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I already have. Just recently multiple times. Need to get someone to film thought.
Now i have fuel curve pretty well sorted out. I didnt remember that many moons ago i bought my intake with "working" competition series AFB's. Seller didnt technically lie, im sure they worked at some point.
Anyways, those had smaller secondary jets- and voila, now its not overly rich at wot either! Goes to .85 ( AFR 12.5) at smash of the throttle, and slowly creeps to .75 ( AFR 11.0) as the pull lasts, which is only good thing. The bog is also gone with combination of smaller secondary jet and tightening air doors. They really work flawlessly, believe it or not, all transitions from circuit to other, and wot. I ended up doing nothing to trans. When i got more miles under the belt today morning, i think ill suffer the city driving. After all i build it for driving distances, not as a grocery getter. At road the shift points are now perfect, and 75mph is nice 3000rpm- with enough passing power behind the pedal. And i spend most time at the hiway, time and miles-wise. Now to dyno to get all out of the programmable ignition. When i get some more money.
Last edited by Inline; March 23rd, 2021 at 02:48 AM.
I still feel that i nicely hit the goal with combination of engine/ trans/ rear gears. Drives effortlessly 80-85mph at highway ( my usual worktrip is 70 miles one way consisting of 55 miles of highway) just at the start of power band, plenty of passing power there. And it feels really good at 3000-3500rpm cruising speeds, does it really effortlessly.
Temps still keep dead set between 170-180f, and oil pressure on 50psi @ 1000rpm idle, with 0w-40 synthetic, after the blast to work on highway.
Only chased down problem at the moment is the valve-cover baffle at M/T covers, original baffle looked questionable at best, and its just that. Pulls a tad too much oil to catch can on my opinion. Just need to get the set screws out of covers without breaking them.. To make bigger baffle for it.
Other thing, not quite a problem, is the sound of roller rockers. I quess its normal thing since nothing have broke. Kinda like sewing machine. Been wondering does the cast aluminium valve covers with spacers to give clearance to valve train, amplify the sound?
And i have no sound-deadener at hood either
Need to move to chassis next, getting sea-sick riding that thing, all rubber parts, springs etc are old and worn.
Hve a great driving season everyone!
Last edited by Inline; April 24th, 2021 at 12:21 AM.
Been just driving this and filling up. No hicups ( except one flying alternator belt, woops, my miss), oil pressure still as new, temps stay dead set at 180F with clutch fan, and it pulls well. And cruises down the highway @ 3500rpm without a problem ( ~90mph)
Yesterday i went to bigger shopping trip to buy stuff to build a grill to new house, you barely could notice the trailer behind.
2000 miles behind after the first start. I quess its time to sum up the spend time, behind the wheel, and outside, with some pictures, and future plans.
Well, here we are at my wifes parents summer cottage, just arrived, to spend Mid-summers fest ( its the biggest thing among the Christmas and New Year here in Finland). 2 adults, 2 childrens, all the luggage and needs aboard. 180 miles one way, so relatively short trip.
They make awfully small parking lots here. Notes to the picture, the whole suspension gets renewed at winter, all the rubber parts, coil springs and shocks. Cargo coils, or some air-inflated shocks, like Gabriel Hi-Jackers are going to rear.
Two rear-facing childrens seats. Dont note the posture, in the picture they are released from belts to not compress the seat pillows when not necessary.
Received some vintage parts. Offenhauser off-set carb spacers. I love vintage equipment.
As a reminder, this is not an performance build in todays meaning. I love playing with vintage parts, and as this car is an 70's "GT-car" type of build, this already matchess the performance nicely. Its more than adequate for our roads to drive spiritedly. The car cruises at between 3000-3500rpm, and does about 12mpg combined ( cruises a little too rich, we will get to that later, this summer i just drive it), and the whole family enjoys it. Our fuel price has been steadily between $7.5 to $8 per US gallon, equivalent quality as your 93.
And it keeps the oil pressure and water temp steady no matter how hard, or how slow ( city traffic) you drive it. Constant ~180F.
So whats on the list?
- Full suspension work-out
- Cargo-space was at premium for 4 on mid-summer fest. Luggage rack for rear deck-lid is possibly coming
- Headers have to go, no matter the power loss. After an hour at highway, the footwells got damn hot, and stayed until at destination
- Need to buy exhaust, the one i quickly cobled together, was relatively noisy to begin with, but after hitting it few times to stones at distant gravel-roads ( to get on the summer cottage) it qot noisy..
- Transmission shift-points need tweaking to match better our usual speed-limits
- Lifting the engine at winter. Developed an small oil-leak from my home-made split front cover, which i did "just because"
- Carb off-set spacers get installed. Due to not-so ordinary carb-spacing of 8 3/16, theres not much else to choose for air cleaners than the 6 3/4 pods. With the spacers i get 9 3/16 carb spacing, which opens all new world for air cleaners. Going to get fresh air fed to them aswell, unlike that hot underhood temp
We are enjoying this car with the whole family, and are going to use it for that for years to come.
Last edited by Inline; July 1st, 2021 at 09:35 AM.
Have you come across any other oldsmobiles in your travels ? Even here in the US its rare that i see another olds just driving around unless its a cruise in or other event that attracts old cars.
Have you come across any other oldsmobiles in your travels ? Even here in the US its rare that i see another olds just driving around unless its a cruise in or other event that attracts old cars.
I still see the occasional Oldsmobile around here but not as often as I used to. Then again, the newest Oldsmobile is 17 years old. Surprisingly, what I see the most of are Eighty-Eights from the '90s, the newest of which are 22 years old.
Have you come across any other oldsmobiles in your travels ? Even here in the US its rare that i see another olds just driving around unless its a cruise in or other event that attracts old cars.
Had to really think about it, and i quess i have to say no.
Unless its some kind of car show, which i rarely do attend. And then its mostly the 80's Delta 88's you see from Oldsmobile, because they sold those surprisingly much for TAXI-usage here back then, with the diesel.
Pulled the trigger to solve luggage-space situation. Picture is an illustration about the type of rack i ordered. Figured out it would look better on my car than the rounded tube-ones.
Eagerly waiting for it to reach my hands, and test-fit it. 36" wide, 14" deep. Big car-show also at start of august, which is held once in a year. I happen to have 8 miles there.
Wife really didnt like to travel with Cutlass due to space problems, and i didnt like when family didnt like, after all it should be for all of us, that hobby, since it takes considerable amount of money.
Tomorrow ill acquire our new car. Its Olds powered. Cutlass has been put for sale. No hurry to sell tho, due to my garage holding two cars easily.
I liked this project. The journey most. Could prove myself that i could build an rear, trans, and engine. Plus i was and am really satisfied with the overall combo . Otherwise i would swap engines, but follower requires something with big cubes and low revs to maintain its style.
1983 Buick Electra Park Avenue. Museum registered/ same as classic car registry, roughly. Bought new to either Salora or Nokia, not 100% which one, going to find out from archives. We have those here available.
Bought from the first private-owner family, from grandson of that first private owner. Sat 2000-2016 at heated garage, then museum registered, after that 420kms on 5 years. I dont even mention total mileage, you would call me cheater. 307+th200-4r.
99% rustfree, and real story, my father did the rust-prevention to this exact car at 1983, believe or not. Interior also like from factory.
Thanks for everyone following along this build, but the Electra will now get 100% attention and money.
Time for everything they say, this fits our family needs, and wife approves.
LOVE IT! Now that should be a great riding car. My 85 Seville is a K body the Buick is C body. Does it float over the bump! Tenison bars for the front end?
Location: Edmonton, AB. And "I am Can 'eh' jun - eh"
Posts: 24,525
Originally Posted by HighwayStar 442
LOVE IT! Now that should be a great riding car. My 85 Seville is a K body the Buick is C body. Does it float over the bump! Tenison bars for the front end? Old's 307 or 403? - 350 diesel?
1983 had coil front springs. Engine is a Y code Oldsmobile produced 307 4bbl.
Originally Posted by HighwayStar 442
Buick factory Mag wheels! three holes or four holes on upper front fender. Four holes, like his is for the upper end cars.
3 louvers is Le Sabre. 4 louvers are always Electra/Park Avenue. Louvers are only trim, not functional but i suspect you already knew that. Jouni and I share a lot of information together; I've known about the car for a couple of weeks now. It's literally a time capsule. IIRC he said it only has around 17k KM (not miles) on the clock. Some minor repairs to do from sitting so long. But this is his thread so he can take it from there.
End of an era came upon my Cutlass.
Weve been loving the Electra, and Cutlass has been driven once after that. Simply put, no time to drive two cars, and the family-one will always get chosen.
They say its time for everything, and it was now time for this car.
Got lowball offers ( should have sold it at summer) for it, i didnt care.
On the other thread i was asking 350 or 403, and general consencus seemed to be 403. But due to Cutlass sitting on yard, i decided to rip off the engine out of it. Change cam, change heads to drop compression from 10:1 to drive with any gas ( i have 8's, will yield 9:1). Will use the bottom-end of it, since it was where most money went, and was done well. Electras 307 will get replaced with this. Dual carbs will go also, out of curiosity, Holley Sniper this time.
Also will stole the rear-end gears and truetrac, 3.23 and th200-4r will be nice combination on Electra.
Then sell the shell forward for someone to LS swap.
Last edited by Inline; August 21st, 2021 at 04:26 AM.
Excellent plan. The gear swap alone will help driving a lot, do that first. This calculator is accurate within 50 rpm according to GPS. http://tech.oldsgmail.com/ch_axle.php Exhaust is another big one, the factory crossover is very restrictive and the single pipe is too small even for a 307. Dynomax Superturbo mufflers are noticeable outside and quiet inside. The super padded interior also quiets exhaust a lot inside. Get the machine shop to use a bowl hog cutter under both valves, install a 2.07" intake valve and the #8 already have a 1.625" exhaust valves. The exhaust bowl is terrible, otherwise the ports are OK. Your heads should measure less than the 79cc spec, both mine sets were 77 and 78cc. The 403 4A are worse than the #8 on the exhaust port, a bowl hog cut won't fix them. My set measured a whopping 86cc. You will want a cam that will work with your ideal 1600 to 2100 rpm cruising speed, it will be quite and luxurious. With stock 215/75R15 tires, 80 mph should be 2100 rpm. A mild roller cam would be a nice upgrade, my 358 is getting one, 218/218 .525/.525 on a 112 LSA. Have a flat tappet cam fail and you will want a roller cam, mine destroyed a $120 short block, not risking it on a $5000 one. Any oil on the shelf will work, also better vacuum and manners with more lift from a similar duration. You probably have a factory D9 converter in your 2004r, they stall around 1900 rpm. You could also have one of the 3000 rpm full throttle shift governors, even too low for a 307. The high performance governors are hard to find, I modify my own for 5000+ rpm plus shifts. Change the fluid and see what it looks like. The earlier the transmission, the weaker they are. Hardened pump rings, bigger boost valves and proper pump clearance and springs are key along with a better servo set properly, deep pan and bottom feed 700R4 or the better fitting 4L60E filter. Also get a 300 psi oil gauge for that trans, you need well over 200 psi line pressure to live behind better than stock power. Enjoy!
Last edited by olds 307 and 403; August 21st, 2021 at 06:13 AM.
Install the leftover Buick parts in the Cutlass and sell it.
Good idea. But i thought to sell the Cutlass, with 307 not installed, and rear-end gears from my Electra, not installed either, for cheap to some young guy to get into this wonderful hobby. Little blood and sweat, and next summer his driving. Top money aint always everything.
I want to say few words to all of you. Forget the old, stupid tell-tales, and give some own thought. Reading for fun, Summit Q&A for stuff they sell, usually kill a little bit of my faith to continuation of humankind..
Here we broke 3 myths. 10:1 compression ratio aint doable with pump-gas and iron heads. Zero problems, with equivalent to your 93.
Second, dual carbs cant be tuned to Olds 350 for some mythical reason, and for sure not with 1:1 linkage. Well, i run 1:1 linkage, instead of progressive, and got an almost perfect fuel map ACROSS the table, i quess as good as it is possible with carbs. And it had zero hesitation, or problems at starts or at driving in the city.
And 3rd. I drove it in with Amsoil 30w drive-in oil, but after that..
Market 0w-40 Mobil full-synthetic. Zero wear, perfect bottoms at lifters, even and perfect "wear" marks at lobes of the cam, zero, zero eaten lobes. Oil pressures with 0w-40 were also at hot 25psi under 1000rpm, then kept stable at 50-55 psi all the time when over 1000rpm. Cold pressure was something like 65-70psi. And i drove this only at street, over 2000 miles, and cruise-rpms all the time atleast 3000rpm. Cam was little over 230 @.050, and about 280 closed, dual springs ( dont remember the pressure).
Im not saying anyone should do as i did, im more saying that forget the typical, stupid wives tales, and use your own brains. And most importantly, pay attention to DETAILS.
Last edited by Inline; August 22nd, 2021 at 03:09 AM.
March 23rd, 2021, 02:44 AM
