I know, seems pretty stupid to spend so much money into a car I dont have a title on. There's a short story in this to explain why.. Origionally when I bought the car I was driving a 2005 300C, and had a truck in the back yard. I didnt really trust the truck, and dont own a trailer. Have to take the Skylark to Lubbock and get it appraised so I can get a title. Was hoping to get the car fixed enough to drive it to Lubbock (70 mile trip, one way) and get it appraised then. Anyways, the company I was working for sold the facility (prison guard) to another company, and due to lost paychecks and cut hours during the transaction I knew I was going to lose the 300C. Had bought the 300 in September before I knew the company was selling out.. if I had known, never would've got it. Was a very nice, very fast car. Gotta love the new hemi's, but having a car that fragile is scary. Whole front end is plastic, and was pulled off many a time by backing out of my driveway due to the low clearance. Anyways, car was repossessed, so I was down to the truck. (Would rather pay the house bills and keep a place to live than live out of the car.) Was doing fine till the motor blew on the way back from lubbock, a week before I was suppose to go pickup a 4-door parts car in south texas for my Skylark. Was flat broke at the time, couldnt afford to get a motor, and the bank I was at at the time wouldnt give me a loan due to the repossession. Skylark was running, so I drove it around for a week till I got paid. (I know, very stupid to do with no insurance on it, etc. But I get bi-weekly paychecks, couldnt do anything else at the time.). On my days off I took it to the local auto shop to have the brakes done.. they were completely shot. Found a disk brake setup on e-bay on sale for 300, and bought it. Went ahead and replaced the whole brake system, might as well do it right. We kept finding more and more problems as we went.. The mechanic sold my cousin (also my roommate) a pickup and I helped her pay it off. (87 Chevy shortbed) In exchange for being able to use it when I like I keep up the maintenance. Figured it was a good deal at the time, so we bought it to have a reliable vehicle. I'm still driving it while fixing the Skylark.. And that's where I am now. Talking with a board member about getting it appraised too. The bank I'm with now doesnt go by your credit, so long as you have good credit with them. They dont report to credit agencies, etc, and have aggreed to give me a loan to rebuild the motor once I get it appraised and titled. In the process of doing that. I think if I didnt have bad luck, I wouldnt have any luck at all. o No: Of course, getting the Skylark drivable and taking it to Lubbock for the appraisal seemed like a good idea at the time. Had a wrecker pick it up and deliver it to my house. :idea2: I'm not claiming to be smart, I just have alot of half-baked ideas..
what i was trying to say is that the higher the car apraises for the more the bonding company will want to insure the title. by getting it appraised early before dumping a bunch of cash into it you can save yourself some money on the bonding of the title
Re: 69 Skylark - "Free Falling" build up. Been awhile since I've last posted an update on this, so here I go. I purchased a wrecked 68 GS as a parts car from Cole D, along with a 68 Skylark convertable. Glad it was a short trip to go get them. Convertable ran, but had some rust issues. Ended up trading the convertable to Carmantx for a new motor. (everybody around here calls me a horse trader, I have a bad habbit of keeping cars less than a year. Only exceptions are by Buicks. p ) The motor was built by a racing engine specialist out of... hmm, cant remember at the moment. Has been bored 30 over, with arp studs in the bottom end. Came with a new comp cam, but I swapped it for a TA 310 cam. .499 lift @ 232 duration. :Brow: Pulled the heads off the motor before I did the cam swap to be sure of clearance issues, has low compression pistons in it. I'm guessing 8.5:1? Block hasnt been decked, still has the SO code on it. (SO code = 70 350 motor, 2 barrel) It came with a TA Stage 1 intake and a 750 Edelbrock carb, but I'm going to use an 800 cfm Quadrajet I bought off a 72 Buick 225. Also using some headers I bought from a board member, not sure the brand. Has 3 inch collectors tho, and sounds really aggressive. Motor came with a Petronix Ignitor points conversion, and a MSD coil. WHen I first started it the local know it all heard and stopped by to inspect, he's been trying to get me to race him once I have it going against his supposed 9 second camaro, which he's never run before. (72 Camaro, fully gutted with a roll cage, 10.5 rear slicks, fiberglass front end, and a 454. No accessories, manual brakes, electric water pump, and runs off racing fuel out open headers. 650 Double pumper carb) I think he was checking out the competition, didnt like it when I pointed out that I can drive this anywhere and have fun while he can only go a few miles before running out of the special racing fuel he uses. Nearest place for that fuel is Lubbock, 70 miles away. Here is a funny part to this: I have a couple issues to work out. One, the quadrajet is getting rebuilt, it wouldnt put enough fuel into the car to keep it going, had to really pump it hard just to get a tiny sputter of fuel out of it. So after disconnecting the fuel line from the carb to double check that the fuel pump is working properly, I went to turn it over and the car fired up! Carb must've had a bunch of fuel in it and finally let it loose. Tried to turn the car off, but when I turned the ignition back to the off position the car kept running, I've got a wiring problem somewhere so it keeps sending power to the coil. Had to run around and disconnect the battery to kill the car. The mechanical fuel pump is working fine, it flooded the top of the motor with gas and left a decent little puddle (lake) on the floor. ou: Anyways, last night I swapped out the steering column. Pulled the floor shift setup off the GS (turns out this 68 GS 350 has a 400 transmission in it. Going to pull that today if the weather holds out) and have started swaping it over. Guess I have to pull the under dash wiring harness out of the GS too. Still need to cut off the bucket seat brackets, and the brackets that hold the console and get them welded into the Skylark. A shame the GS is totaled, would've been a nice car. Passenger side of the body is crushed, pushed in the door pillar. Would cost more than the car is worth to restore. I think I've got a nasty 350 build figured out on paper. Have it listed out as far as machine work, and the parts one 5 pieces of notebook paper. Will post it here once I get it out of my TA cataloge (left it with the car, 10 miles away).
Motor build specs I promised: http://www.v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=166504 Keep in mind I dont know too much about Buicks. This looks good to me on paper, but I cant even begin to understand how well it would do with a real life buildup.
Where is Dickens,Tx? Looks like a a nice project.When I started looking for a Buick I thought I wanted a 70-72 GS but I came across a 69 GS350 in Cal that caught my eye and now I'm glad I bought it instead. Kirk Chandler,AZ
Dickens is 60 miles east of Lubbock, TX, up in the panhandle south of Amarillo. Still looking for a car? This one is up for sale. $3,000 takes it and all the pieces I've collected for it.
I've found a nice building that the owner is willing to finance himself, I just dont have the funds to put the deposit he wants down on it. Atleast with the building I'd be able to tear down a car completely and still be able to keep it inside. I'm kinda stuck on the Skylark at the moment.. If it sells, then ok. If not, then I'll keep working on it, either way it doesnt bother me. But with the building, I'd be able to work out of it on the side. 24x100 with a 20 foot ceiling for $8,200. Cant really beat that eh? :Brow:
