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New member 1972 Cutlass Supreme Northern California
I’m a new member to this site. I inherited this 1972 Cutlass Supreme from my father who purchased it in Seattle around 1981 after his brother crashed the first one he owned in 1979. This was our family car through the early 90s. In 2002 the motor blew and it sat in our shop in Richmond California since then.
When he passed I moved it to my house in 2019 and it sat for another few years. In 2022 I had a shop put in the new 455 and got it running. I drove it once and decided as I get older, suspension and brakes were more than they were to me when I was 16 as I plan to daily drive this car.
The car sat another year until I tore the suspension and brakes out and replaced everything. I planned to put an affordable front disc brake kit with affordable control arms but those plans went south immediately when I started digging into it. This turned into me spending a little more cash and I went with QA-1 control arms, coilovers, sway bars and Wilwood brakes which turned into me needing bigger wheels and going with a quick ratio steering box as well.
After I was done with all of that, I went with a Holley sniper.
As of this past weekend this car has seen the road for the first time in 22 years. Tomorrow I have an appointment at a shop in Benicia Ca to get an alignment and sort out a few minor bugs with the Sniper and it will be on the road on a regular basis.
The car is complete and the interior is all original minus the seats being recovered in the 90s. The paint has minor surface rust in a few spots im hoping can be patch repaired and painted. Only interior piece I’m looking for is a new stock steering wheel or a company who can refurbish this one. Next I am looking to put a new stereo system next with a decent navigation screen with apple car play to give it a little more creature comforts. As you can see in the interior picture it had a custom box built between the bottom of the dash and center console and I’m looking to do something similar. If anyone has any ideas for me that they have done with their stereo please send them my way. Thanks. Second picture is me in front of the car in 1988. Thanks for looking.
Welcome. I’m using QA1 stuff on my Olds too. Good stuff since KYB has gone off shore.
As to stereos, for A bodies, you can get kick panels that have moldings for front speakers - probably 6.5” rounds and then put 6x9’s in the back under the rear package tray. Couple that with a 10” or 12” woofer in the trunk and you’re off and running. I like the Alpine BT149 head units, but they’re getting more rare. See eBay for pricing but they don’t do CarPlay exactly, more like they use an iPhone as a USB input. These days amplifiers have gotten small enough that you can fit 1 or maybe 2 underneath the package tray with the speakers - 1 for the Mid/Tweet cabin speakers and separate one for the sub.
While you’re preparing for stereo stuff, consider getting some dynamat sound deadening materials for the cabin to reduce noise. Also I highly recommend silicone rubber speaker baffles to drive the sound that the speakers produce into the cabin instead into the doors/kickpanels or trunk.
The aftermarket front kick panels do hold 6.5" round speakers but watch your magnet depth to ensure your speaker of choice will clear the inner wall behind it.
You can buy the panels pre-loaded with speakers, but they're typically cheap quality Pioneers which are terrible, so buying just the panels to fit your own speaker choice would be the better option.
I put Alpine R2-S65 speakers in mine. You can review them on Crutchfied for specs to include magnet depth for an idea of what will fit (my ragtop is also a factory a/c car so yours should be the same fit specs).
Also, these aftermarket panels are thin and will vibrate if you don't line the inside surface surrounding the speaker hole with a stick-on sound accoustic material.
Depending on how much audio power you want to run, Alpine also makes a decent 4-channel amp which fits in the glovebox and can be coupled directly with the radio wiring for its power trigger - Alpine KT445U - 45w/channel. In my case it's mated to a Retrosound M4HD AM/FM Sirius/Bluetooth stereo that I installed in the original dash opening.
One other thing - there's a kit available for the dash trim that has the new trim + mounting clips -
Great info you guys. I’ll use this thread as a reference to come back to once I’m ordering parts. I appreciate the PMs about the windshield molding and I replaced the bead trim clips around the dash already as well. I’ve driven the car a few times and the Holley fuel pump seems to be pretty noisy as I’m driving it as well as the car has shut off at idle once or twice. Next on the list is to replace the fuel pump with a new one and possibly the hyper spark kit.
The Olds club zone show will be September 26-28, 2024. It is put on by the Northern and Southern Cal Olds Clubs. You would enjoy it and get some tech tips from other attendees.
