Day by day, step by step

Progress continues, although slower than I'd like.
Having gotten the motor mostly reassembled, I've focused on other items that will put me closer to

TH350 adapter brackets

the goal of getting the chassis rolling and complete. Since I'm using a Turbo 350 tranny, I purchased an adapter kit to use the transmission with the '55 frame. I've painted and installed the single exhaust system, which was a bit of a bear but eventually everything went together. I dug out and cleaned up the distributor, installing new points and condensor. I also unearthed a Rochester 2bbl carb that I rebuilt about 15 years ago but never used. I took it apart to make sure everything inside was still good, which it appeared to be. I've also had the temporary tires removed from the wheels so I can prep and paint them with the final coat of yellow.

Ready to start

Since I'll be mixing up some color, I've been working on prepping some of the front end sheetmetal so I can maximize the time with the paint gun, as well as minimize or avoid paint waste. The repairs I made to the left front fender have turned out really good, which has given me renewed confidence in my sheetmetal repair skills. Last weekend I finally shot a good coat of filler primer on the fender, as
well as the three pieces that make up the front splash pan. All of these pieces were suffering from minor to bad pitting, which required quite a bit of time and elbow grease to fill and sand, fill and sand. If the weather will give me a break this weekend (that is, no rain or high humidity) I should have some truly finished pieces to admire.
Once I bolted on the carburetor and lined up the distributor, there

Primed and sanding off the guide coat

was no other reason to not try and start the motor. I had done a temporary start with my son's Ford six banger a while back, so I didn't think it could be too different with the Chevy. The only difference was the solenoid, which is mounted on the firewall of the Ford and doesn't come into play. With this motor, I had to go through the solenoid with my wiring.
After hooking it up the way I thought it should go, I took a deep breath and turned the key. She turned over, as I expected, but wouldn't fire. I noticed, however, that just as I would let off the key, for a split second the motor would try to fire. That told me that there wasn't a constant source of power getting to the coil, but no matter how I reconfigured my wiring, I just couldn't make anything happen. Frustrated, I turned my back on the whole thing and let it lie for a day.
Once I cleared my head, I started looking for some direction on the Internet. Every configuration I found resembled what I had already tried, until I finally came upon a hand-drawn schematic that showed one additional wire connecting the coil to the starter switch.
With fresh resolve and hope, I attacked the problem again the next morning. Once I had my wires in place, I again took a deep breath and, well, the result is in the video below...