Top notch work. I like what you did with the bead roller to replicate the Buick pattern. We made a die and ran our floor panels thru the Pullmax. The only difference is ours are a little wider. Tool tray and rear pan have been a pain to work on.
I realized immediately after i finished the beading that i had a wider die i should have/ could have used, but the damage was done so i'll live with it. It did do it's job of making the floor more rigid and holding a wheel, and i'll end up putting some black rubber mat down, and maybe some sound deadening under the mat so it will all be hidden anyways. i'd like to get the location of the battery figured out before i go too much further, but im thinking maybe on the axle hump/ bridge that separates the trunk from the rest of the interior. Im going 6 volt so it will just be a small Optima i think, so it will be able to squeeze in without too much trouble, or maybe a place under the trunk tray that covers the spare tire. I have the under the floor battery mount, but with the seat being non removable, i didnt want to make it too hard on myself if i needed to get to the battery.
Hey thanks, i appreciate it! Im hoping it will start getting a little more interesting when the metal work is winding down and it will start to look like something again!
This what we built to hold the vacuum tank and pump as we have no room under the hood. You could build a battery shelf in the same place. Mine has no back seat or jump seats so it is a free area.
Whoops! its been awhile since ive posted, i' got a little side tracked with my off topic and neglected C10 the last few months, but ive been quietly picking away at the Buick, changed my mind on a few things and decided to set a goal of driving it to a show ive been frequenting for years, next summer. I've never been one to set goals, worse at following them and i work annoyingly slow, but its something to kind of aim for so i stop dragging my feet! Trunk and stuff are mostly buttoned up. i still have to finish welding in the weather stripping channel, (its welded in but not completely but still need to get it all cleaned up) trunk lid is just bolted in but not aligned so the gap at the bottom is a little big pieced together a starter, solenoid and plunger, though im not real happy with the actuator linkage, seems to bind a bit. started to make a little battery tray for the 6volt to mount to under the hood on the passenger side near the starter. will be held in with weldnuts to the frame incase i ever decide to use the stock under floor location, there will just be some threaded holes as evidence. I decided to change how im going to tackle the fabricated intake and the 4 carburetors, ( im going down to 2 2barrels for reasons) so i figured i wanted to get the header put together so i can stop knocking it all on the floor when i bump into it. Hogging out the holes, they were cleaned up and fitted to the tubing nicer than this picture When i first welded up the runners to the big sweeping piece, it looked alright, but it didnt seem finished, so for aesthetics, i made another pass on each tube so i could have enough material to kind of blend the tubing together how i was orignally imagining it. still alot left to do, but after a few hours with some carbide bits and flap discs, it started to look better. The last tube was sort of a concession due to space restrictions, but i'll take being reasonably happy with 7 out of 8. I have no idea about flow and im awful at math, this is an amalgamation of having a long obsession with Brooklands era/ 20s-30s race cars and the big sweeping headers they'd make for airplane engined cars and the like. Dont inspect too closely, its still a work in progress and im ordering some smaller sanding bits to pretty it up a bit And since i'd like to start body work sooner than later, i want to be able to close the trunk and doors, so instead of trying to find a locksmith to do it on my day off, i bought a Curtis model #15 key clipper, and the associated cam and carriages to do GM cars from 1935 through 1966, and ford cars from 1952 though sometime in the mid 60s, so i can do both the buick and edsel keys. Im still waiting on some code books so i havent really given a try yet, but i bought extra keys since im sure i'll mess up a few times figuring it out And i pushed it outside a week or 2 ago to blow the dust off and spin it around to make working on the driver side a little easier
Hey thanks! Maybe not exactly how i was picturing it before i started them, but pretty close! Hoping to get them coated in the next week to keep them from flashing over, and start on the new version of the multi carb intake hopefully sooner than later
Thanks! It wasnt too bad, but this is definitely a few days work and if i was ever going to do do it again, id probably try and get some modest tubing notcher and make a slightly better plan, a chop saw and grinder to notch all of of the tubing got old and could have been more a little more precise, but im digging how its coming out! I'll definitely try to figure out something to record it when i get it running, a few things i want to do before, but hopefully not too long in the future! Yes, running a muffler, the end of the header goes from 3 at the end of the megaphone piece, down to a 2.5" and is 2.5" single all the way to the back with a Porter Steel Pack in the middle. Should sound interesting! One of the things i made sure to do before i put the body back on, was run the exhaust so i didnt have to do it laying on my back
Have just gone through the whole thread and wow. Very inspiring and really nice work. Keep up the good work.
Hey thanks Orn, i really appreciate it, its been alot of work but its starting to come together after these last few years, and im really happy you guys are following along! im buying 2 new Stromberg Big 97 Primary carbs and loosely modelling the new intake after an Edmunds Custom cast intake. Maybe not the most exciting, but taking this car on some thousand+ mile road trips has been the plan from the start, and reliability, parts availability, tuning knowledge is a big part of that. Now with having a sort of goal to drive it by next July, this is going to help make that a little more realistic, and reining in my first multi carb/ fabricated intake project to a little smaller in scope. Originally i built the first intake to run 4 Carter W-1 574s (mid-late 1940s) single barrels, would have been cool and eventually probably would have worked well, but right off the bat, after rebuilding atleast 4 of them, would have been alot of complete guessing and months of messing around to find a baseline to start getting them tuned, synchronized and running right and reliably. the last 4 single barrel intake, it was still pretty far from done
Hah! It honestly hadnt even crossed my mind, though i guess theres a fairly oportune spot for it I should have the coatings for it this weekend so ill get the header sorted and painted in the next few days, and i started ordering materials for the new intake today, but it will be a bit before i'll have anything to show for it
A whole lot of hours this weekend with a few die grinders and sanders getting the header pretty. Not perfect but for an exhaust header, it will do its job and look presentable enough i think. The inside of the tubing runners are fully welded inside to the flange, and outside and ground down to blend into the flange. Coated inside, (most of which i dumped on the floor when i flipped it over) and sprayed the exterior satin black through a gun, though its supposed to darken up when its cured. On to the intake next!
Thanks! its nice to see something that was poorly planned, come out how i was imagining it! i was trying to figure out about how many hours i had into it but gave up, i'd guess deep into the mid 20hr range from start to finish, but i work slow and get distracted alot In the 'picking away at little things', the GM key code book for 1935-1970s locks was delivered last night and i got to play with my new (to me) Curtis key clipper, so now i can actually latch the doors and trunk and start body work soon. Worked great, and while i spent alot more than it would have cost getting someone to cut them for me, its nice to have the stuff to do it yourself if the need arises, and might make finding some handles in better shape a little easier since i can swap the locks around, and can make keys for the Edsel as well.
What's your thoughts on running a spare pipe coming off as a fender dump with a bung at the end? That way you can crawl under, and "open 'er up"
I was planning on getting the driver side lower cowl replaced this last week or so, but got distracted by something i didnt think i would have on this car, but they popped up on a pre war buick group so i jumped on them and had them shipped in from Wisconsin through Fastenal A pair of the rear fold down 'Opera seats'! My car was picked clean when i got it, and was planning on just having a plywood divider for the trunk to cabin, and maybe cover it in some black rubber or something, but these popped up, i hemmed and hawed over it for a few hrs, decided i could swing the cost of them and got them. The seats were about $400, and it was about $200 to get them shipped from Wisconsin to a little outside of Boston, and took about 6 business days. Procured some 3/4" sanded Thursday ,(from a shipping crate because this is a high end build!) by last night had something resembling fold down back seats. First a big cardboard template so i didnt screw up multiple sheets of plywood Some hammer in threaded inserts, and was able to use some of the stock brackets that were still in the body, though i will have to make a few more since the floor has been replaced, and there are some threaded insert brackets on the backside of the seat bucket tins. And i need to figure out how to mount the side cushions, there are loops on the top and bottom, and i cant make sense of how or where the top ones secure. One of the seats is missing the leg post/ part of the latching mechanism. The receiver part is still inside the seat, but the leg post acts as a handle and moves the latch to unlock it from the seat tins. I think the plan is to get a length of 3/8" stainless polished rod, and widdle out a latching end/ block and weld it to the rod, and if that works, maybe make an extra to replace the current leg i do have since it the chrome is all pitted and if one is shiny and nice, they both might as well be shiny and nice The coating on the new header failed pretty quickly, like before i even got to cure the paint, it had started flaking right off and wrinkling on its own, ( was still hanging on the stand) so i think im going to get it polish jet coated, and get the intake (when its made) in a matching finish. Its one of the special things on the car, so it might as well look nice and have it coated right. Made a quicky little template to measure for materials for the new intake, some stuff has been ordered, but the seats had my attention this last week. Design isnt fully locked in place, but it will be close to that shape. And since i'd like to start bodywork sooner than later, got the door stuff fitted up so i can close the doors all of the way and line it up.
Do you think your car had opera seats originally? Not sure it did since I see it has fixed 1/4 windows, and cars with factory opera seats had sliding 1/4 windows for the rear passengers. My '39 has the sliding windows and is a Master Deluxe opera coupe.
I believe it did, i was talking with someone over on the AACA forums, and was forwarded several pictures from when they had their 1937 seat opera coupe apart, and its the same as mine, and the inner factory brackets are still in place for them, im just not sure about the upper side cushion mounts. I dont think i have seen any '37 coupes with sliding rear quarter glass, but i could be mistaken. I more assume something was removed decades ago when the car was stripped, or something rusted away. The bare picture is one i was sent from someone, and the upholstered picture is just one i found, and neither look to have non fixed glass. Maybe sliding quarter window glass was a feature they added for the new '39 models?
In speaking with the guys at DiOrio's Old Car Parts, I was told that opera coupes had sliding 1/4 windows starting in 1937, if you ordered the jump seats. Also passenger coupes could be ordered with sliders too. In addition to the special sliding mechanism, they also has a different size garnish molding with the offset opening to clear the operating handle. And they have a drain trough inside the 1/4 panel that catches water and directs it out a hose to the underside of the car. Mine has the troughs on each side, but both were rusted out, so I had to repair both to keep things dry inside the 1/4's. Mine was also missing the driver's side garnish molding, so had to use a fixed 1/4 window molding that I sectioned, and welded back together to make the one in my picture above. I contemplated using some jump seats from a mini pickup, but in the end I figured nobody will ever be riding back there, so just built a platform, and carpeted it.
I really couldnt tell you the optional features for it, maybe it depends on the series? i dont recall seeing the rear sliding quarter glass in any of the '37 coupes i've seen, but its not something i've been looking for really, and the small differences between the years and series isnt something im an expert on. My car is designated as a 1937 Buick Century Opera Seat Coupe Series 66S, maybe it being the higher tier Century series 60 got it the rear opera seats? I 100% had the same idea with the minitruck jump seats, since i figured i would never find a usable set without buying a parts car or something, and they werent something i cared about so a plain divider was the plan. The '90s Ford ranger's stuck out with their rear fold down seats, and i was casually looking for them off and on but getting them to look right and recovered made it less enticing. If these didnt present themselves, i probably wouldnt have pursued them, but it should add alot to the car as far as making it look a little more finished inside, and hopefully absorbing up some of the interior tin can noise. I'll end up covering the wood with some similar colored fabric to the front bench seat, and worry about getting the rear seats recovered at some point. Interior stuff can wait until after the cars out driving, and i can pick away at it.
From what I was told the sliding 1/4 windows are extremely rare, and I've not seen a '37-'40 GM coupe with them besides mine. I surprisingly have seen several sedans with sliding 1/4 glass though, which seemed odd since they had roll down side windows. But I guess more people bought sedans, so more with this optional sliding glass. We have tons of Rangers with jump seats at the local U Pull, so they're cheap and plentiful. I bought a sewing machine to sew my interior, so I could always add them if I want to later. I'd make them fold up to the sides as the ranger does, as not sure how I'd make them like GM did?
Stooge, great find on the opera seats! In all my travels I have never seen a coupe with them. Might try ceramic spray on exhaust coating for that manifold. I think I used VHT the last time and it is still holding up. does have to be cured with heat cycles. A lot less than sending it out for coating. Might be worth a try. Did my whole exhaust with it.
If you are going to get the header coated you may want to consider splitting it and running duals, the stock straight 8 is pretty unimpressive sounding with the single exhaust. Maybe splitting it would give it some sort of sound.
Thanks! i was pretty excited to find the seats, especially since it wasnt something i was really even considering having, not even so much because of budget constraints, i just had kind of written off ever finding them. This car's sneakily getting nicer and nicer! A good friend of mine has a paint/ powdercoat/ finish shop so i was going to try and grab his ear to see what would be the way to go. I like the black header, but i've been thinking of the polished chrome looking Jet coat or similar and get both the intake and header coated at the same time so they match. I wont really have much money into piece, so as long as it isnt too, too crazy, i can budget for it. my friend's always offered to powder coat whatever i need for material cost, or let me do it at his shop, but i've never really taken him up on it. something like this type of finish thanks for the suggestion, but i think i'll leave it be for the time being. End of the header goes to 3", then the rest of it is 2 1/2" with a Porter steel pack. It should sound interesting enough with the sweeping megaphone header, and i dont need it to be real crazy since the plan has always been to road trip this car, so i want it to have some road manners. Plus i dont want to cut this up already!
Great work as always. I am pretty sure all the Century's had the rear jump seats. My car came with bits to put them in but I decided not. You have enough room back there where they are just cool.
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