Howdy. Pretty much new here to the forum and to Buicks. I've recently picked up a '64 Wildcat with a 401 nailhead. I'm in the process of pulling the engine/trans for its' buyer; already have a source for a running 455/th400 to drop back in. Oh yeah, the 'cat is a 4 door hardtop. seems like all the accessories are elec power and there's no crazy unibody or pwr steering controlled windshield wipers like the crazy '68 Conti I'm doing and engine swap on for someone else. and there are coils on all four corners so it looks like it'll be relatively easy to drop! This is my first big block and first buick; I've been building SBCs and SBFs since 8th grade. Well, actually I did swap out a tired 2bbl 350 for a rebuilt 4bbl 350 in a '70 Skylark but I didn't do anything other than ignition for it. So far my hairbrain ideas have lead me to an offy dual quad intake and a comp K-kit. I have two squarebore 600's, not sure yet if they'll even work or not, I just want them to since I have them. I also want to look into what needs to be done to upgrade the ignition. So any helpful info would be very much appreciated as I don't know the Buick basics and quirks. And don't worry, I'll exhaust the search feature before I start asking a million questions...looking forward to being on this site, from a little lurking it seems to have a good atmosphere and good tech info! jon
The Buick Offy manifold has the reputation for being so poorly designed that it will slow you down rather than speed you up. You would be better off withthe staock 800 CFM Q jet used 71-76 perhaps reworked. From ther jump to a 1000 CFM Holley. There is really no horseepower to be gained with an ignition change except for recurving the advance which you can do on the stock unit. The TA aluminum heads would provide the biggest jump in hp. Also shorty headers from www.TAperformance,com.
soberarmy, I most likely have it sold, have to get a freight quote to the guy and make sure he still wants it. I'll let you know asap if he doesn't want it. flyinbuick...did they get a bad rep because they're a higher rpm intake? I know some people try to give a Vic Jr intake a bad name on a sbc...because they put it on a stock cam and exhaust manifolds, so about the time the cam is done letting the engine breathe, the intake is just getting in range. so I'm just wondering if it's really a bad manifold or gets mismatched? my thing with the dual quad is not for performance, more for the wow, nostalgia and because I have two carbs. as far as I know it'll make it annoying to drive on the street compared to a single 4bbl. I didn't look around TA perf enough to find the shorty headers, that should make the exhaust part of the transplant pretty easy.
Don't let any body tell you that dual quads are bad.Most of the time people have problems with them is due to camming like you said the biggist problem isthat 90-95 percent of the people who try to run them don't know how to tune multible carbs any way.I am waiting for my AFBs that i orderd and when they get here i am going to do the Offy dual quad thing on my 455 in my LUV pick up.That will run untill i get every thing to run my tunnel ram set up.I you check other rides on this site there or others doing and running the same set up.You can find mine on this forum un powerd by BBB.:TU:
im new to this board,,,but if the wildcat has the same tierod arrangment as my 64 riviera,,,,then any swap to a motor without a center sump pan looks tough...right??? yackygene
yes, finding that out...hoping to find out some info. the drag link is pretty far behind the crossmember. I'm not scared to cut up and re-fab the pan/oil pickup but if there's a center sump pan available I'd rather do that. a rack & pinion would probably let me run a mildly modified rear sump pan but that's more than I want to do with this car, it's just for occasional fun, not for a daily driver...shoot, none of my DD's even have R&P steering... anyone know anything about the oil pan clearance thing? I'm going to get started on this project again, I just found a 4bbl 455/th400 from a 76 electra, runs good w/ all the accessories included for $400. as far as I can tell, that's a good engine, isn't it? I mean, I know it came from the smog era but eventually I'll be changing the intake/carbs/cam and porting the heads.
