Projects '52 Catalina Super DeLuxe Custom Build

very nice!

 

I just read through this thread at work today, great build. I am a Ford guy, but love the old Pontiacs. Great content, thanks for taking the time to share your progress with us.
I also noticed the Arctic Cat sticker on your toolbox, been riding those my whole life!
Congrats and goodluck on the new addition to the family

 

So my car is burning oil. About 1qt per 200 miles. Doesn't appear to be coming out the tailpipe or on the ground but it does project white smoke when I first start the car for a little bit especially on cold days, then it clears up relatively quick. So maybe blow by on the rings or oil seeping into studs with my mismatched heads to the block. Old school neighbor of mine said to try out STP Oil Treatment. Sure why not? Stuff is THICK! I'll have to drive my 200 miles and check my dipstick and see if it helped.

 

After my stainless waterfall fiasco, I had to purchase and rewire the LEDs into the third brake light. Simple and fun but a little messy. The caulking seems excessive in the photo but there are tons of light leaks and spaces around the red acrylic. It looks basically the same as before I dug it all out. With the extra white LED strips I want to do some sort of engine compartment lighting off a switch. Would be sweet for roadside work, evening shows or just working in the garage really.

 

Drove the car 4 days in a row to work here in MN. And at my second job I got caught in some unexpected heat storms at night. Car got hailed on too. ****s, there is some tiny damage on the roof kind of like it cracked the ****py paint in places leaving a bunch of little rust spots if that makes sense. Luckily my work had a giant tarp right inside the door so my interior was spared since I have completely dried up window seals.



My car at work in the official vehicle parking space next to the University vans haha. Quite the work vehicle. Saw some students (University of Minnesota) taking pics as they walked by...niice.

 

Wow, a lot of good work. I have all ways enjoyed this model of Pontiac. What you need now is a set of dropped spindles.

 

Sorry to see you got caught in the rain and hail

 

Started looking at the door cards for the first time in 2.5 years. I'm hoping my seat upholstery guy will be able to complete the door cards, kickboards and headliner over the winter. I pulled the stainless off and it has these little nails like soldered or welded to it. I'll have to ask him what he wants me to do with those. Digging the cigarette ash trays. Keeping those for history's sake. I am missing one tiny round piece of stainless on the rear cards on the bottom. Maybe I'll find it floating around the garage but don't remember seeing it anywhere.

 

Insurance adjuster came out to inspect my hail damaged I noticed a couple days after the tarp night. Basically small cracks in the roof paint and potential dings in the body. NEW PAINT ON THE HORIZON?? One can hope...




Blown out baffles in my ****ty Xlerator mufflers for the last week plus were finally repaired at my local shop. Team Allied Street Max mufflers were installed for $125 and they fixed this squeaking pinch point on the p***enger side where the new leaf springs were rubbing the exhaust pipe. Man that was annoying and consistent. They complimented the car (he works on a lot of cl***ics so it was taken to heart). He said on my way out "Burn outs are optional" so I gave them what they wanted and chirped the tires on my way off to which I heard cheering from the garage, haha.




Finally had the time to do a radiator flush after finding a bunch of sediment like iron in my overflow can. I'm guessing it was just silt from sitting in the block before I bought it but it dirtied up the coolant pretty good so I just bought two new jugs of concentrate and filled it back up after 4/5 hoses flush and run cycles.



Cooling down in MN, going to freeze overnight tonight (Thanks Canada! Keep your cold air up there!) Days are numbered for driving but I'm going to keep going as long as the highs are in the 50s and 60s.

 

The exhaust shop owner speculated my timing was off because of how short my drive was to his shop and how hot the mufflers were. He wasn't wrong. I moved the timing from 10 degrees to about 14 degrees and drove it for the day after which I pulled the same plug and got the white tips. The car does feel like it idle and runs better. Because I can't be certain with the rich plugs turning more lean as a good indicator of what the engines doing I bought new plugs and am going to change them one at a time giving myself 8 potential adjustments.


Drove the car to Stillwater, MN which is a riverfront town that has a historic lift bridge. Very popular place for hordes of tourists. Found a good parking spot and stopped into a local brewery for a quick cold one looking over the river at all the boats. Let my friend drive (the one who helped me build the car and teach me about the timing) he was impressed. He has a lot of cl***ic cars, but only a few of them running.

 

Researching into timing, I should have my vacuum advance hooked up from the distributer to the non emissions engine port on my carb. The dude who built the motor was a flat track racer. It's making more sense why he only had mechanical timing for wide open throttle. Mechanical advance is just not practical for my situation and my gas mileage! I pulled the rubber ****** of the advance and he even glued the tip. So I sawed that off and reinstalled it. Also, under the distributor cap, the rotor cap was not connected via the two screws....Things like this are why one should go through everything and not ***ume someone else did the job right especially when it comes to cars. I didn't notice any difference with the vacuum hooked up on the road but certainly changed my idle in gear and park.




With a new plug in cylinder one, this is the latest adjust made to about 14 degrees and driven for 60 miles. I'm going to advance the timing 4 more degrees and if it pings, I'll pull it back 2 degrees and hopefully I get nicely browned plug tips.



36F when I drove into work today but supposed to be in the 60s and maybe 70 Sunday so definitely getting in the Pontiac for some cruising.

 

Have you checked the timing with a dial back light to see when the timing is coming in and how much you are getting at higher rpm's? Be good to know. How much vacuum do you have at idle?

 

I'd definetely change that rotor. It shows arcing with the black residue underneath.

 

Yeah, so I just had to look up what a dial back light is. I have been using a traditional timing gun and now that my idle BTDC is beyond the 12 degree mark on the tab, I'm just guessing. While looking into that dial back light I see there's some MSD timing tape available for the harmonic balancer too. Could you explain to me why knowing the degree of advance at higher rpms is necessary or advantageous if I can just dial in the timing at idle?

How would one check the vacuum at idle? or in general? I have a vacuum canister coming off my intake that I use to supply my power brake booster. Would that gauge be an accurate vacuum reading? I want to say its like 35psi but I could be wrong.

 

Thanks for the advice. I'll have to figure out the entire distributer's model # and get a new rotor cap ordered to match.

 

You need a vacuum gauge. hook it to manifold vacuum. Many older guys set the timing using the gauge. Adjust timing to it's highest level then back it off an inch. Test drive the car. The gauge can also tell you a lot about other issues or at least give you an insight into what might be happening. Here is a link to a site that takes you thru the process:
Engine Performance Testing with a Vacuum Gauge | Actron

First, are you certain that the harmonic balancer and TDC are in sync? ***uming they are, a dial back will allow you to rev the engine up in steps ie. 1000, 2000, 3000 to see when your advance is coming in and how much your total advance is a t cruise speeds/rpm's. At cruise speeds around 2500-3000 you would want to see advance in the area of 32 - 36 degrees. This will prove out how the distributor is set up and how much advance is coming in and when. Changing those weight springs will allow you to change the sequence and steps. In some cases individuals install an adjustable vacuum canister to fine tune the advance. These are available from many sources.

 

Wow, ok I didn't realize how much you can see into the motor using a vacuum gauge. I'm going to pick one of those up today. Thanks for sharing that article.

As for the timing, I can't be certain the harmonic balancer is at TDC but would ***ume the builder did draw the lines on the HB and timing tab accurately at 0. I'll start with the vacuum gauge and see what's going on before I look more into dial back timing.

 

Try it, you will like it.

Ben

 

Point out to your upholstery guy that the interior swoosh isn't straight, but has a very subtle curve to it, that can be missed.

Everything else is looking good. Weather damage to cars ****s though.

 

Some fall updates on the ride. I did a compression test to check on my cylinders since I'm still burning oil in a mysterious fashion. Unfortunately, cylinder 2 is real low compared to the others. I did another compression check on cylinder 2 at operating temp and got the same 160psi. The motor was supposed to have new rings so I'm hoping they'll still seat properly soon. I was and still am getting oily plugs but that has gotten better since I increased my initial timing to to 18 degrees and 38 degrees at 3000rpm as seen on the new plug in cylinder 2 after 100 miles on that latest timing. This is coming way up from 10-12 degrees how I got the motor. Dude said he timed it, but yeah, always double check everything yourself. Shout out to vtwhead for the recco on the dial back timing light. That tool is amazing.





Ugh, the oil...So ever since I did my 600 mile oil change and only 2 qts came out and had the crazy shavings on the magnet, I was wondering what my second change would look like. This is at 700 miles. I'm hoping it was residual from before as I've been keeping the motor at 5qts by checking the level every 100 miles. Still, not what you wanna see. I guess my next oil change in the summer will be more telling if it has cleared up or not.


I also tuned my idle air mixture with a vacuum gauge, it wasn't far off at like 9.5-10 but I did dial both idle air screws into 10.5 in. HG. I'm guessing my vacuum is low because of my cam (I hope) Here are the specs on my cam. I really don't understand what it all means but maybe someone with more experience can sum up the size of this for me? Otherwise according to this chart, I could have late valve timing or more likely poor rings.

Cam specs:

 

Ya never know with the weather in MN but this was potentially the final ride of the season on 11/3/22. I put STA-BIL in it, drove it around the neighborhood and really just had a good time with it. It's been driving awesome, after 1320 miles this summer I've been feeling really comfortable with its operation and just becoming one with the car. Sounds woo woo but all those miles, adjustments, cold starts, freeway rides and burn outs has really just connected me to the car so I can listen to what it wants and what it is doing. As much as I don't want to do winter garage work, I have new Monroe front shocks absorbers to install, wire looming to finish and a fuel gauge to still hook up. There's also the potential of finishing the interior upholstery this February and new paint job this spring is in the works but more on that later. Hope everyone had a great riding season for those of you in winter climates.

 

Enjoyed your posts, love your car. Thanks for sharing

 

First, love your car and the wonderful job you are doing!

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that motor is wounded. Back when you it just had an open breather on the valve cover, you complained of oily residue everywhere. On a small block chev, that's likely related to a bad ring seal ( there are other causes as well ). Then on the first startup/running video, I thought I heard top end noise. Your plugs show evidence of oil in the combustion chamber and then there is the horror on your drain plug. You're doing such a nice job on this car, I'm really upset for you that the person who sold you the motor didn't sell you a good one. That shrapnel on the drain plug is evidence of a disaster. It doesn't look like bearing material, as you noted it looks like remnants from the machining, or catastrophic part failure internally.

 

Well said, I completely agree the motor is in a state of suffering. I'm just trying to stem the hemorrhaging until I get the motivation to a do a THIRD motor swap on this car. I do think I may go Pontiac 400 though. As for now, it's already F'd so I'ma just keep driving it another year or two then pull the motor again. This next time around, no independent sale, I'm buying from a shop with a warranty or a crate motor. I'm glad to hear you think the metal on the plug is machining shrapnel but then again...could be worse.

 

Hey all, crazy update for the Pontiac and the ending of my build thread. I have some lessons learned to share and I hope it helps people out as well.

Last September 2022, I got caught in a freak hail storm that p***ed through quick in my neighborhood. I had tiny paint chips mainly on my roof in my car's 4/10 paintjob. I made a claim to Hagerty thinking this would be a great way to get an insurance paintjob. They accepted the claim after confirming there was damaging hail in the area at the time I said so they sent out an adjuster. She covered damage on every panel. So Hagerty promptly sends me a $3750 check minus $1000 for my deductible and says that's that. So I go out looking for a shop to paint my car. Find a guy who was very generous and had a going shop rate with Hagerty. He said hit him up in the Spring time.

May 2023, Bodyman submits a $22K quote to paint my car to Hagerty. Hagerty says they are going to total my car and he is the one telling me this on the phone. So I call up my agent and he says "You have a guaranteed value insurance policy of $30K and because the repair is 70% of the value we are totaling the car. You also have your car listed as "under construction" so we took a percent of your value and add it to the policy. Were offering you $40K to take the car or $30K for you to keep the car with a salvage ***le."

What would you do? Some factors to consider...I need paint, rubbers and gl***, also cylinder 2 in my "new" small block is 30ish PSI below the rest and I'm burning a quart of oil every 200 miles. I'm looking at the 3rd motor pull on these vehicle in 3 years.

I took the $40K

A month or more ago, I sent my signed ***le to Hagerty. Once they received it they reached out to Copart to contact me. Copart picked up the car very promptly. Like next day at 9am. It went up for auction in Blaine yesterday and sold for $9200 to someone in Illinois. I poured hundreds of hours and $25-30K into the car, so I feel like I just got my money back essentially with a little on top. I learned A LOT about hot rodding, cl***ic cars and cars that don't have a ton of aftermarket support hah. I have a 7 month old baby boy now so my project time in the garage is not what it used to. I still want to hotrod and drive the family around and have him grow up around cl***ics, so the hunt is on. I am interested in '53 '54 Bel Airs currently. If anyone has a line on a finished driving Chev please let me know. And yes, I did think about bidding to get the car back but I had enough time in-between to let go. Plus salvage ***le in MN is forever now.

Thanks everyone for the support and reading the thread. I'll start a new one up once the new cl***ics in the garage.

 

Wow I did not see that coming!!
I enjoyed following along on your project!
Congratulations on the new baby boy!
Good luck on the search for a new Hot Rod!

 

Hope you find a Belair that suits your needs.

 

Hopefully your next car gets a build thread as good as this one was. Great reading and good luck car hunting.

 

So that was your practice car. You learned a lot, had some fun, had some not so fun. But you came out ahead in the end, and that's a good thing. We got a very interesting thread to follow, with lots of interesting updates. Win win for all. Hope you find a nice car to continue with the old cars adventure. Brian

 

@BJR said it really well! Best of luck with your next car!