Project Franken-Riviera -1964 Buick Riviera-

[SuperBuickGuy]

you're fast... each one of your bullet points would have taken me a month to diagnosis and fix....

[CTX-SLPR]

Well I'm resuscitating this thread!

Since I last posted a lot has happened, not so much with the car but with everything else
It ran long enough to get it on a trailer and off again when it got here
I've moved from TN to CO
It has no oil pressure!!!

Well I called a pow wow of my few car buddies in C-Springs and got the engine and transmission out of the car in a very long afternoon. We think we knew why the oil pressure was zero so I'm halfway through correcting that problem. Basically it comes down to leaks at the hose ends where they attach to the cooler (the hose ends aren't tight enough), the pressure regulator piston not seating on the filter adapter, and the bolts holding the backing plate on the gerotor pump were loose.
Over the last week I pulled the front cover off to inspect the pieces and correct the problem. I was missing a bolthole on the block for the later model lower timing cover section so I made a drill guide out of painters tape on the drill bit and used the cover as a guide to put the hole in the right spot. When I pulled the gerotor pump apart I noticed that the bolts were barely finger tight and the cover had some embedded aluminum particles. I cleaned the cover and the rotors up and reassembled it packed with petroleum jelly and lockt-tight the bolts down. To fix the problem with the pressure regulator piston not seating I got rid of my ghetto rigged homemade one and used my mill to slice down a stock oil pump adapter then drilled and tapped it for an AN fitting. I'm waiting to hit the Lowes tomorrow to pickup another bolt for the new hole then I'll put the front cover and oil pan back on. The hose ends I'll deal with when I put the engine back in.

Other issues the car has that I need to fix but currently have work arounds for.
The fuel pump won't come on with the computer. I need to trace the harness again but I think I might have an open connection that's supposed to be wired into a resistor or the VATS is keeping it off. I've put a switch on the rear mounted relay that lets me manually turn it on when I need it. Will keep looking for that one.

Timing table is way off. The first time I let it run for 5min or so the manifolds started glowing when I was cycling it around 2000-3500rpm in neutral. I used a table from an NA 3.8L with the same heads but it's not working well. I'm going to go back to the L67 supercharged table since it's conservative enough for boost even when I'm not running it yet.

Tach signal isn't coming into the scanner or the tach in the dash. I think the computer problem is that I thought I had a Regal harness when I cut the tach wire off of the coil pack and put it directly into the tach on the dash. The Regal ECM calculates the tach internally for the dash tach while the Grand Prix ECM is dependent on the external feed from the ICM. Best guess is that the tach is somehow also shorting out my tail lights since the dash and tail lights share a fuse.

Brakes are crap. No idea here but will get a friend to help with bleeding them this time so we never let the master cylinder run dry and can open and close the bleeders instead of relying on a fluid head in a one man bleeder.

After fixing these I could theoretically go on Power Tour but there are a few more things I want to do before then. Namely switch to a Sanden compressor and relocate the engine as far back as possible to give more room for turbo plumbing. Get said AC system working. Convert to disk brakes in the front since I don't want to put any more money in the drums. Swap rear axle for an 8.5in 10-bolt, with 9C1 B-body wheels it's a wash on the track width and I should be able to keep the stock wheel covers. Finally if I can swing it, install my 4L80E and wire it into the L67 PCM with a polarity inversion on a solenoid and reprogram the tables to run properly.

If you have any questions about how I solved problems listed in my last post, fire away!

[TheSilverBuick]

Keep at it!

[horsewidower]

Are you sure the timing table is off, or are you overfueling? Did you check it with a timing light?

We just started an engine that had 36pph injectors stock, with a set of 72pph injectors. The headers were glowing bright orange within 5 minutes. Timing wasn't the issue.

Keep us up to date.

[CTX-SLPR]

Are you sure the timing table is off, or are you overfueling? Did you check it with a timing light?

We just started an engine that had 36pph injectors stock, with a set of 72pph injectors. The headers were glowing bright orange within 5 minutes. Timing wasn't the issue.

Keep us up to date.

Stock L67 injectors with the stock L67 tables. Only things I changed were the timing tables, MAF table for the LQ4 MAF, and set the rev limiter at 5000rpm. I did disable a bunch of the emissions modifiers such as EGR and torque limiting features so it should be running straight table.
The timing of the new table was less than the L67 but I chalked it up to the advance of the 3800 Series II/III cylinder head over the old 8445's.

[CTX-SLPR]

Put it all back together today! Everything went back together smoothly and I was more careful this time about the amount of Aviation Form-a-Gasket I used so it didn't ooze all over everything.

I'm going to see if I can get another pow wow to put it back in and test fire it sometime later this month if I can. Should go easier than taking it out I hope.

[CTX-SLPR]

Well after working my butt off to get done with my Masters degree to save my Air Force career (not in a promotion sense, but in a survive the RIF sense) since Christmas timeframe. I can now start piddling with the car again though I'm spending more family time and my wife's family is in from India for a few weeks so that'll cut down on the amount of work time I have to spend on it.

Picked up a Geo metro AC compressor and Astro hydroboost system from the local junkyard and am starting to get them cleaned and mocked up. The Geo compressor isn't ideal in stock form since it's a PV4 pulley but still a Sanden SD7B10 compressor so I can do some of the mockup with it and a 4 rib belt while I order a new PV6 pulley'd compressor.
I'm trying to get it ready for the Drag Week convoy from Denver to Topeka so I've got a minimum list to work out.
1. Install the Sanden compressor since virtually everything else is dependent on it to do
2. Install the Astro Hydroboost since the old booster is shot, I'm also putting a 96 Impala SS master cylinder on it and a Wilwood adjustable prop valve since I need to convert from a single circiut to dual circuit brakes anyway.
3. Build the brackets to hold the calipers onto my spindles for the 73-87 HD C10 rotors and R32 Skyline caliper brake combo.
4. Redo the fuel pump wiring since the computer won't turn it on and I can hear the relay clicking so I think I've got the right security settings.
5. Redo the power steering remote reserviour hose so it'll not be a cludge of rubber and braided line that leaks.

Optional stuff:
Move the engine as far back as I can with the new AC compressor clearing the suspension
Install my 4L80E transmission and wire it up to the 4T65E controller with a solenoid polarity flip and some table reprogramming
Install a 8.5in 10-bolt rear axle with 3.42's in place of the 3.23 stocker with a modern rear drum setup.
Build a new upper plenum using an LT1 throttlebody to increase hood clearance and balance air distribution in the lower bathtub ram plenum.

Of course I'm leaving out installing the interior and cleaning up some of the wiring under the hood but those are givens.

Let the fun times begin, I'm headed out to start clearing space to work in the garage!

[SpiderGearsMan]

get a powermaster electric booster from an estate wagon

[SpiderGearsMan]

hydroboost leaks all the time and is not the most responsive

[SuperBuickGuy]

two months to get that done.... wow. I'm cheering for you - that's an impressive list.