Projects SA's 1957 Buick Super Build

Will do, I'm in the process of cleaning up the generator and starter.

I'm not sure if I'm going to run the OEM oil-bath air cleaner, so I don't know if I'm going to fancy it all up.

 

Still waiting on valve cover gaskets, painted the generator and stuck it on there.

I think I'm going to order this neat little oil filter adapter. I like the design because it allows you to keep the OEM housing, and at $58 it's not a bad deal.

 

Very nice! I'm doing a '55 Special right now. Wish my nailhead would have been salvagable. It's long gone. Nice colors too.

 

I looked at the pics in your albums, car looks good! I've always wondered how hard it would be to get a '55 bumper on a '57. Those were always my favorite tri-five Buick front bumper.

You going to run a Nailhead in yours?

You should join up with the Buick HAMBers group and the Buick Nailheads group if you're going to run a Nailhead.

 

Valve cover gaskets came in a couple of weeks ago, they are in. I also made a gasket for the water-neck.

Got the Dynaflow successfully mated up to the Nailhead, looking ready to go back in. I took the front clip off for a little more breathing room.





Motor is in, sort of! I got it in, but the trans. is not completely splined up with the torque-tube yet. More info. on that here.

Here's how we're sitting right now.

 

Still playing around with the splines of the t/tube and the trans. The work crew (dad and brothers) were out and about so while I had some free time I polished up the grille a little bit. I used a rat-tail file to remove the burrs in between every piece and used very fine steel wool to bring the brightwork back to life. It took me about 2 hours.

Before:



Half way there:





After:

 

I dig your Capri

 

sweet man, did you rebuild the nailhead?

 

LOL, I figured you and metalshapes would see that...

the Buick is looking good...

 

Thanks, that's my dad's vintage road-race car. He blew the engine last season and hasn't gotten around to rebuilding it yet with all these kids around with their hot rods and customs!

I'm not just into the pre-'64 stuff, though. Here's a pic of the Capri I've been working on with my dad and brothers:

No it is not rebuilt, just cleaned up. The motor came out of the Roadmaster parts car, which has 40-thousand-something miles on it. I've run the motor in that car, and it is quiet and doesn't miss a beat! I couldn't be happier with how it performed.

If the almighty Buick God that is zman thinks my car looks good... well then, I think I can die happy now.

I'd like to thank you for all the info. you've shared with me on Buick's and on Nailhead's and Dynaflow's. You're pretty much the guy that set me straight on doing things traditionally. Congratulations on poisoning a young mind.

 

I've been having trouble with getting the Dynaflow getting splined up in the torque-tube, so I backed the motor out of the car, cleaned the t-tube splines and greased them.

I was getting ready to get it back in when dear-ol'-dad decided to fall and cut his head. (It is Friday the 13th!) So with no one to help me guide the beast back in I set out to do something productive.

So I cleaned up the firewall a little bit. Looks pretty good, I think. I only spent a few minutes on it, and I think it's going to get the job done. I don't know if the master cylinder, and other accessories are staying, so I refrained from painting those for now.

 

those tredelvac(spelling) master cylinders are a loaded gun waiting to go off. get rid of that thing fast. they are known to fail all the time.

 

Yeah, I've heard bad things about them, even if they were decent I'm not going to entrust my life to a single-reservoir cylinder. I'm thinking maybe Corvette dual-pot? Still researching the swap.

 

I messed around with the motor today. The t-tube is fully-mated with the transmission! It went in without too much trouble, and I got most of my trouble from a gasket I made to replace the destroyed OEM one. It's good now.

The problem now is that the motor is too far forward to get the motor mounts lined up properly. I'll try to tackle it again when I have some help around.

 

I was rearranging my PhotoBucket and broke some of the links in this thread, the ones of the motor/trans. I will post 'em again if you guys want to see, but I'll assume you don't care and move on.

Spent last night getting some trans. linkage and the transmission mount off of the Rustmaster. The Super had everything already on it, except the one arm that goes from the ger shift on the trans. to the bracket on the frame. Originally I tried to take just that, but of course the cotter pin broke, and left stubs. The "bolt" I guess you'd call it that goes through the arm was also very tight, and hitting on it with a hammer had little effect due to the flexibility of the bracket itself.

Plan B, take the whole bracket out of the car so we can remove the remains of the cotter pin and remove the "bolt." The bolts that held the bracket in were rusty and tight. Really tight. I got a breaker bar on my socket wrench and got to twistin'. Luckily, they didn't break. (It seems almost everything that deals with hardware on the Rustmaster has broken.)

Next to get, the transmission mount. This was kind of a pain to get out, and this car has no engine/trans. in it. I think I made a mistake not putting it in the Super before dropping the motor in- more on that later.

8 bolts hold in the transmission mount, luckily it was super greasy down there! Kept the bolts from getting uber tight. With the help of my brother, holding the nuts on the backside, we got the bolts out without too much trouble. I was very glad about it, because the cars that sit outside my house get swarmed with daddy-long-legs! Nothing a little carb. cleaner won't fix.

Then a few swift kicks, and the mount and all its shims fell out, this is what we were left with: (Minus the shims.)



Took a little time today and cleaned it up:





Originally I was going to use overn cleaner, but I was fresh out of that. I also didn't get as much paint on it as I would have liked, but I ran out of black spray paint as well. I figure it's acceptable for what it is. This isn't one a them fancy-schmancy street rods.

 

Ok, so after further messing around with the transmission mount, it's clear to see that this thing is broken beyond repair. Option A, is to modify/build my own bracket to work, and option B is to pay $85 for a new one on Ebay. I'm an option C type of guy, offered the Ebay guy $50 for the part, and he accepted. It's a good feeling to get a deal, even though I still feel sort of ripped off since I'm paying $50 for a glorified bushing. It's on the way.

I don't really feel like waiting that long to put the car on so I put it on the ground! I Got the transmission crossmember (in pics above) in the car with the shims and it fits nicely. Me and my brother hooked a come along to the back piece of frame and pulled the motor back so it would line up with the motor mounts. Got those in, so this bad boy is in there for serious!

Took it off the jackstands, aired up the tires and rolled it out to give it a good hosing off. I was so happy to see the grime come off.





A previous owner had the car painted with a really nice flake green. It really pops in the sunlight. Just a note, the front clip is just laying on there, it fits very nicely when you put the bolts in.

So... now I'm thinking of cutting the springs so this thing doesn't look like one of those lifted diesels running around town. I think I'm going to start with two coils. Does anyone have experience cutting these? I realize there are no bumpers, etc. but I had my dad and my brother stand on the front, and it doesn't go down much at all.

 

You might want to hold off on cutting the springs until you've got the car together and running/driving. Let everything settle a little with use, then figure out how much to remove from the springs.

Just my $.02

 

Good advice, but dang that's a lot of 4x4 to look at for a while. I think maybe I will hold off, but I change my mind a lot. The heavy stuff in my mind are the front and rear bumpers, and the gas tank. (all of which aren't on the car.)

 

Looks good man, I was hoping you didn't sell this thing. (because I didn't have the cash to buy it.)

 

Thanks. I'm not really trying to actively sell it anymore, but everything has a price.

 

School has been keeping me kind of busy, not so much homework yet, just trying to get settled in to the schedule.

Progress has been kind of slow. Car is back in the building and I'm working on buttoning up the rest of the engine details. I've hooked the trans. linkage up, it felt amazing to shift the car for the first time- big morale boost. Carb is on, spark plug wires are in, I hope they still work. Some pesky mud wasps decided to build nests in the sockets. Power steering pump is painted and installed, fuel pump is painted and installed, starter is painted and installed, and the air cleaner is painted and installed. Here's how we're looking:

 

It's looking great, man! I've been eying this car since you posted it in the classifieds. No way in hell I could have convinced the wife to let me buy another project car since I'm still working on my first :/ Following this thread intensely!

 

Thanks for the kind words and support. I hear you on having multiple projects... such a pain.

Anyway, progress has been kind of slow, I'm in the process of taking the Roadmaster interior bits out to swap them over to the Super. I'll have pics when it's all out.

I'll also have a video of the start-up for you guys.

 

The weather was super nice today, so I got outside to dissemble some of the Rustmaster, which is generally an oven on the inside. I took the glovebox door out and cleaned it up a little.

With one end cleaned up:



The inside:



Important instructions from "the man!":



After:



I'm sorry the pictures don't really do it justice. Prior to cleaning there was a bunch of green stuff on the chrome, and it wasn't paint! Algae or something or other. Anyway, it's gone now. It's not perfect, but I don't think it's ready to be polished yet.

More to come.

 

Oh sugar he's got the chrome glove box door!

 

A necessary accessory for any cruiser!

Ok, so I got busy with school and an OT project, but I'm shifting back to Big Green.

Spent the afternoon taking the exhaust off the Rustmaster. Here's a few pics as to how the Roadmaster got its nickname:







Not much of a framerail left. Knocked out a few wasp nest and a big rat nest. Michigan is hell on cars. This one didn't make it to the South in time.

I couldn't get the two pieces that go over the rear axle out. It looks like I'm going to have to drop the tank to get them to come out. That's no big deal, because I needed a gas tank anyway! I might as well use this one.

Here's what I'm looking at:



These are the pieces I did get off:





It looks pretty good. The front right muffler is dinged pretty good. I may try to straighten it. When I ran the motor in the Roadmaster it was pretty quiet (read as "too quiet") so I'm thinking of either:

1. Dropping the two front mufflers, as one is already messed up.
2. Dropping the rear resonators, both in good condition.
3. Buying some new swag.

I can't really figure this car out. It's part field car, part restored. The exhaust bits are all basically brand new, but it's kind of rusty toward the back end. It's almost as if someone backed it into a pond and let it sit for a few years. Most of the rust on the car is on the back-half. Also, 90% of the hardware holding the exhaust up was finger tight, and all the hardware and mufflers/resonators were new.

Anyway, next up is dropping the fuel tank, getting that all prepped, and getting the rest of the exhaust out.

 

Went out to the shop today with my brother (smarg on here) and finished getting the exhaust out. I did end up having to take the fuel tank out first, and then it was still a challenge snaking those last bits off.

Pics of the battle:







This car is ridiculously rusty in the back end, both rear framerails are basically dust.

The exhaust was brand new, though. The stickers on the pipes aren't even burned off. It was too faded to see any dates or anything. This car is a mystery, but a smoking hot deal!

Now, questions are going to the fuel tank... this one seems to be pretty rusty on the inside, and has been repaired in a few places already. Is it worth it to try and fix this one, or just buy a new one? I'm going to have to price things out.

Oh, I also got a basically new fuel line that goes from the fuel tank all the way to under the hood. Another score. Oh yeah.

 

Nice going on a cool car. I'm 47, and my first car was a '57 Century 4dr hardtop in 1978. Gotta love this thread, looking good..

 

There are no new ones that I'm aware of, I'd say get it clean and see where you are then.

 

Try Flat Top Bob at Owen's Auto Salvage. They are a Texas-based HAMB Vendor and ship worldwide. Lots of inventory and a great reputation for supplying good parts at fair prices. Give Bob a call. Number is in the HAMB Vendor section.