1960 Electra 225 Convertible R&R

[Smartin]

Picked up a little project today for a friend...

I'll be doing the work on the engine compartment and trunk to bring it up to snuff for the 2006 BCA national in Rochester. I'll also be working out any other bugs the car has everywhere else. Hoping to grab a senior award for this one!

I'll be asking dumb questions from time to time due to my lack of knowledge with this vintage Buick. I'll also try to keep this thread updated on my progress in the next couple months!


Here's the beast!










It fits in the garage nicely

[BamaWildcat]

Make sure you pet that Nailhead.

[skyphix]

What a nice car!

[Junkman]

I hope to get my '60 convertible looking that nice! I see that one has the bucket seat option. My Chalet Blue project has bucket seats,but no console.The console would be a hard item to find at the swap meets.

[Smartin]

Tore into the trunk yesterday and finally finished stripping the tar paper off the pan and cleaned it up at bit with thinner and a scratch pad. This is a SOLID car!

Before:




After:




This is what came out - everything gets replaced....except the irreplaceable printed cardboard trim pieces.

[Smartin]

Trunk floor is painted along with the jack parts and the spare tire.

Next in line is the underside of the trunk lid, which is scratched up and a little rusty in spots.


Jack bits:




Trunk floor covered with Eastwood Rust Encapsulator (I still have the stuff stuck to my fingers)




This will all be covered up by new trunk material and original cardboard trim pieces when it goes to the upholstery shop this Winter.

[Smartin]

Weekend progress:

Only managed to break one bolt getting the t-stat housing off. But I was able to wrench on the stud and unscrew it once i soaked it with PB Blaster.



Oh the destruction!!!!





Oh the beauty




Generator, fan guard, and air cleaner top came out nice..

[BamaWildcat]

You know parts are clean when you can put them on the bed!

Will you be taking the Nailhead out and painting it?

[Smartin]

That's a spare room in the basement that no one ever sees anyway

The engine will be stripped down to the short block in the car. Heads will be off. Yes, it will be painted, also. This engine compartment is not going to have a speck of dirt in it when I get done with it. The firewall is getting refinished, too...as soon as I can pull all the parts outta there.

[Smartin]

Didn't get too far today, since I broke two sockets and managed to destroy the passenger side exhaust manifold.




But I got the intake, valve covers, and the drivers side exh manifold off.

I had to make a trip to Sears for a new impact wrench and some new sockets...

[Smartin]

When I popped off the passenger side head this morning, this made its way to the floor. I have no idea what it is, or where it came from. Can anyone help out?? It's roughly 5/8" tall and 7/16" wide. It looks to be a plug of sorts, but it has a hole through it.

I can't see anywhere that it came out.

[Smartin]

Discoveries I made this weekend:

Dead heater core (which explains the mildew problem and the fogging windshield)




I also got the passenger side manifold off and found that the heat riser was frozen shut. This would explain the power issue!

The heads are getting rebuilt as soon as I get the gaskets and seals from CARS.


Current state of affairs: waiting for parts.

[Smartin]

Got some more random stuff done today...

Did some cleaning under the hood today, but concentrated on getting the heater box cover done, power steering pump, horns, and breather tube clean and painted. Every nut and bolt gets wire wheeled and clearcoated, unless noted a specific color. I love seeing things come together, even if it is just a heater box! Everything's clean and spotless. I love it!!


PS pump: purrrrdy!





Heater Box Cover - this should look good when mounted again





T00B...nothing special here..





I got the heater core out last night and it is TOAST. When I say TOAST, I mean it must have been leaking for 5 years. No wonder everyone was complaining of mildew problems. I hope it can be recored!

[Smartin]

CARS order came today.

Does anyone else notice that they use hydraulic hose for their power steering hoses? Not to mention the fact that they sent the wrong one...

I think I'll be going to the Bobcat dealer with my old hoses and have them make me two hoses that are identical to the old ones. Don't want to waste another month trying to get the right ones from CARS.

Everything else looks right except the head gasket kit. Where is the valley cover gasket??? There are what looks to be two sets of valve cover gaskets and NO valley cover gasket. WTF??

Heads are getting taken to the machinist tomorrow for a cleanup and rebuild, along with the exh manifolds to be hot tanked and blasted for cast iron paint.

BTW, the Buick Green paint is really nice!! It goes on thick and dries VERY fast. And so does the chassi black paint. I love this stuff! I got a bunch of little parts stripped and painted tonight, so I actually feel like I made it somewhere on the car. I feel like I've been sitting idle with this thing waiting for this one shipment from CAhhhhS.

[BamaWildcat]

Yep, good old CARS. I haven't had near the trouble out of them that some folks had, but at one time my car had to wait at the body shop an additional two weeks waiting on gaskets CARS said would get there "in a couple of days".

Did you buy the Chassis and Buick Green paint from them?

[Smartin]

I did...and it's really good stuff.

[Smartin]

Hokay,

Got somewhere tonight! yay!

I painted all the engine brackets and such...(forgot to include the fuel filter housing in the picture )





I also shot the firewall tonight. It needed very little touchup, and much more general cleaning than anything. There were a few spots where the paint had chipped off and started to rust a bit, so I cleaned that up along with the rest of the wall. Masked everything off and bombed it with some paint. Came out very nice! It's starting to look like a car again

This is the part I really like - when I can actually see progress being made. HOPEFULLY, I'll be able to make it to the machine shop tomorrow to drop the heads & exhaust manifolds off, and also to the Bobcat dealer to make some new power steering hoses.

Here's the firewall:

[Smartin]

More paint..


Block is done:



Intake:



Valley Pan:



Core Support top bar:

[Mister T]

Looking good Adam, you going to get that battery tray as well?

[Smartin]

Yes, all the black parts will be getting a fresh coat of chassis black when I can get everything cleaned up, sanded, and masked. There's a lot of black under that hood! The battery tray looks worse than it is. It's just dirty from me using it as a parts tray when disassembling.

Heads and manifolds are still sitting in my truck waiting to be dropped off at the shop. They weren't open yesterday, Go figure.

I also have to take the distributor up there so they can press out the roll pin. I fought that thing until I was blue in the face yesterday. The vac advance can is dead, so I have ot take the whole thing apart to replace it.

[flynbuick]

Adam

That is great work. Could I rent you for a couple of weeks?

[Smartin]

How's the food in NC?

You'll have to help me figure out what to say to Jon when I tell him I'm leaving for a month to go play with cars on the East coast

[flynbuick]

Tell him that you began hearing the Theme from Deliverence in your mind and you have developed a craving for pickled pigs feet.

[Smartin]

pickled pigs feet - where do I sign up??

[flynbuick]

Adam

If you can slide one of those pigs feet that has been mellowing in a 5 gallon jar of golden mystery elixer for a couple of years down your hatch then you will surely qualify to be an honorary North Carolinian in no time.