bk82388

Hi everyone! I am new to the site and I thought it may be the place to get some answers to my questions.

My father gave me his 1982 Cutlass Supreme Brougham Coupe with the V6 diesel engine in it. The car is truly like no other cutlass that I have come accross in that it has a vinyl interior instead of the plush cloth seats and obviously the diesel makes it a little more unique.

Curious if anyone here knows how many of these were actually built with the diesel engine or how I could go about getting the build sheet and info from GM.

Also, the hood insulation pad has seen much better days, and I am curious where I might be able to purchase a new one!

Honestly, any information anyone has on the car would be appreciated. The car means a lot to me as it was always in the garage when I was growing up and it became "the car" in my own mind. I really would like to learn more about it and anything you all can do to help would be appreciated!!

Thanks

rocketraider

You have a comparatively rare beast. Most of the Diesel cars went to the scrapyard long ago.

I don't have the info you've asked for, but a V6 Cutlass Diesel sedan showed up at the 2009 OCA National Meet and it had a constant crowd around it. When it entered the showfield we heard Diesel clattering but didn't know what it was. As it made its way to its show space it picked up a whole entourage following it. Looked like rats behind a Pied Piper...

Lot of people want to forget the Diesels, but in spite of their issues, I still think the Diesel program was one of Oldsmobile's successes. No other Division stepped up (ok, it was assigned to them) when GM decided to produce passenger car Diesels.

The Oldsmobile engineers admitted they knew nothing about Diesels but they learned as they went and it was reasonably successful until the problems started showing up. Two things contributed more to the failures than anything else: 1) GM marketed the Diesels as lower maintenance and 2) many of the people who bought them took GM at its word and didn't maintain them at all. Those folks really had no business owning a Diesel.

Everyone I've known who got good service from their Olds Diesel maintained it religiously, used the best fuel and oil they could get, and had extra fuel filters and water separators installed. In other words, people who understood Diesels. Also helped that these folks were driving their Diesels long enough to get everything thoroughly warmed up and equalized, with very little short trip driving.

bk82388

any other insight?

1970cs

Welcome to C.O.! You may want to start here.... http://www.gmheritagecenter.com/

Pat

joe_padavano

Yeah, I was one of those people. I've only ever seen two V6 diesel cars in my life, the one at Seven Springs, and one that came to our All-GM show one year. This is the only Olds with a true serpentine belt system.

jaunty75

My father owned a '79 Toronado diesel, and he maintained it just like the dealer and rocketraider said he should, and it still blew a headgasket at 20,000 miles (while he happened to be on vacation 500 miles from home). He was a beneficiary of the result of a class-action lawsuit against GM regarding these early Olds diesels where he received a refund of his repair expenses.

Olds started offering diesel engines in 1978 and did so through 1985. Your experience with the diesel was likely a function of when during that time span you bought one. Early on, and you were more likely to experience problems. Later on, when Olds had more experience and figured out what they were doing, and you were less likely to.


Some interesting reads:


Better Off Dead
The story behind some engines that shouldn't have been.

http://www.popularhotrodding.com/fea...obile_engines/


The Cars That Killed GM: The Oldsmobile Diesel

http://www.autosavant.com/2009/08/11...mobile-diesel/


G.M.’s Dreadful Engines Gave Diesels a Bad Name

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/au...es/18RUST.html



Overall, I would not characterize the Olds diesel engine program as a success. In fact, as one article I read noted, the Olds diesel program probably did more than anything else to harm the perception of diesel engines in consumers' minds.

Tedd Thompson

My dad bought a new diesel Delta in 78 and could not depend on it to get him out of town. I believe he had three sets of head gaskets blow and problems with fuel pumps injectors a couple of times. Traded it in for a new Toro when it only had 11 thousand miles on it. I think he only received 2500 dollars, at that time you could not give them away for free at a dealership....Tedd

jaunty75

Interesting that the owner quoted in one of the articles above also had a head gasket blow, as did my father, as I mentioned.

Yours being a '78 was definitely one of the guinea pigs!

olds 307 and 403

My understanding is the V6 is the best of the Olds diesels for reliability. More head bolts per head, I believe. I bet the mileage is awesome too.

z11375ss

I actually owned one of these pigs in the eighties. It was given to me by my bro in law. He never did like me. I remember changing the starter in the freezing cold in an apartment parking lot in the snow. The starter was like 100 bucks on top of it.
Does your diesel have the harmonic distortion mine had? At about 42 mph, with the right pedal pressure the car would shake like it was coming apart. You either stepped on/backed off the gas or hit the brakes. I think it was the transmission drive shaft harmonizing with the crankshaft. That's all I could figure.
Reverse soon became gone. Now I had to park the car at the train so I could just pull away. No backing up. In 1987 I went to look at the new 5.0s. They gave me 600 dollars in a trade in value for the mighty Cutlass Cierra diesel!. As soon as the guy said the price, I said, "DONE!" LOL! Good times, bad times. But times all the same.

DXSMOKE

Google hood insulation and someone should be able to cut you one that would fit. As far as parts go, auto parts stores, eBay, word of mouth and junk yards - GM dealer obsolete parts look up. They would need a part number.
I worked in a diesel shop during the era of the 5.7 diesel and worked on a lot of them and owned several myself. There were three families involved with this business and between them they owned 14 5.7 diesel cars and one 4.3 v6 representing every GM division, three were purchased new: 81 Bonneville, 84 Buick Lesaber, 85 Cad Fleetwood RWD. They were very popular in ag country. Every farmer had one, and diesel fuel was at that time thirty cents a gal cheaper than gas. The first years 1978-1980 were plagued with problems, injection pump failures, broken rear main caps, resulting in rear main oil leaks, blown head gaskets due to failed head bolts, wrist pin bushing failure resulting in the piston hitting the head. I heard of camshaft failure in the early engines (flat tappet cam) but never saw any in our shop. The blame goes squarely on GM brass who wanted the engine out there before Olds engineers thought it was ready for market! GM touted it as low maintenance, no tune ups needed, long oil change intervals of 5000 miles. Dealers sold them to the wrong people, someone with a three mile commute was not a good candidate for a diesel. Not enough technicians understood diesel operation or repair. In 1980 Olds started making changes, went to micro injecters from pencil injecters, eliminating return lines and fittings. 1981 saw an improved block, revised rear main cap, roller cam and lifters. Contrary to what you have been told, it never was a converted gas block. The 350 gas of that time had holes through the main webbing of the block and 2.5 inch mains. The diesel had much thicker main webbing, 3” mains, no holes in the webbing and much heavier rods and bolts and full floating wrist pins. The 81 engine was improved but still suffered from three things, that i saw. 1. oil ring sticking when using 10-40 oil and long oil change intervals, straight 30 wt above 32 deg and 10-30 below 32 deg. was recomended. 2. Wrist pin bushing failure 90-120,000 miles, and 3. Broken head bolts, although GM had revised their head bolts. If I remember right, it took three revisions before they got the head bolts right. In 1982, they went to steel clad wrist pin bushings, and that ended that problem. And 1984 to a two piece oil ring, from a three piece, and that ended the oil ring sticking problem. By 1984 it was a very good engine, in my opinion. But, by then, everyone had a bad taste in their mouth for them. The 84 Lesaber went 220,000 before head gasket failure and the 85 Cad went 250,000 miles with no major problems before it was replaced. And the only thing I replaced was two glow plug controllers, two sets of glow plugs, and an oil pump drive shaft. They had a tendency to round off in the vacuum pump drive gear with high miles. They were octagon shaped. Those of us In the know bought nice full sized GM cars - cheap - built an updated 5.7 diesel and had a good car that got 26-30 mpg on the highway. Nothing could touch them for comfort and mileage at that time. Also had an 84 Grand Prix 5.7 diesel. It would squeal the tires! No kidding! And got 35 mpg highway because they were lighter than a 98. As far as the 4.3 diesel goes, they’re pretty trouble free. You have a fairly rare car there. Back in the day I only saw two of the RWD version, one in a Monty and one in a Cutlass. All the others were FWD as was the one I did maintenance on, a Pontiac 6000. Enjoy it! You don’t see the 4.3 diesel very often anymore. By the way - want a real rare 5.7 diesel?? Find a 1982-84 El Camino diesel!!

DXSMOKE

bk82388 Does yours have the rally gauge package with oil pres temp battery & tachometer?? looked @ one at the dealer once, cutlass supreme hatch roofs, rally gauges, tilt, cruse, bucket seat and counsal auto on the floor with the 5.7 diesel 1983.