TheSilverBuick's 1977 Skylark

Discussion in 'The "X" bodies' started by TheSilverBuick, Jul 5, 2010.

  1. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    It wasn't even on my radar until yesterday afternoon when a friend mentioned he was going on the Car Craft Anti-Tour this year. They are finally doing something different after five or so years of the same drive. I'm not sure if I'll be able to make it, but I have the wife warming up to letting me make the drive to southern California, do the cruise up to Redding, CA and her and my son will just make the 4 hour drive from our house to Redding on Thursday night. I'd drive down Wednesday night, drive back up Thursday with the cruise.

    https://www.facebook.com/events/1414314585308860/

    April 27-30.
    Looks like there is a drag strip runs at 5:30pm on both Friday and Saturday!
    https://koolaprilnites.com/Koolpage.asp?ID=7
     
  2. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Been doing some tinkering in the background. I've wanted to experiment with converting a smog pump to a vacuum pump but have been finding it quite difficult to find smog pumps for cheap and to get them sent to me. So far after several months of looking I got one in my hands last month from Hector (CARHEX). A seized up unit from an early 70's Buick.

    Some background, it's fairly well documented that the carbon seals in these things don't like oil. For some reason it causes the units to lock up, sometimes catastrophically enough to shear the pulley off. After opening one up, I think I know how the catastrophic failure happens, the carbon seals not only seal up against the vanes but also keep it fairly centered through the rotation, and if oil cooks itself to the vane and chips the carbon seals, eventually breaking them into pieces then the support for the vanes go away and it jams, hard. GZ Motorsports I think is the only company that uses the smog pump design and their solution is a custom seal that can take the heat and not be significantly damaged by debris/cooked oil. Taking a page from them I went to the hardware store and bought some large 3/16th O-rings to make new seals out of. My thought is, if the seals keep somewhat oiled they may be happy, and if they get slightly damaged, they aren't at risk of completely shattering like the hard carbon seals. Google'ing indicates the hardware store seals are Nitrile and tolerate temps up to 250ºF which is pretty low for the working environment, but it's what was available.

    The pump came apart reasonably easy. I cracked the external fan, but I have no plan on re-using it anyways. Seems just a bit of rust build up from sitting caused it to be stuck as all the needle bearings and bearing surfaces were in good shape. Heck, even the carbon seals were in good shape.
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    First order of business was sealing up the intake hole so I can make a new one that a hose can slip on to. The hole was behind the external fan, so with some crappy welding (aluminum casing, generic MIG welding) to make some support structure that RTV could be smeared over to seal it up.
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    It seems that one carbon seal is fixed in place and the other seal has a small bent piece of metal to spring the seal against the vane to maintain the seal. The small bent piece of metal wasn't going to work with the flexible rubber. I found that zip ties were the right width so clipping some of them I shimmed the seals into place. It actually seemed to be a decent fit with minimal resistance on the vane when I turned it. I used hi-temperature wheel bearing grease on all the bearings and coated the rubber seals and vanes with it as well. Hi-temp right?
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    Got a nice "wipe" pattern on the vanes.
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    I cleaned out most the gunk that was built up in the housing and back plate. I tapped the stock outlet on the backing plate with 1/2" NPT and drilled and tapped a corresponding hole on the inlet side (seen on the top left) and put it back together.
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    Seems I didn't take a picture of it assembled and on the engine, but the result of test #1 is yet to be determined, but I've removed the pump for disassembly and inspection. I ran it for about 10 minutes with the outlet not connected to anything and it pulled just under 5inHg at 2,000rpm, which is on par with how I had the intake pulling vacuum through two oil separators. However the outlet gas smelled of burning rubber, which I took as a bad sign and removed the pump for disassembly and inspection. I expect to find partially melted rubber, but who knows? I haven't looked yet, but I'm going to start looking for teflon o-rings or small plates to cut in the 3/16th thickness range to try next.
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    Fun fun, and if you know where some GM smog pumps are you want to send me for cheap, let me know! I figure I'll eventually break this one in testing.
     
  3. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    I finally got around to disassembling the pump and it seems one of the vanes started de-laminating and formed a bubble and that lack of smoothness started cooking the seal. I'm not sure if it's a defect of the vane and it was delaminating before I installed it or if the heat started it's failure. The other side looks mint. Its still flat and the seals still look like when I put them in. So I'm not on a holding pattern until I can source another pump. Since I have a bad vane now, I'll see about disassembling it and trying a different material.

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    Last edited: May 16, 2017
  4. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Its not really worth starting a project thread on, but after driving my Centurion across the state and in real traffic, not idling around a podunk town, it's safe to say the engine seems to be feeling tired. I rebuilt the engine in 2000 or 2001 when I first got the car and other than a head gasket in 2006 or so it's been a good reliable engine, but I think the valve springs are starting to get weak as it doesn't seem to want to rev much over 4,000-4,500rpm anymore and it used to pull easily to just over 5,000rpm and chirp the tires hitting second gear.

    So thinking about parts left over from use on the Skylark, I have a TA-212 camshaft I used for a year or so, aluminum edelbrock performer intake manifold and set of smaller chamber 1970 Buick 455 heads with big valves, gently used springs and mild porting I did sitting in storage, all that can easily go on this engine. Though it's approaching 100,000 miles, it doesn't seem to burn any oil and still has great oil pressure, so I'm thinking of a simple head, cam and intake swap could really wake it back up. The 212 cam should pull better than the single pattern smaller isky cam in it now with a slight bump in compression ratio, fresher valve springs and aluminum intake it should wake up nicely. Of course I'm not sure when I'll have to time to do this, but I'm technically a gasket kit away from doing it......

    I also see that Maaco has a $299 summer paint special going. With some quick and dirty bondo rust repairs I think I can get some new paint on the car that'll last a couple years for under a $1000. Going to stop by there later this week.

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  5. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Well Photobucket knocked $300 off their ransom demands and for $99/yr (>$9/mo) I paid them off to restore my photos across the web. Not a homerun win but at least not completely ridculous.
     
  6. newmexguy

    newmexguy Well-Known Member

    I should have at least two smog pumps I could send for shipping. Know one is off a '87 chev truck (first year TBI)
    Dave S. dona Ana NM 88032
     
  7. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    I would very much like to have them! The last couple I got are pretty rough, to put it lightly. I'll PM you.

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  8. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    As for the Skylark, just out driving it from time to time. Going to Cars and Coffee's and such when the weather is decent enough.

    Just about defrosted.
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  9. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    They arrived yesterday, thanks!!
     
  10. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    The car has been more or less parked since February because the clutch fork pivot pin backed out, stiffened up the clutch pedal and I didn't want to drive it with the throwout bearing loaded up on the pressure plate. It comes loose two or three times a year, typically in winter, which I think is a result of driving it when cold, allowing it to come loose. I think the steel scattershield must not shrink as much as the pivot, where the stock aluminum bellhousing would probably hang on to it better.

    Anyways, it took a flat head screw driver to back the pin out and the angle into it around the transmission is less than ideal and gacked up the threads and it wouldn't back out anymore. So the car sat. I finally got up the motivation to pull the transmission to change it out, but my working conditions now suck (I miss my old shop!) and looking at it I convinced myself I could just slide the transmission back ~1.5 inches and I'd be able to change it out. Every part of the job sucked, but I got it done, lock tighted the outer piece, and then at the suggestion of a circle track racer friend of mine put a bit of ultra black RTV across the face of the bushing and in the threads inside the bellhousing. Hoping it stays in place now!

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    Last edited: Mar 26, 2018
    Harlockssx likes this.
  11. wormwood

    wormwood Dare to be different

    wow... look forward to seeing your travels this summer
     
  12. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Just going to stroll through memory lane, the best I can remember, lol. I got the car in 1997 from Grandma right after I turned 16. Drove it with a 231 oddfire V6 TH200, 3.23 gear for five years until I bought my first '69 Firebird. Then went through the engine, re-ring, bearings, gaskets, then promptly dynamited the TH200. Picked up a 2004-r and put it in the car. Then my Firebird was totaled in 2002 and I went back to driving the car until I started the V8/TKO-600 conversion in 2007. The first 455 I built for it promptly ate the crankshaft, so I took the stone stock engine out of Centurion during the winter of 2007-2008 and put it infront of the TKO-600.

    As I got it from Grandma.
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    Teenager doing teenager things.
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    Went on the Car Craft Anti-Tour in 2008. Had the stock 7.5" rear end so I didn't want to beat on it too bad, but still didn't stop me from doing a pegleg burnout, lol. Single 2.5" glass pack exhaust!
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    Over the winter of 2008-09 I put a new crank and C118 flat tappet cam in the first engine, rebuilt the front end steering and suspension. Also installed a Cadillac Seville 8.5" rear end with 10" rotors and 3.08 gears, then front 12" rotor brakes.





    Then started working towards the EFI conversion. I would occassionally vapor lock the Q-jet during WOT runs, cumulating to getting stalled out at the end of a 1/8 mile run and getting towed back to the pits. So in September 2009 I began the EFI conversion in earnest in my 1 space carport.

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    So in the fall of 2009 I started with a 7-pin HEI conversion, don't waste your time! I ditched the 7-pin after about 3 months and just went with the pickup coil and MSD 6AL box to control timing.
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    Q-jet.
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    SPX with throttlebody. Basically the same height as the an B4B aluminum intake and Q-jet.
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    Put a return line in the gas tank, and used the surge tank method for keeping the high pressure fuel pump supplied.
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    In spring of 2010, I again went on the Car Craft Anti-Tour which went from southern California to Phoenix, AZ to go racing down the 1/4 mile. During one of my runs I hurt the motor. It had a lot of blow-by coming out of it. I realize in retro-spec that I was running too lean, plus running 9.6:1 compression with 3.08 gears and manual transmission was not doing me any favors. Interestingly enough, I figured out which cylinder was the worse blow-by offender and un-plugged the fuel injector to that cylinder and drove 600 miles home on 7 cylinders (and a case of oil).
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    I thought I had cracked a piston, but this is what I found instead. Two cylinders had blown the head gasket out into the lifter valley. Laying the gaskets on top of each other it was essentially the same spot. I'm guessing they may have been damaged before I installed them, but don't really know. I cleaned up all the oil and put a set of headgaskets on it and put it back in the car.
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    I had 3.08 gears in the car but then in October 2010 got a set of 3.70 gears to install for some more fun and reduce the chance of pinging the engine. It was about now I started thinking about going to Drag Week after watching it on the live feed in 2009 and 2010.
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    And now it was time to get serious. Over the winter of 2010-2011 I started to buy some go-fast parts to go to Drag Week in 2011. Some TA SE1 aluminum heads and a roller cam, with too much duration and not enough lift (I asked for it, as a test, and it under performed as Mike T predicted). I was trying to keep the lift down for the stock pistons that did not have valve reliefs.
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    Then in June 2011 I pulled the engine to put the cam and heads on, and re-gasket it, and found a surprise! Broken ring-lands. Going to need pistons and machine work!
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    TA was quick with a set of 10:1 pistons. Off to the machine shop it goes to get bored over, and rebalanced. In a series of comedic issues the rotating assembly traveled across have the western US courtesy of UPS, all while the clock to September was ticking....
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    Last edited: Jul 1, 2018
  13. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Meanwhile, I started working on coverting to a crank trigger for better timing accuracy.
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    Eventually got the rotating assembly and engine back. Installed it, installed the crank trigger, changed out the seat belts, installed slapper bars, packed up and hit the road! You may ask about the mechanical pump, at the time I was using the stock mechanical pump to fill the surge tank.
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    Made the drive to Heartland Park Topeka, KS from Ely, NV. About 200 miles outside of Ely I picked up a grease marker and wrote "Drag Week or Bust!" on the back window, lol. I wasn't very quick, running disappointing 13.3x's at 108mph at 3,800lbs but I had a blast!
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    It was warm, but this car has never had a cooling issue.
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    After a successful Drag Week I started thinking of the next upgrades. I decided to go from a Megasquirt 2 to a Megasquirt 3 and sequential fuel injection. Around this time I also started thinking of putting a screen in the car to monitor the EFI stuff.
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    In April 2012, since the crank trigger was implemented the HEI's pickup coil wasn't doing anything, so I decided to experiment and grind all the teeth off but one and see if it would work as a cam sensor. For the most part it worked pretty well. I used it for two years like that.
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    A beautiful cam sync signal. The cam tooth is the top line and the crank teeth the bottom. Every other missing tooth has a cam signal reference.
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    The way the Megasquirt works is I used my existing computer board and just added the larger processor and extension board, which also included a new case.
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    As it sits to this very day.
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    Then I decided in May to get it painted. Picked up new "fiberglass" filler trim. The fit is poor, but it was better than nothing. They are starting to crack in places now.
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    Stripped the whole car down, sent the bumpers out to be chromed, as a co-worker was going to paint it and was supposed to just be a couple weeks. Then it seemed she just couldn't find the time, and a month rolled by, then a second one... I moved from my small house to one with a nice barn/shop. Then the unthinkable happened, her son died and I simply asked to get the car back as it was now the beginning of AUGUST and Drag Week is in September, and I still had to put the car back together. She insisted she finish it. She rushed the work, painted it quickly, it shows but honestly I was glad to be done with the primer and the price pretty much materials and little labor. I got it back AUGUST 22.
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    Last edited: Jul 1, 2018
  14. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    I had some upgrade plans for the car in the mean time. I bought a new clutch because I had around 50,000 miles on the Autozone Centerforce clutch. Bought what I thought was a nice McLeold, but it let me down a year later. I also figured this would be a good time to put a scattershield on it.
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    Five days later, the clutch was in and I got all the trim back on it.
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    Since I found myself with a little bit of time, I made some new center caps for the car. They are big car rims.
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    And I loaded up for Drag Week.
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    Drove the car out from Ely, NV to Tulsa, OK and made it uneventfully. Turns out this year it was a 1,300 mile Drag Week, the longest yet.
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    Was at a gas station filling up (my car peaking out in the back) when Larry Larson rolls in, tops off, and rolls out. It's pouring rain, he's on giant slicks and still drives 80mph down the road. Incredible. I was running my drag radials and never had an issue in the rain.
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    With some added timing and fuel, but essentially the same combination as 2011 I started dipping into the 12's, which I was pretty excited for.
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    My week wasn't without issue though. A stock 8.5" axle was starting to be unhappy towards the end.
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    The bearing was toast and eating the axle. I then learned of something called an axle saver bearing. Moves the roller over to a new part of the axle. Put one in and got me home.
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  15. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Got home and of course then started thinking of replacing the rear end among other "upgrades" for 2013. The list was, 9" rear, new 3" down pipes and 2.5" X-pipe to the rear, electric cutouts, sent the heads to Tri-Shield for a little grinding and freshening, coil on plug ignition (distributorless), and digital dash. But it would turn out that my 2013 year would be rough a rough one for the car.

    Upgrades began promptly after Drag Week (winter 2012-13). Winters in Ely made it easy to take the car out of commission to do the work. Starting with the exhaust. Went from the Summit dual exaust special to a Performance Years exhaust. Including electric exhaust cutouts.
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    I like how well it tucked under the car.
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    I opted for 3.89 gears in the 9". At some point I had put 3.42 gears in the Skylark.
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    Way more stout.
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    The engine came out again to get the heads ported and refreshened. Just cleaned it up some after the heads came back. (You can see I started doing Firebird OHC stuff at this point too).
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    I welded stands to the valve covers and installed LS engine coil packs. Unfortunately I unsurprisingly warped the valve covers so they perpetually leak. I need to change the gaskets again.
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    I was back on the road in spring in time to go on the Car Craft Anti-Tour again. However halfway through I lost a front wheel bearing. I could hear it chirping and actually managed to catch it be for it was tragic, but did mean I missed a day of the event. Some random PepBoy's parking lot. I actually was hoping they would change it but insisted their tech's were too backed up to get to it that day, so I bought a few tools and got to work. This was forboding the challenges I'd have going to Drag Week.
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    In August I installed a solid state Windows 7 computer in the trunk and finished the digital dash conversion.
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    Overall, 2013 was going okay other than the wheel bearing, I was driving the car to work and back, an occassional trip to Las Vegas, etc and wasn't having any issues and felt ready for Drag Week. Looking forward to launching more aggressively with the 9" and the new 3.89 gears over the 3.42's.
     
  16. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    When I changed out the rear axle to the 9", I expected to need to cut the driveshaft down, but infact it needed to be longer by 1.25", plus I wanted to upgrade to 1350 U-joints. Luckily I had an extra long yoke so I continued to use my old 2.5" driveshaft while I ordered a new 3" one from American Powertrain. I sent them the measurements and it shows up August 16, SHORTER than my existing one! WTH! So I haul it three hours to the next down to get a new one made with the ends, and from that day on it had vibration issues at speed. I suspect the shop I went to did not balance it correctly, but I have a 3" shaft with 1350 u-joints that is the correct length, I should be good to go.
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    Bought a new set of drag radials and all packed up and ready to hit the road.
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    Then more trouble begins. About 100 miles out from home the bolt holding my alternator in place, and also my ground cable, snaps. The tension on the belt pulled alternator forward. I didn't have a backing bolt in it because it's a large case SI alternator and the bolt didn't line up. With the ground cable suddenly coming loose some weird electrical things occurred before I shut down the engine and coasted to an exit.
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    I pulled a longer bolt out of the air conditioning bracket and with a socket for a spacer I wasn't "Busted" yet!
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    Then the next day, I was climbing the 6% grade going to Denver on I-70 when traffic ground to a halt. Would be stopped for 10-15 minutes, move 200 feet, then stop for 10-15 minutes. It sucked, but then sucked more when I started loosing fuel pressure. I had to get a group of cars to hold up so I could coast backwards down the hill over to the right shoulder to troubleshoot. Break down #2 in as many days. I have a fuel pressure gauge on the fuel rail, so I knew I didn't have fuel there. After some troubleshooting I came to the conclusion that my surge tank was empty, aka my mechanical pump wasn't pumping fuel into it. After some creative work on getting fuel into the surge tank the car fired right up and seemed to run fine. Near as I can tell the short run times, on a steep incline, the mechanical fuel pump was not replacing the fuel into surge canister as fast as the engine was consuming, or maybe not even priming, for the short drives. But I got moving again and it looked like a lumber truck over turned on the road.
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    Finally get to Denver, it's 103ºF, but my A/C is working great (even with the bolt removed), car is sitting happy at 186ºF in traffic as I had to go around town to take care of some business (namely renew my passport), but then the clutch starts feeling funny as I'm sitting in stop and go traffic. The pedal is getting harder and harder to push. I'm sitting in traffic thinking I need to find a place to park and get under the car to see what's up when all of a sudden the clutch rod bends and the car lurches forward, in traffic and I barely pull a hard right into a drive way and lay on the brakes stalling the engine. Now I'm stuck in some person's driveway. Fortunately I had a spare set of clutch linkage in the trunk. So I get to work installing the spare rod and the clutch fork moves freely, the throwout bearing appears to be sliding free on the input shaft, but when the rod is installed I cannot push the pedal in.... The damn fancy McLeold pressure plate is siezed up. Fortunately I knew someone in Denver and got a tow truck coming to get my car to take to his house. The owners were home of the house I was at, and were less than thrilled with me being there, but were not jerks about it. Got towed to my friends and contemplated pulling just the transmission, but the new X-pipe made it difficult. At home I could yank the engine and transmission in under an hour, but out here? Third break down, second that day. I threw in the towel. I left the car there and got a rental car and participated in Drag Week as a spectator in 2013.
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    So at the end of September 2013 I take my truck, pick up a u-haul trailer and head for Denver to fetch the car. Driving the unloaded trailer one of the hubs felt just a tad warmer than the others at every gas station, and I suspected something was up, and sure enough, got the car loaded up (the clutch loosened at some point while I was away), made it 2 miles before it was smoking like I was shot by the Red Baron. Pulled over, put a jack under the axle and the tire basically fell off. Unloaded the car, come-a-long'd the axle up and drove to a U-haul to exchange it.
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    Then back on the road.
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    I had already planned to take 2014 off from Drag Week because of planned 2014 vacations, so there wasn't a rush to get ready after that. Three separate, unrelated, failures killed my motivation to do anything with the car for a long while. I didn't bother fixing it until the following February. Near as I can tell the pressure plate got hot and those loose weights McLeold puts on the pressure plate expanded or something causing the pressure plate to jam. I now have a Zoom cluch in the car. Drove the car around during the summer and fall of 2014, but didn't do anything more than that.
     
    Last edited: Jul 2, 2018
  17. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    But one thing that strikes up motivation is sitting at home and watching Drag Week on the internet. Suddenly I was interested in a few more upgrades and going for 2015. Started making plans then the circumstances came around where I proposed to my girlfriend but still insisted I go on Drag Week. October wedding, September racing, what could go wrong? lol.

    January of 2015 I picked up one an SRE oil pan because since I put the big brakes on it in 2009 the oil pressure would dive when I was hard on the brakes, plus I wanted a little more volume to keep the oil temps down, as well as a mini-starter.
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    And I decided my upgrade would be a bigger roller cam and a set of 1.65 roller rockers. I ordered a the MPG cam that Jim tested out on Eduardo's engine. Put a bunch more lift into the engine and dialed back the duration a bit. Pulled the idle vacuum WAY up, along with way better overall driving characteristics. I'd been spinning the engine to 6,000-6,200 rpm going down the track so I figured I'd also run an external oil line to the back of the block to keep the rear main oil passage fed. I do not have any other oil mods made to the '72 block.
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    I used a standard starter for mockup incase I need to change the starter on the road.
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    I am not a fan of these felpro intake gaskets, just feel they could have more substance to them. But the roller rockers are nice! The HEI distributor there is my oil priming distributor. a 1-1/8" socket fits over the advance spring posts and spin it with a drill real nice.
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    I re-plumbed my fuel system. Moved my surge tank and pumps to the back of the car and added an electric lift fuel pump instead of the mechanical pump. With the additional pump and my electrical system already being taxed (I was having regular problems with the 105 amp SI alternators), I decided to upgrade to a CS144 alternator. With that, I cut and re-welded the rear tab bracket to fit the new larger alternator.
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    And in July it went back in the car. I really liked the way it ran. I had to do some re-tuning due to the higher vacuum across the board.
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    Made it to work, ready to go!
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    The mrs. was commited to go with me to Drag Week so I re-charged the AC and put some seat covers in. Unfortunately the AC compressor clutch came apart about 3 days in. Was working good until that point.
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    I installed a front wheel vehicle speed sensor to add traction control to the car. It reads the casting on the back of the rotor hat. Was hoping with some power management I could get the 60ft down. Unfortunately I wasn't able to dial it in as well I had hoped. I have it better now, but haven't been to the drag strip to try it out.
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    The traction control works by retarding the timing to limit power. You can see where I dump the clutch off the 2-step and the rear wheels spin up, timing is pulled until the rear wheel speed matches the front wheel speed.
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    To aid with shifting on time, I added two LED lights on the dash, one comes on at 5,000rpm and the second at 5,800rpm, figuring I'll try and get the shift at 6,000rpm. The dash turns bright red at 6,000rpm.


    Now on to Drag Week 2015!
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  18. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Because my wife was coming with me this year I decided to pull a trailer to make loading and unloading less eventful and time consuming. Loaded up and ready to go.
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    She was commited, to at least 4,100 miles in two weeks with me in a 1977 Buick Skylark!
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    Had a fuel pump relay die on us crossing Wyoming, but only took a few minutes to trouble shoot, change and back on our way, then we made it to Gateway Motorsports Park, IL.
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    The first day passes were about the same as my previous runs, but the second day when I stopped trying to dial in the 2-step and crutch on the traction control for launch I was rewarded with a 12.6 at 110.6mph. Ultimately getting the mph in the 112's and running 12.5x with 2 second 60ft's.
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    Then day 3 didn't go as planned! I made a pass and it seemed down on power, but wasn't sure that it wasn't traction control so I got back in line. It wasn't making any funny noises and oil pressure was normal. I got to the end of the track on the next pass and its running really rough and then quits. I coast to the return road and park under a tree on the side of the road. Due to some rule drama I wasn't allowed to tow my car to the pits and I wasn't inclined to push it nearly a half mile to my trailer for tools and such, so I just went and got my laptop, test light and voltmeter. I hooked up the laptop and the ECU couldn't get a cam sync and it was backfiring when cranking the engine. Definitely very odd. I disabled the fuel and spark then did a crank and cam trigger log and the cam pulse was WAAAAAY off from where it was supposed to be. Like 120º of rotation off, and it was different every time I cranked it. I thought I had either stripped the distributor gear (but I had oil pressure), or worse yet, broke a timing set. No problem, I had a spare timing set in the trailer, and as long as no valves critically collided with pistons I could limp it the rest of the week and home. So playing to the grey area of the rules another competitor towed my trailer with tools to me.
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    Then a sigh of relief, I pulled the harmonic balancer off and notice my trigger wheel is loose on the pulley! The computer is lost! I had 4 roll pins holding the wheel in place, and they are all gone. They had been in there since 2009, and were definitively there when I left home, but they were gone now.


    I lined up the holes, stuck cotter pins in it, bolted it all back together and it fired up like a new car. Like nothing happened. Those cotter pins are still in it today.
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    Driving down the return road with my trailer in tow!
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    We were back on the road!
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    Some track action.
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    Some photoshop action =P
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  19. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Made it to Day 5. It was hot out, but we came prepared!
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    Think I can beat him?
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    Rest of the week and the trip home was pretty uneventful with a comical 4,321 miles driven in about 2 weeks. Then back to work.
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    No rest for the wary, lol
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    A year later, in September of 2016, I was very tired of the vibration that came with the driveshaft, in 2013. I drew out some lines on the floor of my garage, took several measurements and determined the compound angle of the driveshaft at load is 1.5º, which is perfectly in range for smooth running. I stuck my old drive shaft in and the vibration was nearly gone, so was fairly certain it was the driveshaft balance. I then downloaded a vibration "measuring" app on my cellphone and figured I'd try the 2 hose clamp method to see if I could balance the driveshaft. I put 8 equal spaced marks on the driveshaft to reference the weight from.
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    I put the rear on jackstands to run up to speed, made a clamp for my phone that threaded on the shifter and it would measure vibration coming through the shifter. I would measure the vibration at 10mph increments up to ~80mph.
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    First I took baseline measurements with my old driveshaft. The idea would be to move the hose clamps around until I achieved the same or less measured vibration as the small driveshaft.
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    These are the values compared with no hose clamps on the drive shaft. Basically 15% more vibration measured at 70mph.
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    After plotting all the data up moving one clamp around I came up with where I thought one clamp belonged, so installing two then starting to split them apart to further refine it, but it ended up that both clamps wanted to be in the same position. So it was really out of balance, and probably wanted more weight. At the top, you can see the uncorrected values and corrected values. Very much improved but still not as good as the small shaft, but dang close. Hard to tell when driving down the road, overall it was a great improvement.
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    This is where the clamps ended up.
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    Shortly after I got to take a 700 mile test drive for a job interview in Tahoe.
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    I ended up getting that job and it was based in Reno. So we moved across the state. My wife couldn't drive the car and she wasn't comfortable towing a trailer behind the truck, so here I am towing stuff we need for day to day living while the rest went into storage, while my wife, son and truck are in front of me.
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  20. TheSilverBuick

    TheSilverBuick In the Middle of No Where

    Then in February 2017, when I was driving home from work, I made a right turn rather spiritly and the left front dropped out on me. I was able to pull it to the right curb and stop. The lower ball joint snapped. I had installed it in 2009, and it had roughly 100,000 miles on it, plus the stress of racing, and dirt roads going to work, etc, I figured I shouldn't be surprised.
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    So naturally it was time to upgrade. I ended up replacing all the steering components as well.
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    The flat bed set the car in the driveway, where I had used 2x4's to keep the tire out of the fender until the parts showed up.
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    Got it back together and my son and I went to a local cars and coffee. Not the best weather, but it was a good test drive.
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    In April 2017 I started experimenting with converting a smog pump to a vacuum pump. I had always heard that oil and the carbon seals do not work together, so I replaced the carbon seals with some rubber seals. But one of the vanes bubbled and the bubble burned the rubber seal after about 15 minutes of run time. I have more pumps on the shelf now for spare parts, but I haven't revisited this yet.
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    Was pulling about 4inHg of vacuum at idle, which is pretty decent given my leaky valve covers.
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    Then last July, since I now lived in an actual city, with commecial services, I had the driveshaft re-balanced by a local shop.
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    Then since then I haven't done much with it but drive it. Unfortunately ended up rattling the engine pretty good a few months back lugging it down lower than I'd normally go and it went lean to compound it. The oil pressure seems to have lost about 10psi across the board. Doesn't make any noises, but the oil pressure is down. I've been driving it still, but I'm pretty sure it's going to need a crank because iirc the one in it is already .020" under size. I need to double check the pressure with another gauge, but I'm not expecting it to read higher. So I need to finish up my Firebird, go on Drag Week with it, then look at re-doing the Skylark's short block.
     

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