. I had never seen IBM in person, but knew I wanted blue and ABM just didn't look dark enough for my taste. After what seemed an eternity of waiting I finally took delivery of MY car on August 22, 2009.
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Finding Camaro5 and the beginnig of the "transformation"
 

It was while searching how to track my order that I found Camaro5 through a link to a thread mentioning the spasticsquirrel database.

Once on C5, I found out about the Transformer Edition Camaro that was going to be produced, and this is what inspired me to create my own version. I originally didn't think I would add any logos to the Camaro, but as it often does, my childish/nostalgic side won out. I had grown up with the Transformers cartoons being my favorite show and I always liked the character Bluestreak (the gray one), seen below next to his twin Prowl:
http://images.wikia.com/transformers..._Rollforit.jpg

I figured if Bumblebee could upgrade to a Camaro, why couldn't he, and with my color choice he was the pefect character. So I found some Autobot badges, ordered a vanity plate and "Bluestreak" was reborn.

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By this point you can also see that I had added silver bowtie overlays and gill decals as well as polished 20" rims taken off an SS.

May 29, 2010: IMS Camaro/Corvette Customer Appreciation Day
 

This was the first truly special event with my Camaro. The day before the 2010 Indianpolis 500 I was able to take my car to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and drive a parade lap with nothing but 300+ Corvettes and Camaros. We were also treated to dinner and received free admittance to the Speedway's museum. This event was by dealer invitation only, so it was truly a priviledge to be selected as one of my dealers eight representatives.

For more pictures from this event:
Pics from 2010 INDY 500 Corvette/Camaro Owner Appreciation Event

Here is a picture of my dealer's group before we departed for the Speedway. Credit to SirPhobos1
http://i795.photobucket.com/albums/y...0/DSC_4174.jpg

More personal touches and cosmetic improvements
 

As we all know, if you stay active on this site for a while it is inevitable that you will be bitten by the mod bug!

One of the first mods I saw on here that really caught my eye was the Heritage grille. Of course, once I found this, I realized the V6 lower grille doesn't match very well. This problem was solved when I found the Street Scene valence lower grille. These grilles combined change the look of the front end quite nicely.
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http://www.camaro5.com/forums/pictur...ictureid=52666

The next area to be addressed was the door sills. I had seen the "Chevrolet" sill plates but wanted ones that had the CAMARO font, so I purchased the Defenderworx chrome sill plates.
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At this point I wanted to do something that was truly personal to my car. I found the Emblempros dash plaques that were customizable and decide to go with my car's build date and production # on the plaque.
http://www.camaro5.com/forums/pictur...ictureid=63222

http://www.camaro5.com/forums/pictur...ictureid=37166

Completing the "transformation"
 

My cosmetic modifications did not end with the ones in the previous post. Along the way I have added several others, all of which have contributed to my Transformers theme.

The first, and probably most simple was adding decals of my car's name in the Transformer text to the cowl and dash trim.
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Borrowing from one of the first glimpses of Bumblebee in the Transformer movies, I added Aesthetic Creations' Autobot logo decal to the steering wheel.
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1184/...f658eefe37.jpg
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I later decided that I wanted people to be able to see the Autobot emblem on each external side of the car, so I ordered a set of painted bowties from Gary's Custom.
http://www.camaro5.com/forums/attach...1&d=1294523610
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I finally moved on to the engine bay. The stock engine cover just screams to be painted, and when I finally got around to it I replaced the bowtie center emblem as well.
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Yet even with all of this, something was still missing. If my car has a Transformer theme shouldn't I know what it would look like if it could transform? So using this image of Bumblebee. . .
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I had Canadian airbrush artist Corrado Mallia adapt the picture to the color scheme of my car and update the head to more closely resemble that of Bluestreak from the 80's Transformer cartoons. The result:
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This is to date my favorite modification and definitely gets the most attention. A huge thanks to Corrado for the excellent work!

These mods have completed* my Transformer theme and given my car a one of a kind look that will never be duplicated!

(*--you never know what else may come along ;))

Someone is obsess with Transformer... me too! haha Sweet badges, photos, and car!

That would be a fair assessment. :laugh: I'm sure it looks worse than it really is since I lumped all of my TF themed mods together, when I have slowly added them over the almost two years I have had the car. Then again, maybe not. :iono:

Once I get this thread up to date, which should be with my next post, I will be able to go into more detail on the things I continue to add. As I stated before, I originally hadn't planned on keeping a journal. I do still have quite a few things I want to do, so stay posted.

July 16th, 2011: Second Annual Hare Chevrolet Camaro Rally
 

I recently had the pleasure of attending the second annual Camaro rally at Hare Chevrolet in Noblesville, IN. This event has been flawlessly organized by members chozn4service and OldSchoolCamaro for each of the last two years. This is a great opportunity to browse other C5 members vehicles and socialize as well. The first rally had quite a good crowd with an estimated 60 or so cars in attendance, but being the first year attracted almost nothing but Indiana owned Camaros. Here is a link to the thread for the first Rally: Dealership wants to host us - Hare Chevrolet Meet (pictures on pages 13 and 14)

The second year saw such an increase in attendance (estimated close to 100 cars) that we had to move off of the dealership's property to accomodate everyone. This year also saw a large crowd of out of state cars as well, including an impressive caravan form Ohio and even cars from North Carolina and Florida. Another additon from the first year was the people's choice awards for best exterior, best interior, and best overall.

Here is a picture of my car parked in its corner at the first rally,
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and what a difference a year makes! Here it is collecting the award for best in show at this year's event. :D (You can ignore my ugly mug, I'm just there to hold the plaque.)
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This was the first car show award I have ever won, even though I wouldn't classify this meet as a typical car show.

Here are the pictures from this year: PICTURES - 2nd Annual Camaro Rally at Hare Chevrolet

Bluestreak gets an eye transplant
 

Today I installed my RS headlights with the SJM dual mode RGB halo kit. :thumbup:

To start I had to remove the front fascia. There are several good DIY threads for this so I did not document that process.
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Next I removed the two bolts on both the top and bottom of the headlight housings (forgot to get a pic of the second bottom bolt) and replaced them with the RS lights.
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Since this is an LS, and not an RS car, I needed the Ottobody harness (in the large circle) to make this work. For most installations you would use the white wire to power the halos, but with the multicolor kit from SJM you use the connector in the smaller circle.
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Next I connected the halo wires of the SJM kit and ran them into the cab on the driver's side under the dash.
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The halo wires are then connected to the halo control box
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and from the control box wires are run to the control panel.
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I wanted to be able to turn my halos on regardless of whether the ignition was on or not, so I found an "always hot" connection under the driver side of the dash to connect the power wire. I also ran the groung wire to the black bolt seen above the power wire.
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I am quite pleased with the end result and now have color changing OEM halos on my LS!
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You can combine the Red, Blue, and Green to make multiple colors of choice and there is also a strobe function with white and your selected color. As an example of the color mixing here is Blue and Red maxed out together:
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Getting back to basics
 

It's been quite a while since my last post, but I finally have something new to post about.

After less than two years, my aftermarket stripes had degraded into an embarassment. The stripe on the driver side of the hood developed bronze looking stains (see picture below) and there were several small tears in both hood stripes.
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I have now finished removing my old stripes in preparation for getting new stripes painted on, going back to a more basic look.

In addition to removing the stripes I have also added one of Emblempros' "LS" badges on the trunk lid. With the addition of the SS wheels, HID headlights, and the planned addition of a factory spoiler I felt my car was losing some of its identity as an LS. I wanted a way to show I am proud to own any Camaro and am not trying to fool anyone.

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