I haven't been happy with the brakes on my 53 since day one. They are OK but not really good brakes, I have a scare-bird disc brake conversion in the front and drums in the back. Today I did a vacuum test, there is 12 inches of vacuum at idle, the altitude here is about 2600 feet, so at sea level it should be a little higher, maybe 14. I'm thinking this could be the problem? If I shut the engine off in neutral at 40 MPH and hit the brakes a few times to get rid of the vacuum it doesn't seem to make any difference? Anyway that is what I did to the Buick today, beside touching up some little paint chips Bob H.
Took me a while and quite a few made up graphic words but I prevailed and got those mufflers and tailpipes tucked up where I wanted them.
Replaced the saggy, baggy springs on the left with some "Moog C501 cargo variable rate springs, on the right. Drove the car to BG on the "left" springs and kept bottoming out over every serious bridge joint/construction separation and the drive shaft was contacting the aft tunnel. Fortunate no scoring of the drive shaft, just some scuffing of the paint. So, I ordered new springs as soon as I hit the garage when I got home before I went to bed. Drove it once already, and it is a night/day difference. Added about 3" lift to the rear. So it stands well. No complaints.
I put the top down a couple of weeks ago, after adding some fluid to the pump, and took it out to a brewery to hang out today.
Saturday. The Riv(68) had been having a intermittent stumble at random RPM's and load condition. Felt like it would starve for fuel then catch and go. Wasnt sure if it was fuel or ing. I couldnt remember the last time the inline fuel filter had been replaced in the Qjet. Pulled it out and found it to be pretty crusty. Replaced. started the car and checked for leaks. Sunday AM, pull the car cover off, fire it up and head for church. Get to the stop sign a mile up the road and it stalls.Cranks and wont fire. She never stalls, ever. Open the hood and theres fuel pooled on the intake. Do a flooded engine restart and get it back to the shop. Jumped into the 97 Riv and head off to church. Later I pull the carb and open it up on the bench. Find nothing wrong sprayed her out, reassmb, put back on the car and its still flooding out the vent ,weird. Pulled the carb off the RaSabre, slapped it on the 68 and went for a ride! Will deal with the flooding issue later. Next I pulled the trailer around and off loaded the Skyhawk to get ready to drop in the Tomahawk. After that mocked up the carb , brackets and throttle stop while it was still on the stand. by that time it was getting towards dinner time so closed it up for the night.
Went through it again today replaced the needle and seat reassembled and seems like problem solved. Set it on the RaSabre to test.
Swapped in the new grille. Finished up the wipers and put in the kick panels from Todd It's great getting rid of boxes of car parts from the garage! Maybe I can clean the place up?
Took my ‘70 GS to a local car show Saturday afternoon. It was the only Buick there. About 80 cars in attendance. There was no entry fee. I came home with a free T-shirt, a plaque, and they gave me $50 cash. I think the judges kind of liked the old girl.
Yesterday, I fired up my Dad's 64 Riviera and took it off of the jack stands that it's been sitting on for the last 4 or 5 years. I love hearing that 425 run. Hopefully, in the next few weeks I'm going to back it out of the garage and into the sunlight! I want to finsh replaceing the drivers side rocker panel that he started to do sometime this year.
Steering linkage to the rack and pinion was finalized and there is no binding,rough spots and it turns left and right like it should..
Been out with the top down all day. Probably put 150 miles on the odometer today. Took the family to lunch, ran some errands, took my oldest to work then took a nice long drive to dinner with my better half.
Spent 2 hours washing, cleaning and detailing the GS for the AACA regional meet in my area, drove there (only 5 miles away), no one was there? Looked at the flyer and noticed it said 6/11/23.... oops... try again tomorrow.
I cleaned up the convertible and took it to a car show with my son. Brought home a top 10 trophy! Was a good day. Ken
This was a very expensive week for tires! Discovered that the BFGs on both the front and rear were way, way out of date. Front 245/60s were dated 2004 and the rear 295/50s were dated 2011. But our local Discount Tire Store got me good pricing on them. Fronts were $175 each and the rears were $190. Still over $800 with install and tax. My other tire project was to finally install the "Tire Stickers" on my MT drag radials. I run them most of the time in order to harness my 560 lb. ft. of torque but hate going to shows with white letters on the front tires and black walls on the rear. Problem solved:
