kruss77

I'm new to the site, just registered a few days ago, primarily to start researching Olds convertibles. I live in a suburb of Detroit and as you might imagine, cars are our obsession here (lots of car nuts)! Since my family was/is a GM car family, I grew up surrounded GM cars of every type. (Here, families are either “GM families”, “Ford families”, or “Chrysler families”.) My dad was particularly fond of Pontiacs (he owned a ’70 GTO that he still talks about to this day) which inspired my kid brother to buy and completely restore a ’72 LeMans/GTO to it's prior gloray! He gets a lot of attention wherever he goes.

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

Even though I now own a mint condition 1992 Chevrolet Camaro Z28 convertible, I’ve always been partial to Oldsmobile’s. This is probably because I spent my formative high school years running around town with my two best friends in a medium brown ’72 Delta 88 Convertible. Over the many years since then, I’ve imagined owning one of my own someday.

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

That Delta 88 was my first experience with a convertible and it awoke in me the desire to never have a top over my head whilst driving (something that is VERY hard to do here in Michigan). I thought that my '92 Z28 convertible had satisfied that urge, but recently learned that it had not...

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

Early this summer, a guy I’d never seen around here before drove past my house each night around 8:00pm (only when it was nice outside) in his beautiful silver convertible “something”. It had a built engine in it which meant that I always had adequate warning as hea approached my house. Each night I found myself piddling around in the garage or driveway right around 8pm. This car really drew my attention like no other car in the past 2 decades! Since the road in front of my house goes down hill in the drirection he travels, he just coasted past my house fairly quickly -so I could never quite make out the make and model. This frautrated me since I was mezmorizezd by this car. I quickly found myself scouring the internet every night trying to identify this car!

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

After nosing around for a number of weeks on the internet trying to figure out what kind of car he was driving (because it was absolutely beautiful), I identified a number of possible matches –of which, a mid-60’s Cutlass convertible was a very close match. This is what eventually led me to this site. As it turns out, I'm convinced he’s driving a 1966 Cutlass convertible similar to the one driven by gearheads78 (Richard).

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

Here in Detroit we just held our annual WOODWARD AVENUE DREAM CRUISE (www.woodwarddreamcruise.com) which people come in from all over the country (and world) to attend. Woodward Avenue is one of the oldest roads in Michigan and runs from downtown Detroit out through the northwest suburbs. It’s a 20 mile long boulevard and was/is the most popular ‘cruising’ road in the state. About 25 years ago, a number of car clubs started coordinating Woodward Ave. cruises every Saturday night during the summer. This went on for years, and after a decade of informal cruise events, a number of Woodward Avenue businesses got together and started an annual cruise event to focus attention on Detroit as the MOTOR CITY. This event is held on the third Saturday in August each year.

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

Following is a link to some YOUTUBE video footage of the event:

http://www.youtube.com/results?searc...rch_type=&aq=f

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

The annual event started 15 years ago and has grown to the point where it’s now referred to locally and the Woodward Avenue Parking Lot because of the grid lock created by the influx of hot rods and classic cars. For us locals, most of us no longer attend the actual event on Saturday (because of the gridlock), but instead go down there every night after work during the preceeding week and cruise until dark. This year we had record breaking crowds (85 degrees outside with perfectly clear blue skies) and there were an unbelievable number of beautiful cars cruising! Which leads me (finally) back to my point: The combination of this guy driving that beautiful car past my house each night this summer -and- all of the fantastic vintage cars at the Woodward Avenue Dream Cruise has got me thinking again about the Delta 88 from high school!

Now that I’ve found this site and had a chance to see the many unbelievable vintage Oldsmobile’s here, my juices are flowin’ for an Olds again!

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

kruss77

BTW, I’m a 25 year veteran of the auto industry working as the sales manager for a large supplier of headlamps and tail lamps to almost every carmaker in North America. I started my career as a diemaker, but now work as an automotive lighting engineer (headlamps, tail lamps, etc...). If you have any lighting related questions I'll do my best to answer them.

Ken Russ
Fenton, MI

Oldsguy

Welcome to CO Ken. I don't think I have ever read a series of posts on one thread that were consecutive by the same author until now. Then I noticed the time and realized it was early in the morning and probably nobody else was on the site. Do you work a mid shift or what? Your experience will probably be useful to many of our members here so I am sure they will pick your brains about it. So, when are you buying yourself a '65 Cutlass convertible? eh?

Jamesbo

Welcome aboard

How many T 3's ya got stashed away.

wolfman98

Welcome to CO I am sure you will find lots of cars here that are like the one you saw. I always wanted a convertible as well and when I had the chance to trade for this one I jumped at the chance. I love cruising with the top down and there is nothing like it , good luck finding your convertible.

kruss77

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oldsguy

Do you work a mid shift or what?

No, but I do seem to end up online at odd hours!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oldsguy

Your experience will probably be useful to many of our members here so I am sure they will pick your brains about it. So, when are you buying yourself a '65 Cutlass convertible? eh?

I’ve been in ‘lighting’ for 25 years now and seen pretty much everything you could imagine. If I can help, I will!

Quote:

Originally Posted by wolfman98

Welcome to CO I am sure you will find lots of cars here that are like the one you saw.

When I’m able to get a clear look at it I’ll let you guys know exactly what it is. I really have no experience with pre-1972 Oldsmobile’s so I’m really not sure WHAT it is. However, it certainly looks like a ’66 Cutlass. I’ll try to get a photo of it one of these days.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wolfman98

Good luck finding your convertible.

Thanks. Now starts the LONG process of researching the various models, trim levels and options to determine which one I’d like to have. It took me 10 years to find my ’92 Z28 -partially due to the fact that the predominant demographic for “third generation” (‘82-‘92) Camaros is teenage boys (most of these cars go for under $5,000 -making them affordable to anyone with a job at Taco Bell). That being the case, there is a very small percentage of these cars that remain in original condition with low mileage (meaning that most of them are pretty trashed). I was just lucky to have stumbled onto a good one after 10 long years of researching and looking!

kruss77

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jamesbo

Welcome aboard. How many T 3's ya got stashed away.

My inventory of Z28 parts is pretty small. I've spent the last several years looking for factory parts covering those OEM options my car didn’t come with. This year has been great for buying scarce parts (maybe due to the economy). I’ve been able to pick up the last of the remaining RPO parts I needed to complete my “FACTORY PART UPGRADE”. These are parts that were available on “Third Generation” Camaros, but not ordered on my car from the factory. Once installed, my car will essentially be a “FULLY LOADED”, mint condition ’92 Z28 convertible! Also, of-course, all of these upgrades are reversible.

Lady72nRob71

Welcome, Ken!
There is nothing like an Olds convertible!!

Hope you find one you just fall in love with, like I did my '72. She was worth the 1700 miles of suspense (and good fortune)!

Jamesbo, I still have 2 of Lady's original T3s... I replaced all 4 with new halogens for everyday driving, but will keep the old ones for show, should I ever get that serious.

kruss77

JAMESBO:

Sorry, I misunderstood your comment regarding the T-3’s. I’ve not heard this term before, but then again, my lighting knowledge is pretty much limited to things that happened in the industry after 1983 (my daily focus is almost exclusively on high tech lighting stuff now). Are T-3’s the 5.75” round headlamps with the open filaments inside (vs. the encapsulated filaments now used in sealed beam lamps)?

FYI... the Federal Government mandated sometime in the mid-70’s that all sealed beam lamps be manufactured such that their filaments were not exposed to the atmosphere if the lamps were broken during an accident (ignition source for starting a fire). In response to this, the lighting companies placed an additional glass capsule around just the filaments inside the lamp to ensure that they would not ignite a fire if fuel were released during a crash. This sprang out of the side saddle fuel tank debacle GM found itself caught up in with their pickup trucks in the 70’s where several people were burned to death after their vehicles were struck from the side causing their fuel tanks burst. At that time, these events launched the Federal Government into a review of federal vehicle safety laws that protected passengers from fire, and the lamps were changed as a result.

kruss77

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lady72nRob71

Hope you find one you just fall in love with, like I did my '72.

Thanks!

I’m still in love with the ’75 Delta 88 convertible my buddy’s dad let us drive around in all through high school. It was medium brown on medium born with a tan top and had Cragar slotted dish mag wheels all around. It was a real head-turner back then. However, the last time I saw it (about twenty years ago) it was eaten up by cancer and in VERY rough shape. Probably partially the fault of our crappy climate here (and salted winter roads) and partially the fauilt of poor care over the years. After all, his dad couldn’t of cared too much about it, he did turn this car over to a bunch of teenagers!

Jamesbo

T-3's were the original equiptment on most GM muscle cars of the 60's and are considered to be like Gold. There are several kinds mentioned on a thread that stiil eludes me.

gearheads78

Welcome to the site. I am glad my car got you here. Lots of good people on the site. Next time the silver car is comming just run out in the street and stand there. If he built the brake system right you should be OK

kruss77

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jamesbo

T-3's were the original equipment on most GM muscle cars of the 60's and are considered to be like Gold. There are several kinds mentioned on a thread that still eludes me.

OK, good to know. One of my buddies is an expert on things like this. I’ll ask him if he knows where any are hiding and report back. If they’re available in this hemisphere, he’ll know it.

kruss77

Hadn't thought of that method, but I'll give it a try tonight!

p.s: If you don't see any new posts from me after tonight, assume he did a crappy job on his brakes!

kruss77

BTW, here's my current love interest:

(Hope it's not heresy to post a Chevy here!)

wolfman98

I was confused about what a T-3 was when I read it on another post but figured out they were the original style round headlight. i found to my surprise a pair of these headlights at a place called Bargain harley's and since one of mine was cracked and broken I bought them for 2 dollars each. from the sounds of it I should consider myself lucky to find these headlights. I have been back a few times but they don't have any more.