Hello all New to the forum and wanted to introduce myself. Recently became the proud owner of a 73 Gran Sport. It’s a 350 (not a Stage I) Currently working on getting the engine rebuilt then onto the upholstery. Car is all original and in need of some TLC but all intact with very little rust
Super cool. Super cool car. 73's are growing on so many of us. Great looking car. Is that factory black or?
Thanks everyone no1oldsfan: it’s original but faded black with white buckets. Has what seems to be an original 85k miles After shipping the motor to the machine shop for inspection, it looks like the bore, crank, and rods are already at limit spec with some additional machining needed. Goal is to get the car mobile as soon as possible so I Will have to try to source a SBB 350 soon!
Was fortunate to track down a complete SBB 350 from a local fellow V8Buick member so my son and I got to work dropping it in and getting everything lined up with the trans Since I don’t have a lift and I am a bit paranoid about safety, had to get this tank high enough to get some long tube Doug’s headers in
The previous owner had everything disassembled in boxes but not labeled so it took some time to sort through the wiring and misc fasteners. I have casually wrenched in cars since high school but I am very far from experienced so this felt like playing the imaginary board game “CLUE - Buick Edition”
Thank you Steve73GS! The new-to-me motor had been sitting for the better part of a decade in an enclosed garage so I wanted to take it out of its slumber gradually. First I pulled and cataloged the plugs (5 looked unremarkable, 3 had more carbon) took a borescope to the cylinders (6 looked fine, 2 had some abnormal looking bore wear but no gashes, rust or deposits) and sprayed them with Kroil penetrant. After a few days/sprays I gave a few squirts of motor oil and MMO and let that sit for a week. finally I put a breaker bar to the crank and gradually rocked it forward a few degrees and there was no real resistance or roughness. Great so far!
Good to see you were able to turn it. You're at the right place for any questions you may have. This forum is unmatched for folks who know their stuff.
This forum is great. There are tons of places to look for swapping LS motors or adding boost to your mustang but keeping these Buick’s in top shape is not exactly like falling off a log so thank you everyone Now the latest wrinkle is around oil pump priming and pre-lubing the motor before firing it up. Following the Buick service manual and corroborating everything we have read on this forum, I proceeded to figure out what kind of oil pressure I had. I wanted to do this as a first step to establish a baseline before tearing too far into things or starting to throw parts at the motor haphazardly 1. Marked and pulled the distributor 2. Got a primer drill adapter tool from TA 3. Removed the oil pump housing and pump gears for inspection 4. Gears were intact but tooth crowns showed some scoring as did the thrust surface on the pump cover. 5. Cleaned everything, reinstalled the gears and cover with the original gasket and turned the driveshaft by hand to verify no binding 6. Disassembled, packed the pocket with Vaseline and reassembled 7. Added 3 quarts to the crankcase, filled a fresh oil filter and installed 8. Connected an external electric Oil pressure gauge to the sender on the front pass side of the block 9. Ran the drill CW After an initial oomph (guessing this was the vaseline squeezing through, the resistance fell and at no point did the gauge move above 2-5psi. Womp womp...
Huh, I have never tested the oil pressure with the priming tool. That'a a good idea? How long would you say you ran it and how fast do we think it's turning? If the engine has been sitting and is bone dry it might take a minute to develop pressure? Also when you had the pump cover off, did you measure the gear clearance? Which gasket did you use to reassemble? Hope my thinking out loud here is ok. Oh, and welcome from Seattle, WA!